Summertime catch up!

It has been a while! Life has been happy and busy for us and we are sending the girls back to school this week after a summer of swimming, playing, visiting and relaxing. Mia is so excited for 2nd grade to begin, I don't think she can stand it any longer. Ellie will be at Mia's old preschool, 5 mornings a week and I'm so happy to be able to walk them both to school and then have a little bit of time to get the house in order :)

Mia turned 7 on July 30 and had some friends celebrate with her at our local frozen yogurt shop. She does not like cake at the moment, so she had fun creating a huge yogurt sundae with all of the fixings. She became quite an accomplished swimmer this summer and her big achievement was reaching 48 inches so she could ride the "Loch Ness Monster" roller coaster at Busch Gardens.

Ellie has also become really brave in the water after weeks of swim lessons. She tried gymnastics this summer and wants to try dance in the fall. It is amazing to see her ride her little bike without training wheels and do all of these big kid things because to me she is still my sweet, cuddly, freckle faced little baby.

A few pictures below highlighting the end of school and the summer of 2014! Back to school, here we come!

First trip to the Outer Banks

I'm not sure how we have lived in Norfolk for a total of 8 years and haven't spent any time in the Outer Banks. It is an hour and a half away and everybody loves it there. We finally corrected that problem and drove down there over our Spring Break and had a wonderful time. We completely lucked out with 75 degree weather and clear skies for the 2 days we spent there. On our drive home it was pouring and there will be a 40 degree temperature drop tonight!  Anyway, we loved the beach of course, and crazy Mia even went in the water. We also loved Jockey's Ridge (I felt like we were in the Sahara), and the lovely lighthouses and the fishing pier (we saw someone catch skates, and sharks!) and the very cool Wright Brother's memorial. The highlight was seeing whales off of the fishing pier! We think it was a pod of pilot whales but it was simply incredible to see them come up and blow air out and then splash their tails!  We were standing next to a guy who said he'd been coming there for 15 years and had never seen that!  Unfortunately I did not get photos of that, but they were far enough away that they probably wouldn't have looked like much anyway.  Plenty more photos below. And time to plan another trip down there!

Ellie's Frozen Fourth Birthday!

Our baby is 4! She is such a kind-hearted, happy little girl, and like all kids in the world, she is obsessed with the movie Frozen. We had such a fun birthday weekend with Grandmas and cousins and friends. Now if only spring were here to stay!