Beach Day-- It Finally Started to Be Relaxing

Tonight, Ben and I put everyone to bed as early as we possibly could and luxuriated in the normalcy of having cocktails and nachos and watching Big Brother.  After, that is, we finished driving home, cleaning and vacuuming the car, unpacking, grocery shopping, and doing laundry.  Oh, the laundry.  We will be doing it for DAYS.

I think the sign of a good vacation is not being able to blog because I am too busy having so much fun, and the past 15 days have pretty much proved that.  It was so awesome to be gone for so long-- so relaxing and it took all the pressure off the trip.  Having a crabby day?  No problem, there are still a DOZEN more.

As usual, I have WAY TOO MANY pictures, so I am going to split the trip up a little and string it out because all I have to talk about is how unprepared I am for back-to-school, and that's not  a fun subject.

I believe we left off with me complaining that it is hard to watch 4 kids on the beach.  Well.  You guys.  IT TOTALLY IS.  So let me continue in that vein and let me also tell you that the hotel pool was kind of yucky because of all the sloppy drunks in it and we have a way nicer pool at home, but the baby only wanted to swim in the hotel pool, despite the gorgeous ocean.  Sigh.  SO I spent a lot of time swimming in drunk people's urine.

The first 3 days of our trip before my brother came to stay with us were pretty much exactly the same.

Dorothy and I slept in a bed, and Cooper slept on the pull-out couch in our room.  Jack and Ben and Harry took the other bedroom and were similarly arranged with Ben and Jack in the bed and Harry on the pull-out.

As soon as Dorothy opened her pretty little eyes at the crack of 6, we flung open our curtains because WHY WOULDN'T WE?  LOOK AT THIS VIEW!

 Then we would send Ben a text to say we were awake since the bedrooms were separated by the rest of the suite.  When he and the boys woke up, we'd go down to breakfast and let the kids destroy the buffet.  Ben and the kids would head upstairs to get dressed for the beach and do a little online teaching, and I would spend a glorious hour walking on the beach.

After my walk, we all went to the beach/pool together for pretty much the rest of the day, eating lunch at the pool bar where the kids' meals come in buckets and the spinach salad is excellent.

The second day of the trip, we were still oblivious to the cabana that the hotel gifted us for our anniversary, so we saved the little deck outside our window.  We also discovered the entire menu of cocktails under 150-calories.  Spoiler alert:  they are all liquor, no mixer. So, we lifted our self-imposed day-drinking ban.

 Yay!

 Drinks by the ocean=MY FAVORITE.

 The kids liked it, too.

 Lunch view.

 Walking to the inside pool (I wanted to swim in some other people's pee for a change), I noticed our name on the back of a pool cabana, and then Ben remembered that the concierge was really insistent that he had a gift for us, but we never followed up on that.  Oops.  No worries, we enjoyed it Tuesday-Monday.  I even did a little grading while Harry and Jack danced to the pool band and swam in the deep pool.  And also, if we stay at this place again, I will always rent a cabana.  So nice to not worry about saving chairs and they come with a giant fruit and yogurt bowl everyday which was perfect for the kids.  And someday?  I will be able to beach myself there all day while my kids swim without assistance.  So much to look forward to.

 Pretty much everyday, we stayed outside until 4-ish and then got cleaned up for dinner.  The kids typically napped on our drive across the island.

 Rocking in the big rockers in Harbour Town.

 So easy to eat crab soup with a couple of kids on your lap, let me tell you.

 Crab legs!

 Ice cream!  Dorothy now only eats pink ice cream, BTW.

 Cooper got a back pack of trucks at the toy store that really tied his look together.

I am going to Trip Advisor review all 5 hotels that we stayed at before I go to bed, so I'll tell you all about our completely fantastic (oh man, now I spoiled it) 10-year anniversary tomorrow.  I know-- you will be constantly refreshing your screens until then.

Oh!  I TOTALLY FORGOT TO MENTION POOR BEN.  He got food poisoning from the Disney Junior Hollywood and Vine lunch at Disney and then developed a horrible cough and fever.  He really manned up and did his best to enjoy the trip.  He went to urgent care on the island and got some antibiotics and by the end of the trip, he was back to normal, thank goodness!  Poor guy, can you think of anything less fun to do with a fever than ride roller coasters in the rain?