The girls were at Adventure Camp this week. The field trip for Wednesday was a Kane County Cougars baseball game, which neither of them was really that interested in going to. So, I let them stay home and we hung out. We went to Honey Jam for lunch while Daddy was golfing. The girls both got milkshakes!
We were bored at home, so decided to check out a new park near us. It's based on Route 66, so there are different areas representing different cities. It was a pretty neat park and the kids had fun.
The Willis Tower
The slide was SO fast - Morgan barely made it on her feet at the bottom - ha!
They had a splash pad area
This merry go round was crazy - I love Morgan's face!
The other day at karate Morgan told the teacher that she wanted to help teach the class! Well, Morgan is the lowest level belt for the class she was at (it's a black belt class). The teacher (her favorite - Ms. Loula), said she could lead the warm-ups. Morgan was so excited! She got up there in front of the class of people with belts mostly higher than hers and lead the warms-ups! Afterwards, Ms. Loula praised her for being so brave to even get up there to do that at her age and level. :)
So, I finally got around to going through all the stuff the kids brought home from school the last day. I found some really sweet stuff that Morgan's teacher had gifted the kids. She gave them each a little class picture in a frame, a clipboard with their names on it and a personalized sheet with some nice things about them! I love this!
The other day, I heard Milo rustling around and wondered what he was doing. He had just climbed in his crate to lay down and relax! He stayed in there for a while.
At night, Matt hangs out a little later than me downstairs before taking the dog out one last time. He says a lot of times he has to set his alarm on his phone to make sure he's awake to take Milo out. I went down to check on them the other night and this is what I saw... both of them crashed out! :)
The tooth fairy forgot to pick up Morgan's tooth the other night, so she left her a very long note telling her it was ok and asking for a Rainbow High doll instead of money and asking all sorts of other questions. :)
We got home from NC and went to pick up Milo. He had been at Dogtopia for boarding while we were gone. This was his first time staying away from home. The doggie daycare was full, so we were only able to get him a crate at night. They also have little suites where you can bring in their beds and they have more room. So, I was definitely nervous for him!
We brought him home and he was EXHAUSTED! He also had not eaten much of his food during the week while boarding. He seemed a little off, but we thought it was just being tired.
He had a grooming appointment and got all cleaned up. He always smells SOOOO bad after hanging out at the doggie daycare. It's like he rolls around in dog spit all day. Look at how pretty he is!
Then, he was really not feeling well and had diarrhea and eventually threw up. So, Matt took him to the vet. The vet checked him all out and did an x-ray. He said Milo did not have a virus, but may have been suffering from stress! Guess his stint in boarding set him over the edge. Ha! We don't really know what it was, but he was better soon after.
He is now SUPER clingy and wants to be wherever we are. Like literally, if we walk from one side of the kitchen to the other, he's following us and sitting on our feet. He is such a baby!
We celebrated my parents' 50th wedding anniversary with a family trip to Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina. It's about an hour north of Myrtle Beach. My parents rented a house a block off the beach and we all stayed together. We flew into Myrtle Beach and rented a mini-van to get us around.
The girls haven't flown in a while due to the pandemic, so they were pretty excited!
We were on the same flight as the Wilkens'. When we got to SC, we had to wait a little bit to get our rental cars. The kids were ready to hit the beach!
Of course, the kiddos all wanted to walk along the beach. They were all either in clothes or pajamas, which was definitely a mistake. I think all but Avery came back soaking wet!
Yep, that didn't take long!
On Monday, July 4th, we started off the day with some tablet time and breakfast.
The weather was iffy and raining over the ocean... which lead to this double rainbow.
That got all the kids outside with their tablets taking pictures!
My sister-in-law Sandi made t-shirts for everyone to wear on the 4th to celebrate my parents' 50th wedding anniversary. I thought they turned out great! We took some family pictures together before heading to the parade.
The parade was on the street a block over from us. The parade mostly included decorated golf carts and people walking. There seems to be a tradition of people shooting each other with super soakers from the golf carts and the sidelines. The people next to us had water guns and a huge bucket full of water. Ha!
Then, the storm rolled in and it started raining, lightning and thundering. Luckily the parade was almost over, so we headed back to the house.
We decided to check out the little museum down the street. We weren't expecting much, but it turned out to be super fun for all the kids!
This was a favorite spot. If you moved the sand around in the sandbox, the colors changed to show you how the water would flow. It was pretty cool.
There was also this wave maker that you could vary the size of the waves.
There was a room with a bunch of sea creature sculptures hanging that made you feel like you were under the sea.
Then, there was the room where you could hold little sea creatures. Morgan could have stayed in this room forever. She loved learning about the animals and holding them.
The museum had this area where you colored a picture of a fish, turtle, etc. and then scanned it in and your animal would show up in the aquarium on the wall. It was really neat!
Just as we were leaving, Morgan saw the microscope. So, we had to make a stop here.
Back at the house, the weather cleared up enough for the kids to swim. The pool was pretty small, but perfect size for the kids. Notice in this picture the two goofballs at the top left on the balcony... well, they aren't as innocent as you may think! Papa was filling up a bucket of water and dumping it on the kids! It took them a minute to figure out what was going on. Ha!
There was this baseball game on the wall of the little tiki bar area. You had to throw a ring attached to a string and get it to hook on the board on the wall. Morgan was determined to get this. Of course, it didn't take long. Here is the first time she got the ring on the hook... so excited! This was a favorite game of a few of the kids throughout the week.
Headstands in the pool!
Later that afternoon, we officially hit the beach. Avery and Calvin spent a lot of time burying Papa in the sand and building sand castles.
Morgan got a souvenir from the ocean. She somehow hit some rocks while swimming. I think she has a permanent scar from this! At least it's a good story.
We let Matt and Ross brave the waves and watch the kids. Because of the storms, there were rip tide warnings so we kept life jackets on the kids.
Here is the view of the backyard of our house and the neighbors. Everyone is really close together and a lot of the houses have similar small pools.
We were lucky that the fireworks were set off from the pier close to our house. So, we could just sit on our porch on the top floor and watch them. It was a really good show and the finally was pretty impressive.
The next day was gorgeous (and hot!), so we started off at the beach.
Papa didn't find anything exciting with the metal detector.
Later, we took a walk out on the pier while the Wilkens' went on a ropes course. We paid about $2 per person I think to walk to the end.
It was really hot, so we grabbed some frozen treats afterwards. They even had wine slushies for the adults (aka my mom and me!)
Once it cooled off, the girls and Nolan wanted to go play Putt Putt. We got there just in time! When we were leaving, the line was down the sidewalk to play.
All three of the kids got holes in one on this hole, so here they are doing a turkey dance. Ha!
Morgan lost TWO teeth during the week! They were both like molars and one on each side, so she had a rough time eating! We knew one was loose, but the other got a little help from a kick to the face!
The girls and I went shopping one day and we saw this wave... of course, they wanted to take a picture!
We just had to stop in the candy shop!
Back at the pool, the girls got the pool to themselves for a little bit. The boys had gone on a swamp boat tour.
Once they got back, we headed back to the beach. The waves were really big today!
We planned a big anniversary dinner for the adults one night, so the kiddos all got McDonald's.
Matt picked up a bunch of fresh seafood and some steak and cooked it all up for dinner. We had crab legs, tuna steak, halibut, shrimp and steak. It was delicious and nice to have a fancy dinner with the adults, while the kids played on their iPads of course.
The next day was our last morning in NC. We had to drive back to the airport and catch our flight around 1:00. We took one last walk to the beach. It was so hot and humid this day - there was even a heat advisory.
Here they are at the airport in their new sweatshirts! They were really sad to leave! It was such a fun time with their cousins and getting to play in the ocean for the first time. I really liked NC and hope we can make another trip back there soon! We're also so grateful to my parents for organizing this trip and renting the house for us all to stay together! Happy 50 years! :)
