Living Life One Cheerio at a Time

I feel like I am drowning. Self pity, maybe? Overwhelmed, yes! Overwhelmed is not even the words to describe how I feel right now. Drowning is more like it. Its been a little over a week. It could be a combination of the reasons: * a little of post vacation blues * the craziness of  the hubs job [and some of his long hours] *a hubs in the middle of studying like a mad man for a certification for work *the 7th anniversary of the miscarriage of my first child *the fighting/arguing that the cheerio gang has engaged in *the clutter{in my house and my mind} *spending  the short quiet nap time to make phone calls to but getting no answers *trying to get activities lined up for the girls and not getting anywhere *less than a month before child #1 starts school *less than a month before I start school again (an endorsement for my teaching certificate that needs renewed) *a new opportunity/responsibilities for the CBS year wow that's some list! It was ...

One of our cool mornings we decided to do a little mini golf. REALLY what's vacation without some mini golf. We decided on the Dinosaur themed course. The boys (2 papas, hubs and little man) and the girls (2 Mimi's, me, child#1 and pooh bear) split ways and did the different courses. The little girls did really well. Child #1 was W.I.L.D last year. Hitting the ball like it was a baseball bat, but this year she had a lot more finesse in her swing. And really not taking that much to get it in the hole. Pooh bear figured out if she walked her ball and laid it about an inch away from the hole than she could easily put it in and say "I won!" The hubs had the camera so this is a pictorial on how little man did.  Apparently he thought he needed to flip it in. Hubs said he did this for quite a few holes.  Well the final hole came and the winner was New house Mimi for the girls and Hubs for the boys. Hubs was the overall winner! We couldn't have had a bette...

The house in the far left corner of the picture is the house we stayed in...oh yea...we were that close! Hubs and child #1 worked on that sand castle for quite awhile in the morning, but by evening the water had washed it away. We also brought kites for the kids to fly on the beach in the evening. Lots of fun enjoying our vacation!

We purposely chose an out of the way location for this vacation. We wanted to relax. We wanted to be able to enjoy what was around us~the beach and not get caught up in the hubbub of  more commercialized areas. Although we also planned to take some day trips just to break up some of the HOT days! North Carolina Aquarium {free with our current zoo pass~hooray!} Hatteras Lighthouse-didn't climb because at 9 am it was like 95 degrees in that thing! Bodie Island lighthouse my kids are sitting at the base of the lighthouse Wright Brothers Memorial and Kite show Child #1 did 2 programs and became a junior park ranger with a badge and everything. I didn't take any pictures of our first museum excursion. We went to the Confederacy Museum in Richmond and mark and I got kicked out because of "noisy" children. So much for that one....first time getting encouraged to leave...check!

well all my kids' birthdays are all within 3 weeks of each other. SO, the usual plan is for them to have one big grandparent birthday party. But this year we did things a lot different. We gave child #1 her own friend birthday party and we were going to be on vacation during the babies birthdays. So we told the grandparents that the party would be in North Carolina and pack accordingly. The grandparents did a great job thinking up traveling/beach gifts. We let them open their presents from the grandparents moments before we left so they would have something in the cars to do (IE: videos, books, coloring books and travel toys and sand buckets for the final destination) As the parents we decided that the kids gifts could be opened a week early so they could get some playing time in before the big trip. Here are a few pictures of the birthday parties, including the peanut dairy free $$ cake I made at the beach. OH the anticipation! Yes, I got them all 3 jamies to take on the ...

So although we had a house and we tried to be on schedule it didn't always work. Child #1 and little man shared a room and pooh bear had her own. Reasoning was that pooh bear takes F.O.R.E.V.A.H to fall asleep and thus likes to sleep in late. Usually little man falls asleep rather quickly and the we could sneak child #1 in who also falls asleep quickly in to the room and viola bedtime as usual. WRONG! The dynamic duo didn't want to sleep and wanted to wake up EARLY. And Pooh bear well she  was even louder than usual and went to sleep even later and woke up when her brother started screaming  child #1's name. Made for an interesting week of lack of sleep. Granted it was H.O.T. and it wasn't their usual surroundings maybe that's why we found little man like this on several occasions:  This was the first of many occurrences. He also like to take out his mattress and throw it on the floor.  nap time was lacking...sleepy at 6:30 This week they've been...

pooh Bear's first time at the beach Little man is just not sure about his first time at the beach I took 100 steps from the beach to the drive way. That's how far our rental house was from the beach on the Outer Banks. From the house you could hear the waves crashing! Wonderful!  Nine of us just spent the last 9 days traveling to and enjoying paradise! Its always an adventure with 3 little ones, but we had the Mimi and papas (new house and sticker) along for the beach vacation. We all stayed in one house. Which is nice for the little ones who still nap in the mid-day. Lots of pictures coming of all our adventures!