Beach Camping (sort of)

I've titled this with "sort of" tagged on because camping as I remember it was really different than it is now (for my family). When I was growing up, we camped in tents- (sometimes under the stars with no tents!), slept on the ground in sleeping bags, cooked with a gas stove, and ate lots of simple meals. It was so much fun, but I do appreciate the comfort of the nice "fifth wheel" my parents now sport. We had egg mcmuffins for breakfast yesterday (we made them ourselves), swedish pancakes this morning, and tri-tip for dinner last night, with salad, steamed broccoli, baked beans, etc. Not exactly roughing it, but dirty, nonetheless. And a movie at the end of the night isn't all that bad.
Well, the kids had a blast, once again! They love hanging out with grandma and grandpa- playing games, eating smores, riding bikes, fishing, and more. Shea is currently scrapbooking the trip- I should post pics of what she does- she's very creative!
We went to the beach every day in the 77 degree perfect weather, and the little girlies played in the sand, while the three big kids hardly stepped out of the ocean. Reilly and Shea love to boogie board, and Kinley was getting a little more brave with it as well. Another highlight was the sand crab collecting. Kinley would beg me to come down and dig with her, and we would dig and dig and dig- literally for a couple of hours, almost non-stop. Even the little girlies would participate (at times), until a bigger wave would come and sweep them off of their feet and temporarily scare them. Reilly and Shea got into it too- especially when we found a "hot spot". Anyway, a great week in Carpinteria once again, with the sweetest little crew you can imagine... thanks grandma and grandpa!


Happy little tree climbers! Macy kept finding her way over to this tree and climbing right up. She is a good climber, and could find her way back down pretty easily with no big spills...

Mostly. She did nose dive off of the back of a chair, and was eating lots of dirt. She's still so cute.

A lovely tri-tip dinner outside in the beautiful California sun...not too cold, not too hot...wait, is that a pillow under Macy's head? Yep, she crashed on her tray at dinner time (thankfully after she ate). It was so cute. Grandma had to bring her a pillow.

Macy "helping" grandma with the dishes. She's allowed to sit on the kitchen counter, and she enjoys the privilege.

The sweetest little munch bunch...not exactly all cooperating for the picture. It's hard with five, and I don't know how anyone with multiple boys does it. They don't care about pictures like little girls do!

A fine game of Blokus this morning with the girls. Camdyn won. Macy attempted to steal the pieces, and as you can see she thinks she can climb on the kitchen table as well as the counter. Hmmm.