Going to the beach...

... at least as close to a beach as you get in Central Ohio.

My friend Amber and I took all the kids (there were 5 of them!) to Alum Creek beach yesterday. I brought my new camera along, though I was well aware that the star of the show was swimming, and therefore there would most likely be little photo taking. I was right... my girls have turned into water babies, and when you add in Ambers 3 water babies, you get five kids who'd groan every time they'd come up on the 'beach'

Claire would frequently run from the water, up to the beach, grab one potato chip, eat it, run back to the water...

Get a potato chip


back to the water... up to the beach to get a potato chip


back to the water. At one point Ryan (the only boy in the group, poor kid) was crying in the middle of the water like the got hurt. Not hurt hurt, more like one of the other kids bullied him. We holler to him, and get him to join us on the blanket, and ask what hurts.... and then we were horrified


Notice that his ring finger nail is grey, and the others look normal. That's because a piece of sand (ie:small chopped up Ohio rocks) had gotten jammed under his nail all the way to the bottom. And man he took it like a trooper. Amber and I MacGyver'd up some tweezers (the pointy end of a Capri-Sun straw) and got the thing out. And then Ryan was fine, like nothing had happened.

Here look Heather!


He even smiled with his mommy for some pictures




I was really excited when I saw this picture in the lcd of my camera, because I love Ryans look in it. But I really love it now that I see Amber's face. It was bright out!


Ambers two older girls did a good job mother hen'ing the kids. Here's Zoe, trying to figure out what drink to get


and Fiona looking like the epidemie of California summer


However Fiona managed to look bored almost the entire time we were there. Sure you could argue that she's 8 years older than my kids, and has to play with her siblings all the time, so it's not like this was exciting for her... but still ;) She did have fun... I swear.

HEY FIONA! Hey, look excited for me! Please! Come on we're at the beach


'K thanks there. Good job.

How about you Zoe?


I'm dying to do a photo session with Zoe. Secretly when I was younger, I wished I had her coloring. I love red-heads all alabaster skinned and covered in freckles. I even colored my hair red through my senior year in high school like that would magically transform me into a ginger kid. I do feel bad for Zoe in the sense that she must get a ton of attention for her freckles. Olivia's take on it the first time she met her? "HI!! Hi Zoe! Look at you face, it's got spots! Yous gots some spots on you face! Why you got dem?" I think she'd gorgeous


Oh hey Claire, back for a chip?


So you might be asking, where is Olivia?


OLIVIA! HEY! Are you having fun?? Mommy would love to..


Olivia? Hey... mommy really would like..


and shes gone again. Olivia rarely left the water... but frequently joined other families. If she joined yours, I'm so sorry! She's a little odd like that. Look at those three amigoes though!


They had so much fun! But Amber and I knew it was time to go when, well the clock said it was close to work-time for me, and because of the seagulls.


Personally, I'm not much of a seagull fan. I find them aggressive and scary


So when they started hovering out blanket (can't blame them - we had small kids tracking chips everywhere) it was time to go


I love Alum Creek though. And it's a great place for photo sessions! Just sayin ;)

Lifes a Beach...

My Aunt Ellie suggested weeks ago that she take myself and the girls to the beach. I haven't been since I was a kid, and the girls have never been, so I loved the idea and was all for it. Haley and Aunt Sue came along for the festivities. Beware, I'm about to overload you with images!!

Where do I even start? Well we had to explain to Haley that we live in Ohio, a land locked state, and that when we say beach, we don't mean the ocean. We went to Deleware Lake, which is just more of Alum Creek, just further north then the majority of Central Ohio goes to. It was deserted! I don't know if that had more to do with it being Deleware Lake, or it being Monday morning, but we were all about it.

Haley and I spent most of the time swimming in deeper water. We would periodically come up to 'shore' to play with the girls, who were happily digging away in the sand. I was shocked they were ok with the water, let alone in it (these girls act like you're throwing boiling water over their heads when they bathe) but both girls were just thrilled to play in the water. Heck, Olivia is still a week later talking about the beach!

Whenever Haley would come up shore, she would play this kissing game with Olivia. Man those two love the heck out of each other.



Just look at that clear blue water... mmmmm hmmmmmm... nice


I know I have major mommy goggles on here, but I love how Olivia's hair looked when she got out of the water




Claire got into this routine of grabbing sand from the higher area of the beach, bringing it in fistfuls down to the waters edge and throwing it into the lake. Over. And over. And over again. Aunt Sue insisted that while it may be a big task, she felt that Claire was up for the challenge.


My fav image of the day
193 of 365: happiness


I've decided that that location would be amazing for some family photos, so if you're reading this thinking "Man I'd love some photos there" shoot me an email! I tried at the end of the day to take some images of the girls on the beach in dresses... so much went wrong... mainly being that I waited until the end. I should have done it right off the bat, when they were fresh and cooperative and not hyped on sugar and sun. But we'll try it again some time soon.







Shortly after getting home, I realized one terrible mistake that I made on that day. I sunscreened the heck out of the girls... both before we even left, and then right as we got to the beach. I put sunscreen all over the front of my body, but in my haste to catch up to the girls (who were already bee-lining it to the water) I ignored my back. And got the worst sunburn in my adult life.

194 of 365: a little sun never hurt anyone