6th Annual Sand Family Get Together

We had our Annual Sand Family Get Together this weekend and it was a blast!  We all rented rooms at Grand Casino Mille Lacs as well as rented a party room to we could spend time just hanging out and playing games.  We were missing quite a few in the family this year due to work schedules, April winter storms and pending baby arrivals but we made sure we did enough laughing, drinking and eating for all of them who couldn't join us.  We spent time swimming, enjoying delicious food from our Pot Luck Dinner, enjoying drinks, catching up on each other's lives and of course playing a couple friendly games of Catch Phrase and Loaded Questions.   I didn't take as many pictures as I usually do (feel free to take a moment to be surprised) but I did take a few.  Most of the pictures I took were in the pool or of the newest members of the Sand family.  My cousin Kayla delivered two beautiful boys back in December, 6 weeks early, so for many of us this was the first time we really got to snuggle and love on them!  I don't think those boys were put down much at all actually, it seemed like one of us always had them in our arms.  

It was another awesome family get together. I feel very blessed to have family that remains so close and  continues to hold get together's like this even though we all live so far apart and have such busy lives.  I hope this tradition continues for a very long time!

Where's Spring?!?!

How is it that we are still dealing with snow storms and long commutes on the 11th day of April?  I am so tired of Winter but instead of complaining about it anymore (and believe me I have done plenty of that the last couple days) I decided to embrace and make the most of our recent Spring Snowstorm.  Luckily the temps stayed pretty warm so we didn't get the 9+ inches they predicted but we did get a couple inches of the wet heavy kind of snow.  We figured if we can't beat winter we might as well enjoy it so tonight after dinner we headed out to build us some snowmen!  Mason loves snowmen and every time we leave the driveway he says "Bye Mo-man" and when we come home it is "Hello Mo-man" and when our last one melted after standing tall for over a month he was pretty sad so you can imagine his excite when we were outside bringing more snowmen to life.   I will almost be sad to see these guys melt but at the same time I am more than ready for Spring to make its appearance!  

Miss Ilia

Before we went on vacation some good friends of ours delivered a beautiful baby girl and asked me if I would take some pictures of her.  Of course I jumped at the opportunity... two of my favorite things are babies and photography so I couldn't wait to get over to their house and get some newborn snuggles and spend hours taking photos of her.  Ilia is the cutest little peanut and it was so much fun to take her pictures!  They have an awesome sun room full of windows so I was able to play with my camera and taking photos with natural lighting which was awesome.  Ilia was an awesome little the trooper as we tried all kinds of poses and props with her.  Here are just a few of my favorites of beautiful 5 day old Ilia.  Congrats Adrienne and Jason, you guys make gorgeous kids!

 

Where are the boys?

Can you find both boys?!?!

This picture tells me a couple things....

1.)  I could possibly lose one of my children in my own home!

2.)  We have WAY too many toys!

3.)  When left unattended for no more than 10 minutes this is what two Berberena's boys can do to a family room!

Happy Easter

Easter came up quick this year... with us being on vacation for two weeks and Easter being the first Sunday after we got home meant that we didn't have any of our Easter decorations up or any of the "basket goods" purchased in advance.  Saturday afternoon Colton had two friends over for a playdate so I figured it would be the perfect time to make some fun Easter treats!  I love to bake (I am pretty sure the boys had fun as well).  We colored eggs on Saturday night cause we just didn't have any free time earlier in the week.  Mason enjoyed his first adventure with coloring eggs although he wanted nothing to do with that little wire wand... he just dipped his entire hand into the cup with his egg!   Easter morning we were woke up by Colton with his basket already in his hands.  We told him to wake us up before looking for his basket but he said he saw it on his way to our room... lies as it was hid behind a door!!  We told him he could not start looking for eggs without his baby brother and wouldn't you know it about 2 minutes later Mason was yelling "Mama" from his room.  It was a fun morning with the boys running around the house looking for their Easter eggs.  Then we enjoyed a big family breakfast and off to church we went!  Mason was dancing and singing throughout the service, he loves music!  We enjoyed Easter lunch at my parents house with my siblings and mother in law.  After lunch the kids enjoyed another Easter egg hunt, the guys played several (like 20) games of Texas Hold Em and the woman lounged around chatted!  It was a seriously relaxing Easter Sunday which was perfect!  The weather was the only part that could have been better - don't think it ever got about 40 degrees (seriously, where is Spring)!

Feeding Frenzy!

One of our favorite things to do on the island is feed the birds!  These birds are crazy and I swear they have some secret call to each other because once one realizes you have food the rest of the birds on the island show up shortly after.   Well this feeding we had some bread, left over french fries and lots of fish pieces (left over from cleaning on those fish Frankie caught a few days ago)!  We headed down to the beach and the feeding frenzy started.  The boys were having a blast feeding the birds and I was enjoying snapping as many pictures as I could!  Here are just a few of my favorites!

 Everything was going great until all of a sudden I felt something hit me on the back of the neck... something very warm!  Shit, yes that is right I was crapped on by one of the birds!  I almost died and of course I ask my mother in law and husband to help me and they are laughing so hard they were of little help and then my mother in law grabs my camera from my hand and decides we should get a picture of it before she wipes it off for me!  Seriously, so disgusting!

Just because I don't want to end this post with me being pooped on.... here are few pictures from our walks earlier in the day!  I love my little family.

Roll Tide Roll

Frankie, Colton and I decided to spend some time playing in the giant waves while Mason was napping!  The water is still freezing (thanks to this never ending winter) but that didn't stop us from jumping in.  The waves were huge yesterday evening and made even standing in the water quite challenge at times.  Colton was swallowed up big waves time after time and loved every minute of it.  Frankie was even knocked down by a wave that came in and was taller than him.  Playing in waves this big was quite the work out.... we had to take turns resting up on shore!  It was a great way to spend our evening, we are hoping we can play in the waves one more time before we head home but the weather might have different plans!  We are having a blast on vacation, only two days left on the island and we plan to make the most of them.

Here Fishy Fishy!

Frankie and my dad went out on a guided fishing trip and they came back with quite the boat load of fish!  They caught about 60 fish on their 8 hour trip.  They caught Sheephead, Blue Fish, Spade Fish, Flouder, Pompanos, Red Fish and Pig Fish.  We enjoyed an awesome fresh fish dinner that night!  Frankie made me go to the Captain's house and take some pictures before they started cleaning the fish - I was must admit I was quite impressed by the pile of fish!