Holden Beach Memories

Growing up, I have many fond memories spent with my Mom, Grannie, and brother at Holden Beach, NC. It's a small beach town near Wilmington, and the perfect beach for families. I remember as a teen wishing that my Grannie had built the beach house on a busier beach, but now that I am older and have a family of my own, I realize how fortunate we are to have a family beach house on such a nice, quiet beach. My Grannie has also been a big part of my life growing up, so naturally I wanted to be with her this past week to celebrate her 92nd birthday!

My grannie is a very strong, independent woman who is a retired Army nurse and helped carry and tend to many injured soldiers during World War II. I look to her and only wish I had her strongwill, and independence. You wouldn't think she was 92 and she still drives and gets around like a 60 year old! I like to think this is where I got my desire to want to work in the dental/medical field.

My brother and his wife joined us too so the house was full of my Mom, Stepdad, Grannie, brother, sister in law, and my family of course. My brother doesn't have any children yet but he is so smitten with Brynley. He loves Ryder too, but he is really taken with her, maybe since she's a girl. He was always so gentle and sweet to me, but very protective and took his role as "big brother" seriously.

Brynley is also charming her Pawpaw, and even fell asleep like this after I got her changed in her bathingsuit. She stayed like this for almost 45 minutes! It's rare these days when she sleeps on you, but when she does it's just the sweetest thing!

Brynley had fun at the beach but mostly just wanted to eat the sand! Ryder tried eating it too, but after taking a bite or two realized it was yucky and didn't try eating it anymore. I wish this was the case with this silly girl! The ocean was still a little cool from the rain we've had lately, so she didn't really like getting in it. The tide pools were perfect for her though!

And Ryder was content with just pushing his dumptruck all over the sand and filling it up with sand and salt water. He gets in a zone at the beach and doesn't want to look up from what he's doing. Well actually this is him most of the time now too I guess! Oh three is just such a hard age!

The ocean was crystal clear and Scot was able to find this crab that washed ashore in one wave! He looked just like the sand though and we thought Ryder would love seeing a crab this close, but we are realizing he likes things from afar and doesn't want much to do with them when they are within touching distance haha! He totally gets this from me I think.

Saturday I got the idea to bring the baby pool down to the beach and use it to help contain Brynley! It did just the trick and she loved sitting there playing with all the sand toys and hanging out eating juicy peaches in her bathingsuit. I mean, that's the life isn't it??

It's hard to see in this picture, but it's of Ryder on a surfboard being pulled out on a wave. My brother came up with the idea and started passing Ryder on his board back and forth from him to Scot to get Ryder out in the ocean, and used to the waves. I was so proud of him!!

Meanwhile, Brynley took the biggest poop in her life out on the beach, in her little swimmers and one piece bathingsuit. Talk about a poopie, sandy mess! Ughhh! So they were having a ball in the ocean while I was cleaning a messy baby up. Afterwards she wanted to cuddle up and then she passed out listening to the sounds of the ocean. I was able to finish the second Hunger Games book though, so it was well worth it! I have to remember this is only a season and I won't always be changing diapers.

I will leave ya'll with this cute video of Scot pulling Ryder on the boogie board! We had a great trip and I was glad to spend time with my Grannie for her birthday. I can't believe tomorrow is Friday. The week started off slow but has flown ever since and I am just posting from our weekend. Yikes!