This was our first meet with Sparkles:)!! She is so adorable! She turned 3 months old while she was here so she is still a very young pup and very hyper! She was more hyper than the pugs, but the pugs are 18months old now! They had such a good time together! Regan wasn't bothered much and he loved that too:)!!
Since everyone arrived early enough Phillip decided to take John out fishing. They had a termendous day with lots of success! They caught a shark each and boy do they make a lot of fish to eat! They fileted them at whatever location they were at at the time, but I did get a picture of the pompino (however spelled). They were very pleased with their catch of the day:)!!
This is the guys' speckled sea trout they caught! And yes I cooked all this fish that night! It was very tasty too! The guys really liked the shark best though.
Saturday was our big day to go to FWB for the fireworks display done at the Landing on the water. Several booths were set up selling this and that and it is so much fun! Nellis AFB in Vegas has a grand celebration for the 4th as well, but I haven't seen any other place make such a grand display anywhere else other than Ft. Walton Bch. They do this every year. That will be one thing I will miss if where we go next time doesn't have something. We love going to this especially because all our families that are local go to it as well.
Well, with it being the 4th of July I had to dress Sadie up a little to celebrate! Don't you just love her little pom poms:)!!
We got all the kids patriotic hats to wear to this thing! They played with them for awhile. It was long enough for me to get a picture of at least! Josiah is the only one missing in this one. This was taken at Evangelistic church where we parked to walk down to the Landing for the fireworks. We picked up Gabe earlier in the day so he could play with the kids. Josiah was with his parents at a grill out with some friends at this point. It's a cute picture.
No other picture will ever compare to this one from now on!! I got all my nieces, nephews, and little brother all in one shot:)!! I just love it! Actually there is one missing and that is my little niece Kaitlynn whom lives in Alabama and could not come down this time around. She was greatly missed along with all of her family, but this picture was a goal I had all along when I started thinking about this vacation! I knew they'd all be together on this day and so I had to make sure I got a shot with all of them! Yea, I did it:)!! I took several and none of them had perfect faces for any shot so this is the best one and I love it!
Next to Vicki and Sandy this is my best friend right here! This is my sister (Crystal), her hubby (Chris), and of course their son (Josiah). They take really gorgeous pictures!
Here's my dad, Roy, at the grill cooking away. He cooked grilled shrimp, BBQ pork, and BBQ chicken. He used his own BBQ recipe as well. O he is an excellent cook! In my opinion there is no one like him as far as cooking goes. Phillip has always told me that I have been spoiled with his cooking and no one can top it! He's got that right:)!!
My stepmom, Roxanne, is serving in their church booth BBQ. They worked hard that day, but had fun it seemed!! The lady behind her is her pastor's wife and she is a sweetheart:)!
This is my middle brother, Michael, and his wife, Ashley, whom we just found out is pregnant:)!! Their baby should be due around February timeframe! They're a good-lookin' couple! Very sweet too! Michael is persueing a career in youth ministry and/or pastoring. He is in bible college at this point, but is the youth leader for Evangelistic Centre now. From what I have heard he is doing an excellent job of it too!! Very proud of him! Ashley works at a local bank and is doing very well too! She has been a wonderful addition to the family:)!!
These were some good shots of Vicki and John!
We brought strawberries along with us for our day out. Mikayla thought they were wonderful! She has the most beautiful hair. I love her long red hair. She is precious!
Isn't Savannah a sweetie!! She has the most heart melting smile I think!
Noah is holding a squirt bottle I bought for this very hot day. I knew we were going to be out all day and would be hot so I got a couple of these and the kids had a blast with them! They pretty much stayed soaked! Isn't he so cute! This is his best picture as far as smiles go. He is not one for picture taking!
Now is this a good lookin' niece or what!!
I love this picture of Phillip! He is so handsome no wonder I married him, hehe!!
This is one of my favorite shirts. It is patriotic without being overdone! One of the kids took this!
Got a good shot of Ron and Elaine! O they were so happy to spend this special day with all their family. We all missed Matthew, but savored every moment the rest of us had!
This is my oldest brother, Jonathan, he is the one whom just joined the Air Force. He just graduated from Tech School while John and Vicki were in town in PC. We are all so proud of him. Doesn't he look good! I was so glad to have so much family around me this day!
Now this is my little brother Gabe (or Gabriel). I couldn't get him to calm down enough to take a regular smile in his picture, but at least it shows how excited he was to have so many friends to play with on such a festive day:)!! You've probably seen him on my blog lots!
This is my nephew Josiah that I think most of you have seen on my blog before plenty of times as well. I thought this shot was so darling:)!!
These are some old friends from Evangelistic Centre that we have known for a long time, Kevin and Michelle. Now Michelle we've only gotten to know since we moved back to FL, but Kevin was one of Phillip's really good friends since before I moved to FL back in 96. John was good friends with him as well. Kevin was John's best man at their wedding back in 98. Kevin was a groomsman in our's in 2000. They are a lovely couple and we were thrilled once we saw them there at the celebration and invited them to join us. That was such a wonderful treat. And now I'll have their picture to put up as well!
This is just random shots of everyone getting ready to watch the fireworks. As you can kind of see there is the Dyers on one side, the Halls in the middle (my brothers) and then the Richards on the other side (my sister and her in-laws)!! It was a wonderful gathering. I love that we can all get along and hang out like that. It was a nice memory!
This is how our Sunday ended up. Ron and Elaine went to church that morning in FWB and then drove over to our house that afternoon. Everyone was so tired from the night before (4th of July) that we all decided that everyone could sleep in. It was nice too! After lunch the kids decided to have a fashion show for all of us. I had several dresses and things put aside for just such an occasion! So the first few shots are of the audience and then I put in some shots of some of the outfits the kids tried on. Even Noah got in on this fun! He tried on Uncle Phillip's old BDUs. They seemed to have had a good time playing with all that.
Even Sparkles had to get in on the fun of dressing up:)!! Vicki borrowed Sadie's Hawaiian hat and put it on her and isn't she just the cutest!!
Here's the kids on floats and styling in their goggles that Uncle Phillip and Aunt Dani got them! They really liked those goggles too!
Had to get a shot of Grandma watching all the action in the pool. She wasn't ready to get wet nor cold just yet!
Noah is totally into swords and so Vicki bought him a plastic sword for the pool and it actually squirts water too! So I went back and bought 2 more for John and Phillip to be able to play as well. I got this awesome shot of Vicki fencing with Noah though! He had so much fun with that!
Vicki took some shots with me and the kids!! You can see the guys in the background too! We had lots of fun in the pool!
After a long, hard, grueling day the puppies collapsed, hehehe:)!!
Monday was our big Fishing Excersion! The night before the guys got all the poles that we (me, Phillip, Elaine, and Ron) had bought for spoiling gifts and started fixing them up getting them ready for our day. It felt like Christmas to us! I got pictures of each of the kids when they got their poles! They were excited about having their very own poles to fish with!
Savannah got a princess pole. Her whole room at home is done in princesses and she loves the color pink too. She gave the biggest smile when she got her's. I think she liked it just a little:)!!
Mikayla got a Spongebob pole. All the kids like Spongebob, but because it has orange on it she likes that pole the best out of any other character! She squealed over it too!
Noah got a Transformers pole that we thought wasn't going to work, but Grandpa worked and worked on it til he figured it out the night before. Noah was pretty pleased with it too. He didn't let it out of his sight much after that:)!!
Alyssa got a bright shiney red pole that she was thrilled over!
This is our crew after we arrived at the EOD Beach. Check out the scenery too!
Isn't this a good shot of Elaine (Grandma)!
Grandma helped Savannah get all wrapped up in a towel so she could warm up a little before fishing!
John taught Vicki how to cast the net to catch bait fish for her first time! She seemed pretty pleased with herself afterwards! Firsts are always fun!
I thought this was a good shot of Alyssa playing with the sand in the water.
Here's Grandpa fishing!
Isn't this just a sweet picture of Alyssa helping her little sister Mikayla fish! I'm so glad I caught it! They will cherish their friendship for a lifetime!
Mikayla caught several fish. This was her first one, a flounder.
As you can see she was quite proud of that. Later on she called it her "Nemo" and wanted Aunt Dani to cook her Nemo!! It was very precious!
Noah fishing. He didn't catch anything that I know of, but he enjoyed fishing though! I have come to find that fishing is not about success anyway. It's all about casting and waiting:)!!
Alyssa fishing.
Alyssa caught a shark here and boy was she happy with that!!
Savannah liked fishing close to her Aunt Dani!!
Savannah's catch of the day was her very own "baby" catfish! That's what she called it at least! We had to throw it back of course, but got a picture of her catch first! She was so proud of that though! Didn't bother her one bit that we threw it back either! Of course she was thrilled every time she brought her line back in and her bait fish was still on and she thought she had caught something:)!!
Here's the kids with their broken down sand castle. I was a little too late to get a good shot of the whole thing before they started breaking it down. Although I did get a shot of their pond they built for the castle and they actually stole some of the bait fish to fill it with, hehehe!! Little smartees:)!!
John and Phillip started the clean up by cleaning the shark. I guess they have to be done right away. They finished the rest of the fish once we got home.
With it being a fishing/swimming day at the beach it just seemed like the day to grill out for supper. While Phillip worked the grill John tried his hand at splitting wood! Savannah actually got these pictures while we were all inside getting ready for our burgers and dogs!! She did a good job!
Tuesday was our down day. Ron and I both got sick and couldn't do anything. Fortunately, Elaine and Vicki didn't let that ruin their day and they took all the kids to Toys R Us and then on to Books A Million. They got backpacks and all sorts of goodies at Toys R Us and then got several books at Books A Million. These kids love to read books, which I think is awesome. John and Phillip that evening went fishing again while Vicki took the kids outside to the swimming pool. They all made a pretty good day out of not such a great start. It had rained most of that morning anyway so we wouldn't have been able to go out during the early day anyway, but I was so glad they were able to find things to do. It made good memories for all of them, but of course I didn't get any pictures!
On Wednesday we were all finally feeling up to going out. It rained Tuesday anyway, but we all drove out to the Destin Commons to play in the water park and go shopping! We started at a nice sandwich shop called Zoe's for lunch. Very yummy:)! Then the kids headed over to the water area where they played and had a blast!
Here are some random pictures of all the kids playing and running through the water area! They had such a good time. I'm not sure how long we were out there while they played, but it was a good long while!
Ron and Elaine found a bench that wasn't far from us at all, but it gave them time to have some grandparent moments! You could really tell that they were enjoying watching their grandkids run and play all over the place. I think we saw Ron draw a couple tears of joy over his blessings out there! Seeing that made everything even more rewarding after all the planning that us women did before this vacation ever started. I'm glad it meant so much to everyone!
I thought this was a good picture of the 4 of us.
Actually got some shots of when all 4 of the kids had the whole water area to themselves for a few short lived seconds!
Talk about getting your man to squeal, hehehe!! Set a wet kid in his lap and see what happens! Uncle Phillip yelled like a little girl! It was so funny:)!! Savannah laughed so hard!
Savannah's favorite color is pink and this picture really doesn't do her outfit justice. The outfit is a bright almost fuscia pink, but this picture makes it look like it is a light pink when it isn't at all. She is still so very cute though:)!!
Mikayla got her orange in her outfit. I told her she looked like 3 shades of sherbert. She likes sherbert so she thought that was cool!! Doesn't the hat just complete this outfit!! Adorable!
Noah got a dinosaur outfit that he really liked, but he is not fond of having his picture taken though. I'm not sure if Vicki will ever get this outfit off of him now:)!! He's so handsome!
Noah got a shoulder ride from Uncle Phillip while we were walking around.
I like these shots of everyone walking around the Commons. That is a very cool place to check out and walk around. There is plenty to do and see especially for kids.
We stopped at the Cold Stone Ice Cream Shop and everyone tried different ice creams. Got pictures of all of us just sitting around outside the shop. It had rained earlier that morning so it was nice to sit outside with the sun shining again.
Noah enjoyed his blue (cotton candy) ice cream as you can see:)!! This picture was actually taken by Savannah and I thought she did such a good job that I had to have this one in particular for the post. She took several that were good throughout the week
Uncle Phillip held Savannah on our way out from the ice cream shop. I thought the way she held on was so cute!
I got Alyssa's new outfit later on when we got home. This was her first opportunity to wear it. I loved the colors of it because I would have never put these 2 main colors together, but the flowers matched perfectly which made it all connect and go together well. What a cool outfit!! She is such a beauty!
Got several shots of everyone walking along the boardwalk Thursday morning. This boardwalk is about 1/2 to 3/4th of a mile long, no joke! The scenery is to die for though and it makes it totally worth the walk!
In the middle of the boardwalk is a tower that all the kids loved running up to and over looking everything! It is a pretty cool spot.
Here's where the shell finding started right after we got to the end of the boardwalk.
All the kids were thrilled with this land crab that was walking around!
Mikayla is finding shells everywhere!
Had to get pictures of everyone with the beach in the background. It was such a beautiful day!
This was a really cute picture of the twins!
We saw this blue jellyfish and thought it was so unique! Isn't is gorgeous though!
This is all of us walking back. I think the walk back and forth took longer than anything else! It's a beautiful walk though.
Once we were done with the beach we went over to Phillip's shop and checked it out. They greeted all the guys as we walked through. Then everyone stopped to look at a bomb that has always been displayed in the shop. I've never even paid attention to it honestly, but it's been there! I guess I am use to seeing them around now.
Phillip had to show off the segways they have, but no one got to play on those of course!
Uncle Phillip told all the kids to shake hands with the robot! They seemed impressed with that!
Alyssa gave the robot a can to see if it could crush it or not.
These 2 pictures are of the kids checking out the crushed can! They thought that was pretty cool!
Got a shot of Phillip actually controlling the robot. Can you see him using 3 fingers at a time. It's pretty amazing to watch in person.
John actually volunteered for Phillip to dress him up in the bomb suit and they just had a good ole' time doing that together!
Noah is checking out his dad in the bomb suit here!
Thursday night Ron and Elaine treated all of us out to Carrabba's in Panama City Beach. It is a wonderful place. The food is a little more expensive than Olive Garden, but the food is fantastic and the portions make it worth it as well. We all enjoyed the meal very much.
Here are some of the kids playing with some actual bread dough that the waiter brought out for them. They had a blast with it too.
The waiter took a picture of all of us, which I thought turned out quite nice!
After a long week of playing, wrestling, and lots of tug-of-war these pups were exhausted:)!! This is how they ended up at the end of the week. Actually every day was like this, hehehe!!
This was the last picture I got before everyone left. I didn't take any other pictures on this day actually. John and Phillip found this shell when we went to the beach on Friday and gave it to Alyssa. I had to have a picture of it. Isn't it the coolest shell ever!
We had the best time on this vacation and can't wait to get together next time. We hope to get orders to move overseas and then everyone come over there to vacation. That would be incredible for everyone including my side of the family as well.
