Hilton Head 2013

This summer, we went to Hilton Head again on vacation.  It was a really fun trip....Grandmama and Grandaddy went with us; both Mason and Chandler happened to have friends down there at the same time to hang out with; and we had bikes this time ~ fun, fun trip!

This trip was extra special because Ben's birthday happened to fall during that week.  Beachy birthday celebrations were had!

 

Ben is 4!

 Daddy taught Ben how to ride the waves ~ first time ever!

 

Fishing with Bobo...

Mommy and Anna

Ben and Anna's favorite thing to do was play in the waves.  Here they are, having a big time!!

 

Ben and Mason

Ben and Chandler

 

This beach trip was extra fun with Grandmama and Grandaddy there!

 

Our little bumblebee :)

The big excitement one day was a real sailboat ride for Mark and Chandler.  They took it out all by themselves with another dad and son, and actually had a Man Overboard situation!  It was all in fun, though, and everyone made it back safe...whew!

 

Cutie pies!

I adore this picture!!

And we wrapped up a fun week with a family bike ride to the General Store for ice cream! 

 

Back to School, But Not for Long!

The end of summer brings us "Back to School"!!  Ben was excited to see all his friends he'd missed over the summer, and Mama was excited to be getting back into a routine :)  Here's Ben on his first day of school in the 3 Year Old Class with Mrs. Linda.

Before he could even get settled in, though, we took and end-of-summer trip to the beach ~ just Mom and Ben!!  We went with a big group of gals, young and old(er), so Ben was the Man of the House.  I think he LOVED it!

Fun times with his best buddy Sophia.

We had such a great time together, just the two of us...Ben was super good in the car both going and coming home, playing with just two toys the whole ride!  We only stopped once for a special treat :)

Lovin' the sunshine, and having Mommy all to himself!!

Bubbles on the beach!

A highlight of the trip for Ben was the bike ride to town for ice cream.  Little Man was so fast on that bike we had to stop and wait for everyone to catch up :)

My Sweetpea and me :)

Hilton Head ~ 2012

This summer, Anna took her first trip to the beach!  Our family went to Hilton Head in July and had a wonderful time.  Ben was crazy about the pool more so than the ocean...every day, he kept asking to go back to the condo so we could get in the pool, ha!! 

Anna was excited to be on the beach, and crawled right toward the water.  After about five minutes of being sandy, though, she had enough and whined a lot.  So, each day, I would hold her and carry her around as long as possible ~ all the while with her fussing to get down ~ until I would let her down and then she'd play for a few minutes and get annoyed because she was all sandy and wet.  Ha!!  Usually in the morning, I'd stroll her on the beach at nap time and she'd take a snooze in her stroller.

 Ben had a ball with Daddy...here he is in his custom built Lightning McQueen sand car. 



Helping Dad build a sand car!

Anna sat in the shade with Mama a lot so she wouldn't get too sunned or sandy :)

 Ben and his favorite toy of all time:  a watering can.  We brought at least four from home for him to play with!

Ben and Mason

 Fun times with Daddy...

Anna did a cute "crab crawl" on the beach...usually she does this at home when she's wearing a dress so she can go faster, but I think she was just trying to stay out of the sand as much as possible!

Hmm...Sand = Not yummy.

 Ben and Anna both LOVED playing with their big brothers :)  Here's everybody!!

Edisto Part 2

More beach pictures!  Hopefully they're not boring, being so many, but I sure do think they're cute :)  Case in point:  Ben's "smile" for the camera...

Looking cute at a shrimp boil we went to one night:

Mark and Ben ~ I do think Ben's got his daddy's feet :)

Mama and Ben (and Anna!)

This one's alive!!  Ben liked finding these and would say "CRAB!"

More naps - this time with Daddy.

Ben's absolute favorite thing to do is play with water in any way...here he is with Grandaddy.

The whole gang (except Grandmama and Grandaddy, who were taking the pictures and getting Ben to smile!)

Edisto 2011

This year, we tried out a new beach for our summer vacation.  We went to Edisto Beach, SC with the whole family, and Grandmama and Grandaddy!  Ben was LOVING all the family time, of course.  We had a great time just relaxing on the beach, as that is really just about all there is to do there, ha!! 

One thing we thought was really cool was that there were SO many dolphins!  You could look out at almost any time and after a minute, see several swimming in front of you.  Fun!  Ben was a little hesitant about the sand and water at first, saying, "UH OH!" about his feet being sandy.  We laughed and laughed and just told him he's going to be sandy for the next week or so!!

He got used to it pretty quickly, thank goodness.  I guess he still didn't like it, though, because at least once a day he'd ask me to go "home"...one day he even asked me a few times for "home" and "bath" ~ ha ha!!

There were so many great pictures from our trip, I couldn't decide, so I'm going to make two posts from them all....here are the first few.

Ben eating his favorite food, Oreos.

Finally getting used to being sandy!

Fishing with brother Chandler...

and Mason!

 I'm so cute!!!

Fun times splashing Daddy :)

Napping on Mama's lap at the beach (Love Mason's action shot eating lunch in the background!)

"Otter Island" (no, there were no actual otters..ha ha)