Back to School (Boo)

Well, my four month maternity leave is over (boo). I went back to work last week, and the students came back today. This means that Owen and Olivia are in day-care full-time now. I'm glad that I took Olivia to day-care some during the summer. This made the transition much easier this morning. I felt so bad for all of the teachers who had not taken their kids at all during the summer. Those kids were screaming their heads off this morning. Not Olivia, though, she marched into her room like a pro. This is a picture that I took of Olivia this morning before leaving the house. I didn't get one of Owen because he was trying to go back to sleep, and I didn't want to wake him up. Hopefully, this will be a good and productive school year for all of us.

Beach Vacation Part 6- Family Time

Okay, so this is my final post on our beach vacation. It was definitely a great week. What always makes this vacation so much fun is just being able to be with family and relax. Here are some of my favorite pictures from the week.

Photo 1: Seeing as how this was our first trip with Owen, I really wanted to get a nice family picture on the beach. Olivia, however, would not cooperate. In every picture that we took, she was either looking away or making a weird face. This was the best one.

Photo 2: While we were at the beach both Brian and Kelly had birthdays. We also went ahead and celebrated birthdays for Hannah and Cassie who will be turning another year older at the end of the month. Brian received money, clothes certificates, and supplies for the grill that he got for father's day. In this picture, the four birthday boys and girls are blowing out candles on their cake.

Photo 3: We didn't really put the kids in the pool this year because you are suppose to be potty trained to swim in it (although many other vacationers violated this rule). But, the adults enjoyed swimming in it throughout the week. Here is a picture of the 'single' girls- Cassie, Quincy, and Jessica having fun in the pool.


Photo 4: While at the beach, we always go out and eat one night as a group. For our dinner this year we (re)visited The Surf restaurant, which is conveniently located across the street from our condo complex. Rumor has it that they are going to tear the restaurant down and build condos. I hope that they don't because it is a unique restaurant. In this picture, Olivia is sitting with her Gigi and Papa waiting (not so patiently) for her food.

Well, this ends our beach vacation trip report. Hopefully there will be many beach vacations in the future.

Beach Vacation Part 5- Owen's Vacation

I know that I have not said much about what Owen did at the beach. For the most part, he sat around the condo in his bouncy chair. That may sound sad, but it was just too hot for him outside. He was more content inside than he would have been outside. There was one day that was particularly cloudy, so we took him down to the beach on that day. We dangled his feet in the water and walked him around for a bit. He did not really react one way or the other. He'll be old enough to enjoy it more next year.

Owen was not the only baby at the beach. Both Claire and Natalie were too young to be outside for very long, so Owen had plenty of company sitting around with him. Granny Buie, my aunt Libba, and my mom kept Owen (and the other babies) quite a bit so that both Brian and I could go and do things with Olivia. Owen liked all of the attention that he received and is a bit spoiled now.

Beach Vacation Part 4- Fishing

Brian always refers to our vacation week as "Fishing Week". His favorite thing to do at the beach is fish off of the pier. He had a lot of success this year. There was one night where he caught over 60 fish! My dad says that Brian has the magic touch- he can catch fish when no one else can.

There was also a lot of shark action going on this year. On our first night there, a guy caught a 5-foot shark off of the pier. I also saw two 3-foot sharks hauled in later in the week. Brian bought a new shark reel and some stronger line so that he could get in on the shark-fishing action. Sure enough, he caught a shark on his first night with the new equipment. It's always sobering to see someone pull a shark up out of the water. When people in the ocean see that, they tend to get out of the water.


Brian tried to get Olivia interested in fishing- and she was, but she was more interested in running around on the pier. I was nervous that she would run and get over the railing, so she wasn't allowed on the pier very often. Maybe in a few more years Brian can pass his fishing secrets down to her.

Beach Vacation Part 3- Fun in the Water

Halfway through the week Olivia began warming up to playing in the ocean. Part of the reason for this is that Ava had been playing in the ocean. Whatever Ava does, Olivia wants to do. They are monkey-see, monkey-do. Once Olivia got into the water, she loved it. Brian took her out into the waves a couple of times to body surf and she really liked that, too. Here are some of my favorite pictures of Olivia's ocean fun. In one of the pictures, Olivia is chasing a bird- she actually did this with every bird that she saw on the beach.

Beach Vacation Part 2- Fun in the Sand

We didn't get into the water very much during the first part of the week because Olivia was leery of the ocean. She did not want the water to touch her at all and would run away from any wave that came near her. She did enjoy running up and down the beach, so Brian and I did a lot of chasing. At times, it seemed like she was in her own little world. She would just keep going down the beach without a concern that she was going away from us. She definitely has a mind of her own. In addition to running down the beach, Olivia also liked to dig, look for sea shells, and throw sand into the surf.


Never one to be shy, Olivia had no problem with walking up to other people on the beach and looking at (or playing with) their stuff. She gets this trait honest- both her dad and her Papa are social creatures. There was one little boy named Carter who was also on vacation last week. Olivia made friends with him when she walked up and started playing with his beach toys. These two played off and on all week. On the last day, we decided to take a picture of the two of them. Carter's mom was also taking a picture and told them to hold hands. Carter went to grab Olivia's hand, but she yanked it away and said "NO!" This tickled Brian and he told her that she couldn't hold a boy's hand until she was grown.

Olivia wasn't the only one having fun on the beach. My sister, Cassie, brought a bocce ball set to the beach and it was a big hit. I played once and was on a team with Hannah. I stunk really bad, and I do not think that she was upset that I chose not to play again. In this picture Hannah, Thomas, Jessica, Brian, and Cassie are showing off their bocce skills.

Beach Vacation Part 1- Fernandina, Here We Come!

We have just returned from our annual vacation to Fernandina Beach. I have to say that this is my most favorite week of the year. I love being at the beach! The vacation began last Saturday. Brian and I spent a good part of the morning getting everything packed up. After a quick trip to the pet resort to drop Remy off, we were ready to go. We had been talking the trip up to Olivia, so she was excited when it was time to leave. I had bought some sunglasses for her, and she wore them all the way down there (which was good because they kept her occupied during the two-hour drive).

We had a record number of beach-goers this year. We even had to rent four condos in order to accomodate everyone. There were 26 people in all. Six of the twenty-six were going to the beach with us for the first time. The new attendees were Jessie (Cassie's boyfriend), Franklin (Jessica's fiancee), Tiffany (Sam's girlfriend see picture), and the three new babies- Owen, Claire, Natalie. It is amazing to me how our family is growing.