Beach Bunny Bizzy

So, the final installment of our beach vaca is of my biggest girl. Mercy she's growing up so fast. Six years old. I still can't believe it. SIX. Who told her she could get so big?

She loved all things pertaining to life at the beach. Fanatic about the fish shaped pillow on her bed, smitten with the sand, overjoyed at the ocean. All of it. She loved every second.

Playing so sweetly with her littler brothers and sisters and obliging them with just about any game they wanted to play.

Yet also taking some time to play by herself and enjoying the option of running a toy through the sand as far as she desired.

Oh how she's beginning to teeter on the border of still little enough to play baby games and wavering into wanting to do "big kid" things. She humored me and allowed me to turn her into a mermaid.


And after a round of family beach photos, she was an easy option for a model.

That smile and her sweet laugh just melt me every time. And, even though I'm still very much her Mom/Disciplinarian most days, I'm getting a sweet taste of what, I pray, will be a treasured friendship between us when she becomes a woman.

I am so blessed to be able to walk along side her as God grows her into a woman who will do work for His glory. I can't wait to see what God has planned for my sweet, eldest daughter. Her heart already exudes so much of His love and is so tender toward so many things.

Um. You know, will still a splash or two of Sassy thrown in for good measure. ;)

Coincidence Providence

There are some people who believe that life happens at random, that occurrences are left up to the universe and that karma deals you back what you've dealt out.

Some people believe in coincidences. Do you know that dictionary.com defines a coincidence as "a striking occurrence of two or more events at one time apparently by mere chance"?

Mere chance?

The idea that events just occur by mere chance with no forethought or planning by anyone or anything and that they just-so-happen by mere chance is possible I'd guess. But that's not the lens I choose to view life through. Nor do I believe it is truth.

Because if that were the case and it were just a coincidence, or mere chance, that my husband got home earlier than usual today...

When I accidentally turned on the wrong stovetop burner....

And instead of turning on the burner with the large pot for which I'd prepared to steam carrots for Ella's babyfood...

I, instead, turned on the burner with an empty glass dish I'd set on top...

Which proceeded to heat up then burst all over the kitchen...

Sending shards of glass the size of knives...

And others the size of splinters onto the furthest reaches of my small kitchen.

Melting anything within it's reach and causing me to have to trash my favorite pair of flip flops and our cheap rug that was by the kitchen sink.

And yet, my sweet Ashlee who was standing almost directly in front of the glass dish when it suddenly exploded remained unharmed, with not even a small scratch upon her sweet, pale skin. And I, barefoot in the kitchen, standing just inches further away than Ashlee, only received two small scratches on the top of my foot and a burn from hot glass on the bottom of each arch as I stepped forward to retrieve my screaming, fearful little girl.

No, for me, it's not coincidence that, not only, did Ashlee remain completely unharmed but that Luke was home early so that 4 of the other children who are normally by my side (and under my feet) begging to help or to taste, were playing safely outside with their Dad.

For me, that's providential, not coincidental. Because if I'm leaving the safety and protection of my children up to mere chance, I'd be willing to bet that more times than not, mere chance would fail me.

He never will.

Because if it were up to coincidence, I'd most likely be writing to you tonight from our local hospital, telling you about the shards of glass being removed from the skin of my kids and the burns being treated from where the glass had melted their skin, much like it did my linoleum floor.

However, I write this to you from the comfort of my couch, with the bodies of my unscathed children resting soundly in their beds. Sleeping the sleep that unharmed children sleep and without the tick of monitors or the pain of bandages and burns.

So rather than chalk this one up to coincidence, I'm going to mark this one down as something other than mere chance, and give glory to the One who knows of the protection we need, often before imminent danger ever even befalls us. Glory be to the one who is our faithful shield and buckler.

He will cover you with his pinions,
and under his wings you will find refuge;
his faithfulness is a shield and buckler.
~ Psalm 91:4

From a little boy to a man slightly older boy

Lucas has a slam good time at the beach. He's mentioned, on a daily basis, how he's ready to go back. He spent most of his time boogie boarding on ankle high waves and avoiding looking at the camera.



I bought some small dump trucks at the dollar store before we left and they proved to be a good investment. Lucas in particular loved running them through the sand and into the waves.



He "practiced" swimming in the shallow waters because he's just too upset that his eldest sister knows how to swim (in the pool) without floaties and he does not.



Several times over the course of the week I'd look at my oldest boy and marvel at how grown up he is. I know 4 years old isn't old, but for this Momma's heart it seems old. He still loves early morning cuddles and will usually give me hugs and kisses upon request. He still, unprompted, says, "I love you Momma" and it just melts my heart each time.



Yet I see glimpses of the young man he is growing to become. Eager to please his father and I, asking good (and tough) questions about God, loving his sisters despite their desires to only play the "girly" things and loving his littler siblings beyond what I thought possible for a little boy.



And then, just when I think he's getting so mature and growing so quickly, I see this in our attempt at a family photo....



And I realize that maybe he's not as grown up as I thought. But then again, neither is his Dad and he's technically considered an adult.

My own little red-headed mermaid

Ashlee has two favorite activities, running and eating. When she's not doing one, she's certainly doing the other. A close third on her short list of "Things that make Ashlee happy" would be babies, Ella in particular. Being at the beach allowed Ashlee to either be running or eating constantly, which made her little self very, very happy.

Imagine the energizer bunny with a garbage disposal attached to his face and you get Ashlee.

I think it's important to note that the last time we went to the beach as a family was when Ashlee and Lucas looked like this:

She was slightly slower and less of a food hog then. Wow. Time surely does fly.

She and Elizabeth spent copious amounts of time jumping over and running from the waves.

She's stand in them, then scream and run like fury to get away.

Of course there's always time to stop and act silly. Anything to make someone laugh.

There was lots of boogie boarding...

...and I FINALLY got her to sit still long enough to do this....

"Being a mermaid is the most fun ever Mom! 'Cept, can I get up now?"

Oh my little red-head is growing up right before my eyes. Slow down little one. Stay my sweet, loud, overly energetic, baby loving, fast running little girl for a while longer, won't you? Please?

If you try, I'll fix you a snack. Deal?

My bucket filling, boogie boarding, blue eyed boy at the "beek"

Aaron, our most independent child, quite possibly had the best time of everyone at the beach. He loved the freedom to roam anywhere his heart desired. (Except, you know, into the ocean. I think he would have kept going and going and going had we not kept stopping him. He'd get bowled over by a wave, tumble through the small whitecaps, stand up, smile and charge into them again.) He loved the freedom to dig and play in the sand, get dirty and not be told to stop.

And, he LOVED his Daddy pulling him on the boogie board in the surf.

He got mad when he wasn't allowed to take shovels or buckets or toys from his little sister

and decided laying in the sand was a good protest.

He wore the same, "my parents are exhausted" shirt just about everyday to protect his fair skin from the blaring rays of the sun and to also let everyone know the true state of mine and Luke's energy level.

He got his beach bucket filled with Atlantic salt water 5,739 times and followed his Daddy out for a fresh helping almost every time.

And, in turn, led Daddy back to his desired location an equal amount of times.

He helped dig holes and make sand castles and fill buckets of salty water with sand. He played hard, slept soundly, awoke early and probably had the most fun of his entire 2 years of life.

And we loved seeing the beach and ocean, waves and birds, boats and adventures through his 2 year old eyes. He keeps asking when we could go back to the "beek." Buddy, if it were up to me, we'd go back tomorrow.

Meet my new daughter, Sandy

Okay, so I don't really have a new daughter. But, have mercy, if Olivia could have gotten anymore sand on her body I was seriously going to change her name. Okay, maybe not, but STILL.

And to think that her first experience with the sand and ocean started like this...

Before we left, I'd began noticing some reoccurring behaviors with her. Since she used to receive Occupational Therapy (OT) and Physical Therapy (PT) I'm always on the look out for her behaviors and watching her fine and gross motor skills. After talking with my BFF Amanda (who is a Speech Pathologist by profession but spent the last several years as a behavior interventionist, working with kids with disorders of all types) I knew it was time to give Olivia's former OT a call.

Although I think most of her behaviors are certainly learned and personality driven (she's the new, reigning Drama Queen, remember?) I also think there could be some sensory issues going on. I say all of that to say that once Olivia got over her issues with the water and the sounds of the surf and the fact that birds were flying 200 feet above her head and the sand, OHMYWORDTHESAND, she was fine and spent quite a bit of her time doing this....

Of course, what you cannot see is that each and every time my sweet little princess sat in the sand, she felt the need to immediately do this...

What's that? You can't really tell what she's doing? Okay, how's this...

SAND.IN.HER.HAIR. SAND IN HER HAIR! SAND IN HER HAIR. Every.single.time. Do you know how hard it is to get sand out of her hair? I wish I could come up with an adequate analogy but all escape me right now so just know IT'S HARD.

Unless she was helping MeMe carry a fresh bucket of water (where I think MeMe had secretly lured her to the water to rinse the sand out of her hair)...

Or it was the 10 minutes that MeMe convinced her to wear a hat...

my sweet little Drama Queen had sand in her hair. Sandy Olivia loved wearing her shades...

and as her Mommy I loved the afternoon where just the two of us sat in the surf, collecting (and promptly throwing) sea shells and allowing the Atlantic waters to wash away the sand our cares. We sat there for at least an hour. And it may have been my most favorite hour all week.

How I love this little girl, sand and all.