lots of sun and very little sand

this past week, we headed down to the beach with the henson side of the family. we left out of here around 8 that morning, and let's just say that mapquest needs to have on their website, "estimated time" and "estimated time when you have to stop for a 2 year old to pee every hour." there is seriously nothing at all between here and moblie, so we stopped on gravel roads and even were practically in some lady's driveway at one point. of course, she had to walk out to check her mail just as soon as he had to go. she didn't feel the need to return the friendly wave that i gave her! at around 130, we finally arrived in mobile and ate a late lunch at felix's (thanks, heather). the little people slept in the car after lunch, so the last little bit was free of pit stops!

once we got there, we all had a lot of fun. see...here's the three moms looking totally sane after a long trip to the beach.

so yeah, even though there were 5 kids under the age of 2, we were all relatively calm and collected at the end of the week! don't get me wrong....there were meltdowns. i think we'd all agree that the best was when sara beth went into hysterics because zeb foolishly cut up her grapes! i mean, come on....who wants to eat cut up grapes? so the rest of the trip, whenever we saw someone that was upset, you'd hear one of us say, "somebody must have cut his grapes up." or, "who cut your grapes up?" this will no doubt be a classic line in this family for years to come!

we stayed at the caribe which was actually across the street from the beach. it had a ton of pools with water slides, waterfalls, fountains, and a lazy river. it was quite a hike to get to the sand and water, and with all of those cool water features, the beach was kind of non-factor anyway. (that's not totally a bad thing when you are with people who like to eat sand and/or are able to smuggle 4 pounds of sand into my vehicle when they've only been in it for 5 minutes.) anyway, we did make it over there once, so we could at least say that we went to the beach!

daddy and wes making their way to the water

not too close

sweet wes trying to build his own sand castle

every morning after breakfast, we got all of our stuff together and went downstairs to play until lunch time. we could have made it out to the pool even earlier, but every single morning i had to hold one of william's hands while we ran around in a circle with him screaming bloody murder as i tried to spray sunscreen on him. we go to the pool every single day...you'd think he'd be used to this by now. eventually we made it down there every morning.

chillin' on the lazy river

diving in

wes got in on the action, too

taking a quick break for a pic

wes didn't even need the pool to have fun

william and sara beth waiting for a turn on the lazy river

after all the little people woke up from their naps in the afternoon, we got all cleaned up and went out to eat. you never knew who you would end up beside in the bathtub, but nobody seemed to mind!

william, wes and sara beth

william and ariana

we ate some really good seafood thanks to some good recommendations. after the crab races, feeding the fish and looking at the boats in the marina, waiting on the food at calypso's didn't take long at all!

sara beth, william and ariana didn't mind busting a move to some jimmy buffet at cosmo's. wes was out there, too, but he didn't make the picture for some reason!

we tried to get a picture while we were there of the grandparents with all the kids. this is the best i did. we are adding another grandkid in september. again, i say.....good luck with that christmas card picture.

when the "go home" day arrived, we packed up our car and left at 9am. we had thought about going to the pool one last time or maybe even hitting the outlet mall, but you never know what will happen when you have little people in the car. so we erred on the cautious side to give ourselves plenty of time. we made it to mobile fine and stopped at chick-fil-a for a snack. the next leg of the journey only took us the better part of forever. we stopped 3 times for william to tee-tee, once for us (and for real....where the heck are the gas stations between here and the beach? do i need to pack a travel potty for myself? or maybe i just need to pack an extra cup for me!), once for gas, once to change wes' diaper, and once for william to get dirty. yes....he started screaming at me to pull over because he needed to get dirty. we were just outside of macon, and there was nothing around except 500 trees and some power lines!! i told him to hold it, and he began begging for a cup.....yeah, that would have been interesting! so we finally drove up on a ratty best western. i made chase take him in to use the bathroom in the lobby, and i locked my doors and circled the parking lot until they made it back. the rest of the way, william whined about whether or not his feet could touch the dvd player, and wes was furious about something. if the kid would say something besides "dada" and "thank you," we'd be better able to understand what he wants. he obviously did not want cheese crackers or goldfish, and they ended up crushed on the floorboard of my car with that 4 pounds of sand! about 10 miles outside of town, william announced that he needed me to pull over yet again. i think the boy has a bladder the size of an english pea. after that last pit stop, we finally made it home around 445pm. you better believe i had ambien circulating in my blood at around 9 that night!!

we definitely can't wait to go back to the beach with the fam, but if anybody has a plane and would like to fly us to the beach next year...i will be your best friend ever!! any takers?