Carolina Livin': SURFSIDE VACATION!

Last week we went on vacation with all of the Murphy side of the family.

All 19 of us in one big, beautiful house.
Mom, Dad, Jeff, Cyndi, Luke, Jared, Ben, Chris, Cheryl, Nicole, Nathan, Dave, Linette, Alyssa, Matthew, Ethan, Ben, Carla, and Emma.

Crazy, yes, but oh so much fun!

We rented a house in a gated community called Bermuda Bay in Oceanside Village on Surfside Beach. Every day was packed with lots of adventure and fun. Lots of time on the beach of course along with swimming in the pool, a few rounds of mini golf, card games, time in the game room playing pool, ping pong and foosball, a "friendly" game of wiffle ball, close encounters with ducks, kayaking, golf cart rides, a trip to Huntington Beach state park to see alligators, shopping, eating, parasailing (sort of), and even a trip to the ER.
Sorry for the huge number of pictures. I wanted to blog throughout the week but the wifi wasn't working.

Walking back to our house after the oh so fun photo shoot. (I'm not sure if anyone was speaking to each other at this point :)

All 9 kid's and all worried about fire ants

Uncle Ben, Auntie Carla and Nana took Emma and Ethan to the Wacatee Zoo. Ethan keeps asking if he can go back to the zoo with the funny donkeys.

There were lots of ducks in the community. This particular family was very friendly and even walked through the indoor pool area. The kids loved holding the babies although Emma really wanted to get a hold of the mommy.

Matthew

Everyone spent time in the water boogy boarding and body surfing but Dave had us all beat. He spent HOURS in there. Some days it was really rough, but he took it like a man!

A little miniature golf

Luke and Ethan

Alyssa and Nicole riding a wave

Ethan and Emma enjoyed riding the rides at Broadway at the Beach

How cute is that?

Ethan and Emma flying high on the bungee trampoline

Little beach boy

Playing Apples to Apples

Ben and Matthew

Boys and their holes. Matthew was searching for sharks teeth. He found several during the week.

Nathan and Emma

Luke helping out a very tired Ethan

Beautiful Emma

Alyssa, Matthew and Ethan

One of my favorite pictures of the week

Ethan on his boogy board

Daddy's little girl

Nathan

Matthew

Matthew holding a crab and Ethan holding a sea urchin on Pawley's Island

Lots of jelly fish around this week. Fortunately nobody was stung.

A little more mini golf

An alligator at Huntington Beach State Park

Brotherly "love"?

A friendly, or not so friendly game of wiffle ball. These guys are tough!

Jared

Luke

Some time in the pool

Sunset on Pawleys Island

Luke and Ethan

Nicole and Alyssa

Emma and Alyssa

Oops!

Ethan decided to go for a spin in a golf cart. He hopped in, turned the key and disengaged the emergency brake. He rolled over Uncle Jeff's foot and was on his way to hit Uncle Ben's rental car when daddy saw it and jumped in it to stop it. That was almost an expensive moment.

Parasailing. Ok, so this isn't exactly us parasailing but that's what we looked like. Unfortunately everyone didn't get to go... There were 11 of us who wanted to go up and we had reservations for Friday morning. Luke, Jared, Ben, Alyssa, Matthew and I got life jackets on and hopped into the small rubber boat and went for the ride of our lives out to the bigger parasailing boat. To say it was rough would be a huge understatement. Anyway, Alyssa, Matthew and I went together and we were first. We had a blast! Only trouble was that there was a storm coming in really fast and the sky just got darker and darker while we were up there. They brought us down and said they couldn't take anyone else up, that the storm was too strong and getting too close. The little boat was broken so we had to sit out in the ocean waiting for them to fix it while it started raining. 10 minutes went by and they finally were able to get us back to shore. We had a great time, but felt really bad that everyone didn't get to go.