Vacation Part 3 - Hilton Head - THE BEACH!

The one big thing I wanted to do on vacation was go to the beach so Sara Kate could experience it.  Instead of going to the Tybe Island beaches (Georgia), Laura and Leslie like to go up to Hilton Head, South Carolina, which is just 30-45 minutes away.  We got up early Friday, got everything together, and headed to Hilton Head.  We made a quick stop by the outlet mall for hats and then it was on to the beach!  As mentioned in my last post about the pool, I am a total water person and I LOVE the beach.  We went on family vacations to Florida when I was a kid and I remember those trips so fondly.  I was so excited for Sara Kate to experience it!  She walked by herself all the way from the parking lot, down the long pier, and down a long stretch of sand until we found the right place to set up.  She was taking it all in while we got set up.

But man was she ready to hit that ocean!  And she LOVED it!!!!!!

 I just love seeing her so excited!

 

This by far might be one of my most favorite pictures EVER!  The look of pure joy on Sara Kate's face and Chris looking down at her with the waves around them...the entire image just melts my heart.

She really wanted to swim by herself like she did in the pool, but of course she couldn't.  But she loved us holding onto her and picking her up when the waves would crash.  We stayed in the water a while, with Chris and I taking turns holding her and 'swimming' with her, before heading back to the sand to play.  She got a cute little pink bucket and shovel set from Laura and Leslie for her birthday so it was fun that she got to use it for what it's meant for!  As evident from the sandbox play in Alabama, she loved played in the sand, too.  Thankfully she didn't try to dump it on her head this time, ha!!

 

This was Liam's first time to the beach too (kind of...they took a trip to San Diego this spring and took him to the beach but I don't think they got in the water or anything).  He had a wonderful time as well!

The tide was going out while we were there so the water was getting further and further out.  But Sara Kate would run from sand to water, from sand to water, with me chasing her around like a crazy person.  :-)  Eventually I just sat in the shallow water and we played in the wet sand with the water around us.  This is one of the last pictures I took, when she was headed back into the water.  Love it!

Our beach day wasn't nearly long enough for me (I could of stayed all day!) but we had 2 tired babies and it was past nap times so we packed up around 2:30.  The kids both fell asleep on our walk back to the car, although they had to be woken up to wash off the sand/salt in the hoses and to change clothes.  They both crashed on the way back to Laura's house!

The beach was a rousing success and next summer I definitely want to try and do the-week-long-vacation-at-the-beach-thing!

Next up, our last day in Savannah!

Vacation Part 2 - Savannah

On July 3 we left Alabama to head to Savannah, home of my very best friend since 7th grade.  The last time I saw her was in September of 2010, when she and Leslie came over to visit and meet Sara Kate.  Since then, they have a baby boy of their own (who will be 1 in less than a month) so it was past time for us to get over there!  It's 8 hours between my grandmother's and Laura's and we made really good time!  I think we got there by 4 pm.  We had a wonderful reunion and I was so happy to finally meet baby Liam.  He's too cute for words!  We hung out at their house Tuesday night and just relaxed.  Wednesday was the 4th of July and we had plans to go to a neighborhood pool of some of their friends and swim and cook out.  The weather was perfect for a pool day and Sara Kate had a BLAST!!

Happy 4th from the Michaels Family!

 The kids were ready to go!

 

 

Liam got pulled around in his little float and apparently, it's a sure fire way to get him to go to sleep!  So cute!

I'm going to brag right now and say that my kid is 2 years old and she can swim by herself.  After being in a big pool a total of 1 or 2 times last summer and 2 times so far this summer, she can swim by herself!!!  And she wants to!  'No no, mommy!  I do!'  I was a fish as a kid, taught myself to swim, and to this day I just love the water.  She obviously takes after her mama!

The big thing we did over and over again was she would jump off the side...

And swim to the ladder all by herself.  She did this over and over and over again!!  We'll have to get a video of her swimming because really, I am so proud of her!!

 

 We were at the pool for probably 3 hours or so before we went back to Laura's friends house to cook out.  The only way we could get Sara Kate to leave the pool was to bribe her with a popsicle, ha!!  And she didn't forget!  She walked straight into a house of people she didn't know, went right to the freezer and started saying 'Popsicle!  Popsicle!'  Thankfully they had some and were very kind.

She's such a rock star with her shades on, ha! :-)

 

 After an afternoon there, we headed back to Laura and Leslie's to hang out.  The kids had on cute little red, white, and blue outfits so we had to have a photo shoot.  You can't really tell in the pictures, but Sara Kate's shorts are red, white, and blue plaid.  I bought this outfit last summer at the OshKosh outlet, and at the time I thought it would be perfect for this year's 4th of July!

2 blue eyed cuties!

 Sara Kate thought she would take control...Liam's not too sure.

 Then Liam thought he would put the mack on...Sara Kate's not too sure. 

We spent the rest of the evening hanging out at Laura's house.  We didn't go see any fireworks, which was probably a good thing considering by dark we had 2 tired babies.  Plus, Sara Kate is scared of all things loud (hair drier, lawn mower, vacuum) so I didn't think she would really like fireworks this year.  We watched the 4th special from New York City...wow, those were awesome fire works!!  I think going to NYC to experience the 4th will go on my bucket list!  

Next up, THE BEACH!!!!!

Vacation Part 1 - Alabama

I have inadvertently taken an extended blogging break but it's for a good reason!!  We went on our first family vacation the first week of July!  And this past week between work catch up and Sara Kate's extremely late bed time, I was just too tired to do anything in the evenings.  We ended up several places on our vacation, which included Alabama to visit my grandmother and family, Savannah to visit my best friend, and Nashville to visit my brother.  I'll start with Alabama.

We left on Sunday, July 1, right after church to begin our 8 hour trek to Alabama.  Sara Kate did pretty well in the car, and we made decent time thanks to getting off I-40 between Little Rock and Memphis to avoid construction traffic!  If anyone is headed that way or headed this way from Memphis, do it!  Take Hwy 70 between Lonoke and Brinkley to avoid I-40 construction!!!  Ok, PSA over. :-)  I can't remember what time we made it to Decatur but it wasn't terribly late and it was in time for dinner.  My brother was able to take Monday off and came down to see us, which was wonderful.  Sara Kate was able to spend time with her cousin Sara (yes, they share a name, but as discussed in a previous Christmas post, Chris and I had our daughter's name picked out long ago, before cousin Sara was born), and they had a wonderful time together.  It was wonderful to see my grandmother and aunts and uncle, as well.

Monday we were going to go to the local splash pad but it was a little overcast so we went to a local park instead.  The park was so neat and the girls had a great time.  

 

 

 After the park, we went back to my grandmothers, had lunch, and the girls had naps.  Sara Kate was so tired but she wouldn't go to sleep without me sitting right beside her holding her hand.  So I got a little nap too. :-)  After naps, we had a little photo session...can't see family without doing one of those!

Love this picture!

 Don't worry Grandmom, we'll send you copies of this one!

Thought we might as well get a picture of Chris and I too!

 

We ate dinner and then we had to say goodbye to 'Uncle Pill,' as Sara Kate calls him.  But it wasn't goodbye for long since we were stopping back through Nashville on our return trip.  This picture is blurry but it's sweet and I love it.

We ended the day by letting the girls played in Sara's sand box, which of course was LOADS of fun and LOADS of mess for our 2 year old!

Sara Kate thought it was EXTREMELY fun to pour sand on head.

She did this over and over again.  She was so filthy and her hair was so caked with sand we decided to get the water hose out to hose her off and attempt to clean her!  She didn't like it at first but then when she got control of the hose, it was big fun!

 

We had a wonderful visit in Alabama, and we appreciate my grandmother letting us come over and stay.  

Next up, Savannah!!

This Week

This week Chris and I celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary on June 25.  Lucky number 7!!  

I had some beautiful flowers delivered to my office.  7 roses for 7 years.  They came from Northwest Arkansas Florist (awesome florist!!), which is the florist that did our wedding flowers.  Plus, I've never gotten flowers delivered to me before.  Very sweet.

We had a wonderful anniversary date that included diner and a movie.  A big thanks to Meme and Poppa for keeping Sara Kate.  Love you so much babe and I look forward to many many many more years together!

 

This week we went to school on our normal summer schedule.

This week we stayed home with daddy and did fun things like read books, do puzzles, color, and build block towers.

This week we had some fun times in the bath playing with a belated birthday present from Sara Kate's friends Carley and Evan from church.  Yep, that was fun to clean.

This week we ate some more delicious blackberries, this time in the form of a blackberry short cake.  YUM!!!

And this week we had lots of fun times with cousins, including fun at Meme & Poppa's, sprinkler fun, slip n slide fun, and Boingo Bounce fun!

 

 

 This kid is so serious!

 

 Finally a smile!!!

So that's what we've been up to this week!  What have you been up to?  Hope everyone is having a good weekend!