Baseballs, Butterflies, & Blessings: Happy Fourth of July, 2010!

Will flew on his first rapid rewards frequent flyer FREE ticket for the Fourth of July.

That means, that in less than a year, we paid for 16 round trip tickets using his account number. Thankfully, we've been blessed with lots of SW gift cards as we fly so much for medical purposes.

He has flown more than 16 round trips in the last nine months... but many of those were frequent flyer tickets that his daddy or I had earned.

This was a big first for Will!

There was a lady in front of us at the gate who was probably in her forties & flying for her very FIRST time!

I didn't tell her that Will has flown nearly 170 times now!

He also carried his backpack all by himself in the airport!

Yahoo - I'm training him to be my sherpa!

We spent Independence Day at my parents' in East Texas.

Some family came from MO, CO, & LA. We had a blast & spent lots of time in the water (rain, pool, lake.)

Will loved riding on the boat & watching people do "tricks" behind the boat.

He did note that Uncle Adam's wakeskating tricks were "better" than his arm swinging trick he does. I told him he can do wakeskating tricks when he is a bit older.

This cracked me up.

Megan (Adam's girlfriend) rode in the tube with his camera in a waterproof case to get close up shots of Adam doing his tricks. It was quite hilarious to watch.

Will isn't old enough to wakeskate or ski so he enjoyed being pulled towards the boat on the ski rope.

Since I couldn't get my old life jacket to zip around Ellie in the Belly, I had to give up my plans of taking her for her first waterski.

Instead, we settled for a cool dip in the lake (& thankfully didn't tip the boat as I hoisted myself overboard.)

Will with Uncle Adam & Megan (whom he spent most of the weekend flirting with)

The cousins, R, & Will all got to go out on the main lake for an evening ride on the fourth.

It was too crowded on the lake & therefore the risk of big waves too great for me to go along. I had no desire to go into pre-term labor on the lake, surrounded by my cousins, due to hitting a big wave! Somehow, they managed to have fun without me.

(Actually, I'm quite certain no one noticed my absence.)

Will loved watching his Cookie do this.

(My dad is 55 years old! Way to go, Cookie!)

Will enjoyed the fireworks this year! His favorites were the paratroopers/parachuters. He loved running through the yard to catch them.

And he thought it was then great fun to drop them off the second story deck of the boat dock

After an evening boat ride, Will the daredevil suggested we drop him off early & let him swim to the dock. He thought doing this with Daddy was lots of fun!

R & I

Will enjoyed sitting on the "crow's nest" (aka motor cover in center of boat) for boat rides.

Here, he & his Lovie are pretending to be pirates (using their hands for eye patches.)

Will, me, Ellie, & R out for a boat ride

Swimming in the lake

I'm thinking this is the first time that "Itsy Bitsy Spider" has ever been played on this guitar by a two year old.

Obviously, Uncle Adam dearly loves his nephew.

Cookie let Will help drive the boat. It is amazing how quickly he found the horn button!

He also enjoyed going in a big circle.

Captain Will thought he was something else driving that thing!

Excuse me for just a moment... sometimes I just have to stare and smile at his beautiful curls. How did I get so blessed to have a boy with curly hair?!?!? Obviously, it did not come from his daddy or me!