Beach Week!

 We have been in NC for the past week, enjoying good times with Chris' family in Sanford.  I am once again, behind on the blog so I will first backtrack and update on our week at the beach with the Haney side of the family.  We were so thankful to be able to use bro-in-law John's family beach house at Ocean Isle.  We had a great week together, enjoyed lots of nice beach time, yummy meals together and precious family time together.  I have so many photos I had trouble paring them down, but here are the highlights.

 Lucy is definitely the little star and has charmed us all with her big smiles.  She is changing so fast...has 4 new teeth, is crawling, loving Cheerios and starting to say a few words (we think).

 Lucy LOVED Campbell, Charlotte and John's sweet black lab.  She would sit next to her while Campbell patiently let her pull her ears and face.  We are pretty sure her first real word is "Daw" for dog.

 The boys had nightly story time with Bop on the porch.  Bop has an amazing ability to ad lib and come up with stories that keep the boys asking for more.  Here they are making silly faces during story time.

Aunt Emmy (aka Aunt Huggy Bear- all the aunts and uncles got nicknames from the boys this summer) patiently helped Bennett build many sand castles.  Bennett is a sand boy and could dig and build for hours.

 Austin on the other hand LOVED the water.  He is such a different boy from the last time we were here.  He was bold and loved getting tossed by the waves.  There was a bit of an undertow and we wanted an adult with him in the ocean, but he would have spent all day in the water if we let him.

 All the girls!

 Here is Bennett, as he was most of the week, with his frontloader digging and bulldozing away.

 Lucy and "Aunt Wonderful" sharing a laugh.

 Lucy liked the beach ok...she had fun in the little pool, would dig and play with the sand but got a little nervous when the tide came in and out.

 I thought this was such a cool picture though it is a little hard to see, but Uncle Huggy Bear (aka uncle Mark), Chris and Austin are playing baseball on the beach.  Austin is now a huge baseball fan.  He will seriously sit and watch an entire game - any team, though of course the Cardinals are his favorite.

 

Our favorite spot was late afternoon or evening at the end of the island where tide pools would form.  The boys would just LOVE it...even Bennett would stay in the water, swimming in the shallow pools, jumping and running and finding crabs and fish (including a dead fish Austin found and brought to show me).

 Uncle Seats (John) spent a lot of time with Austin in the water and delighted him to no end by throwing him up and catching him.  Love this picture.

 The Outlaw Inlaws band was together again for the week...bringing the guitar, mandolin and banjo together for some jamming on the porch.

 We had a birthday extravaganza, celebrating all the summer birthdays (Nana, Bop, Em, Char and John)...here we are all laughing about the well-chosen card Nana opened.  It showed "bottoms"...the favorite joke of many members of the family who shall go unnnamed.

The boys loved to be "helpful" in helping everyone open their gifts.