Fishing on the Dock

We are now in Oriental, North Carolina for the next two weeks.  The kids love being here for many reasons.  One of them is fishing and on day one here they fished.  My parents have a dock on Dawson Creek which is so large I think it could be called a river.  It is just off the Neuse River.  Fishing is not my thing.  I don't like to touch slimy things, but I am willing to cast lines and help them reel in their lines.  I will also take pictures!

My kiddos have not fished since last summer so some help was needed.  Jonah, for some reason, does not like to cast his line.  He did it one time.  Samuel and Emma were much more independent.  Elena held her rod for about two minutes.  She preferred her boat ride to fishing.

Our fishing night was quite eventful because of what Emma caught.  Kelsey and I did most of the reeling in....actually Kelsey did most of it.  The animal was too strong for Emma and I wanted to document every second with pictures.

Silly Emma thought we could catch this thing in a net.  Finally, after approximately 15 minutes we saw what it was....

Of course, my dad was on the boat and Kelsey and I had no idea what to do with a stingray.  So, we sent Samuel, Emma, and Hanna to get the neighbor.  Apparently there are two choices with a stingray.  The first is to attempt to get it on the dock while trying to avoid being stung by the tail.  Then one can stab it between the eyes and cut it up for bait....um gross!  The kids loved this idea.  Kelsey and I preferred option two which was to cut the line.  The neighbor cut the line.

Bye bye sting ray!

After that incident more normal sized fish were caught.  First, little Leah caught a crocker fish.

Leah was getting some help from her mommy to reel in her fish.

She was very proud of her catch which we threw back into the water.

I was crazy hot and uncomfortable so after about an hour in the hot evening sun with no breeze I went inside.  Not ten minutes later Samuel caught a little perch and I have no pictures of it.  So annoyed by being hot and missing his moment!  Thankfully there will be many more nights of fishing.

Excuse my finger....goodness!

Creek Time and Swimming

One of my absolute favorite things to do in the summer is to take the kids to my Aunt Judy and Uncle Gary's house.  They have a great big yard, a creek to play in, and a pool.  I loved playing there as a child and I love sharing it with my kiddos.  

The kids were not too interested in playing in the creek this year.  It has been rainy and on the cooler side so the creek was a little chilly.  Emma was the biggest party pooper and refused to even attempt to walk in the creek.  Can you tell Emma and Elena were a little cold?

At least they did a little better for our family minus Drew picture.

Emma departed for the deck while the rest of us played in the creek.  It was fun and not too cold.

After playing in the creek, we played in the pool.  That water was cold as well so we spent most of the time floating in tubes.  It was wonderfully relaxing!

It is tradition for the kids to eat too many popsicles and play with water balloons.  

Little Owen sat in a little bucket of warm water for maybe 30 minutes.  He was adorably cute!!

It was the best weather day we had in PA and we took full advantage of having tons of fun!  

Science and Crafting

To me, that is the funniest post title ever.  Science and crafting are quite low on my list of "let's do that today kids!".  But, when the weather is kind of yucky indoor activities prevail and new adventures are fun.  Thankfully I was not in charge of the craft.  I mostly just watched.  And, the science museum was mostly just fun play...phew!

Grammy wanted the kids to make new stepping stones for her garden.  The kids were all about this.  They sketched their plans and prepared all the beads in bowls.  I helped mix the cement and the kids got busy.  A super quick, fun, and easy craft!

The final products looked something like this.  Because it was crazy humid it took a couple of days to dry so we did not get to see them in the garden.

Since the weather was still not suitable for swimming we headed to the Lancaster Science Museum in the afternoon.  Unfortunately we arrived at the same time as a YMCA group, but we still had fun.  There were lots and lots of different experiments for the kids to do.  They each had favorites.  For Emma it was the electricity circuit boards.  For Jonah and Samuel it was the parachute launcher.  Elena loved the bubbles.  I liked the rainbow shadows!

I have now been to two science museums this year.  That is probably more than my entire lifetime!  As much as I could leave after a short time, I do enjoy watching Emma, Jonah, Samuel, and Elena figure out the experiments.  They definitely get their love of science from their Daddy!

A Pennsylvania Farmer's Market

We are food people.  We love to eat and eat good food. So, of course, one of the things I wanted to do while in PA was to go to a real farmer's market.  I say real because I have never been to another marker like Roots.  Roots is huge and I mean huge.  And, it has the best home grown and baked food ever!  

Roots (not pronounced like a tree root, but more like rutts) is only open on Tuesday.  The entire area around Roots is jam packed full of people and cars.  

My kiddos have not been there in a long time.  Samuel and Elena have probably never been there.  They were exposed to amazing food that we cannot get in Texas.  They saw Amish people which always brings out many questions.  We ate or bought some seriously yummy foods.

Eating her homemade donut

Eating their homemade lemon whoopie pies....one of my favorites, but with a chocolate cake

Probably the kids favorite part was getting penny candy.  There were so many choices for them.  My favorite was finding snowman placemats like my Grandma gave me for Christmas many years ago.  I wanted to add to my collection and now I have six placemats.  For me, the second best part was buying black raspberries.  They are perhaps one of my favorite fruits and I have never seen them in a store in Texas.  I have been eating them non stop since Tuesday!

One of the indoor areas with shopping stalls that go beyond what you can see in this picture.

An outdoor stall with some great looking fruit.

My delicious black raspberries

Tired and hot children when we were finished shopping and eating.  It was a very yummy adventure!

Meeting nephew/cousin Owen

My sister Kristin had her first baby in May.  May 13th to be exact.  We have seen many precious pictures of the sweet boy since he was born, but we did not get to meet him until Monday.  The kids were so excited.  Who am I kidding...so was I!

Sweet boy is 7 weeks old.

Emma, Jonah, Samuel, and Elena love to hold him.  They also love to feed him.

And the feeding...

He is definitely the cutest little nephew!