Play by play of the most amazing day!!!
Surprised in the morning with his own surfboard!!
Helpful TEENAGER (!!!)
Here we go!
Very first time surfing!
Seal!!
Baby participating too
Surf buddies!
Brothers, sisters <3
Alllriiight!!!
Birthday Mermaid!
We went straight to the beach the morning of her birthday and she was surprised with not one but two mermaid tails!!
Mermaid scales painting by the birthday girl
She ran into a few friends at the beach and they got to try out the pink tail.
Baby on theme with his Flock of Seagulls hair hahaha
Getting a Stephen King vibe from this seagull
In the afternoon more family arrived and we enjoyed…
Cake!
Vanilla cake with lemon curd filling and homemade buttercream icing. The decorations are Ghirardelli white chocolates that we made…
…plus a few fondant sea creatures. There are also homemade sugar cookies on there as well. The top two tiers are actually rice krispie treats. Cake inspiration from the ocean (obviously) and also Mako Mermaids (show on Netflix) and also from watching those dessert competition shows (especially Zumbo’s Just Desserts!) ! 
This moon mobile she got has a very Mako Mermaid vibe!!
The birthday fun continued into the evening with a trip to Old Orchard Beach!
(By day)
 And night!
Best birthday ever!
A trip to North Carolina, back to school, a birthday, football, an eclipse: why not jam it all into one post?!
Into the smokey mountains
And note: no ipads/phones/screens of any kind on the 10 hour drive; it is still possible for kids to be bored on road trips. haha Staring out the window is underrated, right?!
Duck in Montreat, NC
Another
Farewell to camp! The Spy enjoyed a whole month there this summer.
I painted this with my camp bestie in 1999! (its the floor of a girls’ cabin)
We enjoyed a misty hike
One little pop of color!
Likin this lichen
Almost there!
We tried to do this hike a few years ago but didn’t make it to the falls (the whole thing was straight uphill) it took us nearly 3 hours to get up to the falls.
Which were somewhat underwhelming but I’m never going to complain about a hike/nature!
Fuzzy mushroom
We also took a little walk around Asheville (we all much preferred the woods).
Asheville Selfie
Street bubble
Once home…
Time to start school! (6th grade!!)
And kindergarten!
Then,
Happy Birthday!
She got a bunny leash hahahahahahah
VERY ENTERTAINING
Show Rabbit
And here comes the next victim
Bahahahaha
And on to…
Football!
He dragged this kid along 15 more yards into the endzone!!
Very hot!
And today we saw the solar eclipse which was very cool.
Totally cool!
