Beach Bums...

I just got home from spending the last week at the beach with my family, (Gran Kacky, Poppa, Uncle Selby and Aunt Kinsey) as Ella Ray would call them. This trip has been a tradition in my Duncan family for 20 years and it's always so much fun to see all our beach sites every year. Ella Ray loved the ocean this year and I will say it was MUCH easier this year with her. Last year she was 8 months old and it was a CHORE to get her and all her "baby gear" down to the ocean every day, only to have her cry or have a poopy diaper 5 min after we got down to the beach. Now our condo is on the ocean but the beach is like a football field long and trekking through the sand with a baby, her bouncy seat, food, bottles, cooler and all other swim gear SUCKED last year, however, this year it was MUCH MUCH better. Ella Ray can walk and carry her own towel and she no longer requires so much "gear" to function at the beach. It might have taken us 30 min to walk to the ocean but we eventually got there. The beach was full of jelly fish this year so we didn't get much ocean time except for the last 2 days, in which Ella Ray didn't get out of the water more then 5 min. She was a regular mermaid!!! She successfully learned to go underwater and blow bubbles and swim with no floatation devices. Something I have been actively teaching her since May and for a 20 month old that is VERY AWESOME!!! The big news was that Ella Ray got her first boyfriend, an older man, Will, who celebrated his 3rd birthday while we were down there. Her and Will played together everyday in the baby pool and we hated to leave him. All in all it was a fun and eventful trip, as always with the Duncan clan we had drama, my dad got stung by a stingray, my brother stung by a jellyfish, and I got sun blisters all over my chest...but it wouldn't be a vacation without a little drama! The big news was that our family has grown and we adopted 2 new hermit crabs named Ramona and Beazus. As you will see in the picture Ella Ray was very happy to adopt them, now daddy not so much, just more animals to feed and clean haha....oh well Ella Ray loves them that's what counts right? Now it's back to regular life in Franklin. Still trying to sell the house, no offers yet but we are still hopeful!!! Something about the beach is so relaxing and calming you hate to come back to normal life and leave that serenity......