Day Trip to the Pisgah National Forest

This Saturday David and I decided to head to the mountains for a little cooler weather. After a two and a half hour car ride (which includes the 40 minute wrong turn detour-that is sadly my fault) in which Annalise was screaming and Judah, who gets carsick, was yelling-"I can't take it anymore," I was ready to pull over at McDonalds and get the kiddos french fries until they hit carb lala-land. However, we stayed the course-the right course after that wrong turn-and ended up at the southern edge of the Pisgah Forest, which is absolutely beautiful. The kids had a great time and so did David and I. We maybe could have pulled over anywhere and would have rejoiced just to be out of the car, but shortly after our arrival and while we ate our picnic lunch- the kids all expressed their gratitude to be there. And we had hours of outdoor adventure fun-with no rules and no carseats!

Yes-grandparents-she is strapped in!

We found bears-thankfully they were stuffed.

We took a fun dip in the river while it rained.

And decided to cross the river to shorten the walk back-David had to help us all across.

SUMMER

Well summer came and went and it was full. We have just started our school routine for the year and are having a great time, but before summer becomes to distant of a memory, I thought I'd give it one more post!

4th of July at the O'Neal's new house

Sarah is out-pacing Amelia

A visit from Cathy

We celebrate Amelia and Judah's birthdays together every year because their birthdays are only 8 days apart. This year we had a 2 day celebration which included a pool party at our Y and a party at home with family and out of town friends.

Can you see Judah smiling? If not, just know-this is a picture of Judah with a big grin as he comes down the water slide on daddy's lap!

Pull apart mermaid cake-I get a little bolder every year

Annalise had a blast at the party.

6 year old Amelia-with pierced ears

Patience

So many friends that we love

Two parties means two cakes-mermaid for the pool, mini-excavator for home

Homemade pizza is a birthday tradition

What to get a boy who is turning 4-aquatic frogs of course! Meet Dump Truck and Thomas.

After all those parties it was time for VBS-this year's theme was "The King is Coming."

Our castle room

Lady Kathleen spent her week with us helping out with VBS

 Summer in the South always means more wildlife.

1 of our 3 bunnies born this spring

Cool spider that lives on our back deck-we specifically asked the bug man not to spray him. This guy is big and he eats bees-he's the Mr. T of spiders.

Summer is not complete without a trip to Myrtle Beach

Amelia wanted to dye her hair purple-we thought that would be a fun beach look!

Judah rarely poses for the camera anymore, but he couldn't resist pointing out the cow poop!

While at the beach we visited a very neat Gardens area that had some awesome aviaries and natural zoo.

Judah was loving the camera that day!

We also took in a show at Medieval Times and the kids (and David and I) loved it!

Well, this concludes our summer blog post, but just a few pictures of the youngest, who is changing by the minute:

Yes this is a picture of water bottles in our fridge. I took it because I asked Annalise to put the water bottles in the fridge and she neatly arranged them all-I was impressed with my little 18 month old!

Yum-blackberries

The kids were playing firefighters-I think Annalise was the dalmatian since she has the firefighter hat and the dog headband!

Hi-yo

CAMPING

We had such a fun night a couple of days ago camping in our backyard-here are some pictures to tell the story:

So first you have to set up the tent:

Then you have to have dinner (hot dogs and s'mores) by the fire:

Then it's time for stories and flashlight fun:

Finish off the evening with a Scary Story:

And then it's off to bed! The best part about camping in the yard is that you can actually go inside to sleep. We let Amelia and Judah stay in the tent until 9:30, but they were ready to come in and sleep-they had been hearing bears walking around in the woods after all :)