Weekend Update: Hatteras Edition!

We packed up Eddie's truck at the crack of dawn Thursday morning and headed to Hatteras for the weekend with the Corley family!

It was about a 5 hour drive, but it was so worth it! The drive was beautiful...

Perhaps it wouldn't take so long if we didn't have to stop for this so many times...

 After arriving and having a quick lunch, the boys were in bathing suits and ready to go! The house they rented had a great pool and was right on the beach.  We went to the beach right away and played for a while and then came back up to the pool. Cal and Bennett loved playing together.

Hampton's brother and his family came down too, and they have a 6 year old who was so much fun too. 

We spent the whole weekend playing, beaching, swimming, and having fun.  The boys were constantly going going going!

 Until they weren't.....

All the boys were worn out and in need of a lazy morning...

The laughter that occurred during this pile on was awesome...

My boys were in heaven with all these big boys.  They were constantly snuggled up to someone, sitting on someone, or leaning into someone... (cal and jack below)

More pool time for these cuties...

And played hard.  Like really hard.  He was having the time of his life!

And homeboy took a nap EVERY.DAY we were there! PRAISE JESUS! It made ALL the difference in the world for him (and me!).  He would wake up happy and would be able to hang with everyone way later than bedtimes every night.  I've also discovered a way to get him to sleep through the night, so that's pretty awesome.  (post to come later)

These boys played so hard in the pool.  Unfortunately, we were out on the beach Friday and all the kids were in the water on bogey boards when we got a call from Eddie that he heard there was a shark bite a few miles up the beach from us.  We went ahead and got everyone out of the water.  No time for sharks.  Seriously. Go away, sharks! Ain't got time for ya.

Thankfully we had this pool and these kids were more than happy to go wild in there.

I have no pictures of Eddie from the weekend (or me either...!) for a very good reason.  Eddie and Hampton spent a LOT of time out on the water kiteboarding.  It's a new hobby for Eddie and he is HOOKED. He was a happy guy getting to spend so much time on the water.  

We had such a great weekend with our sweet friends and we are so thankful we were invited to go! All of the kids got along so so well, which is great since there were 6 boys of all different ages. 

That was my first time going to Hatteras and I loved it! Eddie commented multiple times how much he loved it and wanted to go back! Here's hoping we do!!!






 

Last Week

Often if my pictures aren't my #carriedaway pic of the day, they don't make the blog at all.  We had a great week last week so I wanted to do a quick post about it...

Cal spent the week at UNC's soccer camp.  He LOVED it! It was close to 100 degrees every day and he never once complained about the heat (he got that from his father.....).  

Andy wasn't old enough to do soccer camp, so he did Vacation Bible School at our church...and LOVED it!!!! Monday was RED day: 

Monday was also Bruce's birthday! Hard to believe this sweet boy is one year old.  I remember getting the message that the puppies were born.  He's a wild thing, but so much a part of our family now. 

He needed extra love and attention on his birthday, so he got a long massage-- Cal wanted to take a picture of him.  Please ignore my lovely sweaty hair.  

Tuesday, after soccer camp, we picked up Cal's buddy Jack for a playdate-- but we had to get a picture of these three little soccer studs first:

All three boys wanted to sit in the third row together-- look at those smiles!

They played SO nicely together! They were going a million miles an hour building forts (can you see them below??) and playing outside (it was sooooo hot!), that I finally had to give them an iPad to make them calm down a little bit.  

Lee was dropped off at our house and then about 25 minutes later, Jack went home.  I got to experience life with 4 boys for about 25 minutes.  It was chaotic, but it was fun! ha!

The swim team was having their coaches serve ice cream at TCBY with a portion of proceeds going to swim for smiles.  So I loaded up the car and took these three guys for a little afternoon treat!

Think they were happy to have some ice cream?

Wednesday was yellow day at VBS and we didn't have a yellow t-shirt.  Andy was MORE than happy to wear this one that had yellow on it that said NUGGET! hahaha

At drop off on Wednesday, Cal decided he could walk in by himself.  This is a camp filled with kids 5 and up.  And there goes my little guy, walking off like it's no big deal.  I totally got choked up.  He just looked so little on the big fields.  But he did it just fine! Momma needs to be better about letting him do things independently.  It ain't easy!

Meredith took Andy after VBS on Wednesday out to lunch.  He had a blast with these two!

On Thursday, the last day of soccer camp, the coaches gave out awards.  Actually, they gave out awards at the end of each day for the camper of the day.  I thought it was a really great way to acknowledge the kids who were working hard and listening.

As I walked up to pick up on Thursday, a friend turned around and said "Cal got camper of the WEEK!" I was super proud of him.  The coach said it was for always helping his other team mates and being ready to listen...or something like that.   Glad he's ready to listen to the coaches.....because I would love for him to be ready to listen to me!

We left Thursday after camp for Myrtle Beach.  It was a busy week, but the boys had so much fun at their camps and play dates.  We are loving summer!


 

#carriedaway: week 23

Week 23:

 Day 156: a bigger deal than you realize...

 Day 157: first swim meet in the books! Super proud of my buddy!! #bribery #whateverittakes

 Day 158: pool daze

 Day 159: sweet splashing sharks

 Day 160: I adore these sweet, sweaty, stinky, AMAZING boys.

 Day 161: go sharks!

 Day 162: note to self: Bruce is not ready to be out of the crate when home alone. And also, this "non-destructible" bed is very, very destructible.

 

Swim Team!

As I have written a million times, Cal did swim team last year and is again this year and he loves it.  I have also written a million times about Andy's issues with swimming-- how badly he wants to swim, but then freaks out and won't. 

Well, last week, something clicked. 

We were at the pool and he was swimming like crazy. Totally comfortable in the water, me not panicking every 2 seconds that he was going to go under...and stay under. 

As we left at the end of that day, he looked at me and said, "I am going to swim in the swim meet this week." No discussion about it.  That was it.  And he did not waiver from that stance once.  He told everyone he saw that he was swimming in the meet.  And he did!

Wednesday of last week, the boys had a swim meet.  I kept waiting for Andy to panic or change his mind.

 He loved getting there and getting a "spot" set up.  Usually only Cal gets a spot because little brothers who are just watching don't get to take up additional space.  He LOVED being written on: his name and age on his back, his ID number on his forearm, Go Sharks on his bulging bicep.  He was a proud little guy!

it helps having his buddy Lee there with him.   These 4 boys had a great time together!

It was time to warm up, and Andy jumped right in.  A coach came over and had to help him a few times, which had me super worried.  But when warm ups were over, Andy wouldn't get out of the water-- he wanted to stay and play! ha! He was having a big time.

I started avoiding Andy in case he had a change of heart or his panic grew.  I make that worse in him.  Thankfully, Sally was his age group chaperone so he had the next best thing with him.  But he never panicked.  He was calm and content the whole time leading up to his race.  

Cal swam first in 25 free and did great.   He has improved immensely since last year and we love watching him swim. 

When it was Andy's turn to go, I was quite nervous.  I just didn't want him to freak out in the middle, start to cry and have to have a coach go in after him.  I didn't want him to be scarred into never wanting to swim again.  

So while I was a ball of nerves, he was cool as a cucumber.  

It's hard to see in the next picture, but you can see his striped shorts as he's about to jump in. 

Y'all.  It was the LONGEST minute and a half of my LIFE.  

But you know what? He did it!!!! He swam the whole way-- no tears, no freak outs, no coaches having to pull him off the bottom.  He wasn't fast, but he didn't care! He was swimming his own way. He kept looking around and smiling in between breaths and strokes.

I talked to the head coach before the race and we decided he would stay by me the entire race and as soon as I saw Andy start to freak, I would give him the signal to go get him.  A lot of times, Andy's swimming looks like he is struggling, because, well, he IS struggling! ha! The lifeguard on duty during the meet even got up out of her chair to get him once.  I think she thought we were all going to let him drown.  But then he smiled over at her and kept right on going!

He was pulled out of the water and I hugged him so tight!

I do not care how long it took him to finish that lap.  He overcame his fear and did it!!!!!

 As I hugged him and said how proud I was of him, he looked at me and the very first thing he said was, "I wanna do that again." HA!

Super proud of my little guy.  Swimming in a swim meet as a newly 4 year old is a big deal! There are other 4 year olds on the team, so he's not the only one, but I am just so proud of him!

We have another meet this week, which Andy has already asked to swim in.  He really wants a swim team suit now..... ha!