A Late Beach Getaway

What a nice surprise! Monday, a couple of weeks ago, a very dear friend of ours from Kentucky offered to let us use his condo at Hilton Head Island for that upcoming weekend. We decided to do it and surprised Samuel with the news as his reward for getting all A's on his progress report. He was so excited! So we left out on Thursday and had a great weekend. The weather was perfect. We rented bikes first thing and used that as our mode of transportation. I think we got in the car once the whole time we were there. What a nice change of pace! We spent the mornings riding bikes and spent the afternoons on the beach and I don't think I broke a sweat the whole time. John Michael loved the sand and the water and Samuel loved biking, "surfing", and playing football on the beach. We ate at some great seafood restaurants and Samuel loved being able to ride our bikes to dinner.

Pumpkin Patch

Last Friday afternoon, John Michael and I picked Samuel up at school and we headed to the pumpkin patch to pick out some Pump-TINS as John Michael says. They had fun picking out their own special pumpkins. John Michael picked out several little ones and Samuel picked out the perfect pumpkin to carve in a couple of weeks. We took them home along with some mums, got out the rest of our Halloween and Fall decorations, and are now FALL ready. I love it!

Update

Back to school! Yay! We are back in school and loving it. Samuel is so enthusiastic about school this year. He has always loved school, but this year he just can't wait to get there every morning. He loves his class, his teacher, and the new responsibilities of a third-grader. The first day, they did some of the usual "About Me" kind of worksheets. His answers were so mature! He has decided to venture out this year and play football for the first time. It is flag football, not tackle. No, mom isn't ready to allow that just yet! He is also playing Fall baseball and will move up to kid-pitch this season. He is continuing his piano again this year as well. We will be celebrating his 9th birthday this weekend. He has decided to have a swimming party and we are going to Six-Flags on Saturday. He is excited! John Michael is back in school also and he too loves his class and his teachers. I am loving the structure and the things he is learning already! He is taking a computer class called Compu-Child. Yes, he is two years old and taking a computer class. He also has music and art while he is at school. He is talking and saying just about anything he wants. Just ask him, he will tell you! One of his favorite things to do is go to Barnes & Noble and play with the trains. So, on Samuel's first day of school, John Michael and I went to BN to play. So sweet! It's not so sweet when it comes time to leave though! It usually isn't pretty.

We are looking forward to football season and can't wait for the first game to finally roll around. We are tired of talking about it and ready to get it started! Roll Tide!

A Good Big Brother

Samuel plays with John Michael at his birthday party even though the toys were so "silly". He's a good big brother!

Birthdays and Baseball

This past Saturday was John Michael's 2nd birthday. He is such a big boy! We celebrated last weekend with a small birthday party for just a few of his little buddies. We did an Old MacDonald theme at the indoor playground at Imagination Station. They played and had a good time exploring & climbing. John Michael really enjoyed the cup cakes. As a matter of fact he helped himself to three of them! Then on Wednesday, his PaPaw and Nanny came and spent the day with him and took him to Chuck E Cheese. Of course, he loved that! On Saturday, his actual birthday, after spending the morning at the ballpark, we took him to see the horses, one of his favorite things to do. Then we spent the rest of the afternoon at the "poo" another of his favorite things to do. I think he had a good birthday and his proud to say now that he is TWO! But he's not finished yet! He still has one more party with his grandparents coming up soon.

On to baseball... Samuel's baseball team won their district championship game on Saturday morning. We were so proud of them. Samuel had a fantastic play at home plate tagging a kid out! He also hit a triple! They are doing a great job even in this extreme heat. Area tournament is this weekend. Go Americans!