Tuesday at the Beach

TUESDAY morning Jay woke up at 6:15am. I am not quite sure why...actually, he filled his diaper so I think that's why. At any rate, we made the best of it by heading downstairs and out on the back porch to sit on a rocking chair and stare out at the ocean. The big, long porch has several rocking chairs and is the perfect perch for a relaxing few minutes while everyone else was sleeping.

Well, except for Clark. Uncle Josh and Clark and Pops were soon up and eating breakfast. Cousin Clark and Jay are usually among the first up for the day. The girls have been sleeping in...probably because they share a bed with aunt Corinne and she definitely doesn't wake up early.

Eventually Calla and Kelsey were up and I served them breakfast. Jonathan headed out for the golf course for a round. While he was gone, the rest of us headed straight outside for the beach. The weather was supposed to be iffey according to the weather channel, but in reality it was sunny and warm.

A perfect beach day.

Jaybird took a long morning nap, which gave me a chance to hang out with the girls. We built a sand castle and a moat. I also had some time to read my book while they played with Pops in the waves. He likes to give them rides on the boogie boards. The girls and Pops have also built their fair share of deep holes in the sand. That always seems to be a popular activity at the beach. (-:

below: the girls love their little beach chairs. Grandma and Grandpa gave the chairs to them.

below: hanging out under aunt Kimberly's umbrella. The perfect spot for a chat.

I served the girls lunch outside on the porch, which worked out well until Calla's plate sailed away in the wind. It was a windy day. The girls were getting tired, and so once Jonathan got home at 12:30 or so, he put them down for a nap. I went and checked on them and the three of them were sound asleep in our bed.

That gave Jay and I some quality time at the beach....



below: rides with mommy

below: Cousin Clark had a great time too

 below: Jay likes to stand next to the lawn chairs. It looks like he is trying to surf on the boogie board.

below: The boys and aunt Kelly

below: Sisters and sons...

below: Jay likes to clap these days.

 After awhile, Jay got tired so I put him down for a nap. Daddy and the girls were still sleeping, so I skipped out to the beach BY MYSELF. Well, Mimi and my sisters were all there but I was by myself without any kids! A rarity. (-: It was very relaxing.

A rain shower rolled through at 3:00 or so, and we quickly picked up all our stuff. The timing worked out because we had a professional photographer arriving at the house at 4:30 to take family photos. We thought a big family portrait was in order, since we haven't gotten one since 2010 when Aunt Kim and Uncle Jon were married. And, since Corinne is going to Uganda for two years, we won't be all together for a photo (or for anything!) until 2014.

Mimi bought the grandkids matching outfits. We had decided to go with a navy/red/white/khacki theme. Typical casual beachware. (-:

below: the girls...

There are 18 of us in all, so it was a lot for the photographer to coordinate but they did a great job. We all met at teh beach behind our house at 4:30, and started with some shots of the entire group. Then he split us up and did some shots by family, and then some with Mimi and Pops and the grandkids, and then a couple of just the kids.

below: here is one of "the originals" as we called them...Katelyn, me, Corinne, Caleb, Kimberly and Kelly (you can barely tell Kateyn and Kim are pregnant in this one!)

 below: a shot Dad took on his phone of the kiddos...hopefully Kelsey did not make this strange expression for every picture...

Everything went well except for Mimi and Pops' picture with the grandkids! oh no! We must have waited too long in the session to try for the picture, because Clark was not tolerating the photo shoot anymore (read: crying). We are going to have to try again another time! I felt bad because I really did want to get a pic of Mimi and Pops and the fabulous five. (-: Maybe Clark would prefer a swimsuit shot on the beach. (-:

By 5:45 or so we were done, and David and Katelyn served up dinner for the evening. After dinner, Uncle David treated all of us to ice cream at a local ice cream shop! We all headed out and lined up at the ice cream counter and ordered our favorite flavors. Someone ordered vanilla soft serve but I won't tell you who it was. (A crime, in my opinion!) Calla ordered chocolate cookie dough. yum.

By the time we got home, we were due for tucking the kids into bed. Calla was not tired after her long nap so I let her play with her V-Reader in her bed for awhile. I have no idea what time she eventually fell asleep! When I went to bed after midnight, I snuck in her room and removed the V-Reader from her pillow.

The boys have been doing late-night swims in the pool or sitting outside and grilling chicken drumsticks. You know, boy stuff.

In the meantime, Katelyn and Kelly and I played a rousing game of Settlers with Dad. As of this writing, I am 4-2 (wins-losses) at the game. 

And before I end it, I'd like to include a pic of the boys! So cute! Do they look alike? Not at all! But then again, Kelly and I never looked alike so I am not too surprised! (-:

Happy Memorial Day

WE spent Memorial Day doing a lot of this.....

and this....

The kiddos and I were up at around 7:30 or so, and were on the beach by 9. (-:

These happy girls played together...

My girls LOVE the beach.

We were on the beach from 9am until 4pm (when we moved to the pool). The girls even ate lunch on the beach. (-:

They got wakeboard rides from aunt Kim.

Here we are sitting in front of the vacation house...

After we swam in the pool and, in the process, got all the sand off of us, we headed back in the house for a Memorial Day picnic dinner. Mimi and Pops were the chefs of the evening.

Haley and Jay hanging out during dinner....

 Trying to get a cute pic of the two of them was, well, not happening...

The kids went to bed early as usual and the rest of us stayed up until after midnight playing games and talking. Ahhh...the stuff vacations are made of!

Our First Beach Day

SUNDAY morning we got up and dressed...actually, Kelsey was up at 5:30am crying throughout the house and saying "MOMMY? DADDY?" Needless to say, she forgot where we were. haha. But she went back to sleep and when we all woke up at 7:30, she remembered we were at the beach.

Well the beach had to wait. Pops had researched churches in the area and decided on one in the area. We all voted on the 9:30am service. Calla and Kelsey walked right into their classes in this new church like it was no big deal. (The words "She may be shy" were coming out of my mouth to the teacher as I watched her walk right into the room and sit down with all the other kids. Oops never mind.) Jaybird didn't have a problem either.

When I picked Calla up from her class, she was so excited about how it went. It was neat to see how confident she was in a new situation.

As soon as we got home, we ate lunch and threw on our swimsuits and headed to the beach, which is conveniently located in the "backyard." (-:

below: Pops admiring the view

below: Aunt Katelyn and Haley

below: the girls sitting under the umbrella with Uncle Jon and Aunt Kim. Aunt Kim is expecting in September.

Jaybird took a two-hour nap as soon as lunch was over, but afterwards he came out to soak up the sun...

Daddy and Jay...

Pops and Calla digging a hole...

Sisters...

More sisters...
Left to Right...non-pregnant, pregnant, non-pregnant, non-pregnant, pregnant. (-:

A girl in a hole. (-:

Little legs and big legs....

Jaybird loves the beach! He sat in the sand and played and got dirty. There was sand in every nook and cranny of that boy's body. (-: Jay was also a big fan of the water, he would kick his legs and get so excited when the waves came.

After awhile, we headed over to the pool....

 No better way to get all that sand off yah than a big jump in the pool....

For dinner Kelly and Josh were the cooks. (-: With all the little kids, we didn't want to spend the week out to eat so each couple is in charge of a meal. It was relaxing to sit and eat at the house, and right after dinner we put the kids to bed! They were SO tired after being outside in the sun all day. I think it took a total of 30 seconds for all three of them to fall asleep.

Calla and Kelsey are sleeping in a king-size bed in a room with aunt Corinne. Jay is in the pack and play in Jonathan and my room. Mimi awarded the two master suites to us and the Canche fam since we drove the furthest to vaca, so our room overlooks the ocean. It was very kind of everyone. (-: We are taking full advantage of the big whirlpool tub for post-beach baths. It's amazing how much sand is at the bottom of a bathtub after three kids get washed off (and that is after being hosed off and jumping in the pool! sand is so messy).

The kids were in bed by 7, so that gave the adults a nice long evening to play games and hang out. Katelyn and Pops and I played Settlers until 12:30am. I hoped it wouldn't be an early morning for the kids today! haha

* To the concerned: sounds like the tropical storm turned into a tropical depression, and is missing us entirely. phew *

Roadtrip

YESTERDAY and today we spent 17 hours in the car. I bet you wish you could have experienced that epic ride along with us. But because you didn't, let me provide you a rundown of our roadtrip....

We headed out Friday at 12:20 pm. That morning was spent at home, cleaning the house and finishing up last minute packing. The girls wanted to leave so bad that they could hardly stand it...they nagged and nagged all morning -"when can we leave?!" but it didn't bother me because I felt the same way!!

Jonathan had a work meeting in the city, but was home by around noon. He threw some last minute things in the van and then we were off!

below: the happy travelers...

Jaybird couldn't have timed his morning nap worse. He had taken a while to fall asleep, and then only slept 40 minutes, and then woke up and was ready to go! It was a bummer because I hoped he would take a long nap once we got in the car but he felt pretty rested after his catnap

The first leg of our trip was the worse part!! We got stuck in four traffic jams around Chicago and Indiana.

below: traffic jam. eek.

below: I let Jay crawl around the car during the traffic jam. Turned out to be a bad idea since he wasn't very keen about getting back into his car seat after his short-lived freedom...

The girls did the best that could be expected, but Kelsey was missing a nap so she was really whinny. Something minor like her cup falling out of her cup holder would induce weepiness. Ha.

below: Calla and her new coloring/activity book. She was so excited to start doing it.

below: Jay chillaxing...

During the roadtrip, Katelyn and David were driving from Texas. Katelyn texted me a pic of a road she saw on their route...

At 5pm central (so 6pm eastern), we stopped for dinner at a random BW3s. (-: I guess Jonathan was in the mood for wings. It worked out because they had a few arcade games that the girls played on while we waited for our food to come.

We were there about an hour. The kids and I hung out outside while we waited for Daddy to pay the bill. Thank you to the waiter for running Jay's cup out to us. I tend to leave things everywhere we go.

below: Kelsey examining her toenails and telling me she needs nail polish:

below: Calla dancing and waiting for Daddy....("Getting the wiggles out!")

below: Jay stretching his legs...

 

We were back on the road by 7 central, and then drove about four more hours. Our drive took us on a big detour because of construction (we found out the highway was backed up for over 12 miles, so we went the detour). The detour was definitely a "highlight" of the trip...we found ourselves driving up a steep mountain, on a one-lane road, with no cell phone service, in pitch dark. It was so creepy! (-: All the kids were sleeping so Jonathan and I had a laugh over it. We finally got back to civilization.

We stopped for the night outside of Knoxville, Tennessee. We were over halfway:

 

The girls woke up when we were carrying them into the hotel, but Jay stayed asleep. Kelsey was so excited about being at a hotel that she could hardly sleep (coupled with the fact that she'd used the pink potty two times in a row within a half hour of us pulling over for the night. It did not smell good in that van, I'll just leave it at that). She eventually dozed off at 12:30am!

At 5:30am on Saturday morning, Daddy woke up to two girls standing an inch from his nose. Calla was asking him "Is it time to go downstairs to the cafe?" Haha! Calla was so excited to go to the cafe! (-: (She meant "continental breakfast.") Somehow she has a vivid memory of the last time we stayed at a hotel and she had a "waffle at the cafe." In fact, in the car on Friday I overheard her telling Kelsey very matter-of-factly, "Kelsey we are not going to the beach today. We are going to a hotel first. And when we wake up we are going to get dressed and then we are going to take the elevator down to the cafe and we can eat a waffle together. Wouldn't that be fun?" Ha!

Hopefully breakfast lived up to her high expectations!

below: the girls at breakfast at the "cafe" on Saturday morning....

Saturday morning we were on the road by 8:20am. By this point, the rest of my family were already on their roadtrips down from Pennsylvania. We all stayed in constant communication via text message, sending each other video clips of "our cars" and weather and traffic reports. (-: It definitely helped the drive go faster!

below: Jay stayed busy keeping up with his emails...

Saturday we were in the car for 7 hours, including one-stop at Chick fil A for lunch (although we just ordered the food and ate in the car so it was a 10-minute stop). However it went really well. We were all in great spirits because we were headed to the beach after all. (-:

The girls and I played pictionary. As you can see, Kelsey drew a fish:

below: And lollipops....

It made it fun that the girls are old enough to play car games...we played the ABC game and worked on Kelsey's colors and played "I'm thinking of a number between..." and the "which would you rather" game ("Would you rather eat a hot dog or a peanut butter and jelly sandwich?"). We read Dr. Seuss books and colored and colored and colored.

Jay was a bit of a handful. He was content in his carseat as long as I had a full-fledge circus going on...I'm talking about peek-a-boo with a beach towel over my head, or "boo!" in his face with his toys, or tickling his toes with my empty coffee cup....it was tiring! (-:

But at last AT LAST we pulled onto Ocean Boulevard. Somehow Kelsey Mae and Jay both fell asleep within a mile of the beach house! ha!

below: aaaand here it is... yay

We got in at 3:15 or so and I think by 3:30 we were on the beach in our swimsuits! Mimi and Pops and Uncle Caleb were already at the house. The rest of the family came pouring in over the next hour or so...Corinne and Daniel, then Katelyn and David and Haley, then Josh and Kelly. Kim and Jon didn't arrive until after dark.

The weather was just beautiful and the ocean seems unseasonably warm. The girls were racing around in the swimsuits and into the water like they haven't seen the ocean before. ha. Well, Kelsey probably doesn't have a recollection of it because she was Jay's age back when we were in Hawaii.

I can't wait to post some beach pictures tomorrow; the girls think it's just wonderful. It's funny how kids run everywhere on the beach; they just can't contain their excitement.

Last night we just ordered pizza for dinner and shortly after we tucked the kids into bed. They were worn out from their two or three hours building sand castles and racing around.

Pictures to follow tomorrow!