Beach Trip!

We had been looking forward to our short beach trip all month long. It was our very first overnight "family vacation" in over two years. We hadn't been able to leave overnight because we always need to be home for the morning and evening milkings. We are so thankful for our farm helpers, Hannah and Landon, and their willingness to stay at the farm and do three milkings for us so we could leave for a long-awaited time of family fun and refreshment!

Even though we were only going a few hours away to the Outer Banks, I (Meredith) was looking forward to this trip with as much excitement as when we went on a 7 day cruise to Key West, Cozumel, the Bahamas, and the Cayman Islands a few years ago! We loaded up and left for the beach early Wednesday morning and returned to the farm late Thursday night.

We packed so much fun (and treats!) into such a short time! We had so much fun in the water. On the first day we swam a lot, but on the second day, the undertow was very strong and few people on the beach could actually handle it. Elliott, Oliver, and Daddy repeatedly attempted to get to the sandbar where the undertow wasn't so strong. They enjoyed riding the huge waves. Daddy convinced me to go with him once, but I got caught up in the undertow and got carried almost to the pier instead of out to the sandbar. I was just hoping a huge wave would come and wash me back to shore! It was fun to watch all the daredevils come back to the shore panting and hunched over from being so beat up by the waves and undertow. We were really glad that it was so nice the first day though, and we still had plenty of fun in the sand and watching the few in the water on the second day. Chicken fights in the water:
Sweet Sheridan:The first evening we went back to the hotel room, got showers, and changed clothes so we could take our yearly Christmas picture. We aren't posting our Christmas picture here until December, but below are a few different shots. The guys are happy to have the much dreaded yearly family picture out of the way already in August!Our new blog header:

Sheridan and I:After taking our pictures, we went out to eat at Outback and then bought ice cream to enjoy at the hotel room. It's so much fun to all be staying in the same room (well, I suppose it's only fun if you're one of the lucky few that gets to sleep on a bed instead of the floor!) and falling asleep to a movie on the TV playing late at night in the background.

It's not an Alexander beach trip without dreaming about buying a beach house! We get caught up in dreaming about owning a house at the beach literally every time we are there. Since I went to real estate school in Kill Devil Hills, and because we have vacationed there forever, we are familiar with the different towns on the Outer Banks, the different types of homes, the weekly rental income for different homes, and we're always dreaming about owning one of our own one day. Usually the least expensive ones are the ones that have suffered through a lot of hurricanes and need serious beach replenishment work and the shore line has eroded so much that when the tide comes in the waves are crashing under the house! This is our latest find, and although it is not terribly endangered, it needs a lot of work! We figured we needed to sell several million cow shares to buy it, but we can dream! :)

Mama took Sheridan and my pictures in the matching sundresses I sewed for us:

Sullivan caught a bird under the pier:Harrison showing off a jellyfish he found:

We stayed at the very nice, new Hilton in Kitty Hawk. Our view from our room:We enjoyed swimming in the pool a little bit during the second day:

We went to Jockey's Ridge on Thursday night and then went to a yummy seafood restaurant before heading back to Amelia. Running down the hill at Jockey's Ridge:

It was such a wonderful trip!