Friday, July 22, 2016

Summer Beach Trip

Be warned there are a TON of pictures here!

We were the last family to arrive and our kids were in the pool not long after we arrived
 Chatting with Grammy in the pool!

 Abby is diving
 Pizza for dinner our first night
 Maggie falling backwards on purpose into the pool!

 Two little peas in a pod
 and then they fell out!
 What we usually found in the sun room when grown ups started to wake up-kids on electronics
 Blythe with her critter of the day-a tiny frog

We are really and truly blessed with the closeness of our cousins!  These 2 are only February to May apart in age.


 Blueberry snack delivery to the pool!


 We went to the beach nearly every morning, would play til people started to nearly faint with hunger, return to the house for the pit crew lunch run through and then swim, read, play games etc all afternoon until dinner time!
 All nine floating around
 Emily and Joy-who has NO teeth!
 snuggles and books and Grammy-a wonderful combination
 and snoring Uncle Greg on the other couch!

 Spot it, Guess Who, and a newly purchased Ticket to Ride

 the craft table
 To the Beach!!!!!
 all 9 and a couple of extras-Emily (Greg's sister who lives in Marietta) and Chris (Greg's other sister Jodi's husband).  Jodi and Chris live in Chattanooga and are adding on to their house this summer so Jodi stayed behind to watch over the work at their house.  They are staying with us a couple of weeks after the beach since they are wandering and visiting all over the southeast this summer while having to be out of their house.
 Scott would play in the ocean and ride waves for days on end-except for the need to have food!
 Abby and Ashley chatting about something VERY important!

 How sandy can we get????

 Crazy jumps

 There was texting among mommas to make sure that all the girls were bringing their dolls-
Blythe with Grace, Maggie with Caroline, Ashley with Elizabeth, Abby Jane with Kit, and Joy with Holly-so cute!!! 
 The five girls and their dolls all sleep in the bunk bed room and Grammy and I took turns reading Mr. Popper's Penguins to them at night.  They also felt that they needed to rotate beds EVERY night-hilarious!

Greg enjoying a nerdy engineer book that was a gift from our sweet Atlanta friends the Louthans-Scott has read most of it too now and it is very fun and nerdy.

 on the morning of July 4th we walked 2 blocks to see the St. Simon's parade-The Gross family rode in it and we watched and cheered for them



 There were lots of patriotic dogs and golf carts
 golf carts



 a very fun day celebrating our country

 The kids LOVE to dig holes in the sand


 Sometimes when all the grown-ups were floating in the water and started counting cousin heads on the beach we would come up short.  Then we would wait a moment and someone would sit up out of their hole and we would realize they had dug so far that we couldn't see them sticking out of their hole anymore!

There were some tired video watchers in the afternoons-the Jetsons is popular with this crowd

 Headbandz is another fun game!


 Sparklers and yeah-no one got burned!




 How many buckets can we stack on Uncle Chris' head???????
 We love to eat at Crab Trap-they had great shrimp, great hush puppies, and a hole with a trash can under it in the middle of every table and they have fun t-shirts.  Scott had outgrown his and got a new one this year.  Katie bought one too.

 July 6th, celebrating Ian turning double digits.  We had ice cream sundaes!  before lunch!

 I think Ryan enjoyed his!
 Opening presents-Scott is holding a gift but we said it looked like he was holding a boom boxx!
 Happy guy with his nerf guns
 more Ticket to Ride

 who is about to get shot????
 Ashley had outgrown her Crab Trap shirt too
 Scott is a unicorn with a ginormous pencil on his head!
 Sweet Joy wanted to cuddle and listen to me read-how could I possibly refuse??????
 Last ones of Crab Trap shirts
 who are these crazy people???????


 Family jumping!!!

 So hilarious!
 a cannon ball by Ryan

 downtown after dinner at Iguanas-that Maggie called "Lizards"  They have great shrimp too-Scott should know after eating 21! and many other things for dinner, but the draw of Iguanas is the self serve ice cream bar with 9 gazillion toppings!
 Love these 2 sweet pictures!

 all 9 on the pier
 and 8 on the whale-Ryan had climbed up and jumped off before the picture
 we stayed at the playground briefly but it was SO hot!


 More enjoying the beach!


 and the paddleboards





Grammy saw a great game for the kids to play-everyone got a pie plate filled with whipped cream and one gummy bear that they had to find only using their mouths!  They all thought it was GREAT fun!




 All 9 cousins-Scott 13, Katie 12, Ryan 11, Ian 10, Abby Jane and Ashley both 8, and Joy, Blythe, and Maggie all 6


 Uncle Jake pushed Scott into the pool!!!!!

 Kids were wet and trying to get Uncle Greg wet when he was in dry clothes-crazy!




 Joy does a great cannonball!

 
 Last night pool wrestling!  It was an amazingly fun week!
 

As always, we had a great time and enjoyed being together!!!!

Tuesday, July 19, 2016

Assorted Summer Funnies

 Here are a bunch of fun pictures from our summer-some from before the beach trip and some since we have been back.

Above is Ashley with her birthday rose from Daddy that was just a little late this year!

Below, can you tell she has brothers?????  She spent her own money earned doing chores at home to buy herself a light saber!
 Scott bought himself one also-so he has 2 now
 Ryan-who had asked for 2 for Christmas spent his chore money on another lego set.

 Lightsabers and legos in action


 Yeah!!!!!!  Wow!!!!!!!  Very, Super-Duper Exciting!!!!!!!!!!!!  Scott has received the rank of First Class in Boy Scouts and Greg ordered him an engraved Swiss Army knife to celebrate!  Only 3 more ranks until we have 2 Eagle Scouts in the house!  So proud of his hard work to have earned this!

 Ashley with two of her closest friends-Claire and Aarya-we have been rotating houses for playdates this summer.  They have a great time together!

 Ryan went to Children's Camp with our church this summer and we were getting his room ready for his return and discovered he had over 20 stuffed animals taking up half of his bed, so we decided to have a little fun with them to welcome him back home!  No animals were harmed during this prank!
 The shark is sitting on top of his clock.  Doggie is his MOST favorite stuffed animal and we didn't do anything but leave him on Ryan's pillow ready to greet Ryan but did crazy fun things with all the others.
 Lars, the little polar bear was hanging from the fan and an animal sat on top of each fan blade
 all the turtles were at the foot of the bed
 Many of the animals were doing crazy things and we turned his comforter upside down-he likes it to be stripes side up
 The eagle and the snake were on the door-Greg had a snake like this as a child.  His name was Longfellow.  Grammy bought 2 more for each of our boys when they were little so I guess this is Longfellow the 3rd.

 and here is a close up of our real doggie-I don't know which of the kids took this one!