Ahhhhh....the beach

***DISCLAIMER**** When I first tried to post some pictures from this trip, it didn't work. I had to start over and now the alignment is all funky, but it's the best I could do today. :)

During one of the last days of our BIG road trip, I was on the phone with Andrew and he said, "Do you know what I just realized? I don't get a summer vacation!" And it was true. We had Tony and Cindy come to see us, and then the kids and I took off and next month his parents are coming to see us, but he never got to leave. That's not fun! So, we decided we would take one last little summer getaway as a family to the beach.We left on Friday. He took both Friday and Monday off of work. Yippee! It was a blast. We stayed in Wilmington. There are several different beaches right around there. Our favorites are Carolina Beach and Kure Beach, but they are about a 30 minute drive from Wilmington. The closest is called Wrightsville beach and it is only a 10-15 minute drive. So, on Friday we decided to go there. The weather was beautiful and the water was SO warm. It was heavenly! Whitney didn't get a nap, so she was a little on the cranky side, but not bad. She mostly wanted to play in the sand, but she did put her toes in the water a little bit, as long as mom or dad was right there holding her hand. I think she has a healthy fear of the waves.

Me and Whit. She's happy because I'm holding her.
Otherwise, she'd be running for the shore.

The kids always have a blast in the sand. Andrew will dig big holes for them that they can climb into. Whitney likes for us to make castles for her and then she sits on them or kicks them down and she thinks that is just hilarious. Here they are buried together:

They each got buried two or three times over the weekend.
They love it.
Brandon really took to the water this time. He's been a little hesitant in the past, but he just ran for the waves this weekend. He started off body surfing. He figured out how he could ride the waves into the shore. Andrew and I love to boogie board and usually just have to take turns while the other parent watches the kids. But, Brandon learned how to boogie board and we could go out with him this time. So fun! He would get mad if he kept missing the waves or if they weren't big enough. A couple of times he stormed off to the shore saying, "These waves stink!" He also wrecked a couple of times pretty bad and would go take a break in the sand and have a snack, but then he'd always end up back in the water.

Brandon, king of the boogie board

We spent all of Friday afternoon and most of the day Saturday just playing on the beach. It was wonderful and exhausting. The kids would pretty much crash as soon as we got back to the hotel room. The place we stayed was kind of scary. We are cheap. We were students for so long that I could always use the excuse that we were poor, but now I can admit that really, we're just cheap. We got our room with Priceline, which I've used often and am usually very pleased with. This place was kind of a dump. And we got one king bed for all four of us. That was kind of interesting. We brought Whitney's port-a-crib, which she is probably too big for now. And then Brandon slept with us in the king bed. It actually ended up working out fine, but was a little on the crowded side.

We went to church on Sunday. I bet the Wilmington wards love their attendance in the summer. They told me they had about 6 rows of visitors in sacrament meeting. Most of the visitors just stayed for that first hour, but a couple of us stayed for all of the meetings. I was so excited to actually go to class with Andrew and not have any responsibility! It was wonderful.

We packed a picnic lunch and went to a pretty park after church. Then we took a little walk on the beach and took some pictures. They turned out pretty good considering I put the camera on auto-timer and had to run get in position before the time ran out.

All four of us smiling and looking at the camera--not bad!

On Monday we went to the Cape Fear Museum. It is marketed and a science and history museum, so I wasn't sure how much would be geared toward children, but it was great. The kids loved it. Andrew and I had a lot of fun there, too.

After that we started heading home. I was SO grateful to have this weekend with just our little family. I think we needed it. Especially Andrew. Work and church have been so stressful lately. It was wonderful to not have to answer any phone calls or resolve any problems. (At least not anything bigger than where to eat or how to help Whitney stop whining.)