These are the days of our lives

Real giraffe in zoo in Greenville

Here are some pictures of our activities over the past few weeks:

Toy giraffe in our "zoo" at home

Amelia working on school material

Visit with Cousin Anne from Missouri

Annalise amazed us all by taking her first steps while 7 months old!

Trip with our mommies group to Kings Mountain

And it's a perfect 10!!!

The Beach

Annalise's first trip to the beach!

We just returned from a much needed vacation at the beach. We were able spend our time with family-Nana and Pa and David's Uncle Don and Aunt Karen and their 4 children-Nolan (16), Nate (14), Annie (9), and Ellie (3). Jude loved wrestling with the big boys and playing trains with Ellie, and Amelia loved playing one-on-one with Annie. We spent most of our time at the beach or in the pool with visits to the aquarium and to Murrells Inlet for ice cream thrown in. It was fun, fun, FUN!

Mmmm-sand!

Making Annie a mermaid

Amelia, Annie, and Ariel

Nana as a mermaid

Kathleen's Visit

Of course we would not have one of the older cousins come for a visit and not the other, so we also enjoyed a week with Kathleen-the oldest who will be 11 next month.

4th of July Fun

Lesson learned-those sparkler sticks can still burn you even when the fire is out; so mom and dad know a thing or two since they told us not to touch those sticks!

Thanks for the bubble gun Uncle Josh.

Talking to the family at home

Annalise starting eating rice cereal during Beth's visit-so it was a fun activity to feed Annalise.

Fun at the waterpark

The visit ended with a family visit including Grammy and Scotty from Washington State.

Family

Our summer has been full of time with our family and we have been so thankful for everyone in our family and the relationships we have with them.

Amelia and cousin Sarah at Tangled ballet camp

Pa and Nana

 

Cousin Clark

Aunt Tricia

Best Friends

Great Grandma Hankie

Cousin Kathleen

Cousin Beth

Beth's visit

We have had my niece Elizabeth staying with us this week. Here's a taste of the fun we've had:

Beth found the biggest blueberry!

Found a box turtle in the yard-may be the one we rescued from the road a couple of weeks ago.

The cast of our rainy day plays.

Who knew Einstein was an artist!

Yum-rice cereal!

Teaching Amelia how to play Crazy Eights

And we still have tomorrow!

Cajun Country

Not everyone knows that my dad was raised in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and that his whole family still lives there. Growing up we made many 12 hour car trips to visit our family. We grew up eating oysters and crayfish (I never did eat the crayfish because they came to the table with their heads still on!) and lots of meals were flavored with creole seasoning. Recently my parents, the 3 kids, and I loaded up in the van and, yes, drove 12 hours to Baton Rouge to visit with the Crais side of the family.

Pitcher Plants-they eat insects!

After many hours in the car-we all needed a walk around the bayou. This is at a Sandhill Crane Refuge Center in Mississippi.

After 2 days of traveling we made it to Louisiana.

My dad and his mom-I call her Grammie!

Annalise meets her Great-Grammie.

We did a lot of swimming on the trip-Annalise was doing her Ethel Williams impersonation.

Aunt Suzanne and I at the waterpark with the kids.

Annalise meets her cousin, Jordyn. Jordyn is 1 month older than Annalise and is the daughter of my cousin, Angela.

Amelia with cousin Madison.

Judah with cousin Andon.

Since it was over 100 while we were in Louisiana-water was a necessary component of our activities.

One more visit with Great-Grammie and Great-PaPa.

No trip to Baton Rouge is complete without a visit to-yes, it's true-LSU (my dad's alma mater) to see Mike the tiger.

She may be wearing tiger ears, but she's a bulldog at heart.

We had a great trip. It was a long car ride for Annalise, but was well-worth it. We had a lot of good food,  great fun with cousins, and a special opportunity for the kids to meet their great-grandparents on my dad's side.