OIB

The title of this blog is to be pictured in your head like this:

Virtually every year since my dad was eight, his extended family has spent a week of the summer on the Carolina coast. This began with his grandma, his family and his aunt’s and uncle’s families… but it eventually grew into a 50+ person endeavor.

When I was younger, I literally lived each day in either anticipation for Christmas or for the beach. Each of us had a cousin of similar age to hang out with so we were never bored and it was the one week of the year we could stay up as late as we wanted, eat as much junk food as we wanted and not have to do any chores.

In recent years, we have had to split the family into two trips: one for my Aunt Judy’s family and one for my Nana’s family. While I definitely miss the pandemonium of 16 kids running around screaming, my dad’s cousins pranking each other to no end and my Papa yelling “Shut the door!!!” 25 times a day… not having to elbow my way to the buffet line and having a bed to sleep on (as opposed to the leaking blow-up mattress) has been a refreshing change.

Anyway, this week is beach week. Joel and I made the trek out there last weekend for the first two days, determined not to let “The Man” keep us from as much ocean time as possible. But we headed back last night to pay our dues and go to work Monday and Tuesday. Meanwhile, my whole family and grandparents and cousins and aunts and uncles are in Ocean Isle right now, enjoying the gorgeous view of the moon on the ocean from the back porch rocking chairs.  Thankfully though, we will get to head back Wednesday night and stay through Sunday! I am so excited!

Check out these pictures from past beach adventures:

Don’t Vomit, but, the Boyfriend

I try to avoid anything overly sentimental on here, because I’d rather not sound like a 13-year-old girl gushing about her boy of the moment. However, I think Joel’s presence in my life for the past six months has earned him the right to have a blog post regarding my thankfulness for him.

The first night we met, he told me one of the things he respected most about his father was the way he loved his mom. Little did I know that this was not only something he respected in his father, but it was also something he planned to emulate. The entire six months we have been dating, Joel has found little ways to show me that he cared, from a daily morning voicemail waiting for me at work, to a pack of bendable straws he found at Kroger that he knew I would love.

Well, today, he pretty much blew me away. Although we never planned to celebrate “anniversaries,” Joel wanted to give me something he had heard me mention maybe once or twice before (at least two months ago) because he knew how much it would make me happy. Not being able to wait until our official six month milemarker, he surprised me with it today: the Blue Planet and Planet Earth Collector’s Edition DVD Set!!!!

Planet Earth + The Blue Planet Seas of Life

Let me just tell you… I have wanted this for months, years maybe, and I just never broke down and bought it. So when he pulled it out of his bookbag this afternoon to give to me, I was pretty dang excited!

So now we’re sitting here watching it and learning about how blue whales have blood vessels big enough for people to swim in and how dolphins blow walls of bubbles to make sardines swim in the direction they want so they can capture them. Insane!

What an incredible guy I get to spend time with!