OBX - Sunset Pictures

Before we even left to go on vacation, I was thinking about having pictures of us taken on the beach at sunset.  I thought it would hopefully make for some really beautiful shots.  So, I packed khakis and a white shirt for everyone and a white dress for Sissy.  Jon only had a light pink polo shirt, not a white one, but I was okay with that and thought it would look nice.  

We still had one problem...

We didn't have anyone to take the actual pictures of all of us together.  So, we were hoping someone would be willing to take our picture once we got to the beach.  When we arrived, Jon and I started taking a few pictures of the munchkins and the munchkins with each of us...  

(And here is one of our family pictures, we ended up having a lot to choose from...)

Sure enough, shortly after we arrived, a kind lady walking her dog, offered to take our picture.

The sky was really beautiful that evening!

As soon as she left, another woman, who watched the other lady take pictures of us, came up and offered to take a few more.  She said she understood how much work goes into getting everyone coordinated and ready for a picture and wanted us to have more to choose from.  We were thankful for her kind offer.

Here's one of the pictures she took.

I love how Jon's shirt seems to match the sunset so well!

As we walked further along the beach, a teenage girl, along with her mother, offered to take our picture.  They actually shouted from their beach house, as we were walking, "Can we take your picture!?!?!" We said yes!  It must have been all of us in our coordinating outfits and me, holding the camera as we walked, that tipped them off that we were there to have our picture taken.  Were we that obvious?  :-)

It turns out this family that took our pictures, lives in Cleveland, OH and they own a lake cottage in Angola, IN, about an hour north of where Jon and I grew up.  What a small world!

Here's one of the pictures they took of us all together.

I love everything about this next picture of Buddy and his daddy!  Love, love, love it!!!
Such a sweet capture!

Me and my girl... just love her!

I really like this one, too!  I think it's precious!

We are very thankful for the women who took our pictures!  Turns out we didn't even have to ask, all of them offered to take them and I think they captured some great family photos!

The Wright Brothers National Memorial

On Thursday morning, we headed to the Wright Brothers National Memorial.  This was literally up the road from where we were staying.  Orville and Wilbur Wright were the first two men to fly in an airplane in 1903.
We climbed the hill to see the monument.

Jon and Buddy almost to the top.  It was a steep hill and a very windy morning.

The view of the ocean from the top of the hill.

Our munchkins by the monument.  You can see how windy it was by Sissy's 'fly away' hair!

A view from the top of the hill.  This is the area where the Wright brothers plane flew off the ground.  They chose this area in NC because it was so windy, for the take off, and the ground was sandy, for soft landings.

Here's a replica of their first plane.

Another view of the monument from the replica of their plane.

The munchkins did great walking up and down that big hill.

As we were walking back to the car, the munchkins were holding hands...
thought it was a good photo op!

The NC Aquarium

On Wednesday of our vacation, we were off to Roanoke Island to visit the North Carolina Aquarium.

Our munchkins outside the entrance to the aquarium.

Our munchkins standing behind the jaws of a very large shark!  Yikes!

No worries, the crocodile is not real!

 We also enjoyed seeing sea horses, crabs, turtles, an octopus, and sting rays.  Jon and I touched the rays, but the munchkins were a little too scared to even try, maybe next time. 

As we wandered around the aquarium, we came to a huge room with a glass wall and viewed some real live sharks swimming in a big tank.  I wasn't able to get a great picture of them since it was so dark and they were swimming a little bit too fast...  It was really cool to see the sharks up close, though!

Once we had our fill of seeing all the sea animals, we walked outside to get a few more pictures.

It was a really beautiful place to visit.

We had a great time and enjoyed our visit to the North Carolina Aquarium.

OBX - Sunrise

On Tuesday morning, I woke up at 5AM (before anyone else was awake) to head to the beach to catch the sunrise over the ocean, and I'm so glad I did!

Here's the sky before the sun peaked out.

Here's the first glimpse of the sun.

This is one of my favorites!

It was an amazing sunrise...

just beautiful!

One last picture before I headed back to the house

These pictures remind me of the chorus of a Rebecca St. James song, "Song of Love."

"The heavens declare You are God

and the mountains rejoice

the oceans cry, 'Alleluia!' 

as we worship You, Lord

for this is our song of love..."

The pictures also remind me of a couple of verses I read that morning on the beach...

"The sea is His for he made it,

and His hands formed the dry land." Psalm 95:5

"Mightier than the thunder of the great waters, 

mightier than the breakers of the sea-

the LORD on high is mighty." Psalm 93:4

OBX- Beach

Saturday, August 6th, our family headed down to the Outer Banks (OBX) of North Carolina for a week long vacation. We stayed in Kill Devil Hills, NC.  This was our first time being in the OBX.  

We absolutely loved staying in this area.  It was beautiful and relaxing.

The house we stayed at belonged to a friend of ours from church.  She graciously invited us to stay there all week for a very small fee.  It was a great house for our family and very spacious!  We had more than enough room and it was only a 10-15 minute drive to the beach!

This is pretty much what happened every evening when we returned to the house after being at the beach most of the day... tired munchkins!

So, like I said, we hit the beach every day we were there.

The munchkins had a blast!

They both loved playing in the sand...

and walking down to see the pier.

Our family on top of the pier.

On Thursday, we drove about 45 minutes south to check out another beach on Pea Island.
This was the bridge that we crossed to get there.

Pea Island was pretty much deserted.  There were maybe 3 or 4 other families there.  It was a beautiful beach and the waves were much gentler there than at the other beach.

There was lots of sand to play with there, imagine that!

Buddy all decked out with his daddy's sunglasses on.  Too funny!

Buddy loved going under water, even if it was only two feet deep.

Sissy loved collecting sea shells at this beach and there were a lot of them to snatch up.

This is one of my favorite beach pictures of her...

On the last day of our vacation, Jon and the munchkins built sand castles using some of the sea shells we collected at Pea Island.

Sissy was so proud of her creation.

And so was Buddy.

Sissy decided to take a little rest on my legs as I was catching my last rays of sun before leaving the next day.

The munchkins splashing around in the water one last time before we had to say good bye to the beach.

We really enjoyed our time at Kill Devil Hills!  We are hoping to be invited back again next year.