Beach Time!

With school ending, we've been having a lot of fun going to the BEACH!

In June we spent a long week-end in Ocean City, Maryland. While we were there we also got to visit with Grammy and Grandpa Paul. The boys really had a great time.
Here's Patrick in his beach formal wear!

Patrick has picked up on Connor's old tradition of playing with "beach trains". These are older metal Thomas trains which we reserve only for the beach. Patrick is having quite a conversation with Skarloey below....

Connor & Patrick sharing some brotherly love...

Does Liam go anywhere without a football? The answer is NO!

The 3 McLaughlin boys relaxing in their sand hole...

A week after going to OC, we left for a week long vacation in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. That's about an 8 hour drive for us - and Patrick was pretty good in the car. We shared a beautiful beach front house with my cousin Rick, his wife Helen and their 2 sons Andrew and Mathew. Below is Connor and Mathew enjoying the surf..

And here's Rick trying to catch some dinner for us. No luck this year.

Here's Helen reading with Patrick...

We got to celebrate the 4th of July on the beach this year! The fireworks were right in our front yard! Here's Patrick in his festive flag-wear. This little romper actually belonged to Liam and was worn by all 3 of our boys.

Tough guys...

And finally, here's a nest that is in a tree right outside our back deck. There are two birds in the nest and we've been watching as their momma has attended to them over the past few weeks. When we returned from vacation, the bird had flown away. If you click on the photo you'll be able to see the little birds....

Hope you are all enjoying your summer as much as are!