{ The Old Gray House ~ aka The Shell Shop 2014 }

Hello everybody!!  Christina has been nagging the crud-muffins out of me to get this post shared.....she wants to 'move on' to fun fall things, like carving pumpkins and costume parties!  She keeps leaving me little notes stuck here and there around the dorm that count down the days until Halloween.....goodness, that is SO Christina!  Soooo.....I am excited to finally be sharing about our visit to The Old Gray House a couple months ago.  We very much enjoy spending time with and talking with Ms. Mary Parr.  She and her husband own and run The Old Gray House.  Ms. Mary runs the gift shop inside and Mr. Dewey does all the gardening and handles the shells and cool rocks that he sells in the shacks outside.  They have been doing this together since 1988!  Dewey Parr is a grandson of the Gray family and he told us that the Gray family and their descendants have been living on Hatteras Island since the early 1600's!!  Wow!

Now, on with our visit.....as you more than likely read in the last post, we had to stop TWICE to let Christina have her photo taken with her head sticking thru those 'head in a hole' thingies.  I was really getting impatient with her but was really trying to have as much sisterly love as I could muster, even though I could have cared less about those silly painted boards.  So, I was super glad when she agreed to stop after the second one and go to The Old Gray House!  I could not wait!!!!  Here we are upon arrival!  I love this old boat they have out in front.....it's the perfect place for a photo-op!

{ Besties at the Beach }

I was so excited to be able to go to the beach with my best friend, Faith.  We are always so busy at the dorm that we never really have time to just hang out.  Since we are both beach lovin' girls, we jumped at the opportunity to go on a camping trip to Outer Banks, NC.  It was certainly an eventful trip though!  No sooner than we arrived that we had to pack everything back up and leave as we were in the path of Hurricane Arthur.  We were able to return just 3 days later and caught this beautiful sunset.  The next day, we hung out at the campground and then off to the beach late that afternoon!  We wanted to catch low tide at 6:04 p.m. cause that is the best time to look for shells - our favorite thing to do at the beach. 

{ Lego Time! }

Sup peeps! Trey here. I've been looking forward to Saturday all week long! I love weekends because I don't have to spend my whole evening doing homework. My plan for today was to take Meatloaf and ride my skateboard out to the caboose to hang out with Alden for the day. Unfortunately, its below 0° outside today.....and I didn't want to fight Meatloaf puttin' on his booties.  He hates those things....I swear he must think it makes him look girly cause it is impossible to get them on without sitting on top of him!  No worries, I decided to chill with my Lego homies! 

{ Wassup Peeps! }

Trey here!  I'm not sure if ya'll peeps know this or not but I like to spend time in the outdoors!  My friend, Alden, told me about this place up in town where they paved an old railroad track that was no longer in use.  He said it'd be cool to skateboard down.....dude knows how much I like to go boarding!  He also said that while I was there I needed to lay eyes on a super cool train caboose that has been restored.  Alden is way into trains.  He knows like, everything, about them!

So, I didn't bring my board cause I was just checking it out but boy - Alden was right - the caboose totally rocks! 

{ Deadwood } Part II

So, picking up where I left off......

Alden and I headed towards the train station and on the way took advantage of some cool photo-ops.  This one was pretty close to the station.

{ Throw Back Thursday - Halloween 2014 }

My name is Harper and first, I have to apologize for the silly title to this post...especially since technically it's no longer "Thursday" at the dorm as we are on the east coast!  BUT, I figured it would still be okay since it's still Thursday on the west coast and in Australia and other parts of our big ole world, right?  Super, so glad you all agree!

So, yep, we have been super busy and not had even one extra moment to post about all the stuff that's been going down here at the dorm.  Some of the girls have been in after-school clubs like marching band, orchestra and chorus, practicing for their upcoming Christmas concerts.  Some of us have been busy after school with Edge Club and others, like me, with basket ball.  Boy, fall sure is an exciting and busy time of year!  AND, soon Christmas will be here and we are all super excited about that!

So now, back to my Throwback Thursday topic of Halloween though!  I know you guys are like, geez, Halloween?  Just go with me here, okay?  Now, lots of the girls were away Halloween weekend on a camping trip.  Since there were only four of us at the dorm with nothing to do on the Saturday after Halloween, we decided to throw ourselves a little party.  Hollie and I were the ones to get all the goodies together and decorate the kitchen.  We had loads of fun doing it too!   

{ Snow Day ~ Inside Fun! }

Well, by now in the DC area, we are starting to get pretty tired of all this snow.  See, we are not used to getting this much snow and all though I do love to go outside and play in it, I'm sorta getting tired of not going to school to see my friends.  Course, that doesn't stop our teachers from posting "snow work" online for us to do.....my math teacher is quite fond of doing this to me every single time we miss a day of school due to snow.  Who ever heard of "snow work"??  I think we should all boycott it!  Anywho, I decided to take a break in between my math worksheets and play with my Julie doll and Cindy's Ruthie doll. 

I have been sooooo looking forward to playing with my dolls at their new table we got last week.  Our good friend, Echo, told us about this "Re-ment" table that was perfect for our dolls.  You can see more about the table and chairs and other Re-ment goodies by visiting Echo's blog - From Echo With Love. 

{ Vaca Fun with Meatloaf }

So, while I was on our Easter break camping vaca, I decided to take Meatloaf out for a little walk. I was going to go boarding but instead decided to take him out for more of a get-back-to-nature walk cause, you know, he is a dog and they like that sort of thing, right?  Just as we started to walk along the campground road, I noticed a super cool, round fluffy dandelion seed head! 

{ Happy National Peanut Butter Lovers Day! }

Okay, I bet ya'll didn't know that March 1st of this year is National Peanut Butter Lovers Day, did you?  Doesn't that include, like, everybody? I mean, who doesn't, right? So, it got us girls to talking about all the foods that peanut butter is good on!

{ Saying Good Bye is Hard to Do! }

Well, the day has come to say goodbye to our sweet friend, Isabelle!  Tomorrow she becomes the official American Girl® "Girl Of The Year" doll for 2014!!  We are super excited for her!

After saying goodbye to the girls in the upstairs bedroom, Isabelle popped down to the downstairs bedroom to say goodbye to the rest of us.  As soon as Isabelle walked in, Faith called out to Isabelle "Hey, did you see that you had a 'big reveal' on the Good Morning America show this morning?"  Faith could tell by the look on Isabelle's face that she didn't believe her so she added, "Yes, yes, you were! It was totally awesome!"