Collins family day

We had a lovely day with my family today. It was VERY hot though and so many hours were spent in the pool. When we first arrived it was time for gifts to be exchanged. It was great meeting Graham's fiance - Aleks.
My Dad did not disappoint and took the girls around the garden looking for fruit. The neighbours pomegranate tree is really big and thankfully a number of the fruit hang over onto my parents side.
I can always count on my Dad giving the children new taste experiences. Today it was pomegranates, droe wors and biltong.




These lilos were a lot of fun once the trauma of the first experiences were over. Ruth was on one and floated into the deep end without being noticed. She wanted to try and kick herself back to the shallow end but in trying to get her feet to the water she fell off - the lilo flipping over on top of her. I was inside the house and saw it happen. I started running and shouting immediately and was really shaken up by it. Thankfully Ruth did well and did not get too stressed. It did not put her off the water either - which I was thankful for. A little later Hannah was in the shallow end and fell off. She is not tall enough to stand there and so went under. This put her right off the pool and it was quite a while before she was willing to even come close again.

They had a watermelon in the pool too - Rachel and Graham were playing with it. The watermelon keeping cool in the pool is a memory both Brendon and I have from our childhoods - so it was great for the girls to experience that too.
Graham is always good with the children. Here he is enjoying the lilo with Ruth - our little fish.
Rachel and Graham playing catch with two pool balls - can you spot them? Graham suffered from all the time in the sun though and got really burnt. He has been living in Germany - so his skin is not as used to the sun anymore.

I always love how many of the adults in my family get into the pool on days like this. My Mum and Dad spent time in the water too - but here you can see my brother Craig, sister Gillian and her husband Paul (and Brendon of course). It was also great to have Hannah back in the water.

Hezekiah enjoying some time with Graham - trying to cool off.
Then we decided to really let him cool off in the pool. At first it feels quite cold on your feet but Craig is experienced and so splashed his feet around till he was used to it.




Craig slowly got him further and further in and eventually I even held him from the side of the pool under his shoulders like I do when he baths.

It was great to see Hannah getting more and more comfortable being in the water. We assured her that everyone knew she did not want to put her head in the water. Eventually she was playing on the step and tipping her head forward and getting the top of her head wet - she felt like she was achieving so much. :-)
It's always fun to see how much fun my Dad has with the children in the pool.
Hezekiah sleeping in the bare minimum to try and keep cool.
We had a really lovely day with great food and fun times. The girls were exhausted after their long day in the sun and the two little ones were fast asleep by the time we got back to the Bucklands. We tried to wake them but it was just not going to happen - so we just popped them into bed.