Vacation!!

 So we went on Vacation as a family and it was marvelous! It was the 5 of us, plus Mark's friend Beacham who is practically his brother as they have been friends for almost 2 decades! And we brought along his sister Emily who is 21 and possibly the sweetest, most selfless person on this earth! I asked her last July if she would be up for coming with us this summer and she, without hesitation, said yes. Really, a free trip to the beach with the only stipulation being you have to help with 3 littles...I would totally have went too! Oh and my sister and my two nieces (my other sisters "grown" girls, almost 19 and almost 14!) were there as well! They are the super tanned beauties in the pictures below!

We left at 8:30pm Friday night and drove the 7 hours without issue. Arrived at my sister's beach house that she rented for the summer around 2:45am. Miriam and Emily were sleeping pretty much the whole trip (Emily's was drug induced as she apparently gets more car sick than she realized!). Juliana and Samantha were in and out of sleep, as was I because I feared Mark would get lost in the dark in an area he had never driven before. Granted, Beacham was navigating and they had 2 GPS systems going, I being the control freak that I am, couldn't relax until we pulled into the driveway.

And as we unloaded what we needed for the night, Miriam woke up and was ready to go! She had just slept about 6 hours and thought it was time to play! Bless Mark's heart because after I fed her, he took her outside on the screened in porch and walked with her for a bit and then laid down in the car with her on his chest. The beach house was great but not big enough that a crying baby wouldn't have ruined everyone's little amount of sleep even more!

Saturday started around 7:30am for me and Miriam, at which time I plugged in Dunkin Donuts to the GPS and found me some COFFEE!! :) Grabbed some bagels for everyone too. We lazed around and then headed to the beach. We were all a little groggy but we weren't stuck in beach traffic!! Which, if you've ever been to the Eastern Shore, you know how bad it can be!

Later that day we checked in to our place and got somewhat settled before we went to Mass. The next 6 days consisted of breakfast, cartoons for the kids (a real treat b/c that is not normal at home), bathing suits, beach, pool, lunch, naps, beach, pool, showers, dinner, dessert and back to the beach!

I miss the beach. The feel of sitting with the sand between my toes and reading a good book. Sand castle building. Chatting with family. Crashing in the waves. Playing at the pool with the kids. I love the beach!

Oh and MIRIAM STARTED CRAWLING while we were away!! So exciting!

This was the first time i saw her crawl! It was so wonderful to see her on the move!! Now she's into everything but it's okay. It was bound to happen!!

Our Trip in Pictures

Sisters on swings

Mark and Juls in the far right corner...there footprints in the foreground of the picture

The girls on the trip! Hence the reason Mark insisted Beacham come! :)

Big sisters on right. Little sisters on left. Imitating Juls when she is trying to get Miriam to look at the camera!

The sunset on our last night.

Hope you and yours have as wonderful as of a vacation as we did!! :)