Our trip to Destin

I'm a little behind (okay, a lot) in writing this week because we just got back from our trip with Garen's family to Destin, FL. We had a really nice time and it was fun to show off Lucas and meet his cousin Ava. Of course, it was great to see the other 2 cousins also - Reece and Riley. Reece is probably the smartest "almost" 3 year old I've ever met! He was spelling red and blue to us! Riley is 11 months old now and she is a character! She is walking already and is a beautiful little girl. Ava has the squishy baby-rolls, but I think they are absolutely adorable. She is much more laid back that Lucas is. I was very jealous of her behavior, although her mother swears it was a fluke (we don't believe you Heather!).

The car ride down was pretty easy. Luke did great and we made the 8 hour trip in 9 hours! We were both very happy with that. But because Luke was a grump while we were there, we left Friday night and drove 1/2 way and spent the night in Birmingham, AL and came the rest of the way on Saturday. Thank goodness we did! Luke was not a happy baby on the trip home. I swear he crapped himself ever hour just to make us stop the car! I sat in the backseat with him on both trips and overall he really wasn't awful.

Luke wasn't a big fan of the beach. Because of the storms in the gulf, the water was pretty cold and every time it touch him he started crying. The first and last days we were there the ocean was nice. It rained really bad and they closed the beach one day, and the rest of the days it was "red flag" (rough waves and a strong under tow). Not to mention the jelly fish! I think everyone got stung at some point, but not badly. Emily, the youngest SIL, got stung the worst. She came up from a wave with one stuck to her face! Yuck (and ouch). But when we were out at the beach, the temperature was perfect and the company was fantastic. Garen and I took turns most days, one stayed inside while Luke napped while the other went to the beach. We took him to the pool a few times too. He liked that much better. I have an inflatable turtle for him to ride in and he smiled and kicked and liked the pool.

Garen's friend Adrian came down for a few days also. He took our Engagement pictures and we asked him to take some family photos while he was there. They turned out really nice. If you'd like to see them, go to http://www.eventpix.com/guest/events/index.php?_function=search and put "Nichols" in the "Photographer last name" field. Click on "Harshbarger, Patterson, Grashot" and the password is "destin". Yeah....we did the khaki and white thing. I love it. I think the pictures are wonderful. THANKS ADRIAN!!!

We spent our evenings watching the Olypics and Michael Phelps (and the gymnastic girls). Who knew ping-pong was an sport!