When Ben and Ruth arrived I was in the middle of a packing frenzy so I set engineer Ben to work getting the games and books to fit in the bags I had picked out to put them in and Ruth helped the kids make brownies to take to the beach for Grandaddy. Ellie loved getting to lick the spoon!
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| Ben, Ruth, and I took an evening walk around the neighborhood and found a chicken! I want to figure out which neighbor she belongs to...I want fresh eggs! |
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| Hanging out with Aunt Ruth and Uncle Ben |
Saturday morning we went to Famous Toastery for breakfast. It never disappoints!
As soon as we arrived at the beach Saturday afternoon, the kids and I headed to the beach for a few minutes.
Sunday Gin-g and Fred came for the afternoon and we celebrated Ellie and JP's birthdays. Their actual birthdays are in July and September but it's hard to find a time to get everyone together and Ellie LOVES celebrating at the beach so we go with it!
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| The grandparents and grandkids...Ruth stuck her bump in the picture :) We can't wait to welcome baby in October/November! |
We had cake and homemade ice cream to celebrate the birthdays. Gin-g always does a great job with the cakes and my dad and the other guys make an excellent cookies and cream ice cream!
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| JP had to help Grandaddy get the churn ready. |
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| Most important part of churning ice cream...taste testing the oreos! |
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| JP got a scooter and so Ben and Ruth gave him a helmet. As you will see from the pics the rest of the week he LOVED his helmet and wore it all.the.time. |
The kids and I quickly settled into a lovely routine for the week. Beach in the morning then we would head to the pool at the house around lunch time and eat lunch at the pool and they would play for awhile. Then while JP napped the other kids would play or we would ride bikes. Then in the afternoon we would do the park, beach, or pool...it varied depending on the day! The kids usually headed in for showers right before dinner.
Ruth and my mom generally did the beach and pool with us. The guys played golf 2 mornings during the week. Ben and my dad would ride bikes in the morning on the days they didn't play golf and Paul would come to the beach with us on those days.
Beach fun!
Pool time!
Playground at Night Heron Park. Even more than the park, the kids loved going to the (air conditioned) Nature Center.
Ruth and thegirls woke up early one morning and played a fun game of Battleship on the driveway.
We had lots of relaxing time too where we just laid around.
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| JP has a spot on the couch, his football, and his sister reading him his book about rescue vehicles...life is good. |
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| Always good to wear your helmet while watching TV...safety first! |
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| JP watching golf with the guys. |
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| They guys had to do some work. |
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| Franklin chillin by the pool...but not too close to the pool of course. |
We had lots of good food at the beach thanks to my mom who made countless trips to the grocery store to keep us all fed! She also cooked all our meals!
We also had some special treats along the way...
Aunt Ruth and Uncle Ben brought the cotton candy machine all the way from Mississippi!
Popsicles were a favorite afternoon snack.
JP...always safe wearing his helmet at meals!
When Gran's around you get to eat ice cream out of the carton. (For the record, Gran would NEVER have let HER children do this!)
Watermelon was a big hit with JP!
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| What? You don't eat your watermelon with your whole face? |
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| The girls got Uncle Ben to comb their hair one night after baths. :) |
One evening after dinner we biked over to Night Heron park for a magic show. At different points during the show Emmie and Ellie were both picked to be volunteers which thrilled them!
We always take our own bikes to the beach but this year we also rented a bike with a tow cart on the back so JP could "ride" too. We rented through the resort and had a great experience. The bike was waiting for us at the house when we arrived and they picked it back up the day we left. Having the tow cart was fabulous and I know the kids loved it too! (And I'm definitely wondering why we never did this before!)
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| Ruthie upgraded from the scooter to a bike with training wheels right before we left for the beach and she loved getting to practice! |
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| Ellie hopped into the tow car whenever she could! |
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| Emmie is our only non-training wheel bike rider and it was so fun to explore the island with her. |
Emmie and I went to the Marsh Tower two different times. Early in the week we went with Ruth and then the last day it was just us as we did the tower and then went in search of an alligator!
JP was very insistent that he bring his train tracks to the beach to play with Uncle Ben. He carefully packed them all up and put them by the door about 2 days before we left. (And then he also piled every single thing in his bed beside the door too! He was going to make sure we didn't leave him behind!) Uncle Ben didn't disappoint...he built a great track and gave me a list of pieces I needed to buy so that the track would be even better!
One of my favorite things about Kiawah is that we always have lots of nature sightings. We saw dolphins almost every day when we were at the beach and they were pretty close to us a few times!
We saw this bird a few different days on our bike ride to the park.
We saw lots of deer. There was one that we saw often in the back yard and then we saw some other ones around the island!
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| in the dunes |
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| in front of a house while we were riding by on our bikes |
Generally the golfers see some alligators while they're playing golf but this year we got to the last day and hadn't had any deer sightings! Emmie and I took a bike ride to the tower and then decided we'd head back to the area we stayed a few years ago because we had often seen a gator in the pond over there. Well as soon as we left the tower we saw a gator in a nearby pond!
And that's all for Kiawah Island 2018!
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