beach bums and angels

happy 6th anniversary! amber took this picture for us while we were eating dinner.

so, once again, lots of things have happened since my last post. first, i would like to update you guys with some pictures for the birthday party we had at the beach. it was tons of fun. sarah and i posed for some pictures as nathan took them....

do i have something in my teeth?

he likes to take candid shots!

happy birthday, ladies!

so, following our party, we had lots of food left. so, we decided that probably for every monday until the end of the summer we will have a bbq at the beach so we can eat all of our leftover hotdogs! here is a documentation of our first party. bryan wasn't able to make it since he was working at school, and we missed him. since the guys were at school, it was left to the girls to start the fire. so, i started it with some wood, matches, and a couple sheets of the church news... all we had was 4 pieces of newspaper. i think we did pretty good without any lighter fluid or anything. that's putting all those yw camp experiences to good use! here is grace lounging around as she eats her sandwich.

on friday, the 20th, bryan didn't have to go to school, so we headed down to the beach again. crescent bay was tons of fun and mike and amber met us with their kids. grace has discovered sand crabs, and she loves them. it is so funny, because she really is afraid of every little creature or bug that moves. for some reason, she loves the sand crabs. spencer would catch them for her, then she would just hold them. after a few minutes she would say, 'let's let him go back to his home with his mommy and daddy.' so she would let him go. it was pretty cute.





this past monday, we went to the beach again with the thompson's and the swiss family. we decided to try our hand at foil dinners... i think we need more practice. ours turned out just ok. but we still had fun!

on thursday, sarah and i decided to take the kids to the beach. we wanted to try a cleaner beach, so we headed down to newport. it was so much fun. we hung out by a rock jetty, and the waves were considerably smaller since they were breaking on the rocks. we didn't have to worry too much about the kids playing in the water. well, it was tons of fun up until the part where i decided to help paige and fill up her bucket with water so she could wash her hands. i took the bucket to the water and stuck it in and the force of the wave drove the bucket back. the bottom of the bucket got caught on my big toenail, and ripped it almost all the way off. yuk! it didn't hurt too much when it happened... luckily it happened so fast... so i went to the lifeguard and he wrapped it up for me. i called my mom and asked her to talk to dr. carron (a podiatrist in our ward in missouri) and he said i needed to cut as much of it away as possible, so i went home and started to cut. i got about 2/3 of the nail off and then it started to hurt. so, that night, nathan and bryan cleaned it out as best they could. there was so much sand in it. on friday morning, bryan told me he thought i needed to go to the doctor to have it removed. so i called up a podiatrist close to our house and it must have been a blessing... the doctor answered the phone and i told him my problem and that i was worried about the shot because it would hurt. that is when he told me about a painless injection... i thought to myself... where have i heard that before... oh yeah, bryan is always begging me to let him give me a painless injection in my mouth... yeah right! so, i had my doubts, but i dropped the kids off at sarah's and headed to the doctor. well, all i can say is that the doctor was true to his word... i did not feel the injection at all. whew... i was so relieved... and he removed the rest of my toenail... double yuk! apparently it will take like 6 months to grow back, but at least there won't be any infection from the sand and it will grow back normal.

ok, moving on to the more pleasant.... last night we went to the angels game for lds family night. that was a lot of fun. grace seemed to like it, but raegan was a handful. it probably didn't help that the game started at 7:05.... almost her bedtime. well, we ended up leaving just before the 7th inning stretch, but it was a good game.