Kiawah Island 2015

We just spent a week at Kiawah Island with my family and we had a great time and BEAUTIFUL weather. After weeks of temps over 100 the whole week at the beach was in the 80s-low 90s.




Our adventure started on Friday when my brother flew in from Delaware. He flew into Columbia so the girls were ecstatic to get to pick up Uncle Ben from the airport. They're fascinated with the whole plane thing (and it really blew their minds when he told them that sometimes he sleeps on the plane...I think they're imagining a plane that's big enough to hold a bed for the giant!). All three girls were excited to see Ben (or Bay as Ruthie calls him) and loved that he was spending the night at our house.

Ben "got" to do the bedtime routine with the girls. Halfway through his reading I skipped out to walk Franklin and left Ben with the big girls lol! (Hey, I did put Ruthie down first!)

Saturday we packed up the car and headed to Kiawah after lunch. It was a full mini van with 3 adults and 3 kids! We had some traffic and Ruthie got a little restless at times but we made it in 3 hours which wasn't too bad.

Naptime in the car! (The blanket in the back has a sleeping Emmie underneath.)

We stayed at a new house this year (we'd outgrown the old one) and this house had a pool in the back. I was really, really nervous about the pool at first, especially with Ruthie but all of the girls did great and we really loved having the pool in the backyard! The layout of the house was also really nice. There was a master in the back and then another master down a hallway with a double bed room across the hall which was perfect for us and Ruthie. There was also a double room right off the den. There was a FROG which had 3 double beds so it was great for the big girls and was a little separated from the rest of the house so they could play in the morning without waking everyone else up. In addition to the layout of the house there were a few other perks. The house was directly across from the beach access, a huge plus when dragging 3 kids and their toys to the beach.

The house also had a little wooded area in the back and to the side and we had some deer that frequented the back yard and the path to the beach. They would come right up to the fence which the girls just loved. Poor Franklin had a slight heart attack the first time. He thinks they grow the squirrels really big on Kiawah!


Last year we saw some people having a pizza dinner on the beach and Paul and I thought that would be a fun thing to do with the girls so we planned to do it the first night at Kiawah. We walked out on the beach and the wind was sooooo strong (AND it was high, high tide). Next year we will definitely check out the wind conditions before taking our pizza to the beach...it was a bit sandy but we made the best of it and had fun eating and playing in the water.

Lovely facial expression from me.

My little crew quickly fell into a routine for our week. We got up in the morning, ate, and headed out to the beach.  It was low tide in the mornings when we were out there and the girls had a blast playing in the tide pools. After 1.5-2 hours on the beach we would head back to the house and hop in the pool.









The girls would play until lunchtime and then they'd hop out of the pool, eat their sandwiches on the deck, and hop back in the pool for a little more play time before it was time to go in for some down time!




After Ruthie took her nap the girls would play until dinnertime and then it was back to the pool or ocean until bedtime. These little girls LOVE the water!

Sister snuggles

At the beach the girls loved collecting shells, making/destroying sand castles, playing in the tide pools, occasionally playing in the ocean, chasing birds (Ruthie) and running up and down the beach.

We saw a lot of horseshoe crabs.

Ellie LOVED to roll in the dry sand and then go lay in the water. In fact she loved to lay in the water in general!

Franklin even came down to the beach some. He loved getting to hang out with his people!

Overall the weather was PHENOMENAL while we were at Kiawah. The temperature was in the 80s-low 90s the whole week and we had a nice ocean breeze. We did have a few big storms hit and Paul was almost struck by lightening (think grilling steaks on the deck with an umbrella, saw the lightening hit behind the house, and Paul let out quite the yell and sent that umbrella flying!) but the rain and storms were usually quick and then we could go back to swimming!

My brother got this picture of one of the storms moving in. Eek!

Two of the days we were at Kiawah my dad, Ben, and Paul played golf. I know Paul really enjoyed it...he doesn't get to play very often!



While we were at Kiawah we put the training wheels on Emmie's bike (we'd been trying to teach her without them but she's still just too nervous) and she LOVED getting to ride up and down the street.


Thanks to my mom we ate really well the whole week (and I didn't have to do any cooking!). We had watermelon a few nights and the girls just adore watermelon, especially Ruthie. Thanks to my dad (and Ben) we also had two nights of delicious homemade cookies and cream ice cream...also a favorite of my crew.

Clearly she gets a little crazy around the ice cream...those are definitely crazy eyes.

 (Does anyone else think Ruthie looks like Ziggy when she's eating the watermelon?)


On Thursday we had Ellie's family party and all of our family came to celebrate! It was so much fun and lived up to all of her expectations. Because, in Ellie's mind, it was such an anticipated event I'm doing a separate post on that day so stay tuned!


Saturday morning Paul got Emmie up bright and early to go watch the sunrise on the beach before the we left. Sadly, it was kind of cloudy but they still enjoyed their daddy/daughter time.

28 Weeks

I'm now 28 weeks and 5 days!

Today I went to the doctor and had an ultrasound to recheck the baby's kidney's and make sure the placenta had moved up. Everything looked great and baby is weighing in at an estimated 2lb 12oz! (At her 28 week ultrasound Ruthie was 2lb 8oz so they're pretty close size wise!) Baby's tummy measured a few days ahead and baby's head measured a few days behind which has been the case for every single one of my babies. I love big baby tummies! Baby is also head down and I'm hoping that baby will decide to stay there for the duration! (Ruthie didn't flip until around 35 weeks.) I love being able to compare this baby's 28 week stats and pictures to Ruthie's! I think this baby and Ruthie definitely have different noses. Ruthie has a nose all her own! (You can check out her post here.)

Our sweet, sweet baby!

Emmie and Ellie went with me to the ultrasound and they LOVED getting to see the baby again. Emmie kept saying how cute our baby was...and that's just skeleton baby...real baby is just going to throw her over the edge with all the cuteness! Ellie was more interested in looking at everything once we had the printed out pictures. She wanted to know what everything was (eyes, mouth, nose, etc).

Overall I've been feeling pretty good. The heat definitely drains me and if I get too hot then I feel pretty bad the rest of the day but if I can stay cool then I'm just normal tired and sore at the end of the day.

I don't really have any strong cravings right now...just still really hungry all the time!

I was very relieved that I passed my glucola test at my last appointment. I have always been so worried about having to do the three hour test!
The normal ultrasound tech was training a new tech so we got lots of time to see baby so that was fun :)

I snagged a foot picture this time...I love baby feet :) It took her awhile to get the foot picture because baby kept wiggling its toes...this baby was a total wiggle worm during the ultrasound!

18 Months

I am 18 months (and 10 days) old!

• I weigh 21lb 15oz (39th percentile) and am 32 1/4 inches tall (63rd percentile). Mommy is super excited that I've finally moved up from the 10th percentile for weight! At my age Emmie was 26.4lb and 33in and Ellie was 22.8lb and 31.25in.
• I wear a size 4 diaper, 18mo clothes, and a size 4 shoe.
• I have all but 2 of my teeth. I have 2 on the bottom that haven't come in yet but they're very close to popping through!
• I really, really like to eat. One of my new favorites this month is watermelon!

• I have brown CURLY, CURLY hair and hazel eyes.

• I sleep about 12 hours at night and take a 2-3 hour nap after lunch. I am always VERY willing to go to bed. Mommy will tell me it's night-night time and I tell everyone bye and give kisses and hugs and go straight to my crib, lay down, suck on my fingers for a few minutes and I'm out! I do have to have my special yellow blanket and I like to have a book or two in my bed for when I wake up.
• I've warmed up to other people but I definitely prefer Mommy or Daddy (I'm a bit of a Daddy's girl) if they're around.

• I'm a problem solver. If I can't do something at first I figure out a different way to accomplish my goal. Mommy is pretty impressed with my determination and inventiveness.
• I LOVE the water. I love both the beach and the pool and I'm great at kicking my legs in the water. I also love to lick the water!

• I went to Kiawah for a week this month and had a wonderful time.

• This month I went to visit GG and Papa for a few days and we had lots of fun adventures such as the beach, the aquarium, and a tea room!

• We went to the zoo this month and I loved seeing all the animals.

• I am generally pretty happy but I can pitch quite a fit when things don't go the way I want them too! I will also sometimes throw things when I get mad...Mommy and Daddy are working hard at trying to correct this behavior! Sometimes I also get frustrated when people can't understand what I say.
• Generally if I get really cranky it's because I'm tired. Mommy always knows when it's time for nap or bed!
• I'm starting to talk a LOT more. I use sentences, sometimes you can understand them and sometimes you can't but it's very apparent from my inflection that I am purposefully using 2-4 word sentences.
• I still love to read. I have pretty much the same favorite books: Pout Pout Fish and Little Blue Truck.
• I love to climb on things.
• I had my first popsicle this month! The first time I got terrible brain freeze but then I figured out that I needed to eat it slower and now I LOVE popsicles!

• I still suck on the same 2 fingers on my left hand.
• I like to sing. 
• My eczema has been really bad this month and my zyrtec had to upped from once a day to twice (if I need it). I've also had a couple days where my itching was so bad that Mommy had to give me some Benadryl as well. On the plus side, thanks to all the aquaphor I have on me my fingers that I suck on are in much better condition than they were a month or two ago. I also had a bit of a battle with heat rash on my back and thighs while we were at the beach which was no fun on top of the eczema difficulties.
• I love jewelry and purses and bows. I'm such a girly girl!
• I still love hanging out with my sisters! I have very different relationships with each of them. I tend to view Emmie as more of my other mother and I follow her around everywhere and want to do everything she does. She is also more likely than Ellie to let me have whatever toy it is that I want to take from her. I tend to view Ellie more as my peer and Ellie is less willing to give in to my demands. I think they're both so fun to play with and one of my favorite things is when we all cuddle together and read.

• I can find many of my body parts including ears, eyes, nose, head, mouth, toes, and tummy. I am quite fascinated with trying to put things in my ears, especially sea shells. Mommy  is pretty sure it won't be long before we have to go to the doctor to get something fished out of my ear!

Emmie at 18 months

Ellie at 18 months