Pool Time

I mentioned in an earlier post about meeting up with friends from church while we were in North Carolina, they were the ones who had suggested it would be a good place for us to vacation and boy were they right. On the day we finally got to meet up with them, the big boys went parasailing while I stayed behind with the girls and enjoyed some pool time. The girls had a blast! Kate, I'll call 'St Kate', played and played and played some more with them while I visited with her twin sister Beth. I would have visited with Kate too but she was otherwise occupied with a whole slew of short people! haha. After playing with Kate all afternoon, my kids didn't want to go home w/ their mama!

Beth & Kate - thanks so much for such an enjoyable afternoon! We had such a good time. And St Kate - I've never, ever seen anyone let kids crawl all over them like you did. Goodness, patience is your virtue!

Vacation - Colonial Williamsburg

With Ryan having the goal of visiting all 50 state capitols, it's really pushed me out of my 'comfort zone' on the whole vacation thing because we are now traveling to areas where we really know nothing about. Last year's trip to Michigan was WONDERFUL! This years trip to the Outer Banks was as well! I highly recommend Michigan and the Outer Banks area of North Carolina for a great vacation destination. But being the type that likes to get as much in as I can (my family refers to me as 'Force Marching' them when we are on vacation), I've tried to plan our vacations such that we can get in at least two state capitols while we're away. On this trip we were able to visit the capitols in both Raleigh, NC as well as Richmond, VA.

With that said, I had the great idea of also visiting Colonial Williamsburg while we were in Virginia. Not that I'd head a lot about it, but what I had heard was good - and it probably is for some folks, but it was really not a Hunter family thing at all. Now, it probably could have been had it not been so blasted hot that day and had it been the primary reason we were in Virgina, but in our case it just wasn't a good fit. For one it was just way more expensvie than I had anticipated. There were some other preconceived ideas too that just weren't quite right too - but maybe we can go back sometime when the girls are older and it's not so hot and humid.

So, for pictures from Colonial Williamsburg - this is the best I can do :-) I'm thinking I should have made a run for it while I could! Just kidding, just kidding!

Ryan's Favorite Part of Vacation!

The highlight of Ryan's trip was getting to go parasailing! Before we left we had made plans to get together with some friends of ours who were vacationing in the same area as us. That's pretty bad to have to go 12 hours away from home to catch up with friends, but that was the plan. The boys wanted to go parasailing and I wanted to visit with the moms. Long story short, we were surprised to find out that the boys were treated to the outing by our friends' brother. Isn't that just the nicest and kindest thing ever?! Ryan was so tickled and thankful?! As was I!

Sail Boat Time

My mom and her husband drove all the way from Oklahoma to spend some time with us in Virginia before we headed back home. That's just got to be one long drive!!! Their first evening there we went on a sailboat tour along the river in York, VA and it was so relaxing and pretty! Of course it was just that much better by having my mom along!





The girls were invited to "help" with the sails & Rebecca was the first one to say yes while Emma wasn't so sure she wanted to, that is - until we were praising Bex & taking pictures ... then someone else wanted in on the action too!

Cape Hatteras Lighthouse

We also visited the Cape Hatteras lighthouse while we were on vacation, which is the tallest in the nation. There are 268 cast iron steps to the top ... 267 more than I wanted to make, but Ryan & Emma scooted right up to the top while the other 3 of us checked out the visitor's center! The lady taking the money looked at Emma a little skeptically and said you had to be a certain height to climb to the top. Emma went over to the measuring stick and stretched her little bones best she could to show that she was plenty tall enough. Ha! The lady still didn't act like she thought Emma could make it, but we assured her that she was more than able. Which of course she was!





The park ranger was nice enough to take their picture at the top!

Dolphins, Dolphins, Dolphins!

A trip to the beach just wouldn't be complete without an outing to watch the dolphins! This trip was no different, except when we did these things in FL it was always on a big ol' boat, this time we were on a pontoon and were in the company of a very nice & good with kids marine biologist. Well worth the trip! She took the time to explain all kinds of things to the kids and even let the help her as she was gathering data on the temperature, water temperature, salinity of the water, etc. Good times!

Wright Brothers National Memorial

We stayed really close to the Wright Brothers National Memorial while we were in North Carolina and were able to spend some time there. It was so interesting reading about their inventions and their trials.

My Favorite Beach Shots

Raleigh North Carolina

In addition to meeting up with Rebecca's friend from China, our trip to North Carolina included having dinner with my 5th grade boyfriend, his lovely wife and BEAUTIFUL daughter. His wife was a former classmate too so we had lots of fun talking about some of our antics in Physics class and just a good time catching up. Dwight enjoyed telling my children that he was my old boyfriend and that I had broken up with him. Of course I had to add that it took him about 2.3 seconds to ask my best friend out. Now how is that for just plain ol' funny?

Then it was on to Raleigh to visit number 12 on our list of Capitols. I'm a little on the OCD side when it comes to scheduling things so I had us down to visit the Capitol at 11, which their website had listed as a tour time and then had it planned so that we would be at the beach right at check-in time. Well, the website was wrong-ola and we had to wait around until 1 for the capitol building to open and the tour wasn't until 2 so we just did a self tour thing. While killing time waiting for it to open we were able to walk around the downtown area, have a snow cone and visit the North Carolina history museum. I would really like to go back to Raleigh again so we could see more of the area, it looked very pretty!

Starfish Friend Reunion

Our vacation started out in the coolest kind of way, we were able to meet up with the family who adopted the little girl named Jade from the Starfish Home. She and Emma are very close to the same age and I think were the two oldest children at the home. The girls didn't seem to remember each other at first but in no time were back to being the best of buddies!

Virginia & North Carolina

We've added two more Capitol's to our list! Raleigh, NC & Richmond, VA. Still a lot more to go ...

We Really Should Get Out More

We've been on vacation this past week and just couldn't find the time to blog while we were away.

As far as this picture, the girls amused themselves with the peepholes in the hotel room ... one on was up high and the other down low. That's how we amuse and entertain our children - with peep holes. We really should get out more!

Beach Babes

Enjoying the Outer Banks with the kiddos!!!

Sparklers for Rebecca

My last note on fireworks, I promise :-)

Fireworks

We really splurged this year, we went across the river and bought fireworks. Now I'm not so sure I completely understand why we had to drive across the riva' but apparently IN fireworks are better than KY ones??? Someone please 'splain that to me.

The kids had a blast, this was Ryan's first year to do some of the bigger kid things like bottle rockets and he's hooked! The girls were content with their sparlers and watching some other things that Ryan had picked out for them.

We enjoyed some at home and then on then also had a get together with some friends on Sunday. Lots and lots o' fun. Pictures from there coming soon, maybe! After downloading to my pc, it would appear I did more visiting than picture taking!

Sprinkler Fun

After hanging out and burning up at the ol' time 4th of July celebration the other day, we headed home and setup the sprinkler for them. They had a blast!