Beach Trip: Post 1

After spending a few days in NY, we drove up to Maine for a week long vacation with Grandma Bernard and Uncle Steve. While most people think we're crazy to have gotten in a car for 7 hours with a 2 year old after having driven 10 hours with him just days before, we are crazy lucky that our sweet boy is a great traveler. And he didn't disappoint - he was great on the entire ride! People also think it's crazy that we live in North Carolina and travel 17+ hours to go to a beach in Maine - but there's just something about Maine that we have always loved and I have a feeling we'll be visiting there for many years to come! Maine is just so incredibly relaxing and we're so glad we made the trip.

Anyway, I took a TON of pictures on our trip so I'm going to have to break it up into several posts. On our first day in Maine we settled into our rental and then headed down to the beach. We weren't really sure how Truman would react. Last year when we went to the Outer Banks, Truman was pretty much terrified of the ocean when he first saw it (even though it was his 2nd trip there). Then when we went to Virginia Beach earlier this year he was pretty much indifferent. Well, this time, he LOVED it! As soon as we got to the sand, he started laughing and was ready to run. We put a swimmie on him (a diaper made for swimming) and he just sprinted for the water, all while laughing and squealing in delight. It was  incredibly cute. We had to keep a close eye on him because he was ready to go into the ocean as deep as possible.

Here's some of the pictures we took that night:

 

Snuggly Family

You might not know this about our family, but we love to snuggle! While Truman isn't naturally the most snuggly fellow (he'd rather be running!) he is coming to love cuddle time with his family. Here he is coming in for a quick snuggle with Grandma Bernard:

And here we are all snuggling together!

Hanging with Grandpa & Great-Grandma Bernard

On our second day up in NY, we were able to have a lovely dinner with Grandpa & Great-Grandma Bernard at one of our favorite Italian restaurants, Little Venice. While we forgot to take any pictures, Truman LOVED the meatballs (he ended up eating almost all of mine!) and enjoyed the homemade spaghetti, too.

After dinner, we came back to Grandma Bernard's house and hung-out outside. Here's some of the cute pictures I took from that night:

Side note: People never believe how heavy Truman is until they pick him up. While he looks thin, he is pure muscle! Right now he is a heavy 32 pounds.

Cousin Love

Wow - I didn't realize quite how long it has been since I last posted! As you can guess, life has been busy around these parts, and then at night (which is when I usually blog) I've been watching the Olympics :-)

Anyway, at the beginning of the month our little family of three made the very long trip up to NY. As usual, Shea & I were nervous about how Truman would fair in the almost 10 hour car ride, and once again we were pleasantly surprised - he did awesome! Almost no crying, lots of laughing, and a ton of food :-) That's not to say he wasn't excited to get out the car. Upon arriving in Binghamton we stopped at Wegmans to get some dinner and he ran circles around the place with Grandma Bernard, all while laughing and giggling - it was super cute!

The day after arriving to NY, we went to Grandma and Grandpa Simmons house for a wonderfully cooked meal. Luckily, Shea's step-sister was able to come over and bring her son, Damon, who is about one year younger than Truman. While Truman has historically not been to interested in other children, he loved Damon! Once we got outside, Truman kept bringing Damon a ball and trying to get him to run. When Damon didn't want to run, Truman tried to give him help (i.e. pushed him :-). Damon was a good sport, though tired more easily of the game than Truman did (our boy has a LOT of energy!). But it was so great to see the cousins together enjoying the beautiful summer weather. And we were so incredibly excited to see Truman making progress with his peer relationships! Here's some of my favorite pictures from the night (get ready for a picture overload! They're all just so cute):

Building blocks with Great-Grandma Bleir

Sharing a banana (which you can't see)

Trying to put the ball in his cousin's hand

This ball feels different!

Sweet hug for Grandma Simmons

Telling Damon to get up :-)

You can probably guess what happened next...

Giving the ball to Uncle Graham

Holding hands with Uncle Graham

Adorable kiss

Stay tuned for more posts about our trip up north!