North Carolina

I'm posting now from the east coast, where Carlton and I have been for the past 3+ weeks visiting family and friends (hence the long hiatus in posting!). Mark was with us for the first 2+ weeks, but had to return to Seattle to go back to work, while Carlton and I stay awhile longer with family. We therefore have many updates due from all of our travels and adventures....so this first post will cover the first 9 days of the trip, which we spent in the great state of North Carolina.

We started our journey in Durham on the first of May for the wedding weekend of my dear college friend Anna, which was such a memorable and sweet time. Carlton did fabulously at all of the wedding events and managed to charm quite a few women. Thank you, Linds and Nick, for your wonderful hospitality once again! This is already twice in Carlton's short life :) Here I am with the glowing bride at the bridesmaids luncheon on Friday.

After the wedding, we headed over to Wilmington with Mark's sister, Jill, to spend the week with his parents. It was a great week of hanging out with Grandma Ann and Papa. Carlton was all smiles (as he almost always is!).

While we were there, Jim celebrated his birthday and a soon-to-be retirement, so we had a bunch of festivities.....gourmet breakfast, steaks and birthday creme brulee, and a trip to visit the USS North Carolina WWII battleship.

Carlton's Aunt Jill gave him a sweet little summer outfit - plaid shorts and a green polo. I love that this photo of his new threads prominently features his ample and adorable baby belly.

It's such a treat to get some beach time at Wrightsville Beach whenever we're in Wilmington, and this time Carlton really enjoyed it. (We took him to the beach when we were there at Christmas, but he slept through the whole visit.) We realized we didn't have a beach hat for Carlton, so Mark offered up his cap to protect our sweet boy from the son.

We played in the sand, stuck our toes in the ocean (still too cold for swimming, as Carlton quickly let us know!), took walks and played paddleball. Carlton enjoyed the scene with the whole family, though I'm not sure he knew what to do with all that sunshine, our little Seattle boy.

After a great week, we finished our time in NC with a night in Charlotte at Jill and Matt's place. On Saturday morning we started the day at a delicious French bakery, and Carlton got some good aunt and uncle time.

We then explored a great nearby park, and discovered that the street where we parked was the perfect one - in honor of our son :)

It was such a blessing to have so much good time with Mark's family. I think this picture sums up how Carlton felt about his time in North Carolina!