A couple of years ago, Jarrod's parents and his sister came to visit us for a little stay-cation in Little Rock. We had been trying to get pregnant for almost two years at that point, and I had literally just found out the week before their visit that I was indeed expecting. We decided to wait to tell them until we saw them in person. It was hilarious trying to get 3 1/2 year old Collin to keep a secret! He almost spilled the beans a couple of times! During that visit we started planning our next family vacation. I LOVE the beach...except now I realize I love the idea of the beach...or maybe it's more that I LOVE the beach sans children. I think it's the latter! We decided that Florida would be fun. I have never been to Destin, and it sounded good so we settled on Destin. We said, "Oh, it will be fine with a baby in tow...we can do this. We'll have lots of adults to help!" Blah, blah, blah - as Collin likes to say these days. So fast forward two years and TWO babies later and beach vacations are drastically different than imagined! We were originally supposed to fly, but that turned into driving when Jarrod and I began to imagine ourselves locked inside an airplane with three small children. Not to mention all the stuff we have to travel with these days! We left on a Wednesday evening when I got off work, picked up the kids from daycare and headed to Tupelo, MS. We stopped on the way for dinner and made it to our hotel around 9:45 pm. Everyone was asleep a little after 10:00 pm. We got up the next morning and had breakfast at the hotel. (Where some older gentleman came over and let us know what a good laugh our family had provided him with for the day - his words were, "There IS light at the end of the tunnel, but it's a damn long tunnel!!!!" He told us we were doing a great job, but it was one of those moments where the encouragement was overcome by the evil laugh he let out as he walked away!)
We got on the road around 10:00 am and hoped the babes would nap soon since their usual nap time is around 11:00 am. Yeah. Right. Atalie sleeps in the car and is just the best little trip-taker. She plays, reads books, and talks to her self. Grady screams in hopes that passersby will rescue him from his car-seat, and he refuses to sleep for longer than 20 minutes. The first part of the trip was fine. We enjoyed seeing Mississippi and Alabama. We found that Alabama has seen the light and there are Whataburgers there! We had lunch. The nice woman who took our order at Whataburger gave Collin a free chocolate milkshake and the twins apple slices. If you know us, you know we ration Collin's sugar intake because it's like catnip for the kid. He can get a contact high just from holding a cookie. So I had to smile at her and nod when she asked if he could have the milkshake. She tried to be discreet, but he's 5 - he can smell chocolate milkshakes from a mile away! So we let him have a few slurps of it, and then we hit the road again. We were feeling great! Super excited. Everyone was doing well, and we had that cheery We're headed to the beach attitude that you start a vacation with. We made another quick stop at Peach Park on the recommendation of a friend. It was a must-see for us. We call Atalie "Peach" because she has no hair, and we like all things peach. As evidenced by the fact that we ate peach cobbler, bought peach fried pies and peach butter!
Our little Peach
There was a little park, so the kids got to run around a bit. And then we got hot and sweaty, Collin stepped in mud, and we realized after we got back in the car that we still had over 3 hours left to go on our trip. AND THEN we got stuck in construction for an hour! One hour. With screaming, hot, tired kids who were ready to SEE the beach. That last three hours were rough. But we did indeed make it to Destin at a reasonable hour. We loved the house we were sharing with Jarrod's family, and of course, the beach was beautiful.
VRBO for the win
We did the beach, we did a pool party at our house one day after we all got burned at the beach, we did yummy seafood, we did the Boardwalk, we did lots of walks around the neighborhood where our house was, and we did the beach some more. I determined I could never live in Florida because of the LIZARDS THAT ARE EVERYWHERE and the giant cockroaches. Call them Water Bugs if you want but they are cockroaches, and they are the size of a small bird.
The house had an amazing deck that looked out over this canal. We could see all sorts of amazing houses and boats around us.
Ms. Florida
Silly boy!
Riding around in style!
Collin would not take those goggles off! He had sunglasses, but he was so concerned he would get water in his eyes. I tried telling him he had to actually get in the water for that to happen!!!
My men :)
He kept yelling, "This is the BEST DAY EVER!!!!"
I was so pleased to see how much Grady and Atalie loved the beach. They enjoyed playing in the sand and were fearless - crawling all over the place. Grady even lowered his own little self down into a hole Collin had dug out to play down inside of, and Atalie splashed in a bucket of water for over an hour one afternoon. They loved going into the ocean with an adult holding them, and they had tons to watch as far as birds and airplanes/helicopters and boats.
Beach Patrol is a tough job and requires ALL the shovels ;)
"Mommy! It's a Bomb Pop 'cause we're the Baums!" I asked Collin near the end of our trip what his favorite part had been, and he said, "Getting to eat a Popsicle like every day!" We had a whole box, and they needed to be eaten so we I let him go a little crazy for a few days!
Collin made searching for seashells his mission on this trip. His Papa pulled this cool shell from the ocean one day only to realize there was a hermit crab living inside of it. We kept the little guy in a bucket for half a day and then Jarrod let him loose in the canal behind the house. Collin was attached to the thing, but he refused to hold it!
Sissy thought the whole thing was hilarious. Collin kept jumping and squealing when we were trying to get a picture of him and the crab in the same frame! This was Collin's I will not touch that thing, stop trying to make me or I will throw a fit face:
Hair in my face and babes who won't look at the camera! Baum Family Vacation 2016
This is our #reallife vacation picture!
So when we went to dinner down by the boardwalk, there was live music. Grady literally cannot control his little self when there is music playing. His body has to move! He and Atalie were a big hit whenever we came near musicians who were playing. I got a couple of videos of them dancing, but I missed a lot of the cute stuff. Like the first musician who asked for Grady's name from the stage and then told him hello and proclaimed that Grady is going to be a "honkytonk man"! He even indulged Grady a little and played the Mickey Mouse song!
We went to a park one day to let the kids play and so Jarrod's sister and her boyfriend, Joe, could play some tennis. The kids loved getting to run around free for a bit.
What do you mean I can't get down by myself?!
Joe had to climb this tree apparently, and then Grady needed to be in it.
This was in Wal-Mart. For serious. I cracked up when Jarrod told me about it, but then he took me to see it and I was amazed. Our kids totally got airbrushed t-shirts as their souvenirs from Destin!
It was impossible to fit it all in one picture! This was only one wall, it continued onto the wall to my right.
Back at the boardwalk another night. We let Collin mine for some gemstones, and he LOVED it. His PawPaw has a thing for rocks, and I think Collin got the same bug.
Grady and his buddy, Joe, going for a walk around the Boardwalk.
And then after dinner it was time for more dancing on the boardwalk. Again, I missed some cute moments. One mom was trying to get her daughter to dance with Grady.
The 3 Musketeers Kristen, aka Aunt Kiki, Collin and the newbie, Joe, who fit right in with the rest of us!
A cookie as big as your face right before bed? .... Yes, please!!!
Saying goodbye to Kristen and Joe before they flew back to Baltimore
Not a great picture, but Atalie had to be in it :)
The twins weren't feeling well for most of the trip, but on our last day at the beach it was overcast and cooler than the rest of the trip. This girl just wanted to snuggle!
Which means Daddy got lots of Grady time on this day. They had a blast walking the beach and looking at all the birds, airplanes, and fish.
How did he get to be this big?! Seriously? He had such a blast searching for sea shells. I was so proud of how self sufficient he was and how imaginative he was on this trip! He is the most fun boy.
The Baum Squad
Sissy getting kisses from her Papa. He is a guy's guy, but he loves this little girl!!
Nonne and Collin. Nonne did lots of work on this trip, and it was so much fun!
When it was time to leave, Collin walked through the house and said goodbye to everything imaginable. Goodbye my room, goodbye bathroom, goodbye pool, goodbye pictures on the wall. I told Jarrod I think Collin inherited that part of me that gets really sad when things are over. He nodded in agreement, but it was the, "You're right, he got the crazy gene" nod.
We drove over 6 hours back to Tupelo, MS and stayed the night again before making our final trek (just under 3 1/2 hours) back home the next day. It was a long trip with lots of screaming children and an occasional screaming mommy. We were ecstatic to get home, only to turn around a couple hours later and head to the pediatrician's office so we could get the twins checked out. They are both on antibiotics and inhalers and doing better.
We loved the beach! We will definitely do it again, just years from now when we've recovered from this go 'round!
