The Vacationers.

We had an amazing time at the beach over Memorial Day weekend. The weather was absolutely perfect, it didn't even feel like we were in Texas. The water was clear (for a Texas beach) and the kids had a great time playing in the sand. I have so many pictures to share, it is best just to dive right on in with the cuteness....

Josh and Katie settling in for a long road trip with their reading material. (This picture cracks me up- fast forward 35 years to an old married couple.)

Erin and I drove down together with Katie and Josh. They got a kick out of being in the car together. For the first 30 minutes, they both had a big grin on their face and would randomly giggle at one another for no reason. They were troopers in the car and had fun singing together and reading books. To break up the trip for the kids (and to maintain our sanity), Erin and I stayed over night at our friend, Rebecca's house. Not only is her house amazingly beautiful, but it is stocked with baby toys. Katie and Josh thoroughly enjoyed reliving their carefree days when jiggle balls and jumperos were so much fun. We even got to see Alicia and Tricia (and her handsome boys) on our short stop in Austin. Ahhh, Austin, how I miss you.

By Friday, we made it to the beach and were ready to catch some waves. Someone forgot to tell Josh how cool the ocean is, because all he wanted to do was this...

sit in the sand with his truck and transfer sand from one spot to another. But, wow, look at the delight on his face, how can you mess with that? He wouldn't even let us walk down to the water while holding him. It was kind of nice not having to worry about him moving from that spot and sprinting into the vast and angry ocean.

There was also a great deal of chasing and attacking Josh taking place. He will love this in about 15 years (but no earlier).


Katie and Josh were rockin' on Rock Band. Katie was hard-core jamming on the drums and Josh looked darn cute with the guitar around his neck.

We spent our last night of vacation at Snoopy's and enjoyed a heart-healthy dinner of fried fish and beer. Yummm. The Basden's were great vacation buddies. There is something so wonderful about hanging out with friends that are in your exact life stage. Everyone expected to be awakened early and eat dinner late. We all knew we had to hide the chips and M&Ms from the kids, but having beer in plain sight was acceptable. There was always at least one parent available to play referee and/or kid wrangler. There was an unspoken rule that the following items were considered communal : diapers and wipes, spf 50 sunscreen, toys, and gold fish. And, best of all, no one judged me when my child had fries, juice, and ice cream for dinner.

Gotta love these folks.

On Monday, it was time to say bye-bye to the ocean. Back to reality. It was a 7 hour drive that we made into a 9 hour day. We got to stop in Wimberly and see Granee, Ginger, and Hershey. Josh ran around with Hershey, played Granee's guitar and listened to music by the river.

Josh did quite well in the car except for a one-hour stint of extreme protest against the car seat. We kept him busy by singing, reading books, eating snacks, playing with stickers (which he stuck all over his body, where else would they go?), watching movies, and discussing the events of the weekend. Here is the list of things he said (in order) when we asked him what he did and saw this weekend...

Beach

I wanna go to lotion (aka: ocean)

Big ones (referring to waves)

McQueen Kite

Bubbles

Kids

Castles (he talked about building them all weekend, but never actually did due to his desire to stomp on the sand as soon as it came out of the bucket)

Truck in sand

Catch waves

Chick n play with Kay Kay

Fishes

Ducks

Cats

I go Kay Kay's Car

Drums

Pancakes

Now, we are home battling a mountain of sandy laundry. Josh is thrilled to be with his toys again and I am enjoying the peace as Josh, Murphy, and Jackson are sleeping away their adventures from the weekend. I love vacation.