St. George, Florida

October 6, 2012 posted by Shara

Thanks to my sneaky blog posting, you may not even know that last week we were on vacation!! We headed down to St. George Island on the panhandle of Florida for a week at the beach with Sue Sue and Papaw, and his parents, Granna and PawPaw.

The weather started out rainy, but it turns out that a couple of days cooped up in the house actually did us good! It gave us plenty of time for puzzles, reading, and indoor swimming!

Jayna loved playing “Guess Who” and “Memory” with Sue Sue….especially since it was a glass table!! {cheater!}

The house was beautiful…four stories with five bedrooms-each with it’s own balcony. We spent most of our time on the main porch off the living room. Fantastic views of the ocean! And a great place to make {and enjoy} some homemade ice cream….

We made a few trips to eat and shop in downtown St. George as well as neighboring Apalachicola.

Dave and I had a date night one night and ended up at a karaoke bar named Tamara’s. I’m just kicking myself for not having my camera {and Dave wouldn’t let me use my phone!}…because Tamara’s apparently is THE place to be on a Friday night! There was karaoke. There was line dancing. There was everybody in the whole stinkin’ town!

It. Was. Awesome.

But….I don’t have any pictures of the shin dig. But there was plenty of dancing the rest of the week!

And yes, the weather cleared and we got several perfect days at the beach.

But one day, the guys saw a shark in the water while they were fishing. I didn’t actually get a picture of it, so I made a true-to-life rendition…to scale, of course.

Needless to say, we stayed on the beach that day.

What a pretty family! {If I do say so myself!}

Til we meet again, St. George……

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Filed Under: Life, Travel

A Recap of our Vacation

June 4, 2012 posted by Shara

Hey y’all! So I know you have been digging all of the party pics lately, but I figured some of you might be experiencing a little withdrawl from pictures of my kids. To recap, we’ve been on vacation. We got back a couple of weeks ago, but you know how long it takes to get back into the swing of things!

We went up to Maryland to visit Mom Mom and GP for a couple of weeks. And it was FAB-U-LOUS…we got lots of time with Nana and Popop and Betsy, Jay and Lulabelle as well. Such a good vacation!

We did so much while we were up there, it would take 6 posts to cover it all. So, here’s the summery of our trip in words:

And here is the summary of our trip in pictures (sorry for some of the blurry cell pics!):

What a great trip!

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Filed Under: Life, Travel

Cheerios and Lattes: A featured article about kids and swimming

May 31, 2012 posted by Shara

Good morning! And happy summer!

Our schools are officially out for students and teachers now and we have seen quite the little boom at the pool this week. Luckily, it’s also been cloudy and rainy the past few days (thanks to Tropical Storm Beryl!), so the girls haven’t been bugging me about going too much. We are a water-loving family. I grew up at the beach on weekends and was on the swim team as long as I can remember. So naturally, I’m anxious for the kiddos to be comfortable in the water as well. Jayna LOVES the beach and our new Zero-Entry saltwater community pool.

{For those of you in the north that are unfamiliar with this term…its a pool that has a sloped entry….kind of like entering the water at a beach}

I started early on with Jayna in the bathtub…as an infant splashing in the water, laying on her back to get her ears wet and using various water toys and household items to get her to explore the water. She’s been to the pool and beach a ton!

Poor Amelia though. She’s lucky if she gets a bath!

I’ve kind of slacked off in the “water familiarity” portion on child rearing with Amelia. I just plopped her right in the pool (again, thank goodness for that zero-entry!!) and let her figure it out from there. So when I saw Mackenzie’s post on a linky party this week…JACKPOT! Her blog, Cheerios & Lattes, has an awesome post this week on water orientation. In fact, she is doing a whole series on teaching your kids water appreciation, safety and swimming!

So, I thought, in honor of summer officially starting here in the Lowcountry, I’d feature her today and give you the links to her series so you can follow it too! Have a wonderful, water-filled summer!

And without further ado, here is McKenzie, from Cheerios and Lattes. Click on the pictures below to see her posts about kids and swimming!

The Teach Your Child to Swim-Summer Swim Series is co-authored by Mackenzie and her long-time friend Chrissy. Mackenzie has experience as a lifeguard for over five years and has been teaching swim lessons at YMCAs, summer camps, and private lessons for over ten years. She has recently been working with her own toddler boys and teaching them to swim. Chrissy has 13 years of experience as a lifeguard and swim instructor. She has also been the Aquatics Director for a the YMCA for 5 years. Chrissy has years of work teaching infants through adults how to swim.

Adult Supervision Required-Every water activity shared in the Teach Your Child to Swim-Summer Series requires adult supervision by an adult at ALL times.

Click here to read the whole series!

Here is the first part: Water Orientation

Subscribe to McKenzie’s blog to get the rest of the article delivered to your email!

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Filed Under: Life, Tutorials

Spring in our Step

April 9, 2012 posted by Shara

Happy Easter! What a wonderful week we’ve had in preparation for Easter. My parents came in late last week to enjoy the Flowertown Festival and the beach with us. Luckily, the weather has been beautiful (some showers, but mostly cloudless skies and 80 degree weather), so we were able to spend a lot of time outside. Jayna has always loved the beach, and I think Amelia will end up being a fan as well!

Although we don’t usually decorate for Easter, we di add a few Spring touches around the house. Of course, there was the paper wreath I made, but I also added a Hydrangea and Easter Egg centerpiece in our dining room.

And despite our diet, I also made Zucchini Cookies (without the frosting, so they are healthier!!) And some chocolate covered strawberries for Jayna’s Easter party at school. Jayna did her part by bringing home some lovely Spring-themed crafts, including dyeing eggs at school!

I also have been busy finishing the bowling ball for Jayna’s Easter Bunny Bowling Set, and making a taggy pillow for Amelia.

And of course, the true reason for the season….Although they mostly just cover Jesus rising and the celebration in school, Jayna had a lot of questions about the cross this year. I didn’t really think I needed to go into too much detail yet, as she is so little and so sensitive. But I did tell her that the cross is a symbol of Jesus’ gift to us. He died so that we could live and be forgiven. She seemed to kind of get that….she said, “like when I am bad and then I say sorry, you forgive me and God forgives me.” So I left it at that. We went to the playground and got some sticks to make these little crosses.

But, little girls will be little girls…she was still really excited to see the Easter Bunny too! Jayna got to participate in three different egg hunts….one with her class at school, one with the church and one in our backyard. The church’s celebration also included a visit from the Mr. Bunny himself, and a delicious spread of cookies!

Jayna was very concerned about all of the gum and other choking hazards, so I assured her we would leave them for the Easter Bunny, who would swap them out for kid friendly candy. And sure enough, he left eggs filled with jelly beans all over our yard! He also left tracks all over our house!

After a heavy scrutinizing, we discovered the tracks lead to the girls’ Easter Basket! Filled with Bunny Bowling, Easter Veggie Tales, a taggy pillow, and a couple of Reese’s Peanut Butter Bunnies. Jackpot!!

What was in your Easter Basket?

Happy Easter!!

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Filed Under: Faith, Life

Manasquan and other MD memories!

July 3, 2011 posted by Shara

Memories of Manasquan! This is my maternal grandparents’ (Nana and Popop) summer house (they are snowbirds and head to sunny FL in the winters). Jayna is the fourth generation who has spent summers here! Most of my childhood summer memories revolve around this beloved little house and this tiny (but booming!) little beach town in NJ. Oh how we love it!

Every morning we ride bikes to the end of the beachwalk to the inlet to critique the early morning surfers, watch the shrimping boats head out to sea, and grab a pre-breakfast cup of joe.

Jayna ran most of the 1 mile beachwalk home…only occasionally stopping to check out boys!!…And her shadow!! =)

After breakfast, we head straight to the beach to jump some waves and build some castles.

After coming home for a quick outdoor shower to get the sand off, sandwiches on the front porch and a nap, we play in the backyard before setting the table for dinner.

After dinner, we head to the beach walk again to walk off dinner. We tried so hard to get a decent family picture….to no avail! Finally a random guy offered to take the picture for us, so we could all be in it. The nice family photo op was a bust, but we were able to capture a silly picture of us trying to figure out who has the biggest belly! (Too bad I’m the only one who actually has an excuse…..)

And our last stop is convincing Popop that we just have to have some ice cream from Gee Gee’s (I think everyone was trying to catch up to my belly size!)!

Thank you for having us once again Nana and Popop! We love you!

Here’s a couple of final highlights from our trip up north…..

Drawing with chalk and subsequently learning to “fish” in the chalk pond with GP:

Lovin’ on Amelia:

Enjoying some ice cream, Pittsburgh-style:

Babysitting Lucy for two days and taking her on the Metro to the Natural History Museum in DC:

Jayna particularly liked the discovery room, where she used magnifying glasses, microscopes and measuring tape to explore artifacts.

Finally it was time to head back to SC. I was so fortunate to have Mom Mom join us for the 9 hour ride back. She is fabulous at keeping Buggy entertained in the car…and continued her entertaining skills into our living room as she taught Jayna some ballet moves.