mother's day trip - bald head island lighthouse #2

we got out to bald head island at 2:30 and rushed to see old baldy before she closed at 4.

bald head island is a super cute little place, no cars, just golf carts and tons of rentals.

we were so excited to get to the lighthouse, but first we had to find our way. we could see it but weren't quite sure how to get over there, especially since there was water and construction between us and the lighthouse.

old baldy is a super cute old lighthouse with a ton of character. it was darlaina's favorite for a long time, even know it's pretty high up there for all of us.

some fun bald head island trivia - it was used to film weekend at bernies (in the movie it was called Hampton island) and the lighthouse can be seen throughout the movie. I haven't seen the movie in probably 20 years but I might just have to find it and watch it now.

happy girls! still in our 'serious lighthouse climbing' shoes.

after our friend went inside we had to take turns taking pictures of each other.

 

which sometimes looks like this. :)

here's the picture shelly took of us after we took one of her. we seriously had too much fun on our girls trip!

lighthouse buddies for life!

the top of the lighthouse is off center, kinda odd but I guess it just adds to the character.

just look at that door!

this is a very cool lighthouse.

all wood, straight staircase. very primitive inside, it hasn't been restored too much at all.

old baldy is only 110 feet tall, the perfect lighthouse height for me. tall enough to be fun, but not too tall or scary.

the oldest standing lighthouse in north Carolina. just listen to all my lighthouse knowledge!

they had a self guided mobile phone tour on each level that was kind of fun.

another lighthouse first for us.

almost to the top!

 

laura heading up to the top. this reminded us of blackistone lighthouse on st. clements island. they had a similar ladder and small trap door to the top, and we had Delaney with us! so laura went first and then I hoisted Delaney up and into the little door where laura pulled her the rest of the way up. I love me some Delaney, but it was nice not to have to worry about that this time.

it's hot at the top!

but gorgeous! another one of my lame panoramic's.

I would love to know the story of this old bridge.

love this old church!

from our fun lighthouse climb we headed over to rent our golf cart to head down to the remains of the cape fear lighthouse. but more about that later. cruising the golf cart!

as we were driving we saw this little black snake in the road. fascinating, right?!

we trespassed all over private country club property because we had been in north Carolina for like 8 hours and we still hadn't set foot on the beach!

loooooooooooooove the beach!!!! the water was freezing, but it was so beautiful!

Chinese fire drill of pictures!

and just for good measure...

we braved the frigid waters to enjoy the sand between our toes.

 

 hubba hubba!

lighthouse angels!

 we were starving and there were like 3 restaurants on the island and none of them were fast enough to accommodate us. and even though we had a car full of snacks, we didn't bring any with us! we caught the 5:45 ferry back to southport and from the ferry laura was able to catch the light flashing from oak island lighthouse. love it!

 

 

goodbye old baldy!

until we meet again!

mother's day trip - to the ferry!

our next stop was to catch the 2:00 ferry out to bald head island.

i am a task master and these chic's were awesome. I like to make the most of my time and am always in a hurry and thankfully everyone was on board. we kept to our schedule beautifully (until sunday afternoon at least, ha!) and were right on time at every stop.

ferry's are fun. :)

miss shelly is a bird watcher and i am envious! i'm not much for details so I don't know that i'll ever be able to really tell them all apart, but i'm up for the challenge! I even bought us a national parks deck of cards featuring the birds of the national parks. fun, fun!

lovely ladies with the lighthouse we conquered behind them.



 getting whipped by d's hair. :)

and another one of darlaina's cute picstitch's.

whoot, whoot!

bald head lighthouse next!

mother's day trip - oak island lighthouse #1

we got to our first destination, the oak island lighthouse right on time for our tour at 12:30.

this lighthouse was built on the cheap in 1958. it only cost $110,000 to build and they mixed the grey, white, and black colors into the concrete so they would never have to repaint it.

 

to cut costs they decided that instead of using the traditional lighthouse spiral stairs, they would use these terrifying ship ladders. that's 131 steps to the top!!!

climbing this thing is a big deal. I had to arrange a special tour to the top (they usually just take people to the second level) and there are all sorts of rules - you must wear tennis shoes, must have both hands free, and you can't carry up purses or anything like that.

 

the pulley thing they used to take oil and supplies to the top.

(i'm not a very technically minded lighthouser)

 the beginning of our tour, happy to have made it. :)

and then we climbed.

I am so terrified of heights that this was probably the scariest physical thing I've ever made myself do. if not the scariest then definitely in the top 5. my palms were sweaty and my heart was racing!

here's the little doorway we used to go outside at the top.

and the views from the top were breathtaking!



everyone was so sweet to me. there were 2 guides and one stayed right behind me the whole time and everyone was very encouraging.

smiling to hide my fear. ;)

 

 I didn't really complain that much, but shelly said that my fear made her nervous. it really was scary!

 laura likes to give me heart attacks!

 woo hoo!

we converted shelly and darlaina and they are now officially lighthouse passport owning, crazy mama's!

 

and my original lighthouse buddy.

what an adventure!!!

but then we had to go back down!!!

the guide had said at the bottom that I should just look forward, not up or down.  I followed his advice to a tee, I was so focused on staying calm and looking straight ahead!

the guide went first and then me. he would tell me as I was getting close to the bottom step and then would count them so I knew where I was. I'm making myself sound like a big baby, but it was really so scary!

it was an amazing experience and I am so glad I did it and I would probably even do it again if someone really wanted me to. after our tour we quickly bought all the souvie's we could handle and then were off to catch our ferry.

and our view of the oak island lighthouse as we ferried away from cedar island.

and lighthouse #1 was successful!

 

mother's day trip - lunch and more wildflowers!

we had a 12:30 appointment for a top of the lighthouse tour for the oak island lighthouse way down in caswell beach in southern north Carolina. we were making such good time that we decided to stop at smithfields, laura's fav bbq place. we took this pic to make david jealous. everything in north Carolina is vinegar based and everything was delicious!

 all 4 of us took pictures with our phones and cameras and then we all shared them on a snapfish album. I am having the hardest time using those pictures! and then I went through and wrote down all the picture numbers I wanted and now they're all in different places!

ugh!!!

I've been working on these pictures with every minute of spare time since last night.

woe, is me.

 darlaina just couldn't contain herself.

see flowers, must frolick!

mother's day trip - wildflower version

we had the best girls trip over mother's day weekend!

it's taken me a little while to get back in the swing of things, but before i get even further behind i want to start blogging our trip!

and you know you eat an elephant one bite at a time and that's how i'm eating this trip.

so here is our first adventure.
that we all facebooked.

the fb'ing got fewer and further between as the weekend went on, but that first morning we were all up in fb's grill.

we aimed to leave at 5am and we left at... 5:06!

proof that it is our husbands and children that slow us down! ;)

my phone was all blurry, but such is life!

we're on our way!!!

gorgeous sun coming up over the nice bridge (that's it's name, but it is also a very nice bridge) going into virginia.

darlaina takes cool pictures and also makes cool picstitch's.

doesn't she?!

so as we got into north carolina we saw all these fields of wildflowers on the sides of the road (can you see the highway behind me?) and darlaina said "i kind of want to stop," and we were all like "we have no sleeping children or nay-saying husbands (i love all of our husbands ((mine most of all)), it's just a fact) to stop us, so let's do it!" so we did! we pulled over and ran into the wildflower fields.

love the poppies!

my first panoramic with my phone. i'm pretty talented, right? ;)

they were taking pictures of us so we took pictures of them. :)

we had a tight schedule so we stopped to smell the roses (wildflowers) and then had to get!

warrior dash 2013

matt and i ran the warrior dash in 2011, a week before i found out i was pregnant with laney. christian wasn't old enough to run then, and we didn't participate last year, so this year we were ready.

 

it would have been so fun to have lexi join us, but alas, she's an applebee's working party pooper.

he was excited. :)

last time matt stayed and ran with me and i told him after that time that if we ran again he could go on his own. he kind of casually asked if i'd like to run together again, but i kept my word and let him off the hook. we ran together for a few minutes but after the first hill, he was off!

i hadn't run since before i hurt my foot 3 weeks ago, so i was a little nervous. i really didn't have any expectations for myself, i just didn't want to hurt my foot again.

the race was very hilly and we ran a good mile before our first obstacle. we army crawled under barbed wire, did several cargo net climbs, walked a plank while being sprayed with icy water (it wasn't warm on saturday!), jumped over 4 foot walls (5 in a row and fighting not to lose our shoes in the mud), went down a fast and dirty waterslide, jumped over fire, and went over the 'vicious valley.'  the vicious valley was a ridiculous set of 3 10-foot walls with very few and far between foot and hand holds. we had to use a rope to climb over and then repel/fall down the other side. when we got there, there was already a 10 minute wait because of the crowd of people waiting their turn at the walls. i was going to have to skip the second wall because there was only one foot hold about 4 feet up and then a rope to use to pull yourself. i have 0 upper body strength, but some nice older men offered to help me and i was able to do it with their help. i still almost fell, but another one came and pushed my foot up. i totally saw myself falling all the way down and into a large crowd of people. i'm thankful for my warrior dash good samaritans! poor christian slid completely down the other side of the middle wall, he skinned up the side of his face and leg. we're warriors though, so it's all good!

even with the long hold up at the vicious valley, matt finished in 55 minutes.

chris and i finished at 1 hour and 6 minutes.

we got our capes by punching an electronic bag for the national guard.

and even though they were uncomfortable, we ran with them the whole way.

we hosed ourselves off (even though it was f-f-freezing!), wrapped up in towels, and cranked the heater in the car.



i know we say this a lot, but i am really so thankful for my body. it doens't look the way i'd like it to, but it has carried and delivered 5 beautiful children and allows me to do all the crazy things i think to do. i might be a chubby mama of 5, but i am a warrior dash running chubby mama of 5.

it was a good, dirty, cold time. :)