4th of July Weekend

It is always nice when a holiday makes for a long weekend! So 4th of July being on a Monday this year made it the perfect time for us to get up to Virginia Beach to visit Mimi and Fran (Graham's mom and stepdad). We got in Saturday night and then flew home this morning so it was a whirlwind of a couple days, but we had a great time when we were there! I took almost 200 pictures in 2 days so it was hard to decide what pictures to use so there are definitely a lot here, but I cut out the majority. (Maybe I will get motivated to make a Facebook album later).

Sunday morning was raining so we decided to go to the Aquarium. I have been wanting to get Carrie to an aquarium thinking she would love it, but maybe it was not the perfect time to go after she had flown the night before, been up until 10 and not slept very well. She was not a bit interested in looking at any of the fish or sharks or anything in their tanks. She only liked the areas that were hands on and where there were lots of buttons!

Driving a wheel to some machine that was supposed to teach her something...she just liked the driving.

She did love running free which was great except it made her a little hard to keep up with!

She also really liked this shark you could crawl into. Here is a funny pic of her and Mimi...

Her favorite part was this submarine under the shark tank that had a lot of buttons. She was the captain.

And she liked this mirror room, too. So it was not a total bust, but she didn't get as into the animals as I thought she would! Maybe on a day when she is more rested.

After the aquarium, the weather had cleared up. We headed straight out to the beach. She has not been to a beach in almost a year. Her last visit was in September and she loved it. I fully expected her to just love it right away, but I should have known it would take some adjusting!

She did like sitting in the big beach chairs!

And she loved seeing all the planes, jets and helicopters.

But "beach face" as mom and I called it last year definitely showed up again. It is her very-serious-i'm-not-so-sure-about-this face.

She liked walking down by the water where the sand was harder.

And she liked digging.

Fran, Mimi, Dada and Carrie working on a big hole.

She also liked to put water in buckets and clean her hands off with it. The main problem with the beach for her is that she does not like to get dirty. When you are at the beach, it is obviously hard to avoid having sand on you at all times and she could not quite accept this fate so a washing bucket was a necessity.

Tried her hat, but she was not interested.

So Fran put his hat on her and I was able to catch this picture at a priceless moment. She was trying to look up at that bill and figure out what was on her head!

Classic beach face.

An attempt at a picture of her and me. Of course getting her to smile for a picture is almost impossible.

She did like eating on the beach! She got to have yummy things like goldfish, fritos and watermelon! She was always happy when she was eating.

She took a couple of walks on the beach with Mimi and Fran and she liked splashing her feet in the water after the wave had receded.

More beach face.

Driving her dump truck on the 'road' dada made her.

And after a little bit of time on the beach, she was warming up to it. There is my happy girl!

And spinning in the air with dada is always a highlight no matter where you are.

She still loved the pool the most. She wanted to swim, swim, swim!

That night Carrie slept really well after a long fun day. Mimi cooked us a delicious dinner which is such a treat for me. I love cooking, but when someone else cooks for me, it is so wonderful. And getting fresh fish is another plus!

Monday was the 4th of July and we woke up to perfect weather. We didn't waste any time getting to the beach. I wanted to attempt a family picture, but as always, it did not work out very well.

Mimi and Fran took Carrie on a long walk on the beach. When they came back, she was up on Fran's shoulders and was excited when she spotted mama and dada. We had enjoyed a few minutes of quiet on the beach!

Then we pulled out the watermelon. I think she may have sat there and ate watermelon for 45 minutes. She probably put away a quarter of an entire watermelon! And the funniest thing is that she could hardly keep her eyes open while she was eating it after that long walk in the sun! We thought she may even lay down and nap, but no...she got a second wind.

Then it was more time swimming in the pool with dada. Do you think this girl loves her dada or what?

After a long nap, we took her back out to the beach to see some of Mimi and Fran's good friends. It was getting cloudy so I put her in her 4th of July dress instead of a bathing suit and was hoping to get a few good pics.

I am a sucker for cute father/daughter pics. I just love their sweet relationship so so much.

And my photo shoot began. I took about 80 pictures, but here are a few faves...

We found a giant hole that she thought was pretty neat to get into.

And here are just a few of the facial expressions I caught.

I just love that sweet, happy girl!!!

We went in when it started to thunder. Unfortunately that brought storms which cancelled the fireworks, but that was ok. We had another delicious meal and watched NYC's amazing fireworks on TV. We were all exhausted and Graham and I knew we needed to be ready for another plane flight this morning.

The trip flew by, but we had so much fun. I think Carrie warmed up to the beach a lot so it will be interesting to see if she likes Perdido in a couple weeks. She is definitely pooped from the nonstop activity and was happy to get into her crib for nap time and fall right asleep!

Happy belated 4th of July! We are so blessed to live in such a wonderful country and thank you to all of our troops past and present for all your sacrifice to insure us our freedom.