Vacation 2017

A couple weeks ago, we were getting ready to head out on vacation. Much of the week was spent gathering, shopping and packing for it. We also had a couple dentists appointments. The twins each had to get a filling on Monday. Ellie went with me so that she could help Molly at my dad’s office (and get some grape soda from Gina). Andrew took Jackson and Lincoln out to the ranch to get some video footage for a kids’ bike race Andrew wants to do out there. Now he wants Jackson to edit the footage they got to make a promotional video. The twins did great at their appointments. I decided to not go back with them and they said they didn’t make a peep or cry at all. So, it looks like it is best if I just stay away. Ellie ended up staying at my dad’s office since it was less than an hour before closing time. We picked her up later that evening after dinner and I made my mom sit down with me to go through our grocery order. We were doing the order for everyone and I was trying to compare prices between Sam’s and the Publix grocery delivery. The grocery order was taking a while and we finally gave up around 10 with just half of the order done. I worked on it a little more when I got home and finished it up the next day. But I wasn’t able to place the order until Friday for Saturday delivery. When I got home Monday night, this is what was going on in my room.

I finally sent them to bed around 10:45, promising they could finish the next morning. Jackson had a dentist appointment Wednesday morning to get some sealants and ended up needing a small filling too. And while he was in his appointment, I dropped Ellie by her friend, Ella’s, house and she went with them to The Beach Ottumwa for the day. In the midst of getting everything ready to leave, Todd’s dad, Don, passed away after a short battle with colon cancer. We decided it would be good to go support Todd since it was pretty much just him and his mom. Then Todd ended up asking Andrew to be a pallbearer. So, our plans changed a little and we decided to leave Thursday evening instead of Friday morning. I was able to get most of our packing done by Wednesday and Andrew got our beach stuff in the bag on top of our car that night. And since I had most of the packing done, I took the kids to Memorial Park Thursday morning to move around a little before we started our 3-day trip to Florida. We had mostly been to the Kiwana’s playground lately and the twins had been eyeing Memorial Park. Plus it is a good one for the older kids. A city crew was there putting out new mulch, but we were able to stay out of their way. The kids had fun climbing around and then had me time them on the “obstacle course”. I think they thought they were on American Ninja Warrior.

While I finished stuff around the house, Andrew and the kids took Buddy to the Hound Around Hotel where he stayed while we were on vacation. They were all sad to leave him. We all ate a quick dinner and I had Lincoln and the twins do a quick bath and get into their pjs before we left. Then we waited for my UPS package to show up. It was a swim strap so I could do a stationary swim in our pool on vacation. We made our way 4 ½ hours to Mt. Vernon, IL without stopping and got checking into our hotel our 10. They had popcorn in the lobby, so Ellie and Jackson snagged us a few bags for a nighttime snack and we got to bed around 11. We had to be in Louisville the next morning at 9:30 their time, which was 8:30 our time, so I set my alarm for 4 and I wasn’t excited to see that it said the alarm was set for 4 hours and 55 minutes from then. We got on the road in good time the next morning and the kids slept most of 3 hours it took to get to Amanda and Todd’s. When we got to the house, Andrew left with the other guys to head to the church since they were pall bearers and the moms and kids went a little later. They had a visitation at the church about an hour before the funeral and were nice enough to have food set up in the cry room and that helped keep the kids entertained. They had a nice service for Don (although the priest did call Joy by the wrong name) and it was followed up by the burial at a beautiful cemetery where Todd’s sister, Angela, is buried. We went back to the house afterwards, changed, ate a quick lunch and then headed out to Pelham, Alabama. We got in a little after 10 and got settled down. I had started feeling the twinges of the cold that Jackson had the afternoon before, and it was in full force by morning. Andrew got up early though and got a good ride in. He did around 34 miles at a state park near our hotel.

We got to the Donut Hole in Inlet Beach around 2:30 and everyone else was there except Andy’s family, Caroline’s family and Lissy. We ate a late lunch, let the kids play with the games outside and then made our way to our house which was just a few minutes away. It was in a little subdivision which was actually just one small gated street, although the gate was open until a few days into our trip. The lady that did our grocery shopping showed up right at 4 and we were able to get in the house then and then all the unpacking started. Amanda and I got the groceries all put away. Then Caroline and Jared showed up with our Sam’s order, which including most of the snacks for the kids for the beach.

Andy and Lissy flew into Panama City and they were the last to make it, but by that evening all 37 of us were there. I was exhausted and really wanted to sleep, but it was good to see everyone, so I stayed up and visited for a bit. My dad got some prednisone from the pharmacy the next day, which eventually helped. And it was helpful throughout the rest of the week as Andrew, Amanda and Lissy came down with the cold too. So, although vacation started out on a rough patch, the week went really well. Here are some highlights, although I’m sure there is stuff I’ll forget.

-I was a little nervous about all of us in one house, but it worked out really well. All the adults got to visit, the kids all got to play with each other and we didn’t have to wonder which house they were in 😊. Plus, it was just set up really well and fit us all comfortably and worked well for meals. And a bonus was that it was really pretty and the walk to the beach wasn’t too long. And had a smaller pool that was 5 feet at the deepest, so it worked out well for the kids to do a little swimming after the beach.

-The kids had so much fun together. They were constantly entertaining themselves. Once they figured out that the TVs weren’t going to be on hardly at all, they found other fun things to do while we were at the beach. There were a lot of imaginations at work, including making up their own way of playing Monopoly.

-Jackson ventured more with the adults, although he would randomly interact with the kids. He was spoiled as he got his own bunkroom that had a tv on the top bunk. He had his little tv on most of the time but I think he ended up watching news or Westerns because he didn’t have many channels. I only asked him to clean his room once which I think he really appreciated.

-The kids had a best bunk competition again and it was entertaining. Molly did the judging and they got points for different categories including cleanliness, creativity and kindness while the work was being done and to the other group. The boys had a bunk room and the girls ended up in the “media room” where there were several couches to sleep on.  The boys made their beds best they could while the girls had to put away their blankets and sleeping bags. Then they would set up their stuffed animals to get creativity points. Each group won a different category so we all walked over to Rosemary Beach on of our last nights there and Grandma and Papa bought them all some ice cream.

-Our meals worked out great this year. My parents were so nice to go up earlier most afternoon and put out food for lunch, whether it was stuff for sandwiches, leftovers or grilling some hamburgers and hotdogs. The first night we just ordered out pizza for dinner. A couple nights we ventured out to Seaside and The Hub and each family got what they wanted from the food trucks and food stands. Then we split up the other nights between the families-we had Italian night, Mexican night and pizza again. My parents and our family did another beach bonfire. My dad grilled the hot dogs and then we took all our food down to the beach. The beach chair company had chairs set up for us. But then they didn’t show up to set up the bonfire, but thankfully the supplies were all there. So, we set up the table they had and went ahead and ate dinner while trying to figure out where the guy was to set up our fire. He showed up about an hour late, but it all worked out. We had some s’mores, sparklers, glow sticks and dancing on the beach under a full moon.

-Before our bonfire, Lissy got a chance to take another picture with everyone in their number shirts with the addition of Emmie and Annie. And grandbaby #22 was pretty evident in Kaitlin’s belly.

-We had some great weather. It was hot, but not terribly hot, and we generally had a decent breeze down by the water. It only rained a couple of times-the afternoon of our first day at the beach (which was okay for me since I still wasn’t feeling well and they had set up our chairs funky and we had two rows stacked right on top of each other so all I could see in the second row were the back of the chairs in front of me and I couldn’t keep an eye on the kids) and a light shower later in the week, which we were able to just stay at the beach during. The water was a little rough most days though, which ended up being a good thing. We put life jackets on the younger kids, kept our eyes on them and sent them out to play. Most of them loved it. They loved floating in on the waves, jumping the waves and learning to boogie board. The older ones loved going out further and diving into the big waves and trying to do some body surfing. Andrew joined them doing that and I went out with the twins a few times to help them catch some bigger waves on their boogie boards. It was kind of tiring as the undertow was pretty strong and you would have to fight it to help pull the kids out further out in the water. But I feel like it was one our best times at the beach. If the water was calm, the probably would have gotten bored. With the waves, they had so much fun.

 

-And the sand called their name as many sand castles and villages were created.

-There were a lot of seagulls and pigeons on the beach which provided some entertainment.

-Doing the large combined grocery orders ended up working out pretty well. Almost daily trips to the grocery store were still required, but at least they were smaller and we didn’t have to do the huge one when we first got there. And thankfully, our house had enough space for all of our food. And everyone I talked to loved sharing the cost of everything (we did it per person) made things easier and you weren’t worried if you were eating someone else’s food or that your kids were. Everything was just shared.

-Even though Andrew and I both got sick, we both got some workouts in. I did a couple of runs and on one I found a street that allowed me to run by the ocean for just a little bit. Andrew and I also went on a couple of rides to Seaside and back and were able to claim a few QOMs/KOMs. I also brought a swim strap that allowed me to do stationary swimming in the pool. I did it once after my first run and it was a little harder than I thought it would be. It was definitely easier to just swim normally in a pool. Also, it got pretty choppy since the pool was so small. It provided entertainment for everyone though. I only got to do it once because Jared wanted to try it out and it broke when he pushed out to swim. I actually bought it used from Amazon and it wasn’t in as good condition as it stated it was, so I wasn’t shocked that it broke. And I was totally fine with others using it, but sadly it had to be put away. I am able to return it to Amazon though.

-Overall, we had an awesome vacation. Our own kids were pretty good with minimal fighting and complaining. They had so much fun with all of their cousins and it is so nice to just get to hang out with everyone. You could tell all the kids were more comfortable with everyone by the time the week was over. The last night, Carolina wouldn’t leave Jackson alone-she had decided it was time to annoy him a little bit 😊.  The kids all got along great too. There were, of course, a few arguments here and there, but really they did pretty well. It was chaotic, loud, and maybe not everyone’s idea of fun, but for us it went pretty smoothly and was an enjoyable week before the chaos of back to school starts. God gave us a great week.

We were the first ones to leave Saturday morning-a little after 5am. We had a pretty uneventful trip home. We stopped for lunch south of Nashville, were in St. Louis by 5pm and home a little after 8. Andrew said he felt it was a little easier since we were able to get back before the sun went down, so he didn’t feel as tired. We all immediately started unpacking the car and I put the kids in charge of cleaning it out. Andrew and Jackson got the stuff off top and I started airing it out and trying to get the sand off of everything and then started unpacking all the suitcases. This continued the next morning while Andrew took the kids to pick up Buddy and out to the ranch. The lady at the kennel told Andrew that Buddy never really got comfortable there, so I don’t know if Andrew will let me send him back. That afternoon, Andrew went to the office and Lincoln had Josh’s birthday party at the Country Club. I dropped him off and then went grocery shopping to fill up our empty fridge and pantry. I finished getting everything put away from vacation and then we grilled steaks for dinner and ate outside since it was cooler than in our house. Our main ac unit quit on us right before vacation and we decided to do a big overhaul which won’t be done until next week. Fun times being a homeowner. But, we ended our last weekend before school starts with the kids playing outside until it was dark.