First Day of School

She's only 2 years old, but Charlotte is already headed to school!  Well, it's a Mother's Day Out program at a local church, but still, we call it school.  She'll be going 2 days a week for a few hours and even eats lunch at school.  This meant of course that we had to buy a cute backpack and coordinating lunch box for her.

Charlotte was very excited for her first day of school!  She posed for lots of pictures to appease Mommy, walked down the hall of her school with determination, and headed into her classroom.  No tears!  

She was excited to see me when I picked her up, and was quick to recap her day.  They learned about the color blue and the number 1!  We're hoping that she continues to enjoy school, makes new friends and participates in fun activities.  And i'm also hoping that the time allows me to get some things done around the house!  

Another Birthday Celebration

Sunday evening it was time for Kathleen (Aunt Ki-Kat) to come over and help celebrate my birthday.  We'd had dinner with her before we left for the OBX to celebrate her 30th, so we decided to have another little "party" for mine when we returned!

We spent some time on the deck blowing bubbles while Steve grilled us a yummy dinner.  Then we enjoyed the chocolate and peanut butter cupcakes that Kathleen had made!

"Mommy hold you!"

Sitting on the steps with Ki-Kat

The grill master at work!

Mmmmmmm...

Impromptu BBQ

As we were eating brunch at The Liberty Tree, we got a text from our friend Will about an impromptu bbq that afternoon!  Will and some of our other friends had been in the OBX at the same time, and were also evacuated...leaving them with lots of extra snacks, food and drinks.  So...we headed home, got Charlotte a nap, and went over to Will's place to continue enjoying the beautiful day!

Fun activity of the afternoon...running up and down Will's driveway which had just the right slope for fun and potential injury.  Thankfully there were no falls!  

She looks super tall in this photo!

We also spent a while catching the football and blowing bubbles.  We'd also packed her little backpack full of entertainment and activities for her.  Here she is reading Dora on the deck.  

A fun end to a beautiful day!

National Zoo

Since we had to cut our vacation short, and it was going to be such a nice weekend here at home, we decided to continue the fun by going downtown to the National Zoo!  Charlotte's favorite part of the whole experience was the Kid's Farm at the zoo.  They are doing a lot of construction - building a new building for the elephants and giraffes, etc, so we didn't get to see a whole lot of stuff, but we still had fun wandering around.

Peeking in on the miniature donkeys at the farm.  Her favorite?  The brown one named Giuseppe!  

Stopping for a break on the bench

Following the elephant tracks...to the non-existent elephants

More peering through the fence at the farm animals

Cute shoes!

Look! More cows!

Petting Tulip the Cow

Since we were already in the big city, we decided to venture a few more miles to The Liberty Tree for lunch!  We hadn't tried their new brunch menu yet, so we were excited to see what it was all about.  Of course we had a nice visit with Chef Graig while we were there.  Charlotte sat like a big girl on the bench seat - no booster, no high chair!  She played with her notepad and stickers we picked up at the zoo gift shop.

OBX Part 2 - Day 5

Thanks to Hurricane Earl, OBX Day 5 would be our last day of vacation since we pre-planned to "evacuate" on Thursday morning.  :(   But, this day was also my 30th birthday, so we decided to make the most of it and have another great day!

We stuck with our usual morning schedule, this time skipping the beach altogether and staying at the pool for a few hours before lunch and nap.  The camera stayed inside this time around, so no new snacking by the pool pics, sorry! :)

After Charlotte's nap, we headed out onto the deck to use the cool new bubbles that Aunt Jacki brought for us.  Charlotte had an awesome time, which her expression in these pictures will attest to!

I took a lot of pictures, so I had a lot of expressions to choose from, but these were some of my favorites :)

I had brought several dresses for Charlotte to wear for beach "photo shoots," and since this was our last evening at the beach house, I had her change into one for some photos on the deck.  

 And finally, some cute pictures of Charlotte playing with her Grandaddy!

Sneaking up...

Caught you!

Silly faces!

Even though it was cut short, we had an awesome vacation and enjoyed spending time with my parents and Aunt Jacki.  We headed home early Thursday morning, made a quick stop at the Williamsburg outlets and were back home by mid afternoon!

Charlotte even took a quick nap in the car...

OBX Part 2 - Days 3 & 4

The next few days in OBX had basically the same schedule - beach for 45 minutes (or less, or...not at all), pool for a few hours, lunch, nap, playing on the deck, dinner and bedtime!

One of our trips to the beach was just for picture taking.  I put Charlotte is a cute beachy dress instead of her swimsuit since I knew we wouldn't be there for long, and she didn't mind.  We didn't get too many of the ideal beach pictures I would have liked, but there were still some cute ones.

When Charlotte was done with the beach, she started walking towards the steps.  When she realized that we weren't following her, she turned around and started marching back to us non too pleased!  

A few family pics...

I'M READY FOR THE POOL!

More snack time by the pool...

OBX Part 2 - Day 2

Everyone had a great night's sleep and it was time to start our first full day at the beach.  Last time we visited, Charlotte was not too keen on the sand, but we decided to hit the beach first thing and see what she thought about it this time around.  We didn't take too many supplies down there because we knew we'd be ending up back at the pool in no time - all we needed was a towel and a bucket of sand toys!

Daddy and Charlotte trying for a thumbs up, but ending up with #1's

We did a little bit of walking, a little bit of digging, and a little bit of watching the big waves.  We also wandered down the beach to see our friends the Haykens who were staying on the next street over! Charlotte didn't want the sand to touch her hands, which is REALLY hard to avoid, so we stayed down on the beach for about 45 minutes and then headed back up to the pool.

Let's go to the pool, follow me!

Are you all coming or what?!

Pool time!  Charlotte was much happier playing in the nice cool pool.  Well, mostly she just wanted to hang out on the steps and "jump" in every now and then.  

Having a poolside snack
 

Getting ready to catch the beach ball.  We're trying to teach her to keep her eye on the ball, but she just likes to stare at her hands.  

Playing with Daddy

I love cute baby feet!