A nice day

Today was the summer outing for Earl's office. It was held at the curiously titled Camp Ramsbottom, in Rehoboth, Mass. It's a nice facility, with sunny ball fields, shady picnic spots, and a beautiful pool, which is where the kids and I spent the entire day.

The general manager for the Boston and Providence agencies organized the outing, and it was very family-friendly, from the food to the toys to the timing. There was no schedule per se; no organized activities, which some grumbled about, but which suited me just fine. I hate activities like softball, and I'm generally not very good in forced social situations (like the office holiday party) so a whole day in a beautiful facility where I just basically needed to watch my kids have a good time was perfect.

Earl took Brian, who isn't overly fond of the water, to play baseball for an hour or so. Abby tried out both water slides, and liked the taller one better. This slide was fast, and shot her out about 4 feet from the end of the slide into 9- or 10-foot deep water, and she couldn't get enough of it.

Of course, Timmy had to try the slide, too. I helped him once, but it was too nervewracking for me, so Earl did the honors the other times.

We managed to mostly stay sunburn-free (except for Abby's cheeks, which I noticed were pink this evening.) I've got three tired kiddos upstairs in their beds, and Brian, especially, is extra-tired from staying through the seventh inning at last night's game at Fenway. The kid lives and breathes baseball. It's really something.

Oh, and one last note -- Abby had her first personal training session yesterday at the Y. They have kid-sized Nautilus-like equipment, and she learned to use it while I got my weight training done on the adult Nautilus machines. Abby has another appointment tomorrow, and another on Monday, and then she'll be trained well enough to use them herself.

I'm making exercise a "girls' thing" for the two of us. We both could stand to lower our body mass index, and I think the structured workout of a line of machines to do will be right up Abby's alley. She and I took a short walk today, for a little cardio, but that's not one of her favorite things to do. Her gait really isn't correct; she seems unable to maintain a steady left-right-left-right stride for more than 6 or 8 steps. She does better when we hold hands, but she doesn't have a normal footfall, either -- it almost looks like she's landing toe-first. I don't know what to do about that, other than to just try to gently coach her as we walk.

School starts for her a week from tomorrow. My big third-grader!