Back to School Beach Getaway

So, what we REALLY wanted to be doing this last week was hanging out with my sister and her family. When they couldn’t make it, we were and still are definitely bummed. Since I had already planned to take the week off work, though, we decided to see if we could swing a last minute beach getaway instead.

James did some research and ended up finding a fantastic deal on a two bedroom condo near Biloxi, MS. The drive is about as far there as it is to Galveston, and we hear that the beaches are much nicer. That proved to be true. We had the BEST time. We left on Sunday morning, and the condo people were only there until 5 on Sundays. It was possible to get into the condo after hours but more trouble, so we decided to head out early – 5am! The kids did great, though, and napped in the car and watched DVDs like champs. We made it by 3 and took a family nap once we got there to fully catch up.

We weren’t sure our girls would LOVE the beach, so we were grateful to have a pool as an option as well. We need not have worried, though. The sand didn’t bother them at all, and they LOVED making sand castles and playing in the water. We spent 3 days and would do 2-4 hours at the beach followed by another hour or so at the pool. They were in heaven. We ended up picking some great restaurant options, too. We started off with seafood at the Half Shell Oyster House. SO yum, and great service. We highly recommend that one if you’re ever in the area. We had some great BBQ at Hog Heaven and some yummy Italian at Salute. We had our last dinner at the buffet at the Grand Casino since they were doing crab legs and James loves crab. Despite a random vomiting incident thanks to Ellie, it was a great meal, too. The kids wanted to know when they could play the games. Um, never. :)

The drive home went just as well. As soon as we pulled into the garage (after having told the girls not to ask if we were there yet a million times), Emma bursts into tears randomly. (It WAS 9pm at this point, and she hadn’t napped much in the car.) I asked her what was wrong and she whined: I just want to go back to the hotel!!!! SO funny…

Here are some of the photos of a trip that we hope might become an annual tradition. It was so nice to have some great family time before we start into our first of many school years!

This is easily my favorite photo from the trip. So precious to me are those three, and there were lots of moments of them playing together just like this one.

Ellie let us bury her in the sand.

Post-burying

Daddy was next!

Momma had a little fun giving him some extra “chest”

Here are the girls tickling Daddy’s feet while he was buried. :)

Enjoying their ring pop dessert after their beach side lunch

  

Evening walk on the beach

 

Proof that I was there, too. :)

And then you have to check out how great this condo was:

Living Room

Balcony view

View of the pool from our balcony

Momma and Baby Jerry enjoyed the jetted garden tub!

Our bedroom with the ocean view. SO fun to wake up to that each morning.

Kitchen – the master is off to the right of this photo, and the girls room is up that hallway. Nice separation which meant that we could watch a movie in the living room (behind the camera) once they went to bed with no problem.

And the girls’ room. The bottom trundle was Emma’s. They loved it and particular enjoyed having their own TV on which to watch cartoons in the mornings. A luxury they WON’T have at home for a long long time yet.

James and I read the book Radical by David Platt on this trip. (If you read it, you might find it ironic that we read it while indulging in a vacation…perhaps it was.) We’re within a few pages of finishing and I think will consider strongly participating in the Radical Experiment which is a year-long challenge to put some steps in place to be more radical about our belief in Christ and living out our lives for him on this earth. The book spurred on some great conversation, and I love that James and I still connect through reading books (one of the things we did while dating). All in all, we’re so grateful to have gotten to have this little getaway. We spent a lot of time talking about how immeasurably blessed we are. It was a great time with our family of 4 before we have a Kindergartner in the house and not long before we become a family of 5!