Blessings at the Beach

Hubster and I took the kiddos to the beach a few weeks ago.  I admit, I was not super excited about it, as Kiddo is kind of anti-water.  As in, will freak out if water gets in his face, and will cling to you with a kung-fu grip if he's in more than a few inches of water.  Plus, Little Brother gets into everything and has a love for running off wherever his heart fancies, and so I was anticipating an exhausting trip for us.

It was not.  If anything, it was the most refreshing, blessed time Hubster and I have experienced in a while.  We have never seen Kiddo so excited or expressive about anything before.  We'd ask him, "Where are we going?" and he'd exclaim "Da bea!" and do what I call his happy dance.  Or we'd tell him we're going to the pool, and he'd exclaim "Da poo!" and do his made up moves for what he thought swimming looked like.  Never have we heard him so expressive, so vocal, so excited.  I've called him stoic for years.  Not anymore.

And that's just the beginning of the blessings folks.  The Kiddo LOVED the water!  He wanted to swim.  He wanted to go into the ocean and didn't want to get out.  He got water in his face, and though at the beginning of our trip he freaked out a little bit and demanded a "towa" (towel) we'd tell him "no, just wipe it off with your hand", and he would.  Towards the end of our trip, he would wipe it off without us telling him anything, or ignore the water in his face completely.  MAJOR VICTORY!!

He started our pool times by clinging tightly to one of us, or content to play on the top step or two, but slowly he got braver.  We let him float on a boat raft for a while, and he really enjoyed that.  We introduced a kickboard to him, which he liked, but we had to hold tightly to it since he doesn't have the core strength to stay on it without our support.  And we graduated to the swimmies on his arms, which he was so proud of, and by the last night of our beach vacation, was able to keep himself completely upright and (as you can see in the picture below, top right) content to not have Mommy and Daddy so close by.  Again, major victories. :)

And, as if that wasn't awesome enough, Kiddo started JUMPING into the water, trusting Daddy to catch him.  Yeah.  Pure awesomeness.

Little Brother had a lot of fun splashing in the water too, and he added a few new words, the most common being "airplane".  We celebrated his b-day at the beach (pics to come in another post), with my parents, who joined us for a few days, and it was a great time for all.

Swimming with Mommy and Grandma, flying kites with Grandpa and Daddy, and other beach fun.

Hubster and I just soaked in all the progress we saw in Kiddo.  Our hearts were filled with a joy we haven't experienced in a while, seeing the joy, the excitement, the fun the children were having.  It really felt like God was smiling on us, showing us His love for us, for our children, and how everything is going to be ok.  All the hard work we're doing, and will continue to do to get Kiddo talking and communicating and climbing and all that other important stuff, is paying off and we are seeing fruit.  Beautiful, sweet apples of gold.

Had to get a selfie with both my blessings. :)

I am so blessed.  Filled with hope for Kiddos' future.  In awe of God's awesomeness.  And excited that I can share it with you here on the blog.  I hope I never forget how awesome the week really was. :)