Charleston

A couple of weeks ago we decided to take a quick weekend trip to Charleston. It was amazing!!! It is an extremely beautiful city with so much history, amazing food, nice people, and breath-taking beaches. (My camera was out of batteries and I forgot to bring the charger and so here are a few of the places we visited, thanks google images.)

I was able to get a couple of pics at Folly Beach before the battery died. The pier at Folly Beach. There is nothing Ezra loves more than playing in the sand and so what is better than miles and miles of endless sand? And Luke enjoying the drinks that we got before we went to the beach. You would never know that he wasn't even on the charts for weight by the way that kid eats.

A really amazing bridge that connects Charleston to the Isle of Palms beach.

Battery Park

This Park is located on the coast of Charleston and is rich with history. It is across the water from Fort Sumter and has cannons that were used in the war. Pretty cool. There are all kinds of memorials and statues that tell about the history of this area.

The Battery.

A really ritzy area on the coast, near Battery Park, with lots of huge, old, beautiful homes.

Rainbow Row.

Hyman's Seafood.

The place we went to dinner. It has great seafood, hush puppies, fried okra, mac & cheese, and they give the kids free ice cream at the end. What more could you ask for?

We walked out onto the pier and there were people catching crabs. We saw a couple people pull out crab. Kinda cool. The boys loved it and Ezra thinks we should bring our own net next time.

A famous open air market. The building was built in the late 1700's or early 1800's and behind it there is a huge open air market with tons of vendors selling a variety of stuff.

There are women and children all over the city, especially near the market, that weave this grass into baskets, hats, flower, and all kinds of things. It was actually a tradition that was passed down from the time of the slaves.

King Street.

This street is lined with people and expensive shops. We were quite the spectacle with our double stroller. I can't tell you the number of times we were stopped by people telling us how cute our kids were and then asking a question about our ridiculously large stroller that took up the entire sidewalk. I am not sure if they really thought the kids were cute or if it was a dare to talk to the spectacle of a family that was taking up the entire sidewalk, or to get a closer look at what we Utahns call a double stroller.

We stayed at a really nice hotel for a great deal. Thanks priceline.

When we pulled up to our hotel there was a huge Farmer's Market that was going on across the street. It was great! We had gyros, German patries, crepes, and some vegetarian tofu thing that was delicious. There were also tons of vendors, but because we got there at 1:30 and things shut down at 2 we were bummed we couldn't hang around a little longer.

We miss you Charleston and hope to visit many more times!!!

Fall

Who doesn't love fall??? It is definitely my favorite season. The crispness in the air. The perfect evenings. College Football. The promise of an exciting holiday season. Wearing jeans and sweatshirts. The start of a new school year. Spencer not coming home until 9:00 p.m. everynight. The changing leaves. And pumpkin chocolate chip bread.

Delicious!!!

A Sunday at the Temple

A couple of Sunday's ago we decided to drive over to the Columbia, South Carolina temple. (Our first couple of Sunday's were a little lonely and a little long with no one to have dinner with, no one to visit, nowhere to go, and church at 9:30.) This is just one of the little temples, which is only about the size of a stake center, but it was beautiful. I am always amazed at the way the temple grounds are so intricately manicured and well taken care of.

The temple!

Ezra is at the age where he will never smile and even when he does it is that "cheese" grin that every three year old does that you really wish they wouldn't. Thank goodness for candid shots right.

Luke not having such a great day!

First Day of School

I know that this blog is a little bit late, but I had to post some super cute pictures of my boys on the first day of school. Although it can be a little bit overwhelming, I think both the boys are loving school. We see Spencer about an hour a day. Luke is missing Ezra a ton, all day long he says Ez? Ez? Ez? And everyday he asks if he can stay at Ezzie's school and play. Ezra love Ms. Gabrielle and is making lots of new friends. In fact, the other day he looks at me and says mom my teacher says that we praise Heavenly Father. And I said oh really and what does that mean and he sang a little song that goes like this, Praise Him, Praise Him, Praise Him in the noon time. Praise Him, Praise Him, Praise Him, till the sun goes down. He said it's how she prays. They sing it everyday before snack time. Welcome to the Bible Belt!

Ezra and his listening ears.

After school, Luke couldn't wait to see Ez!

Luke blowing kisses as Ezra leaves.

Ezra loves to climb on the top of the car while I buckle Luke in his seat.

Ezra giving Luke a big hug before he goes.

The Boys on their first day of school!!

My family will appreciate the shot of Ezra looking over his shoulder. Every year on the first day of school my mom would make us take a shot like this and Spencer thinks it is hilarious. I am actually still not really sure why she had us do that!!!!!

Ezra really really wanted to make Dad a cake to celebrate his first day of school, but really he saw me get into a cupboad with a bunch of sprinkles and cake decorating stuff and he wanted to play with the sprinkles. Isn't our cake lovely?

MY MOM

Who would fly to South Carolina and organize, move things, hang pictures, buy lights (because none of the bedrooms have overhead lights???), take us to Sam's, hang out with my boys, take us to dinner, and a million other things. And on top of all of that sleep in Luke's room and for all of those who don't know Luke is a HORRIBLE sleeper. I think he wakes up about five times crying in the night. MY MOM!!! Aren't mom's wonderful? What would this world be like without mothers? My mom was so hopeful and such a good sport!! I am lucky enough to have the greatest mom in the whole world. Our family would not make it without this lovely woman. Thanks mom we love youand miss you like crazy!!!!

Riverwalk Cafe

We also ate at a yummy restaurant called the Riverwalk Cafe. They had really good seafood and the boys loved it because they could throw peanut shells on the floor. Unfortunately, they did not quite get it was just the peanut shells we throw, poor waitress, but we did leave her a good tip!

At the Riverwalk Cafe, eating peanuts.

Mommy and Luke at the Cafe.

Ezra after getting soaked in the water with all of his clothes on!

Luke trying to decide if he likes it and Ezra about to run and jump in a huge pool of water on the sand.

Myrtle Beach

A couple of weeks ago we decided to take a quick weekend trip to Myrtle Beach. It was a great getaway from our crazy life. The beach was beautiful. It was clean, warm water, white sand, fireworks, music playing, and yummy food. Ezra loves everything about the beach, the sand, the water, and the seashells. Luke, we are working on!

Pigsty

So, the other day Ezra, Luke, and I had nothing to do, after the sixth straight day of rain. (We received a lot of rain because of hurricane Fay that hit Florida.) We decided to go check out the local library. Suprisingly, it has a really neat children's area with art tables, couches, lots of really big stuffed animals, a table full of puzzles, a puppet theatre, story time, days they do art projets witht he kids, and other fun activities that go on during the week. The library is decorated in the theme of Where the Wild Things Are and it has trees and a mural of the monsters and is really really neat. Ezra loves the library and he picked out a bunch of books for us to read. One of these books happened to be a book called pigsty, by Mark Teague. It is a great book about a boy who doesn't keep his room clean and pigs come and take over his room. Well for some reason Ezra really internalized the book and now is always concerned about us leaving his room or the house messy in fear that pigs will come and live here. It is hilarious, aren't three year olds sweet!

We are Here!

We are finally here!!!! After a whirlwind three weeks, we finally made it to the beautiful South Carolina. We have had an extremely busy and exciting last three weeks. It started out with an awesome and amazing trip to Alaska with the Olsen fam. We had an incredible time seeing bears, eagles, eating, whale watching, viewing glaciers, zip lining, eating, dancing, playing cards, chatting, oh and did I mention eating. We arrived home on Saturday and Spencer was driving a huge, 26 footer, Penske truck with all of our junk to South Carolina on Thursday. Needless to say we were in quite a rush to get everything packed and on its way. We were suprisingly successful, but not without many long nights and help from lots and lots of good friends and family. Thank you again everyone! While Spencer was driving the monstrous load to SC we were living at my mom's and trying to tie up all of the loose ends.






















And.....now we are here! It is a beautiful place (the pictures are just a couple that we have taken of the scenery and campus here) and there will be posts to come to tell you about our adventures in the old SC.