To start off July, we spent some time with Mark's cousins and their children. We went for a boat ride that ended with us sitting under a bridge for 45 minutes with hungry kids waiting for the storm to pass. In the end, We ducked and covered and Grandpa did what he does best... drove fast.
For the Fourth of July we dressed in our festive best (thanks, Bar-Bar!) and headed to the Birkdale 4th celebration. Uncle Ben was once again an excellent shoulder ride around the festivities!
Madison experienced her first fire truck spray down!
We ended the morning with some wet grumpy kids, haha!
We tried to take some more cute festive photos after a nap and putting clothes in the dryer. These are literally the best we have.
We visited Carowinds with the cousins, Here Anna Kate and Ethan are riding the carousel... I think she enjoyed having some older kids to play with!
Grandpa really enjoyed riding everything with Anna Kate and passing on his gene for thrills!
Time was definitely spent at home playing. Madison started using the doll table as her own personal tiny table. And Anna Kate realized that it isn't so easy to hold Madison like a baby anymore!
An annual tradition.. Cow Appreciation Day! Madison was thrilled.
A little chicken and ice cream and all is well in the world! Madison even blew kisses...
And AK danced with the Chick-Fil-A cows. No.. really.
So. Many. Frogs.
Not kid related, or family related, but I did finish this project in July. Sidewalk completed in spring, dry creek bed of rocks in June, plants and mulch in July. I took a break from shovels and lifting after all this... ha!
Summer fun, taking a frog for a walk and a "splash pad". Deep well water doesn't make for very long playtime on the splash pad ;).
We went to the mountains again in July, our favorite! Here, AK caught a wooly worm down by the creek at Nanny's mountain house.
With our hiking partners at Linville Gorge. AK was a little nervous of the heights.
But so was Gigi, so they hung back.
We found a new fun park to explore this trip, the Banner Elk park!
We also hiked Rough Ridge for the first time with the kids. Mark is the MVP, he carried AK the whole way! And smiled at the camera with me.
More pictures from our hike at Rough Ridge!
We also bought some river tubes and cruised down the Watauga into Valle Crucis.
We had to visit the Blowing Rock outlets and have ice cream before lunch at Kilwins, since when Mommy was little and used to visit Nanny's mountains (what AK now calls them) we would always go to the outlets and Paw would sneak us away and feed us ice cream while the ladies shopped. Paw always "got in trouble" and we usually started asking him when we could have ice cream when we got there at 9am.
We also spent the day at Carowinds with Nana and stayed a little too long as Madison fell asleep in the stroller on the way out after a fun day riding rides and playing in the water park.
Madison and Alli dog cuddled up for a boat ride in July...
Daddy and Uncle Scottie took the girls for a swim..
And AK was given a hand me down giraffe, which she named Alice. It was a good July!
