Hilton Head

After all of the crazy house projects in June, we were ready to get a way for a while. We love vacationing in Hilton Head and have found this little secret gem to stay in. You can see how motivated even Selah was to get packed up!

The kids couldn't wait to eat breakfast out by the beach. This place is special because we love the seclusion it brings.

Here is Lincoln's first time in the ocean!

A big to-do on our list was to get some gelato. Favorite flavor of all time - espresso (with mini chocolate chips)!

Like father - like son. Makes me happy.

This babe loved the beach just as much as the others. He was happy bouncing away in the shade while we played.

Selah wasn't a fan of the beach the first few days...she cried at the crabs, the sand, the shells, the tidal pools, and even the other people walking on the beach. (Note: she has always had an irrational fear of things floating in water, so the tidal pools brought lots of issues). But she finally came around and enjoyed playing in the sand.

Ari impresses me with his frisbee skills. That kid can throw...and catch.

In this area, the tide goes way out (several football fields long) and leaves tidal pools to play in. And when the tide comes in, the water still isn't too deep for the kids to swim in.

We did have to walk through some muddy parts to be able to walk way out on the sand bars.

Besides the beach, we also enjoyed the pool. Our days pretty much went like this: breakfast, beach, pool, lunch, naps, beach, pool, dinner, beach, and pool. And we did that for 7 days.

This little man did such a great job on vacation. We have taken all of our kids on vacations at this age and it has always worked well. He was big enough to be on a predictable schedule, but still small enough to nap wherever we were and not need to be in a bed.

Here the waves were coming in and the kids were enjoying jumping over them.

I have to do a double-take on this photo of Selah because she looks so much like Evangeline!

The kids enjoyed a morning walk before heading out to the beach.

The wild life is amazing and you could always spot a bird looking for its next meal. And not to mention the crabs. They were everywhere!

Oh and it wouldn't be much of a morning walk without visiting the "island".

What a fun climbing tree!

Our favorite restaurant here is the Skullcreek Boathouse. It was so sunny I don't think any of us could open our eyes :)

But this place has fun outdoor activities for kids while you wait for a seat (large jenga blocks, large lego blocks, and bean bag toss. We didn't have a wait at lunch so we played a little afterwards until we were dripping with sweat (and ready to go!)

Another place the kids always ask to go to is the Salty Dog Cafe. I miss the fresh seafood already!

AJ took the big kids up to the top of the lighthouse. The camera didn't work well so all the pictures turned out too bright and you can't see the background :-/

We walked around Harbor Town for a bit and even got some ice cream.

We made another trip to get gelato with my grandma.

And thanks to my mom, AJ and I were able to take a sunset walk on the beach after the other kids went to bed.

The kids really enjoyed having access to the beach and pool anytime of day. But sometimes we felt like a walking circus hauling all of our stuff and four kids out there. 

But once we made camp, it was totally worth it.

We were not ready for our vacation to be over, but at some point we had to get back home to reality.

We picnicked at the pool before driving home.

The kids did a fantastic job of being in the van for that long. And it didn't take long before they started talking about how they missed the beach already.

Fourth of July

We enjoyed our Fourth of July tradition again in Wheaton, Illinois visiting AJ's sister. The little town has many festivities over the weekend but we mainly look forward to the parade.

However it started out with loud fire engines and sirens so it woke Lincoln up and Evangeline didn't like it since she was already nervous about loud noises. (notice the earmuffs-she sleeps in them during storms even)

But it was still fun and the kids picked up lots of candy.

This year Erin took us to a new park and pool. It was nice to have a shallow pool with a zero entry that way all the kids could play on their own.

 But after a while they were cold and ready for some pizza.

This park had a zipline, how fun!

The kids requested to come back to this same park one more time before leaving so they could do the zipline again.

They also enjoyed this gigantic hill...walking up and running down over and over again.

And of course we had to get a cousin picture. They love hanging with Owen so much!

4 months {Lincoln}

Little man is getting so big these days. He still eats every four hours and usually wakes up once through the night. He did have 3 nights in a row of making it 12 hours, but then we went out of town for a weekend and it threw him for a loop and woke up EVERY hour. So...once we got back home I figured waking up once was fine for me. I'm sure he could go all night but that seems to be more work at the moment :) 

I was surprised to see that he dropped down from the 25 percentile to the 15 percentile, even though he gained 2 lbs since his last check up. He is a whopping 12 lbs 10 oz now :)

He also grew 2 inches in the last 2 months which is keeping him in the 75 percentile for length.

He still gives the greatest looks. Those eyebrows are all over the place.

And he absolutely loves to chew on his hand. What?! He is our first drool-er and also our first to suck on his fingers. Actually...you have to be careful getting too close otherwise he will grab you and stick you in his mouth! Anything goes. (I'm starting to wonder if this is just a preview of what is to come when he starts to crawl *sigh*).

He also loves to cuddle. He prefers to fall asleep in your arms then be transferred to bed. Also a first in our books. He will fall asleep in his car seat and every once in a while in the bouncer, but he definitely prefers to snuggle. But one thing he does when you go to lay him down is grab hold of your hand like a Chinese finger trap. And then holds it ransom for "ONE MILLION DOLLARS". :)

He is getting close to rolling over. And now when he is on the floor he spins around.

I think it's pretty safe to say that he is mostly blonde now. The back is still darker but we will see what happens over time. He seems pretty happy with his new look :)

life has been crazy

We decided to redo our shed back in May. The whole outside was rotted and the doors were falling apart. The project was much bigger than we anticipated (naturally) but with the help of some friends we were able to get it put back together. There are still things left to do on it but other projects came up and had to be addressed. So June quickly turned in to a month of emergency projects. *sigh*

We had a near fire in our dryer duct and since we have already cleaned it out and replaced a part on the dryer it was necessary to replace all of the duct work and the dryer. We went a week without a dryer and during that our dishwasher had been giving us issues as well. AJ had disassembled some of it to try and fix it but that didn't help so we also had to replace our dishwasher.

And of course replacing the duct work didn't come problem-free, but thankfully AJ was able to figure it all out. When our dryer was finally hooked up I was so behind on laundry and planned to catch up on it all the next day. Well the next day came and at 8 am Evangeline informed me that our downstairs toilet was clogged. So I got the plunger and got to work. It wasn't working very well then all of a sudden everything decided to overflow and spew out all over the floor, flooding our dining room, hallway closet, and bathroom. A half inch of standing water came in those rooms in about a minute. AHHH! Our plumber told us that a clogged sewer means any drain could make it come out again so we weren't able to use any of our other drains. What?! Then Ari came to inform me that our basement was wet. What?! So I went down there to find it RAINING sewer water from the bathroom above it. All over our new dryer, the floor, and all of the laundry I was supposed to be doing. Yikes. Evangeline kept saying "This is an emergency!!"

So I called my mom and she came to the rescue. She knew how to clean everything up (it took 7 hours) and it turns out that it was only a one time ordeal so we didn't need to pay for someone to come out and unclog our lines. Phew!!

So in between all of our crazy house ordeals, we managed to sneak in some fun things. AJ has been playing ultimate frisbee and we love to watch him play. We also went to the local Strawberry Festival where the kids got to explore inside a fire truck and ambulance.

They also got to sit in this sweet rumble seat!

We walked over to the playground instead of playing in the crazy bounce houses. Other kids scare me.

Then we were able to let the kids get inside the basket of a hot air balloon. So cool!

And of course this handsome man was along for the ride.

 I love his facial expressions.

We had some friends stay the night and Ari was so sweet with them that morning. He and the little boy were snuggling on the couch and Ari picked his clothes to match his friend's. So sweet.

We finally made it over to the splash park.

It took Selah some time to warm up to the idea but she finally enjoyed some of the smaller sprinklers.

The kids and I took a morning walk one day. This was my view.

And of course I had to put this in there because this is just part of our every day. :) Ok, so she's not normally this messy but enough to keep me busy every meal.

Somehow I was able to get out with some friends for dinner so AJ took the kids to a new park. This was the same day as our toilet flooding and the kids did so well with the whole thing that I told him they deserved something special. They discovered that McDonald's has free kids cones so that was super special.

By the end of all this we were so ready for vacation. June was absolutely crazy but we are so thankful that we had the resources we needed to get everything fixed up. June ended on a happy note with vacation in South Carolina. And that was a great ending to some pretty stressful weeks.