Spring Break 2012

We spent the last week in our very favorite vacation spot- Pensacola Beach, Florida! The last few years, travelling the 16 + hours to Pensacola from our home in Iowa with 2 children under the age of 3 has been frustrating to say the least! I don't know if we were better prepared and more relaxed or the kids were just older and better able to entertain themselves, but this year's trip was so different. We left late in the afternoon after getting home from work. Randy had picked the kids up from daycare and kept them awake all afternoon, thinking that no nap would make them tired and likely to sleep for some of the trip. We started out and the kids stayed busy enough playing their video games that I started in on "The Hunger Games". Suprisingly I read until we made our first stop. We made it to our hotel with 2 potty stops and a stop for a quick dinner. The kids were kind of wound up at first, but we eventually settled into bed and got a good 6-7 hours of sleep. I got up first and showered and dressed. Then I dressed both kids and we went down to get breakfast while Randy got ready and repacked our overnight bags into the car. We left from our hotel around 7 am. The kids played and watched movies in the car while I picked up my reading. Except for passing out the occassional snack, they kept themselves entertained for the first few hours. They started to get a little restless, but were satisfied when I started playing car games with them. Aidan fell asleep late in the morning and stayed asleep until about the time we stopped for lunch. The afternoon went pretty much the same, with the kids entertaining themselves for the most part with me putting my book away to play occassional car games with them. We finally pulled into our hotel on Pensacola Beach around 4 in the afternoon. We unloaded the car and dropped everything in our hotel room. We found our swimsuits and rushed down to the pool! The kids swam and played for a few hours. When the sun began to go down, we finally returned to our room to get some dinner. Thankfully there was a Subway across the street, so we picked up sandwiches to eat in our room and then put our stuff away. We finally called it a night around 10pm. The next morning after breakfast we went to town to get groceries for the week. When we returned, the kids put on their suits and ran to the pool!

The next few days we bounced back and forth between the pools and the beach.

We also took walks to the park.

After long days in the sun, we cleaned up and went out to dinner.

Randy had to leave us for two days to go to New York for meetings. We took advantage of that time to do something new: mini golf!

Reese even made a hole-in-one!

The next night, we enjoyed some shopping, exploring the boardwalk, feeding the birds and an ice cream snack. We spent the last few days building sandcastles on the beach and playing in the pools.

Unfortunately, I did not get any family pictures this year, but I did get a few shots with my favorite kids on our last night.

On the ride home, we left our hotel just before 7 am and drove straight home. We stopped occassionally for meals and potty breaks and made it home just after 10 pm. Though we were sad that our vacation was over so quickly, we were very glad to finally be home and back to our own confortable beds!

Family Vacation

I have spent the past week vacationing with my family on sunny Pensacola Beach, Florida.
We spent the mornings playing at an area playground,


digging in the sand,

and running away from crashing waves,

and splashing and bathing in the hotel pools.


After a quick lunch and refreshing nap,

we prepared for dinner and nights spent out on the town.


We got to totally relax and just have fun as a family.

By the end of the week, I was totally refreshed and ready to return home! Though it was nice to not have to cook or clean for almost a week, I really began to miss my home!

The difference a year makes

Last year at this time Randy and I were completely at each others throats after a very long and stressful drive to Pensacola, Florida for our annual family vacation. With a 1 year old and 2 1/2 year old the trip did not go anything as planned. This year, with a 2 year old and 3 1/2 year old it was a completely different story. We planned to leave in the afternoon as soon as we had finished work and packed up the car. Thanks to a lot of preparation work, we had the car packed and left earlier than we had even thought possible. The kids were happily playing with the toys from the activity packs that I had made for them from a variety of Dollar Store and other bargain priced toys that were all new to them.



We had reserved a room about 4 hours away, but after driving for a while, Randy decided it would be better to try to book a room another 2 hours away. I was upset at his choice to drive further when we stopped for dinner and a restroom break and he was stressing about sticking to a time schedule. That was exactly what we were trying to avoid! He apologized for rushing us and things went pretty smoothly from then on. We broke out the DVD player after dark, which entertained the kids up until we arrived at the hotel around 11:30pm.

The kids were pretty wound up and didn't go to sleep until about 1:30, but at least they went to sleep! Last year I walked them around a parking lot for 2 hours in the stroller hoping they would fall asleep, but they never did! When they awoke at 5am the next morning we just got up and got back on the road. Aidan was so tired that he fell asleep around 9am after a nice long stop for breakfast and playing.

Meanwhile, Reese played nicely by herself, allowing me time to actually read the book I had brought along!

We made another pit stop to use the restroom a few hours later. Randy made a phone call, which allowed them several minutes to dig in the dirt and run around freely. When we got back in the car the kids watched movies.

We had some fun when we crossed the border into Florida and rolled down all the windows.

The lack of sleep finally caught up to her and Reese was down for the count!

We stopped for a few groceries and food when we were about 20 minutes from the hotel and beach and had to wake Sleeping Beauty. Fortunately, she woke up refreshed and not crabby at all. The kids were still eating as we pulled up to the hotel an hour later. They handed over the rest of their fries and jumped out of the car, ecstatic to finally be at our hotel. After checking into our room, we quickly changed into our suits and finally hit the pool! A few hours later as we returned to our room, Randy joked with the kids that vacation was over and it was time to get back in the car. Both kids immediately responded, "No way!"