happy 4th of july

i had to post a pic of these two before church this morning because they looked so cute in their patriotic wear. mackenzie is not pictured due to sickness.

turks and caicos

with many things to celebrate this summer (colin's graduation, me turning 40 and our 15th anniversary), we decided to go to the beautiful island of turks and caicos. the pictures do not quite capture the beauty of the island. the color of the water is nothing less than spectacular...the most gorgeous color of turquoise i have ever seen.

to help us celebrate, oma and the lewallens came on the trip with us.

we snorkeled, ate some delicious food (even jackson liked the conch), took a boat ride, caught some fish (grouper and snapper) and cooked them for dinner, trekked to remote beaches and treacherous parts of the island and played games. it was fu-un!

reese caught the biggest fish (not pictured).

these kiddos were so good about trying new things and did a great job snorkeling!

this is at malcomb beach...very remote and so pretty. reese and oma stayed home because reese was sick and oma was sunburned.

the conch shells were plentiful. i think we had conch almost every meal. we brought several home that we found on the beach.

this little guy is fearless.

some of our good friends were staying at another resort on the island so we got to hang out with them in paradise for one afternoon.

although jackson did not want to wear his mask, he loved snorkeling on our backs. we saw plenty of fish when we snorkeled: parrot fish, barracuda, about a 5 ft nurse shark, a giant lobster and many bright fish that i did not know what they were.

the flowers were beautiful and plentiful.

we ate outside almost every meal...just the way i like it!

we had the beach all to ourselves at our resort.

our first time to turner falls

we took some kiddos from gbc to turner falls on friday. the place is beautiful...somewhere that we hope to return to in the future. we swam in the cold water, sat in the waterfalls, explored an abandoned castle and hiked to a cave. it was such a fun, relaxing time. btw...their snowcones were fabulous!

this was a little tunnel on the cliff. you could see the waterfall if you were brave enough to crawl through the tunnel.

these girls were inseparable.

the hike to this cave was slightly treacherous, but jackson wanted to see it so his daddy obliged and carried him up there. meanwhile, i was doing alot of praying.

hot fun in the city

hardly any lines to wait in...beautiful day...perfect temp...good friends...made for a great day at six flags! the only downer was we left without a funnel cake.