First Time Skating!

Sophia, "I want to skate, but not fall on my bottom!"

Santa Visit!

SJ was not a fan. He was fine until I sat him on Santa's lap.
Sophia jumped up on his lap, then Sophia loudly said, "hello. My name Sophia. I want a princess kitchen." She looked up at him as if to say, ok we are done here! Posed for the picture. Hopped down. She said, "Bye. Merry Christmas." We moved on to the train!
SJ thought the train was super cool...

Christmas Eagle?

I joking said to Sophia we needed to decorate our eagle...well, she thought so too. Santa Eagle! It's a dog costume...fits like a glove. Cracks us up.
Merry Christmas!

Snuggle Weather...

Sigh. It was hard to get out of the bed...when you have a snuggle bug in the bed with you. Far worse than bed bugs to get rid of! :)

Sunday...

We made our hand prints, & kids feet print, in the new section of sidewalk. It did not go smoothly. :) Soso was all about shoving leaves and pinecones into it. Hands, not so much. This was a tranquil BEFORE photo.

Georgia Game

We are in Athens at the Hester home for the weekend! Soso is hanging with her buddy Bebe and having a blast. We are going to tailgate then the game. Beautiful day for football! War eagle!!

Afternoon At The Beach

We shopped.

We ate.

We hit the beach.

Most of our toes in the sand
We walked along the pass to get out
to the main beach.
There were kids on skim boards that
entertained us for a while.

I was walking behind looking for shells. Soso following in her daddy's footprints

Moon over dune

SJ, aka the wanderer, enjoyed
the daddy shoulder tour for a while

My Sophia
happy in the sand.

Not always happy with the camera.

Steve pointing out a crab hole in the sand.
SJ immediately stuck his entire arm into it!

The boy has no fear.

Sophia cautiously listened...

Beach sentinel

SJ chased him...and that's a BIG bird.

We enjoyed the sunset until the last ray peeked out

from behind the clouds.
We were the only ones left on the beach.

Well, until the blue angels did a fly over!!

I had put away my camera...

yep.

Blue angels.

Right there above us.

I'm pretty sure they don't fly that low normally.

It was as if we could touch them.

No mistaking the planes.

No camera.

Ugh.

This is the only photo of the fly over...
it's now more like a fly way out over the ocean
after they turned around at the pass.
Click and zoom in, maybe squint.
Sigh.

File this photo with the Florida bear sighting one!
It was a great end to the day!

Sunday Morning Stroll

While I got dressed, Steve took the kids

for a walk to the end of the RV Park.

It's a small place, no fear.

At the end though is a great dock on the bay! SJ watching the grass move...
Swing by the office...

Steve has taught them to check out the water,
all the critters and creatures!

We went for a quick breakfast at the waffle house.

THEN HIT THE BEACH!

Shoe removal at the truck was mandatory!
There will be no shoe-ed foot on my watch!
Here the kids were funny walking in
the parking lot.

If you could read his mind,
"Crap. It's those Kennedy bird chasing kids."

Love this picture.
SJ took to the sand without hesitation!
He was giggling and squealing...

running!

Welcome to the family...

we speak beach.

Steve stopped to hold the sand down.
SJ joined him for a brief second.

I'm not really sure what she's doing.
I'd like to think she's whispering

a little thank you prayer
for the wonderful sand, blue skies,
and ocean waves.

SJ saying GET UP!
GET UP!

We saw the wedding party the day before in the parking
lot as we drove by...we found their petals in the sand!

It was weird because I called Steve after passing by,
"DID YOU SEE THAT!?!?"
SK, "Yea. A bride."
Me, "NO. THE LIVE TIGER!"

SK, "Oh. I thought it was a stuffed animal!?"

So, if you were in or attended the wedding

on the beach Saturday...
what's up with the live baby tiger?

Sophia playing landslide with Daddy.
SJ slid off too, because he could.

See ya suckers! Sophia in the tracks of the beach patrol truck

I turned around,
Sophia lying in the sand.
"Momma! Sand angel!"
I had to smile.
Where does she get this stuff?

SJ as we were leaving,
decided no.
He wasn't leaving.

He wandered a little further
in the opposite direction!
I let him go to see how far until
he turn around...
yep.
if I had not chased after him,
I believe little man would still be walking!

Gotcha!

The truck didn't make it out of the parking

lot of the beach access before SJ was out napping.

We made it across the bridge.

To the turn north, I lost Sophia.

Steve held out as long as he could...but zonked.

Heavy snoring all around.

Lightweights.

I had a few minutes of shopping to myself at the outlets!

I left everybody in the truck sleeping!

No worries, I cracked the windows.

Left a bowl of water...

Gulf Shores State Park Pier

On our drive home from Texas...we took a side trip.

Not that we needed a reason...

but the thinking was to catch the Bama/LSU game.

If we drove straight home, we'd never make kickoff.

After a family meeting at the Alabama welcome center,

we headed to the beach to set up!

Also, we hadn't had sand in the toes for awhile...

We decided on Perdido Key.

BUT our first stop as we were getting close to the RV park,

Gulf Shores pier.
Sophia got a kick out of the sea turtle statue!

Come on guys!
Sophia the leader.
As I looked over the side of the pier...
I noticed the wind pattern in the sand.
Looked like animal print to me.

Speaking of animal...
Sophia was so excited to be at the beach.
And probably glad to be out of the truck.

She was crazy running around.

SJ fighting the cool baby shades
we want him to wear to protect his eyes.
They are polarized too...

help see the fish in the water.

The sun was getting low.
I want to say it was about 4pm?

Along the walk out on the pier,
there were informational signs.
SJ had to stop and look at each one.
Sophia was giving him the cliff notes version,
"SJ. Fish. Fish. Fish. More Fish."

so he hurry it up and move on!
Amazing how they take on our personalities.

His long blonde hair blowing in the gulf breeze!
Kinda looks like a bad toupee!

Sophia on the same bench.

We walked all the way out to the end.

Saw what people were catching.
Not much, it was "too windy"

according to one fisherman as he was leaving.

Saw a TON of jellyfish.

Sophia playing, "STOP!" and "GO!"
with Steve on the walk back to the vehicles.
SJ was cackling.

The one nice thing about our vehicles...
we never have to guess where we parked
in ANY parking lot.

Ever.

Halloween 2011

Sorry I'm a little late with the Halloween...

Here are the photos from the Monday night

trick or treating that we

did in Conroe, Texas,

SJ was Blu from the movie "Rio"...

He loves to dance to the music.

So after un fruitful searching.

I ended up making his costume.

I made Sophia's too...
I didn't like the off rack Jesse costume.
(The hat and boots are from Disney store)
Blu flying from his first house!
This is his first time walking trick or treating!

Steve and I took turns taking the kids to the doors.
Some of the houses had lawn chairs set up
at the end of the driveway!
Almost all of the houses were decorated.

(Thank you Aunt Amy for the Strawberry Shortcake bag!) This was an odd sight.
There was a lady with a pony,
which was dressed as a ninja turtle,

walking through the neighborhood.

Sophia eventually touched its nose.

Jesse doing the tired ear tug.
Soso helped me with the buttons.
She also had input on the design...
sometimes unsolicited!

Daddy's turn!
After several practice rounds of you say

"trick or treat" to the person with candy

walking between houses,

right in the moment of facing

the candy giver, Sophia would freeze!

Finally, she started saying what Jesse would
say to someone:
with hat tip and very loud,
"YEEEHAW!"

Most people laughed and got it.
Ahhhhh...my Sophia.

She thought this was cool...from a safe distance.

Back in the bus assessing the loot!
She was quite impressed with this holiday.

Poor Blu was tiiiiiiiired and didn't
get to see the fruits of his labors
until the next morning!