More Island adventures

Look at these girls hunting for little muscles as we like to call them. We had many competitions to see who could find the most, biggest, smallest, and prettiest. Katherine is as competitive as me when it comes to this stuff!
















These were some of the fish that we saw at the fishing tournament that was going on the weekend we were there. The eel is freaky looking up close! It reminds me of what I think Voldmort from Harry Potter looks like.


Who knew that a hot tub could be so fun, especially in the tropics of Dauphin Island! Katherine and Jeff's neighbor was very nice to invite the kids over to use it. I don't think it has ever seen the action that we gave it.

Dauphin Island-day 1

Yeah, we made it to Dauphin Island. We are planning on spending a week here with my youngest sister. It only took us @#$%^^&*@# hours to get there. No, really it was not too bad. We left at 6 am, so we beat the Atlanta traffic and sailed through the rest of the way. The kids were great. When we got to Aunt Katherines we had to walk down to the bay right away which she practically lives on. The boys played in the mud which I later found out after ruining several shirts that it does not come out!!!! We had a ball all week playing here. L.C. caught 4 shrimp in the shallow water. Two of which he just plucked right out of the water. This is the bay where we also went soft shell crabbing at night. The boys (okay and me) were hooked on it. We would go out at night during low tide with these big lights and look for crabs that had shed their shells. There is a short window of opportunity when their entire bodies are soft while they are growing a new one. These are the ones that you pick up. It is so cool (and kind of sad) that they can not pinch you because they are so soft. They say that people pay a lot of money for these. I don't even like crab, but I love the hunt. We got 27 the first night we went out. That turned out to be the best night. One of the nights Katherine and I went out by ourselves. She scooped up one that she was sure was soft. I felt it and said "no it is hard as can be" she said "Are you sure?" Being a dummy, I felt just to be sure, and that sucker drew blood. Thanks for that sister!
This is what we named Hermit Crab Island. All of those shells that you see are hermit crabs. They had a ball gathering them up and letting them go. We went here to watch Captain Jeff's (Kath's boyfriend) boat come in from a fishing trip.

Here is what he brought in. J.J. was enthralled with all the fish and immediately tried to pick one up.

State park week

This week in July we decided to go hiking at a different state park each day. This is just a picture of us at Anna Ruby Falls. We did get everyone looking in this picture!

Blueberries

After we got back from Edisto, the Lingenfelters came and stayed a couple of days with us. Of course it is July, so we had to go pick blueberries. There is a place less than a mile from our house. Don't you just love this face that Pipi is making. Let me tell you, we were very trusting letting her hold this bucket of blueberries. It took the six of us (well that is counting the twins) over an hour to pick this many!!! Everyone was tired and ready to go at this point!

Happy 4th of July!

We we were still at Edisto for the 4th, and were lucky enough to spend it with family. Uncle Trotti, Aunt Sandy, my cousin Audrey, and her daughter live there, so we saw them often during the week. They were so good to us . They cooked and brought over food, groceries, and rented bikes so we could ride around the island.

What would the 4th be without some ice cold watermelon. These kids could eat their weight in watermelon. We have to just stop giving it to them. We cooked out and had everyone over. Then we went to watch fireworks (since they are not allowed on the beach) which turned out to be better than expected considering they were just a someones house.

Family pictures

Every year at the beach I make us take a family picture. This year was no exception. It wasn't until a few days later that I realized L.C. was making a funny face (intentional) in every one of the pictures, and of course it is impossible to get everyone to look and smile. But it is what it is, and I love every crazy minute of it!




Here are the big boys celebrating that we were finally finished taking pictures! After this they ran down the beach with there shirts off. You would think picture taking was some form of torture!

Sunset

Isn't she beautiful!!!

That dimple is just irresistible. And I don't like to brag, but he is just as beautiful!

Tuesday's Edisto adventure

I told you he was an awesome big brother!

Tuesday we took everyone out early on the beach. We walked down to the point which is on the sound and there are a lot of good treasures there to be found. I had my head down looking at shells when I heard Pipi say "Look mom, look mom a shark." I turned around and she had this baby shark with her hands wrapped all the way around its belly. I of course kind of freaked because I knew that she was playing in one of the tidal pools and had no idea where it had came from. I yelled for her to put it down which I think startled her. We quickly found out that it wasn't alive and found 5 more washed up. We also found a sting ray, spider crabs, blue crabs, fish, and some more horse shoe crabs"stuck together".


Can you just imagine keeping up with all these shoes?