Beach Camping: Life is Beautiful

I don"t know if I have ever found any place else that rivals the beauty of Southwick Beach at sunset. And when surrounded by those you love, its even more beautiful...

Sheri and Trevor were nice enough to entrust us to take some maternity pictures of them on the beach. Life really doesn't get much beautiful than this... (P.S. Big thanks to our good friend Chrissy who helped with posing the couple and saving me from cracking my head on a rock as I nearly fell over it trying to get the perfect shot...:-))

Beach Camping: Life is Good

We successfully made it back to the beach and had a great rest of the week, making lots of memories as always. Aunt Sheri and Uncle Trevor (Vince's sister and her husband) made it up from Florida and spent the time camping out on our site with us. It was really good to spend the time with them and the boys definitely enjoyed the extra love and attention. Aunt Melissa, Uncle Walt, and Noah made it up for a day and it was the perfect beach weather. Charlie and Noah got along really well (sometimes this is a challenge for two 3 year olds) and had some fun times on the beach together. 

Uncle Trevor helped dig the boys a hole.

They are investigating...

(I imagine Charlie is giving Noah some kind of 

direction at this point because that's how he rolls...)

Daddy showing off his superhero strength... :-)

Aunt Sheri was so excited to finally 

get some snuggles with Ben

It rained over night and the next day we had 

some very wet sand on the beach. Great 

for building sand volcanoes!

Our beach loving family <3

(Thanks Chrissy for the great pic!)

Beach Camping: kitchen helper deja vu

In preparation of the rest of our camping trip, we needed a delicious dessert to bring to the beach, of course! Charlie wanted to help and luckily there was a step that was perfect for a three year old to help with - sprinkling a layer of peanuts and chopped peanut butter cups. Yum. It took great restraint for Charlie not to snack while sprinkling and he *almost* succeeded! 

(Charlie loves getting stickers from the grocery store 

and putting them in the most obvious of places, as you 

can see. At least it was a real sticker and not the 

bright orange paid sticker that has ended up smack 

dab in the middle of his forehead more than once...)

As he was sprinkling, I was reminded of another time a three year old was given a similar task in my kitchen.  I went looking back through my pictures and this was from March 2010. Emanuel would have been almost exactly as old as Charlie is now - maybe just a a week or two difference. He helped me make magic cookie bars while a much younger Charlie napped in his crib. And I recall him having similar issues restraining himself from eating chocolate chips as he sprinkled. 

Beach Camping - Day 2: Sun and Sand

As I said last post, we were able to spend one night and the following day at the beach before heading back to reality for a bit. It was a perfect beach day and we soaked up as much sun and sand as the day would allow. 

Charlie spent hours digging and playing in the sand

My summer boy...

Dipping our toes in the water...

Charlie was not wanting to willingly go near the water, 

but the picture does not look that way! :-)

Our new tradition: taking Charlie's
pic next to the binoculars
(too bad his eyes are closed!)

If only we all had the energy of a
three year old at the beach...

Lulled by the breeze and waves, safe in Daddy's arms

Our beach day comes to a close, but we'll be back soon!

Beach Camping - Day One

Last week was our annual camping trip to Southwick Beach. We were not able to stay as many days as usual and it did not work out quite as we had hoped in terms of the other people we are usually able to camp with, but it was a good time with some very special memories made. 

Charlie was over the top excited to go. Saturday morning he got right out of bed (at a very early hour) and dressed himself (which he NEVER does without coercion) and announced he was ready to go. Unfortunately, mom and dad were still in bed and we were no where's close to being ready to go. He managed to contain himself and his excitement and we were able to get things organized and ready and got on the road relatively close to our goal departure time. 

We just set up camp and stayed the one night and following day before heading home, but we left everything there to return to later in the week once Vince's sister and her husband were able to join us. (They flew up from Florida just to go camping at the beach with us this year and it was a great time - but more on that to come in another post...)

Ready to hit the road!

Charlie's just a little excited to go
(in case you couldn't tell)

Ben is underwhelmed with the whole thing...

Ben slept through the whole set-up process...

...while Charlie made "sand soup"

campfire!

Didn't take much to convince Charlie to try a s'more... 

too bad he doesn't have the same sense of adventure

when it comes to trying vegetables!

my big boy!

1 month

I decided forever ago that I wanted to make sure to document Bennett month by month with some kind of photo. Then he turned a month old and I realized I had no plan of how I was going to go about being creative with this documenting. So, his one month photos weren't taken *exactly* when he was one month old, but you get the idea and I am sure at the end of the year a few days difference isn't really going to matter so much! I do wish I had thought to take a laundry basket picture when he was littler so that we would have more of a comparison point as to how big he's already gotten at this point, but alas.... 

And, yes, he is huge. We totally got robbed when it comes to having a newborn because he felt like a newborn for all of a week. Then he learned he likes to eat and it was all downhill from there! :-) I have taken to calling him "meatball." My sister calls Charlie "chicken nugget" so it only seems fitting. 

Who does he look like?

While you are pregnant the most popular questions are 'When are you due?' and 'What are you having?'

Oh, and my favorite: 'How are you feeling?' ...never really felt like I could be as honest as I wanted to be with that one! But I am also guilty of asking this question of others - maybe in hopes that they are responding honestly!

Anyways, once the baby is born the questions become 'How's he sleeping?' and 'How's he eating?' and of course 'Who does he look like?'

I, for one, have never been good at seeing similarities in how people look - especially when one of those people is a squishy baby. So, Vince and I decided to do a side by side comparison of the boys, just out of curiosity. The picture on the right is obviously Charlie. He was a week and a half older than Ben at this time, but this was the best picture of his face (First day with no tubes/tape :-) except the tegaderm left there 'just in case'). Have to say that I did not realize how round Ben's head was until seeing it here compared to Charlie's. 

And for good measure, here's mom and dad as well...

So, you decide for yourself because I just have a hard time seeing it and saying one way or another. He's just beautiful, no matter how you look at it! :-)

Newborn Photos

I have had such big hopes for keeping up better with the blog, but alas... Not sure where the time goes, but it's flying lately! 

After getting home from the hospital last month, we had Alex Thornton (the same photographer who did our maternity and family pictures a few weeks before) come to our house to take some newborn pictures of Ben. Here is a sampling of the amazing results... 

(Anyone in the CNY area who wants an in with a great photographer, let me know and I will get you in touch with her! Not only does she do great work, but she is just a fabulous person too!)