ava got up on the wakeboard last night!

it was her first try ever. this is pretty darn impressive. it involves first getting the wakeboard on her feet--strapping herself into boots connected to a board that is probably bigger than she is (i am fairly certain that if she held it on end and hid behind it, you could not see her), then managing to jump off the back of the boat into the water without clipping herself on the boat itself -- i think she had a bit of assistance on this one -- then getting herself floating on her back with the board in front of her and the rope handle in her hands as the boat slowly idles away, straightening out the rope. she had a helper in the water for this part, but then she swam back to the boat, leaving ava in the water, looking at the rope disappearing over the top of the horizontal board, beyond which she could not see anything. then the boat started and pulled her right up onto the board! this means that she held onto the rope handle as the boat pulled it, and then managed to turn the board from horizontal to straight out in front of her (like a snowboard) as she is moving through the water. if you don't switch the board, you just pitch right forward over the edge back into the water. apparently (i was in the house with anna) she stayed up for 2 or 3 minutes. i am so proud of her.

though now we have skating, riding, skiing, rollerblading, swimming, fishing, rowing, biking, tennis (trying) AND wakeboarding. i am sure there are more, i just can't remember. thank god she does not want to do soccer this year.

we have a lot of gear.

carter declined the offer to ride, which is fine by me.

anna has suddenly recognized that she does not really want people to disappear--she has started to protest when she is put down. she used to follow the 'out of sight, out of mind' maxim, but now she remembers. and she hollers. she is definitely going to make herself heard in the future. she is not yet sitting up, and i think that has something to do with the weight of her upper body. she is currently working hard on small motor skills, desperate to get everything she can in her mouth. last time she was at the doctor, she was about 17.5 pounds. we tried her on solids recently (she is CONSTANTLY hungry), but that was a no go. she still has a very strong gag reflex. she looked at me with wrinkled eyebrows and held her mouth open with her tongue away from the sides of her mouth as if to say "please. get it out now."

and her eyelashes are so long, they tangle.

2 days ago, it started to thunder, and the kids had to come inside. this was very upsetting to carter, who wanted to go out in the boat. when he came inside he said "i am very mad at god right now. could you please tell him to stop?"

unfortunately i have not figured out how to manifest that sort of power, but i certainly appreciated the assumption that i did!