Down By The River

Hey! We've got a great idea! Let's go swimming at the river!

That was our Sunday afternoon moment of spontaneity. After trying to get Hallie to lay down for a much-needed nap she made it clear that a nap was not on her agenda. We were hoping that a trip to the farm would fit in well with her agenda. We suited up and packed all of our swimming essentials, made a quick stop to pick up a floaty and a beach umbrella then we were on our way. Hallie was in a spectacular mood during the thirty minute drive. She tested out her new floaty while I tested out my new camera.....

Not gonna lie, it felt  A.W.E.S.O.M.E. to have a camera back in my hands. Ah, snap snap snap. :)

We pulled into the farm house to pile ourselves and our things in the mini-truck. Hallie and daddy tried to take off without me....

Not so fast my friends! I loaded in with Hallie on my lap and we were off toward the river. As we drove across the highway I caught sight of a very important place....the grain elevator. Now that I was armed with my trusty camera I told Riley to make a detour so that I could take some pictures of Hallie at the place where we met. Be prepared to be amazed....this place is a beauty. Ok, maybe not. You just have to look past the fact that it hasn't been tended to in a long while and the concrete is falling apart and it's basically a very, very old grain elevator. To me it is special. ;)

Full circle

"And this is where I asked for your mama's phone number"

"Ya see Hal, that's where I first saw your mama"

A short but very bumpy ride through the pasture took us through the gait and down by the river. Hallie started out having a ball and actually got to try out her driving skills again...this time all by herself. Riley let her do the steering and she thought she was hot stuff. The funny girl took her job very seriously and had both hands on the wheel...not 10 & 2 but more like 5 & 7. Hey, it worked except that we ended up veering to the left and off the path which made for an even bumpier ride. We were nearing the entrance to the river and Hallie must've suddenly realized just how stinkin' hot it was in that truck because she was not happy. The grasshoppers were EVERYWHERE and a few hopped in which resulted in be squirming and screaming. Ew, those creatures are just creepy! We finally were at a place where the road ran out and we were going to load up our stuff and take off on foot. It was just a short walk to the river. As I stepped out of the truck with the babe on one hip and a bag on the other I suddenly realized I had something warm and wet running down my leg. Now I knew it had to be one of two things: either I'd gotten so hot that I'd peed myself or my daughter was peeing on me through her failed swim diaper. Since I'm pretty sure my continence is intact it had to be the latter. Hallie and daddy took off laughing all the way as I stood there with pee still running down my leg to my foot. Despite being covered in pee I took off behind them excited to get set up by the water.....

Wet shirt, wet shorts and if you look really close you can see my leg glistening in the sun

As I followed behind trying to stay up with my two crazy companions I hollered "I'm coming" to which Riley didn't respond. Turns out he was too busy staring at what I was about to see. I made my way around through some trees and looked down to spot Riley and Hallie standing in the water. Oh wait, I mean sand.....

"H2nO"

As we surveyed our dry as a bone surroundings there was really only one thing to do: laugh. I sat my bag down and threw Hallie's float toy in the middle of the "river" for her to jump on while we came up with a plan "B." She wasn't so sure what to think about the sand. It was her first encounter with the gritty hot substance. Of course what better way to introduce yourself to something than eat it. And so she did. A nice big mouthful of sand. Yum! As Riley did some damage control I dug for some wipes and a diaper to clean both of us up....yeah, I bet you've already forgotten about the pee mess on both of us, huh? As I was asking Riley to pick her up so that I could take her bathing suit off a lovely wasp came over and perched on our girl's shoulder. I'm not sure if it was my scream or if Riley had cat-like reflexes but that wasp didn't have a choice but to retreat into his habitat. Grasshoppers and wasps had all heard my screams...surely they had spread the word to all of their other icky creature friends. Well Mr. Spider must be stubborn...either he didn't get the memo or he just didn't care. Because as we sat Hallie back down on her floaty here comes Mr. Spider creeping up because her. Little Miss Muffet was sitting on her "tuffet" and didn't see him coming. So I did what any protective momma would do. I screamed "Riley pick her up, pick her up!" He replied with "I thought I was supposed to be cleaning the sand out of her eyes and nose?" Belly laughs ensued and we were wondering why we had this grand ol' idea in the first place! We made our way back to the truck laughing all the way.

"Who's idea was this anyway?"

Her face says it all....

Someone wasn't so happy on the ride back to the car. She was asleep within seconds after getting her transferred back to her carseat. Whew. She needed a rest....sweet girl was tired and hot despite drinking what seemed like ten gallons of cold water....

We decided to make a driveby to see if the lake would be a good place to get our feet wet. Hallie didn't appear to be waking up anytime soon but she seemed to sense that we were at the lake because she woke up....for about two seconds and then her head fell to her chest again. I jumped out to test out the water...it felt so good after wanting to cool off in the water so badly. As we drove away with our sleepy girl I spent the next five minutes pleading my case for a boat...I think I broke through a bit more this time around. :) I'll have him convinced come next summer!

It was pretty fitting to see a big cloud of gray smoke as we drove back on a 110 degree day having left the dried up river bed. This fire was looking pretty nasty as we passed by....

Oooooooklahoma where the wind comes sweeping down the plains, and the rivers are dried up and swimming really sucks and you can't recall the last time it raaaaaiiiiiiiinnnnneeeedddd......(I hope you sang that along with the tune, if not, go back and sing it.)