A Few Other Items

The girls are still cooking like crazy which is pretty fun.  They make some pretty tasty items!

 Mia is super pumped about her new ninja costume!

 Lily went to her new friend, Isaiah Grace's, birthday party last weekend.  They spent the night downtown, went swimming, did makeovers and nailpainting, went out to dinner and watched a movie.  Whew, I'm tired just thinking about it!

 Both girls really enjoyed reading and watching the first Harry Potter.  They were excited to see all the fun things Barnes and Noble has relating to this franchise, especially the Sorting Hat!

 I was so excited to go on Mia's class field trip to the Monastery this week!  I love getting to be a part of Stonehaven activities like this, and she loved having me along.  It was a beautiful day, and this is such an interesting and fun place to explore.  Of course, bringing home monk-made fudge made it even better!

Love these sweet kids (and Sophie who missed the picture)! 

Gulf Shores Birthday Trip

Oh how I love going to Beach Club in Gulf Shores!  I have so many great memories from here.  I was thrilled when Dad said the condo was available over Labor Day weekend, and we could go down.  What a great way to celebrate Ryan's birthday!  Even better, the Henderson family came down to join us for the weekend.  We made this trip together for 4 years before our different school schedules got in the way.  It was so good to be back down here together!

Our family skipped school on Friday and headed on down that morning.  It was an easy trip, and we stopped for groceries on the way in and had an early dinner out.  When we got to the condo, we decided to head down in our clothes and just play on the beach for a little bit.  We saw the most beautiful sunset that evening!

 The girls were ready for some fun.

 I sure do love these two amazing girls.

 Nobody I'd rather be with and no place I'd rather be.

The Henderson's got in pretty late Friday night.  On Saturday, we all went down for awhile before all the great college football started.  I promised the kids I wouldn't bug them taking pictures all weekend, but I had to get one purely for this comparison.  This was from our second year down together, in 2010.  Lily would have just turned 4, Parker was 3.5, and Mia and Macey would have been just shy of turning 2.  Love, love, love these kiddos.

We headed in early afternoon on Saturday for a late lunch, and I'm glad we did.  The weather turned ugly a little bit later and stayed like that through Sunday evening.  We didn't really mind though.  We had fun hanging out together, watching football and going to see "Pete's Dragon" at the movie theater.  

On Sunday, Ryan had a surprise for me.  He had calculated how many days he lived before he met me (6,938), and then he figured out when it would be Day 6,939 (this day) meaning he had known me more days than he hadn't.  He gave me a beautiful new watch with this engraving to mark the occasion.  How incredibly thoughtful is that?  I love this man.  He is the most thoughtful person I've ever met.

We left a little before lunch on Monday because we had heard the roads were starting to flood, and we knew we needed to get home.  The trip took about 7.5 hours (2 hours longer than usual), but we made it back safe and sound.  Probably not the most exciting way to spend an actual birthday for Ryan, but the weekend itself was fun!

First Day of School - 4th and 2nd

School time is here!  The week before school started, Stonehaven hosted its annual Back to School Picnic on the Square.  It was wonderful to see so many friends again and welcome new families.  Of course, the girls were most excited about the face painting artist who was there.

 The next day, we got back to school haircuts.  Look how adorable Mia's is!  I love this short do on her.  Notice anything else missing?  That's right, a tooth.  At the picnic, Mrs. Barbulescu helped her pull out the really wiggly one!

Here we go...ready for another great year!

I love seeing their aspirations!

 Mia is looking forward to a wonderful year with Mrs. St. Hill.  2nd grade will be awesome!

 Lily is excited about 4th grade with Ms. Keesee!

 Let's get this new year started!

End of Summer Fun

A few fun things we did to wrap up summer...

First, we most definitely enjoyed these macaroons Ryan picked up for us in the Paris airport on his way home from Lebanon.  He also brought baklava from Beirut.  Our tastebuds rejoiced!

 We took a weekend trip to Birmingham to visit Liz and her new home.  It's so lovely, and we're so thrilled she found it!  We were excited to spend a little time with Caroline and Liam while we were there too.

 Bama having fun in the pool with her granddaughters!

 I think its safe to say that Decker has become part of the family.

 Mia's been having some fun baking recently.  First she made some fudge (some with sprinkles, some without), and then she recently made a key lime pie.  Both delicious!

 Being treated to breakfast in bed is always a nice treat; thanks Lily!

 On one beautiful afternoon, I realized the girls had been outside for a pretty long while.  I looked out the back window to see they had found our huge wheeled trashcan and had filled it with water to create a little mini-pool.  They were having a blast playing in it!

 Ryan took both girls on Daddy Daughter Dates recently.  Since Vini, Vidi, Vici closed, he and Lily are looking for their new spot.  They tried out Valencia, and absolutely loved it.  I had some of her leftover pasta for lunch, and it was fantastic.  I want to go try it soon!  While Lily was at Emory's playing, he and Mia went to Chuck E Cheese.  She scored a pretty big loot that day!

Mia and I had fun together too.  After eating dinner at the Japanese restaurant, we came home to decorate cupcakes that she and Ryan had made earlier in the day.  I taught her to use my decorating gun which she loved.  She thought the way it mixed colors inside of it was awesome.  I love making fun and tasty memories together!

And just like that, summer was over!  I'm not sure any of us really wanted it to end this year, but ready or not, it's time for school!

After Camp Fun

I forgot to write about our after-camp experience.  We were so thrilled to have our family back together again!  After we checked into the hotel, we headed over to a nature center.  It was a fun way to spend a few hours talking with one another and simply enjoying our time together again.

 Painting with water is always fun.

 They thought playing on this old tractor was pretty cool.

 Since they also have several animals here, there is lots of education surrounding that too, from how to care for them and their environment to useful information about each one.  We decided we would actually want to see the bear with this size paw on it.

 This musical playground was pretty neat!

 We all slept well on Friday night, and we headed to Biltmore Estate on Saturday morning.  I love this place.  It reminds me of Downton Abbey which Ryan and I miss terribly.  I love to imagine what life was like while they lived here.

 We took lots of great pictures of this beautiful estate, but I decided just to put this little collage here instead of listing each one separately.

We stayed for several hours taking in the whole house (the girls loved the basement with its kitchen, swimming pool and bowling alley!), but by lunch, they were pretty tired.  We knew the last couple of weeks were wearing on them too, so we headed on home.  It was a great way to have a little fun family time though!

New Smyrna Beach Trip

The girls and I had a great time on our trip to New Smyrna Beach this year.  Ryan was actually on a mission trip in Lebanon, so he wasn't able to join us this time.  We certainly missed him, but we made lots of memories to tell him about.  We headed out on Friday morning and drove down to the JW Grand Lakes in Orlando.  Not only do we love this hotel, but it helped us avoid some of the crazy Saturday traffic.  We arrived about 4 and immediately headed down to the pool.  We love the lazy river with several smaller pools around it.  This is such a fun play pool!

We intended to stay out as late as possible and eat dinner poolside.  As I got ready to order though, I noticed a massive storm cloud just above the hotel.  I decided to hold off on ordering, and it was a good thing.  Not 5 minutes later, the bottom fell out of that cloud.  We ran back inside, took showers and ordered room service.  Really, we didn't mind.  We also watched a really cool lightening storm from our window.

 To pass some time, the girls broke out their oil pastels and started coloring which was fun.  We also watched the live action "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" and then "The Muppets Christmas Carol."  I guess HBO Kids was doing some sort of Christmas in July special.  We enjoyed it!

 The next morning we headed down early for their fabulous buffet; it was delicious.  Then we changed back into our suits and hit the pool again.  We were there over 3 hours before we had to check out and head on over to the beach.  The girls had a great time playing with the floats.  We all enjoyed floating around the lazy river and playing in the waterfalls.

 Before getting completely out of Orlando, we stopped by City Walk for lunch at Bubba Gump's.  LOVE IT!

 We then drove over to New Smyrna, stopped at Publix, so we wouldn't have to get back out and got into the condo.  We unloaded as quickly as possible and then headed down in our clothes to get our toes in the sand.  We couldn't wait any longer!  Lily immediately carved out some sand.

 We were beyond thrilled that Meme was able to once again join us at the beach this year.  She hasn't been the last four years, and it just felt off.  We are so grateful she was feeling up to the trip.  On Sunday morning, we started out by letting her lead us in a devotion.

 The great-grandkids were pretty excited that the Birthday Money Game was also played on Sunday morning; this year we did bingo.  Needless to say, everyone left happy.

 Three of my favorites.

 There's very little order to the rest of these pictures; just kind of when I took them.

Ready to hit the waves!

 Boogie boards work pretty well in the pool too.

 Lots of sand play happened this week too.  I love that they aren't too big for that.

 Mia loved that Nicholas and Suzanna buried her in the sand and then gave her a Darth Vadar look, complete with light saber!

 Probably my favorite picture of the week.  So, so grateful Meme was here.

 Pretty sure the girls prefer the pool to the ocean.

 They loved when Granna got in to play with them!

 We were glad to have Meme supervising Dad, Joe, Randy and Jodi as they prepared our family breakfast one morning.  Biscuits, gravy, bacon, sausage, eggs, grits and fruit...yum!

 Almost everyone was able to make the annual "cousins' night" dinner at The Garlic which was a fun time.  This is a fun group to hang out with!

 One morning, just to stay out of the sun a bit, the girls and I had fun in our condo.  We baked brownies, colored some art, and played lots of games like Argh, Clue Jr. and Story Cubes.  It was a restful but fun morning.

 Hot dog day is always a great day!  After a fabulous lunch, we headed out for our big family picture.

Our family with Meme.

 Pool side fun

 The girls love when Papa goes out into the ocean with them.

 Playing in the pool together.

 Jumping waves with Suzanna.

 We all three did a good bit of reading on the beach this year which I loved.

 Mia learned how to skim board!

 That also involved a few spills, but she got back up and tried again until she got it.

 Sophie is an excellent skim board instructor.

These two had a great time together this week!

We didn't have a drop of rain this year which was amazing in and of itself.  We had to leave Saturday morning, but we left with lots of great memories.  This was a special week indeed.