Beach 2013

We went to the beach with my whole family last week, and had a BLAST!  I have to admit, I was a little anxious (and not very excited) about spending one of my two weeks off work (for the whole year!) with a house full of people and kids... I love my family, don't get me wrong, but 14 people (4 of those are small boys) in one 5 bedroom, 3 bathroom house for a whole week didn't sound like my idea of "vacation".  Well, needless to say, God convicted me of my negative attitude the day before we left and made me realize how blessed I am.  I have a job that allows me to take a paid vacation.  I have two beautiful children who were SUPER excited about the beach and love spending time with their cousins and grandparents.  My parents are healthy and happy and thriving.  My family likes to collapse on the beach and seriously REST on vacation.  I have a car to get me to the beach.  I could go on and on.  But I was truly guilty for the negative feelings I had, and I had to repent... and it was honestly a GREAT vacation.  My kids loved every minute.  Liam napped on the beach in the mornings, John and I took the boys in for lunch around 1 or 130 and by 2, both babies were down for naps (with no complaining or whining!) and I got to go back out to the ocean while John (willingly!) stayed in to oversee naptime.  We stayed in most evenings, cooked dinner at the beach house, and walked most evenings.  It was truly very relaxing, and I hated leaving my boys Monday morning to go back to work because I had enjoyed my time off so much with them!  The only negative part of the whole trip (if I have to pinpoint something!) was the traveling.  Neither of my boys napped well in the car and probably napped less than an hour for the total 5 hour drive (same for the ride home)  JP was fine as long as he was occupied with an iPhone, iPad (what did we do before these gadgets?) or other toy... but Liam pretty much could ride about an hour happily, then he would fuss until we got him out for a few minutes... So we made several stops.  But, overall, it was wonderful.