Quick beach trip to Stone Harbor, NJ

Happy hump day!

I hope everyone is have a fantastic week!!! The weather here in Pittsburgh is so nice...it finally feels like summer! Yippee!!!

Today at work we are having an employee appreciation picnic...so excited to sit outside and enjoy the weather at lunch time!!! Ahhhhhh.....

So, last weekend was awesome!!!!! I got home from my trip and then called the cat sitter to come back again and went on ANOTHER trip! HA!!!

My little sister had their family vacation last week and invited me down to hang with them for the final couple days. We normally all go together but this year the only time her family could go (due to sports and summer camps) was June and no one else wanted to spend June at the Jersey shore (the water is freezing then) so their went alone and my older sister and I popped in for a few days when we could.

This is Saturday when I arrived...I LOVE the beach, Stone Harbor, NJ...the sound alone is sooo relaxing to me (gulls, ocean waves, laughter)....serenity!

It was a little cold...as you can tell by my older sister. It was not as cold as she is making it seem but according to her she was "freezing"! HA HA! We still got tan though - HA!


This is my adorable nephew making friends with the planter frog in a store in Stone Harbor.


I went for a walk early Sunday before anyone else was up and got this beautiful sunrise picture!!


Another sunrise with the dunes...


Sunday morning we all walked down to Coffee Talk. We love this quaint little coffee shop (their oatmeal is delicious!!!). My niece loves it because Taylor Swift goes there with her family...see the pic in the background. Kyleigh is a HUGE TayTay fan!!! 

Next door they also have a fresh juice shop called The Juice Girl.  It was great for fresh cold pressed juices and smoothies!! I got an apple cider shot and green veggie drink and the kids all got smoothies - both were awesome!!!!  YUM!!!


Here is the little sister and her family toasting with their coffees and smoothies in Coffee Talk!


My niece Alyssa was shopping and saw this magnet. She bought it for me and then they stuck it on my car when I was not looking! HA HA! I love it so much!!!


As quickly as I got there; it was time to begin the 7 hour drive home. It was totally worth the drive to be able to spend time with my adorable nieces and nephew on their vacation! 

I was stuck in stopped traffic leaving the beach when I spotted this cool nest on top of the power lines. I think it is an osprey but I am not sure of that...so cool though!


My favorite purchase I made over the two day vacation was an adorable striped, short sleeve cardigan that goes perfectly with all my simmer dresses for work! Yippee - it was a great deal for something I can wear almost every day! Here is a picture from my desk at work...


I hope every is having a fantastic week. Please heed my warning...life is SOOO short...if given the opportunity to go somewhere or do something (no matter how short the duration or long the drive) DO IT! I drove 7 hours each way to spend 48 hours at the beach and I am so happy I did! We had so much fun and made so many memories!!! I want to be a part of as many happy and awesome memories as I can for my nieces and nephews!!! Spend as time as you can with those you love...life is short!

Every drive really far for a short amount of time? Taking a vacation this year? Where are you going? Do you go to the same place or change it up every year?
 
HUGS TO EACH AND EVERYONE OF YOU! Thanks for reading!

The End of Stone Harbor 2018 Family Vacation

Happy Monday everyone! I hope you all had a great week! I am in that "just returned from vacation" funky mood right now...UGH!! I think it will take a few days and I will be fine...LOL!!!

Here are pictures from the final two days of vacation. On Saturday morning we went for a little walk in the am to say goodbye to my little sister and her family who stayed a few blocks away. They had to leave a day before us; my older sister, Mom, Dad and myself stayed one extra day and drove home day Sunday. Here is a selfie of me and my sister!!

Here is the beautiful sunrise we saw on our way to meet them to say goodbye...

My last day on the beach I was still reading this SAME BOOK! This is crazy for me because I usually finish at least four books on vacation but I spent a lit of time playing in the water and sand with the kids! It was a great year!

Here is a picture of the lifeguards on duty on our final day at the beach...I like the picture with the life boat in it!

On Saturday night the Yacht Club of Stone Harbor held their 2018 Festival of Lights. It is a lighted boat parade, like we did HERE, only it is much larger boats and they had about 25 boats participate! It was great fun even though there was a little drizzle that night! Here is Mom, Dad and sister staying dry as we waited for the boats to drive past!

I was only able to get decent pictures of a few boats...the theme this year was around the world.

Another...

And finally this one...they had a giant toga party on board! It was great!!

Then my parents and I left early and drove all day Sunday to get me home to Pittsburgh around 3PM. My parents had another two hours to get to Ohio so they arrived home safely around 5PM. It was nice to have time to do laundry and get organized before heading into work today.

This is the only thing I have left from the beach, other than the memories...I bought salt water taffy for my treat bowl at work...Fudge Kitchen anyone?!?!?

I hope everyone had a great week and I look forward to being able to catch up on every one's blogs this week. I tried but was way to involved in family and nieces and nephews to be able to keep up!

Just a little PS on this chair below that I told you about in one of my favorite things posts.  I took it to the beach and opened it up and it immediately died! Yes, you heard me right, it died. You should be able to fold the top and bottom up and down and it just got stuck in the U position! It was so irritating! It was marketed for the beach so sand was not this issue...I was so disappointed! I cannot wait to return it to Walmart! Do not buy one - it dies right away and stops folding! UGH!

I wish you all a stress-free, enjoyable week!

Anyone else every purchase anything that you could not even use once? Does Walmart take returns without a receipt since it was a gift? What vacations do you have coming up?

Stone Harbor = Heaven

WOW!!!

Sorry for the extremely long and unintended break!

I meant to go away for a week and it has been wayyyyyy longer!

I was enjoying my week long vacation away and then I had to play catch-up for days afterwards! ICKY!

But, I am back now and I would like to formally thank you for not de-following me!! ha ha

Below is the vacation pictures and an update on the trip - I went to Stone Harbor, NJ...It is by far my very favorite beach on this planet. Both because it is a great, clean, family oriented beach and because it is very sentimental to me also.

I promise that there are not many as I was focusing on enjoying the break and did not take a lot of pics at all!

Here are my vacation nails! I wanted to select a bright beach color along with some Jamberry wraps! I think I loved them all week long!!! You can order your own here... http://annsterw.jamberrynails.net
...there are over 300 styles to choose from and they last over two weeks!!!

Since vacation is when the whole family is together, we decided to celebrate my little sisters birthday while we were all together...even though it was a few weeks early. Any excuse for an ice cream cake right?!?!? 

We always run the Ron Jaworski 5K (fights childhood obesity) when we are on vacation in Stone Harbor. This year some of the little kids joined in and ran too! I love that they are running with us and enjoy coming along at such a young age!!!This is our pre-race group photo!
 

 

This was our one family dinner night out. We cook in every night and only eat out on one special night - this year we went to Sylvester's in Avalon - YUM!!!!

 

 This is our awesome family pyramid on the beach!!! The only ones that were with us on vacation that were missing were my Mom and Dad and Brother in Law.  LOVE IT!!!!

Here is the family waiting to ride on the free jitney to go to the Stone Harbor Craft Fair. It is huge and lots of fun...we got to this every year also!

 

And this is me braving a lesson and 1 hour paddle board session on the bay! I loved every second of this! Once you get stable and comfortable, this was soooo much fun! I cannot wait to try it again!!!

 

Thanks for sticking with me through my bloggy break! I am back!

Stone Harbor 2013

I just returned from my family vacation to Stone Harbor, NJ. We have gone every year for as long as I can remember with the exception of a few years here and there. We LOVE it here!!!  Every morning we get up around 6AM and whomever wants to goes on a morning 3 mile jog/run/walk...and then we all head down to Coffee Talk to get coffee to take home to prepare to head down to the beach. LOVE this little coffee shop!!!!!! This is my sister and mom with their coffees after our run.

This will be my view for the week...not too shabby!!! Right across from the lifeguard station! HA

On Monday (our third full day at the beach) my sister Kerry informed us of a blood drive across the street from where we we staying. We were all a little hot and ready for a break so we decided to check it out. I could not give as I had just donated at home about three weeks before that but my mom, sisters and niece all donated. It was for Team HurriKANEN and a very special little five year old boy that lives in the area - you can check it out HERE!

Below is my sister Kerry in the middle of the donating process!!

 And below here is my sister Susie laying down as she gets sick and faint every time she donates. Kudos to her: if I got sick every time you would not see me donating at all - just saying.....

 Jordan, my niece, and I ran into town to grab Pizza Bread for everyone on spaghetti night! It is a family favorite from the Bread and Cheese Cupboard. Absolutely amazing!!!! She was sneaking bites the whole way home!

On Monday night, my mom and my sisters and I decided we needed to head out of town to my mothers favorite nail place. I have no clue where this place was...I just rode along - HA HA!

This is the finished product of my adorable, beachy toes!!!

 I was teasing everyone Monday night because June from Honey Boo Boo took away her families phones because no one talked to each other anymore. Well, I told everyone I needed to take their phones...they were ALL candy crushing or facebooking every night!! It is a family obsession!!! LOL I am part of the blame too! HA This was my view from the chair of everyone on their electronics!

 This is Tuesday morning...a fun game of Headbanz before heading to the beach. This is a great game for kids and adults...the kids LOVED it!!!

Dinner Tuesday night was our night out. Every year we pick one night to eat out with the whole family.  This is the shot, minus me, from out dinner at Sylvesters in Avalon (just a town over from Stone Harbor-5 minute drive)...YUMMY!!!! Thanks for dinner Dad and Mom!!!

We got word that Santa was in town for the week we were vacationing this year.  Usually we are there during Shark Week and we watch the shark shows each night and then swim in the ocean in the day - ha ha!!!!  This year we went earlier due to family scheduling issues and Santa was in town promoting Christmas in July! It made up for no Shark Week... Here is me, Mrs. Claus, Santa, my sister Kerry and my niece Jordan in the SH boat!!!! It was supposed to be for picks with the kids but we took advantage! HA

Wednesday morning I decided to get a photo of the family favorite for breakfast on vacation. Gatorade and Sticky buns (also from Bread and Cheese Cupboard). YUMMY!!!! No wonder the kids were flying high speed all day every day!!! HA

 Thursday was our only rainy day and frankly; we needed a beach break. We go down to the beach around 10 and stayed till at least 3 everyday! LOVED IT!!!! This is the motel that Grandma and Grandpa stay in - we had the kids calling it the "no tell motel" by the end of the week. LOL

This was a photo walking back to our place from the above photo at the "no tell motel"...

Since it was a rainy day, I decided my niece and I could talk the little kids to the Wetlands Institute to give the adults some free time to hang out "drink that is" hee hee!!! This is on the way in the car.  If you every get a chance to go, you should! It is awesome....we try to go every year. They teach about turtles and you can watch them feed all kinds of sea life in a "petting" pool.  Pretty amazing and for future reference - flounders are very aggressive fish!!! Just sayin......

My sister Kerry and I ran into town Thursday morning to get a secret birthday cake. We ran into Santa AGAIN in town and told him everything else we want for Christmas - I should make a pretty good score this year! HA!!! We ended up celebrating my sisters birthday early since the whole family was there and together.

Friday morning I agreed to be buried in the sand...not as fun as I remember from a kid! HA HA! This is me buried and my nieces and nephew...they enjoyed this wayyyy more than me!

 Last day on the beach shot :-(  LOVE this beach!

Saturday night my brother-in-law wanted to take those of us remaining to dinner (my sister and her family, me and my niece Jordan all stayed an extra day later than everyone else). So off we went to the Lobster House in Cape May. NJ.  This is a shot as soon as the car started moving they were out!

This is Steve's dinner....my brother-in-law....I forgot to get a picture of mine....Yummy!!!!!! I had stuffed flounder.

This is the last day at the beach. I was up around 5AM and went out onto the patio to sit and reflect on vacation!

For the past three years we have always registered and run the Ron Jaworski 5K while we were at the beach. This year, since we went a week earlier, it was on our last day instead of our first. This is our pre-race photo.

They have awesome booths set up for the race day and this year was no exception!!! This is our bags of FREE fresh fruit and other goodies!!! YUMMO!!! Great for the car ride home!

What a great time we all had!!! Really missed that my brother and his family could not make it this year and also really missed Dan and Matthew (my other brother in law and nephew).  AMAZING TIME IN STONE HARBOR!!! I think I need to retire here...how much longer!?!?!?!?

Soooooooo happy to be back in PA..... LOL!