West Carver Community Pool...

The pool opened on June 24th, with some restrictions like 50% capacity, separate entrance and exits, etc.  But Lukie and Lex didn't care, they wanted to swim.  We've been swimming some at Safari Island since they opened June 10, but it's summer and time to swim outside...

Tonight was their first time at the pool since August (the afternoon session today was closed due to thunderstorms that passed by earlier)...

Lukie with his tuck dive...

When I got there, Lex said she was practicing cannon balls...

And was happy doing it...

Later, she was practicing dives...

Took a bit of convincing, but eventually Lukie started his flips...he said he wanted to get used to this board again before trying one...

Then Lex went with a cannon ball off the board...

Trust me, he was happy...

Of course, the slide is still there too...

There's no season passes this summer due to COVID and the 50% limit, so we have to get punch cards.  They currently have 19 punches left...wonder how long they will last!?!?

I'm falling behind on posts.  We went camping on the North Shore a week ago and had some great hikes...pictures coming soon...

Baseball!!

The first town team baseball game was tonight!  Technically, it was an exhibition game, but it still was a game.  Several weeks ago, the MBA (Minnesota Baseball Association) that rules town teams gave the okay for in-state teams to play games with neighboring state teams.  After the governor did not address sport events like baseball last week (he did give the go ahead to gather in groups of up to 250 people if proper social distancing is practiced), the MBA gave the okay for teams to hold exhibition games if it was okay by the municipality that owns the field.

The Cologne Hollanders got the okay and played tonight against Union Hill.  This first pitch...

The kids were back to chasing foul balls...there was a decent crowd and the vast majority were properly social distancing...the players were as well in the dugouts, there were no high fives, sunflower seeds, etc.

Lukie was smiling...especially after getting two foul balls ($.50).  We left at the end of the 5th inning with the Hollanders winning 14-0.  There were 3 home runs (one was a grand slam), it was fun.  They ended up winning 14-4 after 7 innings (the ten run rule was applied), so we didn't miss much.  

Great day (we also spent it swimming)...

Braces and more...

The original date was back in April, before the purge...but the appointment was re-scheduled and today was the day.  Lukie was getting braces!  Honestly, he was nervous working up to it...he didn't want you to know, but we knew...

Here we go going in...

Well...actually here we go going in...got to have the mask on.  Of course Lukie took the one I usually use, he said it looks like Darth Vadar's mask...so fine, I'll use another one...

While waiting, I'm pretty sure he was smiling...

During the appointment, Lex and I took a walk and came back about an hour later...then he was done!

A couple of hours later (and yes, he was sore already) we went swimming at the pool in Safari Island (which opened June 10)...he was pretty happy...

He was even happier when we were leaving and we saw that the wait for a haircut was less than 20 minutes at Great Clips (of course it was in Belle Plaine), but whatever, let's go to Belle Plaine (he has not been a fan of no haircut since February, me...I'm going with Elsa's point of view right now...I'm letting it go, no haircut or shave since mid-February)...

Not too bad of a day for Lukie...he's sore, but that will pass.  He got a haircut!  Went swimming (so did Lex) for the first time in who knows how long!

Tomorrow, there's a baseball game scheduled, which we'll go to...we camp for five days at Gooseberry this weekend...living the COVID dream...

Puzzles...

Not too many know that Lukie likes to do puzzles...he's got more patience than me at getting them done (though, with everything that he's involved in, sometimes the puzzle takes a while to complete).  He finished the puzzle below last week.

It's the largest puzzle that he's done so far (1,000 pieces) and he did the vast majority of it himself (I got around 40 pieces)...the best part, we can put it away now!

Lex's Reading...

I've been trying to get Lex to read the Harry Potter series for about six months.  A couple of days ago, we were at Target for some essentials and made a side trip through the book section, we found the first book in the series and bought it for ~9 (paperback).  I told her that every time she finishes a book, I'll get her the next book.

She started reading the book immediately...

After dinner, she took a shower and kept reading...

By mid-morning the next day, she had finished the first book.  She had the second book in the series by about 3:00 that day and is currently reading that now.

The elementary school has a summer reading program, if you read 1,500 pages, you get a party next fall.  If she continues with reading these Harry Potter books, consider that goal met (by next week)...

New bikes...

Both Lukie and Lex had outgrown their bikes over the last nine months, with summer coming, they needed new ones.  Lex can easily ride Lukie's old bike (he could also ride it, but it was small), but her bike that was originally bought to get her out of training wheels was way too small...

So on Friday, we took off to Dick's Sporting Goods in search of a bike...we found one...

Lukie's bike helmet was also getting small, so we got another one at a deal with the purchase of the bike...

Lex got a new bike (to her as a hand-me-down) and was happy as can be...

We're three days into these bikes and they have taken plenty of bike rides...they'll both get used...