More from the beach... (post #3)

This post is just a few pictures I want to document.  Hope you aren't tired of vacation pictures yet... if you are, just come back in a day or two and I'll be on to something else, I'm sure.

Mom and Dad agreed to keep the girls one afternoon on vacation so that Chris and I could go to the World Golf Hall of Fame together!

I was so very glad we got to go there.  It was really neat!  We saw so many neat things and learned a lot too!

The whole area around the World Golf Hall of Fame was beautiful!  Lots of neat places to live and stay while visiting, beautiful golf courses, and there was, of course, a really neat restaurant and huge golf store!

Another neat thing we were planning to do was an Eco-Tour!  Our friends Scott and Beverly recommended it!  (They own the condo we stayed in.)

They told us that we were in for a treat and that Eco-Tours were a must do!  We were excited to see dolphins, manatee, and sea turtles among other things.

It was a HOT and HUMID Florida day and we couldn't wait to get on the boat and out on the water!  The tours are very personal and it was just our family on the boat with the captain!

We got there early and enjoyed looking at the boats and visited the little shop there at the marina.

Finally, it was time.  We checked the radar and they said we were clear to go.  We loaded up and off we went on our boat!  It was great!  The kids were loving it!

5 minutes into our trip the captain did an about face.  There was a VERY scary looking storm cloud brewing!  We headed back for the docks at full speed ahead and the rain still caught us!  It was our last day, so we didn't get to do the Eco-Tour.  We are looking forward to going back and scheduling another tour for a day with better weather!

My sister-in-law is the best at coordinating outfits!  She got the little girls and big girls matching bathing suits! I have pictures of my girls in them, but she got pictures of all four girls in them on the beach!  Hopefully I can share a few of those when I get them.  For now, you'll have to settle for my sweet girls in their navy stripes!

I think Chris had the most fun looking for critters!  From crabs to sand fleas, he was all about catching stuff to look at!

Ava Grace was all bout finding shells!

Lily just loved playing in the waves!

It was fun to watch her dance and sing in the surf putting on shows for an imaginary audience!  I remember doing the same thing when I was little!

Love this little super-star and her BIG imagination!

Everything is right in the world when you hold Daddy's hand!

Lily is getting so big!  I can't believe she'll be in 4th grade!  Looking at these pictures made me realize how much older she looks now!

My little beach bum!

These two love each other so much.  They are inseparable!  I'm so thankful that they have such a strong bond.

Beachy Keen (beach post #2)

I could live at the beach.  Seriously.  When I was about to graduate college and had decided not to go on to law school because I was tired of school and to go on and teach I really thought about it!  I used to get online and look at school systems... Destin, Tybee, Gulf Shores... just to see.

Turns out, I didn't outgrow that.  The beach really and truly is good for my soul.  It's my home away from home.  It's a place that feels right. Content.  At peace.  And when I leave, and sometimes in random moments, I feel homesick for a place that is not my home.  The beach.

More important than the beach is family, of course.  I love being near family and that will probably keep me from ever actually living at the beach, but I do think I could do it.  I guess you never know where life will take you.  Maybe one day I'll find myself living on the beach with Chris and our kids and parents and brothers and sisters will all come visit us there often.  I can dream, right?

If I ever did move to the beach it would have to be somewhere really beachy!  I love the soft white sands and clear water of Destin, but that's not the kind of beach that I long for when I get that homesick-for-the-beach feeling.  I like something more quaint.  Somewhere with beachy charm that is not tainted by all the commercial hoo-rah.  No big tall condo buildings and massive hotel chains and motels lining every inch of beach front.  No big time retail or mall steps from the beach.

I like a beach that's not crowded.  I don't want to sit around hearing other people's conversations and other toddler's tantrums.  I don't like having to "find" a spot for our beach umbrella and a place for the kids to play in the sand.  I like a nice, wide-open beach.  Even better if you throw in some little beach front houses, a couple shabby little beach shops and a seafood dive where shoes are optional and the AC is just an ocean breeze.

Tybee Island, GA has always been that beach for me.  The one.  Now, I can say that St. Augustine, FL has joined it's ranks.  Okay, Tybee might still be number one in my heart.  It has a lot of sentimental value... A LOT.  Family trips and girls trips and my first Chris-vacation-beach-trip have all been there.  But, St. Augustine was a pleasant surprise.

Summer.  Peak Season.  Do you notice the lack of other people in the background of our pictures?  Yes.  St. Augustine is special.  It was as uncrowded as any beach I have ever been on.  The beach was dotted with gated condos that were at most 4 stores high.  I didn't see chain hotels and high rise condos.  The beach was wide and clean and beautiful with a sprinkle of families here and there.

The beach was wide and long at St. Augustine.  Lots of room for the kids to run and play.  Large enough for uninterrupted games of kickball and softball!  The kids played games without getting in anyone's way.

We collected and played with lots of shells!  Although the soft white sands of the gulf and inviting, I grew up with and enjoy the grainy golden sands of the Atlantic and the array of shells that it never fails to offer!  The girls had the best time searching for a saving shells!  We have more shells then we know what to do with!

The water was perfectly cool and the surf was just right!  We had a couple days of waves just rough enough to toss you about and to teach Lily how to really use a boogie board!  We also had calmer days that were perfect for playing and splashing about in the shallow water.  The murky water of the Atlantic doesn't bother me a bit and it didn't bother our girls either!  They were perfectly happy splashing about and playing in tide pools chasing minnows and pretending their boogie boards were boats!

We enjoyed perfect weather while we were there!  The days were hot and humid, but the ocean breeze kept us comfortable.  The evenings were pure perfection.  Almost every evening we went out to walk as the sun dipped in the sky.  In that evening time, the beach is down right magical.  The ocean sings a lullaby and the whole beach and everything on it is bathed in a magical light.  It is my most favorite time of day at the beach.

After a whole week there, we decided that both girls loved the beach as much as I do.

Their Daddy loves it too... he just didn't know it yet.

So, St. Augustine, you made the cut.  You are on the list.  You are a potential future home... future vacation... future I'm-homesick-for-the-beach daydream.

St. Augustine, you had all the things I love about the beach.  The giant, seemingly endless Atlantic, wide open beach, and now, you have some sentimental memories too!

You also didn't have the right stuff.  You didn't have crowds and big hustle and bustle to contend with.

Long story short, we like you, St. Augustine.

We like you and we'll be back!

Beach Babes...

For the first time since Bentlee was three (six year ago), we took a "family" as in, all most of us, vacation! 

I started scheming this about a year ago and mentioned off and on, planting the seed of thought throughout the year.  When I got the go ahead and we were all able to find dates that worked (shocking and miraculous, I tell you), I was thrilled!

My sister and brother-in-law couldn't come with us.  For one, they aren't big beach people, but more importantly, they had a mare expected to foal around the time of our vacation.  They wanted to be there, of course, and they were able to witness the birth of an adorable little colt! 

So, we missed them, but the rest of us (My Mom and Dad, Brother, Sister-in-law, nieces, the girls, Chris, and myself) loaded up and headed to St. Augustine, FL. 

It was a great trip!  Chris, the girls, and I went down a day early and enjoyed a long 8-night vacation!  What a treat!  We had the first day and last day all to ourselves.

It was so fun having all the girls there to play together!  It really took the usual what-can-we-do-to-entertain-the-kids thing out of vacation, which was great! 

With cousins as playmates and extra adults to keep eyes on everyone it was a remarkably relaxing vacation! Granted, it was a far cry from the do-nothing, sit-on-the-beach-and-read-sleep vacations of my past, but it was still restful and fun!

 Of all the fun things we did and saw, the best part for me was watching the girls have such fun!

 I now know for sure that both girls are 100% beach bum... just like me!

The second best part of vacation?  We converted my not-a-beach-person husband in to an ocean-playing, wave-riding, crab-catching beach bum!  Self-proclaimed, I tell ya!  The words came out of his mouth on day two and I will never forget them!  "This is fun.  Alright... you've converted me."  Turns out he just needed to go to the beach with the right person... and to the right beach.  ;-)  We *might* just retire to a beachy town some day... just sayin'.

Many Many more beach pictures to come, but that's enough for one post!

Good night!