Elliott Times: 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!