Day 1083. Emmy was the first one up this morning, as usual, and he really insisted on me getting up, which I wasn't ready to do. It wasn't 8 am yet , and nobody else was up. At 8 am I finally gave in and got up. I put Sammy into Emmy's bed and put the covers over the bed to make a cave, like we've done before. They just enjoy them so much. When breakfast was ready, we sat down to eat. It was one of those very rare occasions, where they ate all of the food on their plates. After cleaning them up and dressing them, I took them downstairs, where we read a Bible story together. Emmy and Tammy were listening carefully; it's been a new thing for Emmy to sit down and also listen. Then Tammy wanted to draw, so I gave her all that she needed. Sammy wanted to play the piano, so I put him there. Then I left to go upstairs and work.
At 10 am I had a lesson with a student, and just after it ended Sonja arrived. Praise God! She comes so rarely now that it's even more special, when she does. The kids had already been waiting for her all morning. I had already started cooking, when she came. Randy came upstairs to put a little desk together, while I could hear the kids having fun with Sonja downstairs. Just after noon we sat down to eat. And spinach is one of their favorite dishes, so they all ate well, and everyone had icecream. Then we put them into the bathtub to have fun and get rid of the green. We dressed them again, and they couldn't wait to go downstairs to play with Sonja. At 1:20 the alarm went off to let them know it was time to come upstairs and lie down for a nap. Randy had already left for the grocery store. I sat down by them, and they soon fell asleep.
I sat down by my computer and was working, even though I was so tired I just wanted to close my eyes and sleep a little. And then Emmy already walked into the room. He was eager to go downstairs to play with Sonja. The other two slept a little longer, then I took them downstairs as well.
We had not gone swimming all summer, but had kept it in mind. And so we were finally planning to go swimming today, getting there at 4 pm, when it gets cheaper, as that's still plenty of time there. The only uncertain part was the weather. They had forecasted thunderstorms for the afternoon. When I looked outside, it looked alright, and it was certainly pretty hot, though not as hot as it's already been. And so we packed our bag, got them ready, and left the house at 3:30 pm. We walked to the bus stop and got on the bus that was already sitting there and waiting a few more minutes. Tammy and Emmy were sitting with Sonja, while Sammy stayed in the stroller. When we got off, we just had a little walk left to get to the swimming pool.
We had been there once before, but in winter. It was our first time in the outside part of that pool. The first thing that struck me was that there were no people. I had expected it to be full on a Saturday afternoon. We got two beds out and started changing the kids. Emmy was excited about his new spiderman swim pants, and Tammy had a FROZEN one that barely still fit her. And then they spontaneously hugged each other. They were impatient to get into the water and started playing in the kids area right there, where water was coming out of the ground on one side, and on the other side there was a little slide into shallow water. They were having fun on both sides.
I pointed at the big slide and asked them, whether they wanted to go down that slide with me. Surprisingly it was Tammy who said no and Emmy who said yes. And so I walked up the stairs with Emmy. I sat down on the slide, then took Emmy and put him between my legs, and off we went. The slide wasn't very steep or long or fast, and so I even stopped and had to push to go on. And that's why I only went down a few times and then let the other adults slide down with them. I went down with Sammy one time, but he really didn't care for it one way or the other. Once Tammy saw how much her brother had enjoyed it, she wanted to go down as well. And then they suddenly closed the slide. Tammy and Emmy started crying hard. I don't know why, but they open the slide every full hour for half an hour. I guess they don't have enough personnel.
With the slide closed, we decided to check out the rest of the area. We walked to the other side of the main building, where the inside pool was, and found a big pool there that we went into. However, the water was pretty cold, and so we did not stay in it long. Randy suggested we'd go inside, and that's what we did. The water was much warmer there.
And we were all having fun. As usual, Emmy was afraid and always wanted to hold on to us, while Tammy swam around all by herself thanks to the vest. And then I had Emmy and simply let go. He was scared at first, but then he realized he was alright, and from then on he swam by himself like his sister. He was clearly happy to be independent and was having lots of fun playing with his sister, and with us. As for Sammy, he only wanted to be with me for some reason, which is unusual, as he's so very attached to his Daddy. And so I had fun with him, but he got more and more cranky.
Once the full hour had come, we left and returned to the slide, and Tammy and Emmy went up and down over and over, either with Randy or Sonja. I was holding a cranky Sammy, wrapping him up in a towel, as he was cold, and was watching (and filming) his siblings coming down the slide. Then we returned inside one more time before deciding it was time to go home.
We had to go back outside and walk all the way where we had left our stuff and the stroller. We dried them off and changed them, and then Emmy spotted a little playground behind the building there. As soon as he was dressed, he was off to have fun there, and his siblings joined him. I was with them, giving the other adults a chance to change. Suddenly I saw Emmy sitting on the ground crying. He showed me his scraped knee, though I still don't know how he actually did it. I took him to the changing room with me to clean his knee, then he returned to the playground. They weren't too happy, when we said we were leaving.
We walked back to the bus stop and had to wait for quite some time. Sonja, who lives close to there, waited with us. It was going on 6:30 pm, and so the kids were hungry and eating snacks. Then they started watching Bobo. When the bus came, we said our goodbyes to Sonja and got on. The kids continued watching. Once we got off, we still had a good walk ahead of us to get home.
By 7 pm we were back home. Instead of taking half an hour to make their dinner, we sat down right away and I was cutting fruit on the fly. And I was surprised at how well they were eating. And Emmy was so tired that he was completely silent, not talking at all. That's highly unusual, as Emmy is the talker among the kids and never stops talking. It showed how extremely tired he was. Once they were one eating, I just washed their hands and face and brushed their teeth, then they went to bed. Emmy even went to bed by himself. The boys were asleep right away, but Tammy needed some time, and the two times I tried to leave, she would not let me. It was about 8:30 before I was able to get away.
I was extremely tired myself, not having had a nap. I got myself something to eat, then started working on the pictures, which took quite some time. Randy went to bed at midnight, while I started writing the report of the day. However, my eyes kept falling shut, and so I finally quit, turned my computer off and went to bed. It was 1 am.
