Quiet Dad!

All this week Audrey has been...rather touchy. She got a few hours behind on sleep over the weekend and as usual it is taking her all week to get back into her cheerful mood. Today she woke up from her nap and Travis got her and brought her downstairs. Then she came over to me and started whining for her "binky". I told her that she could go upstairs to get it herself (yes...I am lazy). She started to go up the stairs and then Travis told her to go upstairs to get her binky, and she stopped and turned around and said "No!". So me and Travis kept taking turns telling her to go upstairs, when I would say it she would start to go up the stairs and when Travis would say it she would get mad at him and say "No". Eventually Travis just kept telling her over and over again to go upstairs and then Audrey yelled "Quiet Dad!"

Carolina Beach

On Saturday we went to Carolina Beach. The water was really nice and the waves were decent. I havent had as much fun on the beach for at least 2 years. My sisters took turns watching Audrey so that I could have some fun in the water to. It was so nice!

Here are Joanna, Michelle, and Sam.

Leah played with Audrey in the water until Audrey had fun. At first Audrey was scared, but after Leah was done with her Audrey was demanding us all to help her play in the waves.

This is a pretty cool sand sculpture. These guys were working on it all day.

Poor Joanna got stung by a jellyfish right before she was planning to get out of the water. The sting looked pretty nasty at first, but after a few hours it looked better.

Lake Johnson

Me, Michelle, and Joanna decided to go to Lake Johnson and rent a paddle boat. It was so hot and we wanted to get in the water (which was at least 80 degrees) but we weren't allowed to. Audrey was in charge of steering us, and we took turns paddling.

The Discovery Center

I went home a few weeks ago and me and Joanna decided to bring Audrey to the Discovery Center. Audrey was actually just an excuse because we really wanted to go to play in the Giant...which we did. :-)

Audrey loved The Giant almost as much as me and Joanna. We hogged the cash register from her. I know, I am 23 years old...but I am still a kid at heart.
You can see the bubble in this picture. Audrey loved it.
There is supposed to be a bubble on the ring. I am not sure if it is there or if it popped already.
Audrey loved this jet! She played with it for 20 minutes and then we had to take her away from it.
Isn't Jo so cute?

Breaking Dawn Party

3 of my sisters came down from NY right before the release of Breaking Dawn. Joanna (15) was the biggest fan of Twilight and me and her have been counting down the days to the release for almost a year. Michelle, Leah, and Jessie were more recent converts to the books (meaning in the last few weeks). Unfortunately Jessie couldnt come down for the party.

I went to Borders early to get my place in line and me and Joanna were the first and second places. (Nerd alert).
We got these pins that said "I was bitten by Breaking Dawn".
We started off the festivities at Chili's.

We were trying to be supermodels here...I am not sure if we were successful though. Lol.
Another "super model" picture...I guess Joanna is too young to take it seriously. This is me and Jo...the first and second people in the line. After we got the books I started reading it right when we got home. I stayed up until 5:30 in the morning and woke up at 8:30 am and read until I finished it at 3:00 in the afternoon. I did not eat, shower, or go to the bathroom.

The party turned out to be lame. You know it is bad when people dressed as vampires are making fun of you (yes, that did happen to me). But, I am glad that I went. I participated in the debate a little bit and also the trivia. Me and Joanna were on team Edward and Leah and Michelle were on team Jacob.

Breaking Dawn Review .... Spoiler Alert!!!

Warning to everyone, there will be spoilers in this review. Read at your own risk.

I thought that overall the book was pretty good. There were some things that I really wanted to happen that did happen. The main thing was that I wanted Bella to become a vampire before the end of the book so that we could get a good feel for her life as a vampire. I either wanted Jacob to die or imprint. Die was my first choice. Ok, so I am mean...at least I will admit it! When I first read that Bella was going to have a baby I wasnt sure that it was a good choice for Stephenie to have made, but by the end of the book I was glad that Renesme was born. I am not thrilled that Jacob imprinted on her though, but at least he got over Bella fast. Letting Charlie in on the secret was a huge mistake I thought. It was like Stephenie couldnt do anything bad to Bella. One thing that I liked about Harry Potter was that Rowling wasnt afraid to kill off some characters. I am not saying Charlie should have died, because I dont think that at all but I think that everything worked out too perfectly. I thought the "battle" scene was a dissappointment. The one good thing is that we got to see Bella's power at full force. It was nice to see her being the protector rather than the protected for once. I felt like there was all this build up for nothing. I can see why there was no battle, but some of the bad guys should have been finished I think.

The character development of all of the main people was very good. Edward, Bella, Jacob, and even Rosalie changed into better people throughout the book. I was impressed with how well Stephenie did in that area.

Overall, it was an enjoyable read and I felt closure. I do hope that Stephenie will do at least one book from Renesme's perspective in the future (although I wish that Jacob would be taken out of it). Breaking Dawn was unlike the other three in the series, but I definately see why Stephenie had to do things the way she did. She is an amazing author who can write the most captivating books.