Sunday, June 29, 2014

A much-needed vaca

We spent last week in South Carolina.  Hot?  Yes.  Amazing, beautiful and full of relaxation and great family time?  Absolutely!

We left on Friday morning and stopped in Greenville, SC to meet up with Brandon's grandma and brother.  In the 8 1/2 years we've been together, I've never met either of them, so it was nice to finally see them face to face and let our boys connect.  It was a great visit, short... but still great.  I was able to spend some time chatting about Ellie with Grandma Shirley a little as we made the long walk downtown for dinner, too.

Saturday morning we headed from Greenville to Fripp Island.  My family has been going to Fripp for longer than I can remember.  I'm not sure how many times we've gone (I could figure it out if I tried harder, I know), but I know that our first trip there was when my mom was as pregnant with me as I am with Ellie now.  So it's held a special place in our hearts for 31 years - let's say that.

We comfortably fit all 23 of us in a big ol' house on the island for 7 glorious days of relaxation, family time, sunshine and sand (and plenty of pool time, too).  We cruised around in golf carts the whole time and each family took turns cooking dinner for the rest of the families... which was a fabulous idea.  There were times when the humidity were a bit rough at 30 weeks pregnant, but we were never too far from cool water or a shaded ride back to the house.  My sister-in-law, Karen, took some family photos for us with a little maternity flare.  My sister Emily snapped some beach shots of us... we were trying to get sunrise pictures, but we had a dreary morning.  And the sunrise silhouette below is compliments of a friendly stranger I saw on the beach when I went to check out a sunrise alone one day.

The drive may have been a little challenging with a bladder that gets kicked when it's full and a preschooler who can't seem to go potty when we make pit stops for fuel, but we did alright.  It was nice to sleep in our own bed again last night and to see our church family this morning.  It'll be nice for the boys to see Brandon's parents tomorrow... but I think I could have stayed in that house in SC for another week enjoying the lazy days and watching while our boys made lasting memories with their cousins.  But today it was back to reality... who knows when we'll be back on the island.  Time to get back into some sort of groove before we welcome this new little bundle of chaos into our lives (by groove I mean: paint the nursery, install new cabinets and counter tops in the kitchen, get all of Ellie's stuff ready... you know) .  We have 3 appointments for Ellie this week... each with an ultrasound... and did I mention we're headed into a holiday weekend??  Yahoo!  You can expect another update at the end of the week.  Thank you for following along.

Here are a few shots from last week for your enjoyment:
 Daddy building a sand castle with the boys.

 Sunrise on the beach... wish my camera lens didn't have sand on it ;)

Family/maternity pic... how cute are those little monsters?

The boys checking out the ocean on the 1st night.

No comments:

Post a Comment