Letter of the Week - A

We had a great time with the letter A. Our painting project was stamping with apples.

We also made a list of A words, said "Aloha" when Daddy came home and left for work, traced the letter A, connected the dots to make an apple, and L even wrote the letter A all by himself and on his own initiative! I was so excited!

Crafty

So I finished some more mei tais, and the boys wanted to - ahem - test the weight limit on them for me. Let's see. At last weigh in L was 33 lbs and M was 30 lbs. Yeah, that is not a typo. This is how you normally wear them (keep in mind how big and long my 4 year old is!)...

And this is how M likes to hang!

This absolutely cracks me up. M is just a tad bit chunky - after all, the carriers are the same size. No, really, he was snug and comfy, and I let a bit of the material slide under him because he likes his arms free (when they're not tightly wrapped around me, that is). He pitched a fit when our "test" was over and I put him down.

No Words Necessary

Homeward Bound

What a catch!

And now you've gotten caught up with Christmas! I spread it out intentionally, because my Todo list was pretty lengthy, and I wanted to know the blog was taken care of for a good long while, plus I love seeing pictures of the beach!

Our ride home was smooth, and we made the drive straight through.

Built for the Sand

Beach baby, beach baby... that old song runs through my head as I look at these! It was a gorgeous day, but even though it was in the low 80's (yes, these were taken at New Years), the water was cold! True to kids everywhere, M did NOT care. Well, sort of. He would lower himself into the water, and shout "Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh!" with a smile on his face and wouldn't stop till he'd stood up again! He wanted to swim so badly, but can't yet, so he'd just keep squating down low in the water and splashing with wild abandon!

Oh, and here's the spider we found (gosh, we used to walk into these all the time camping as kids). I looked it up and it's one of the Orb Web spiders. Fun, huh?

Our New Home...

I'm going to let the photos speak for themselves, but just a few quick explanations: we went over to an island at sunset. We built a driftwood campfire, ordered pizza for dinner, had an awesome time, set off some fireworks, and gazed at the stars on the ride back to the dock.

Everyone really enjoyed the evening so much. When it was time to go, L declared, "I wanna live on the island." And then he started explaining to me how we could get a house there, and sleep there, and on and on and on!

Our first solo family boat trip

With Pappy's blessing (of course), we went out on the boat by ourselves for the first time! Here's the island we went to...

And the boat...

Me and M (sometimes I can get some great self-portraits, can't I?)! Like my new hat? I love, love, love it! Saltwater cowgirl!

Ah, the beauty of boating. Cuddles. Dolphins. The ability to leave the wheel and take a picture of your wife and children.

I mentioned the dolphins, didn't I? They were everywhere. En mass. And the pelicans were thrilled, as the that means better fishing for them. We saw them every single time we went to the water. It was great!

Christmas Afternoon

So Christmas afternoon brought some more family to see us! Grannie wasn't feeling well, and we were sad that she didn't make it. Let's see, who came? Gram & Grampy (great-grandparents), Flip (my uncle), cousin Matt, and cousin Amanda with her husband Jamie and their daughter Aria (and mystery baby on the way). The weather was awesome - see?!

Flip with his grandaughter, Aria.

And after everyone headed home, we had some more fun on our own!

Watching "Lego game" (Indiana Jones).

And here I am on my way to Orlando (all by myself) the next Saturday to see Becca and try on bridesmaid dresses with her sister. Course we're both brides matrons, so we had a good laugh about unpredictably of the size of married women four months down the road. We picked out some pretty dresses, and I'm really looking forward to standing with my friend while she marries such a sweet guy in the spring (he reminds me of my own hubby, so I totally approve)! After that I went and had lunch with my best friend from high school, who lives in Orlando! It was such a fun day!

Okay. After this I have a bunch of beachy, fun pictures to share, and then it's back to what's going on around here!