I tried not to overbook his summer. He participated in swim team and Junior Golf through the DCC. I did not think that 2 activities would take up so much of his time. But he had swim practice Monday, Tuesday, Thursday mornings and swim meets Wednesday nights. Junior Golf happened on Wednesday mornings. Carter enjoyed both activities! He swam fairly well but did not have endurance to finish the 25 yards. He was pretty strong about 3/4 of the way before losing steam. He got a lot of 4th, 5th, and 6th place ribbons but surprised us all with a first place finish in the 25 breast stroke!! In a full heat! He actually showed some competitiveness, which was a surprise and nice to see from him. Carter also enjoyed junior golf. But the thing with Carter is that he doesn't take sports that seriously. He is all about having fun. To be honest, that is equally amazing and frustrating for us as parents. I am so happy that he is not obsessed with winning all the time and can just enjoy life. But, as someone who is competitive, I wish he showed a little bit of care when it came to sports. When Carter concentrated, he hit the ball very well. Matt took him out to Red Hawk a couple times to work on his game and tried not to get too frustrated with him ;).
Along with sporting activities, I also signed Carter up for the Playgrounds program through Bettendorf Parks and VBS. He went to Playground a bit during the first part of summer. He would go to swim practice, have lunch, and then go to Playgrounds when Brea napped at home. Busy days for him! He also went on a field trip to Splash Landing with the park. Unfortunately, his park's field trip day was Wednesday so he went straight from the field trip to a swim meet. That was a very busy day and certainly a moment when I thought maybe I had him into too many things. His attendance at parks declined as the summer went on. He did a week of VBS at Christ Family Church and enjoyed going for the week.
He participated in the reading program through the library. He mostly read chapter books and would often read for an hour before bedtime. He loved reading Junie B. Jones books and Magic Treehouse. He was very proud finishing the program and it was much easier this year than last year, which was his first time doing 'read to self' minutes rather than the 'read to me' number of books.
A lot of the summer was spent out at the pool of course. Carter got really good at diving thanks to swim team. He also became very brave going off the board. He always enjoyed going off the board but wouldn't do anything other than just jumping. He finally was brave enough to dive off the end of both the low and high board. And now he will run towards the end of the board, jump, and then dive. He also learned to flip off the board! I never thought I would see the day! He can be so nervous and never wants to hurt himself or do anything that could hurt. But his buddy Jacob started doing flips and that gave Carter enough confidence to try. He actually went to the pool with his friend Nathan on a play date and by the time I got there to pick him up, he could do a flip!
Carter spent many a nights playing with his friends in the neighborhood. We are very lucky to have a neighborhood full of kids around Carter's age. Since he is older now, we are more comfortable letting him go a street over to play. He also had a couple of friend sleepovers. He stayed at his friend Cam's house. The first time he stayed somewhere other than with family. Cam stayed at our house once as well.
Carter wouldn't be Carter without a new toy obsession. Star Wars are fading a little bit and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are invading our home. He also is VERY into Legos. Our entire basement is a Lego city that he has built including a park...Carter loves to build Lego sets and build a Jurassic World once (248) all by himself. He did have a complete breakdown in the middle when he realized he messed something up but ended up correcting his mistake (after I made him take a minute to step away and calm down) and completed the project. Now all he talks about is the Lego sets that he wants for Christmas. He was showing me his Lego set and said to me, "I am a little disappointed in this set because this face doesn't have too sides like the other one does." I casually mentioned that he should do a review of the set like the ones he watches on KidsTube. Now he is obsessed with 'Carter Tube HD' what he named his channel and requests to do videos all the time. I have yet to upload his videos but I do plan to. I realized he has watched too many of these type videos when at the end of his videos when he said, "if you want to watch more episodes make sure you subscribe!"
We had such a wonderful summer it is hard to believe that it is over!!
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