the first saturday we were back our good friends, the odells, invited us to join them for a day at the beach. this sounded like the perfect break together as a family and with friends, so we jumped at the opportunity.

this is katelyn's little best friend, eliza.  i'm sure i'll say this a million more times, but i will miss seeing these two together after we go.

tanner was trying his darndest to fill that watering can from the sand. 

our little cheeser.   he is such a ham and has the best smiles for everyone.

katelyn decided to dig a little road in the sand.  i decided to take a picture of it.  after about five pictures she finally looked up and said, "mom, stop taking pictures."

after seeing eliza get buried in the sand, tanner wanted a turn too.  but, after getting buried he realized it wasn't as fun as it looked.  he was more nervous than happy.

but he was still willing to stop and give me a great smile.

and of course katelyn wanted a turn being buried as well.  i'm not sure what's so enticing about having sand down your bathing suit.

tanner kept wanting to go in the water with tyler, so tyler turned it into a game.  they would walk out a ways, wait for a big wave, then run back before it got them.

katelyn wanted a turn as well, but she didn't want to run in the cold, cold water.  so tyler improvised by carrying her out, dipping her in and running back quickly. 

glad we could get out to the beach.  it was a beautiful day!  i can't believe i didn't get any pictures of the odells.  i guess we'll have to go again.

strawberry picking fun

right after we returned from utah, my sister camille and her little boy benson came up for a quick visit. her husband was out of town on a cub scout camping trip, so we were lucky enough to get to visit with her. although i do think we might have bored her a bit. we were recovering from vacation, so my kids were tired and cranky.  but we did manage to get out and go strawberry picking so we could make some fresh strawberry jam.

the kids enjoyed picking strawberries in the beginning. they were quite helpful dropping them in the box.

until we discovered that it was okay to eat a few strawberries here and there.  i'm pretty sure tanner considered this his job and took it seriously. we finally had to move the box from him.

aren't they pretty?  they didn't look that way the next day.  they were shrunken and discolored the next day.  the strawberries had a really hard time this year with the crazy weather.

the kiddos finally started entertaining themselves.

i don't know what silly benson boy is doing.  i told him i wanted to take a picture and this is how he posed.

our kids ran a little too far away, so tyler had to chase after them and carry them back.  they don't look happy about it, but they were smiling and having a good time.

our families after picking. i think benson ate his fair share of strawberries too.