Wednesday, June 15, 2016

Caroline's baptism

Caroline has been looking forward to her baptism for A LONG TIME. In January she had a school assignment to write down some resolutions for 2016 and she wrote that being baptized was her most important goal. What a great example!

One of her besties, R., turned eight the day after Caroline, so they got baptized at the same time. All four of their sets of grandparents live in Utah and ALL FOUR of them came out for the baptism. AND Care Bear had a bonus Great-Grandma Cuca in from Texas. I'm so grateful that family came from far and wide to share this special day with us!

C and I went out a few weeks before her baptism to do a photo shoot in her baptism dress.








She was a great little model for me!
This last photo was my favorite one,
but that streak of sunlight on her arm bugged me.
I spent HOURS trying to edit it to make it look natural.
And then we I actually dropped it into the invitation template,
her arm didn't fit in the frame.
Ha!

R's mom, Jessica, and I worked together
to put together the program.
We had GREAT support from our ward family.
And Caroline invited several friends of other faiths
and five of them came, too.
We felt very loved!

Two cuties, ready to be baptized! 

Grateful for the priesthood and that 
Andrew could baptize her.

Lots of love for Caroline. 


 
Two freshly baptized girls!

They love pandas! :)

Sunday, June 12, 2016

Birthday at the Beach

When both sets of grandparents AND great-grandma Cuca are in town, 
what do we plan to do?
Head to the beach!
We had a glorious long weekend at Carolina Beach.

We stayed in the left half of this house, A Deck Above.

It was PERFECT for us. Plenty of room for everyone.

We started planning this vacation months ago, and I'm all about taking kids out of school for family time.  Unfortunately, Brandon's high school does not agree with my sentiment. If you miss more than FOUR DAYS in the semester, you have to make up the time you missed, staying after school or coming in on a SATURDAY. Seriously? Boo on that. He was sick several times this year (I blame early morning seminary) and had already exceeded his four absences.

So, I booked the house from a Thurs-Tues. However, Brandon and I had to stay behind so he could go to school on Friday (at least half the day) and we had to come home Monday evening, so he could be here for school on Tuesday. (Monday was a holiday). It still felt like a wonderful break, but I wish B and I could have been there the whole time.

Everyone else had beautiful beach weather on Friday.
Care Bear was excited to boogie board.

And she did awesome!
When you're that light, the waves can really take you!

B and I arrived late Fri afternoon.

Oh, how the beach makes my soul smile!


Everyone else was already done for the day, 
but Andrew came down with me to boogie board
for a little while. So fun!

We went out to dinner that night at The Deck House,
our favorite seafood restaurant.



Crab legs!!

On Saturday, we enjoyed another FABULOUS
day at the beach. A tropical storm was coming through.
The waves were bigger and more powerful than I've
ever seen at Carolina Beach.
And when it started raining in the early afternoon,
we ran back to our house.
But it was a beautiful morning in the sand and sun!


Shell/mussel hunting with Gigi

Hopscotch with Grandma S


The little boys from the family next to us wanted to
hang out with Brandon. He's so good with kids.

That night was Caroline's birthday.
She planned out the menu for her birthday dinner:
Steak, rolls, twinkies (which we forgot),
potato wedges, cheetos puffs, and strawberry fanta.
Gigi also made a scrumptious fruit salad to go with it.

In her happy place--with steak grilling on the patio!

A table for ten. Loved it!
Dinner was a hit!

Then cake and presents.


She got a chalk bag for climbing and a certificate for another horse ride.

After dinner, she wanted to go fly kites at the beach.
She is such a fun girl!



She even took a turn flying our fun two-stringed kite.
She did pretty well!


As much as her daddy wishes she would stay little,
this girl is growing up! She is such a happy, smiley,
easy-to-get-along-with girl. We LOVE her.

On Sunday, we went to church,
took naps, and played games.

The funniest ones were an LDS Headbands game where
every other answer was "John the Baptist." The girls and I
laughed and laughed at that one. We also had fun playing
One Night Ultimate Werewolf.
We are not very good liars. :)

That evening, I talked everyone into heading down 
to the beach for family portraits.

It's so rare that we're with both sets of grandparents.
Love it!!

Wish we would have a little more blue sky.
But still... we're at the beach! :)

When we first got there, there was a beautiful rainbow.
But I couldn't figure out how to fit all of us AND 
the rainbow in the pics. :)

If you look REALLY close, you can 
see it above Andrew's head in this one.

And then the kids humored me with
their jumping and stunts.
So fun.






She called this her "majestic unicorn"

B can front flip and land it in the sand!





Not sure what was going on here...

And on Monday, we had one more day to soak up the sun.
So fun to see both sets of grandparents
happily married after all these years.

Grateful for their examples.







I bought this awesome little "surf hopper" ball that
bounces on the water. We had a lot of fun with that.
Andrew's just about ready to catch it in this pic.

We tried to stop at Britt's donuts...
the line was too long.
We gave up.





After our beach time on Monday,
we headed to Squiggley's for some yummy, yummy ice cream.
The line was also long there.
But we didn't give up. :)

After all that fun, Brandon, Whitney, Grandma Cuca and I
headed home. (Darn school responsibilities!)
Care Bear stayed with her daddy and grandparents one
more night before they headed home, too.
Lots of fun memories!