OBX

This year we booked our beach house back in November. We got a beautiful house that was huge. It even had an elevator that proved to be very helpful with groceries and moving in and out. We had great easy access to the beach and great views. We went on many walks on the beach and swims in the pool. We celebrated Tom's birthday with a little luau.

We kept the kids busy with crafts and projects like decorating their treasure chests, making bottle cap necklaces, and coloring sand for bottles, and Jeremy's favorite project was making a seashell museum.

Down on the beach we flew kites, went skim boarding, and body boarding, buried people in the sand (Sarah loved this), made sand art, played scavenger hunts, and raced after the frisbee by rolling or crab walking or cartwheels.

We took family pictures on the beach on a very hot morning and we got to see dolphins jumping in the waves while we were snapping pics. We also played lots of games at the house like apples to apples and bananagrams and had fun playing pool with the table that was in the house.

Richard and Tom took a little trip one day with the older kids across the ferry to the next island. They had a very long wait for the ferry and once they were across they stopped at the beach to play. I don't think they were there very long before Richard tried to skim board and he fell and jammed his wedding ring finger into the sand. After watching it get bigger and turn darker and darker for about 24 hours Richard and Tom went to the ER to have his wedding ring cut in two and his finger splinted. He spent the next day drugged and the rest of the week a little subdued.

On the way home we stopped before we even got to the mainland to tour the local aquarium. It was quite cool seeing the sharks. On the way down we left early and drove straight through all day. On the way home we left late and we drove half way and stopped for the night. The hotel we stayed in was nice and the kids really enjoyed it.

Lots of crafts and fun.

Shots of Rachel during the week.

I had a hard time choosing which pictures to use for Hannah since she was in almost every picture. If anything was going on she was there and having lots of fun.

Jeremy had his moments where he was grumpy but on the whole he had a great time. He really liked just hanging out at the house so I did have to force him to go down to the beach a few times. It's a rough life as a six year old.

Sarah had a great time at the beach. She loved being buried in the sand but she was not a fan of the water. Gook (Luke) was her buddy all week. She loved pestering him. For months after this trip she has been asking to go to the beach.