Part I was the initial sand-castle build.

Part II was a large, ambitious expansion.

This is the final part, part III: destruction

Anthony decided that it was time to destroy the sand castle. It's not that he wanted to use the space for anything. He just wanted to destroy. (What do you expect? He's a five-year-old boy, you know.)

When he was done, a lone tower from the original castle stood. I have no idea why he spared it...

As far as I know it's still there today (10 days later), although we've had some incredible thunderstorms that I'm sure [...]

I've had a cold for the last couple of days, but am feeling good enough today to continue from Part I...

Now bitten with the sand-castle bug, Anthony and I went out and, at his direction, we built two large additions to the sand castle he'd built the other day. Once we were done, I went for the camera...

Earlier during our current trip to Ohio for the summer, back when Anthony's cousin Josh was here, my sister ("Aunt Marci") told Anthony how to make a sand castle...

I've got to explain Anthony's fashion a bit. He's still wearing his jammies, and had mixed the upper from a cute little Japanese kimono-type sleeping ensemble, and the bottom from a girl's set of western pajamas. (Why a girl's set? Because he wanted to try them.) Anyway, either set looks cute, but the mix-n-match doesn't really "work", fashion wise, especially with the shoes.

Anyway, back to the sand castle. All these [...]

Anthony was feeding the birds outside, and I joined him just in time for a little friend (a Carolina Wren) to join us...

My mom walked out later, and I gave her the camera. By this time, Anthony had the peanuts out and was ready for the bluejays.

Some other birds-on-the-veranda shots, from last year, here and here.

In the photo above, non-photographers will see a slightly soft picture of a little boy holding a stuffed Curious George, having something shown to him by his grandma.

Photographers will see the metadata under it and say "Holy Freakin' Cow !  200mm handheld at 1/13 sec !" At least, that's what I thought. That was the first picture I took when I saw them coloring drawings of birds together (at the time, my mom was explaining something about woodpeckers), and after hearing the agonizingly slow slap of the shutter, I pushed the ISO from 500 to 1250. I never would [...]