Day 2 Outer Banks

Cade has been wanting to parasail for a year or two and this year his wish came true! Brett and Cade got to spend some father/son time 500 feet in the air. They LOVED it! Maddi isn't really into heights and I've already parasailed before, so the boys got to do it together. Here are the boys waiting to load the boat....it was very hot that day. Maddi, Emalyn and I did some shopping while the boys were parasailing and we were very thankful for the air conditioning inside the stores.


These pictures are from the photographer on the boat. They charge you $30 for the pictures and video or you can pay $20 to have an extra person ride the boat to take your pictures. They get your money one way or the other. Oh well.




This little baby LOVES the water. I think she will be part fish like her big brother, Cade. It's so fun how even tiny babies know to kick their legs when you pull them through the water.

Later that day we made our first trip to the beach, but I didn't get any pictures. We have LOTS of pictures from the next day at the beach. The water was crazy cold that day and there ended up being a bunch of jelly fish so we didn't stay too long. But the coolest part was that we saw probably 30-40 dolphins. It was AWESOME! Maddi was jumping up and down with excitement every time we'd see a new pod. We ended up seeing so many that she wasn't even crazy excited about it anymore. It was worth it to have jelly fish and cold water to be able to see so many dolphins, I think. Emalyn LOVED the ocean and the waves. She'd stiffen her whole body and squeal with delight as the waves would come in. Precious...


We finished off the day with a Birthday party for all the kids turning 1-17 in the next few months. Here they are lined up in order. Alex will be 17, Maddi will be 10 in October, Zoey will be 9 August 13th, Cade will be 8 August 12th, Grace will be 4 in October and Will will be 2 July 23rd. Emalyn was sleeping, but she'll be one November 6th. It was a fun birthday party and Texas Grammy and Grampa enjoyed getting to see the kids open their presents. They said it was much better than just mailing the gifts to the kids.

Todd, Becca and Will finishing dinner and enjoying cupcakes.

I was scooping the ice cream and the kids were eating cupcakes and giving me everyones order for ice cream flavor. It's funny, 3 the three of us all have the exact same color eyes.

One happy almost 8 year old boy opening his new Wii Mario Galaxy game.

One happy almost 10 year old girl opening her gift. Texas Grammy and Maddi picked out fabric and ribbons and jewels for a quilt back in December when they came to visit. Texas Grammy was hard at work back in Qatar and made the quilt. Maddi is in love with it. She did such a nice job.

Grampa, Maddi and Texas Grammy displaying the beautiful quilt. It's hard to tell from the picture, but Ellen did such a good job incorporating all the ribbons and embellishments that Maddi had picked out for the quilt.

I don't think I've met another kid who likes ice cream as much as this one...

...2.3 seconds later, the ice cream is finished. How can he not know his mouth is covered in chocolate? Boys...

Joel getting Will ready for bed and Grace is supervising.

After ice cream and presents, we broke out the glow sticks. We were all having way too much fun!

We had the most beautiful sunsets all week.

The misquitos were feasting on us so we moved our glow stick party inside. I scraped open one of the sticks and the girls were putting the "glow juice" on their legs making them polka dotted. Probably not great for the skin but it was fun!

Brett was playing around with the camera and we got some great pictures. This is my glow clock.

Rebecca was drawing a star shape in the air with a stick and the camera got it!

TG, Grampa, Maddi, Zoey and Becca were making a flower.

Cade spinning a circle around his finger. Someone said it was like a campfire inside without the smoke or bugs. Who knew glow sticks would provide hours of entertainment!?!