Beach Vacay 2014

It's been a while since I sat down and did a post.  If you hadn't noticed, I took kind of an unintentional break for the summer.  Most of you that read this know why, but I will get to more of that later this week.  For now, I want to get caught up because I haven't done the best job of documenting this summer. 

First up- Our Florida Beach Vacation- Only 8 weeks in the making!!!

As we did last summer, we went to Seaside/Watercolor Florida with my parents. 
Here are last year's posts of our trip-- here and here.

The major difference this year was we made it a road trip instead of flying. 

I was incredibly nervous about taking a road trip with a two year old but with a bag of tricks we survived it.  Honestly, J was great!!!  I don't know why I was so worried.   I will say that I think anybody can make a road trip with a toddler if you have a DVD player and a favorite movie or in our case a DVD of Mickey Mouse.  I was reluctant to plug it in too soon on the trip because I didn't want him watching it the whole time.  So about two hours in we turned Mickey on and like I thought it played the rest of the day and the majority of the next.  But who's counting...

We left on Saturday morning and stopped for the night in Slidell, LA.  Then, we picked it up again on Sunday morning and drove for about 5 more hours to arrive at the condo around 2 pm.  I definitely think breaking it into chunks was a good idea!!!

Last year, I took the trip day by day but this year I am just going to show you some of the highlights.  Let's be honest our days looked very much the same.  We got up every morning ate breakfast, were at the beach between 10 and 11.  Sometimes we ate on the beach, sometimes we left and came back to the condo and ate lunch.  Then, we had nap time or sometimes pool time then nap time.  Then, dinner out.  Then, home to bed. 
I have grown to love the beach, but I will never be an all day at the beach girl.  Have you seen my lily white skin?  And luckily, my parents and Aaron are totally fine with us going to beach for 2 or 3 hours a day and then calling it a day.  I don't and probably never will understand people that spend 6 and 7 hours at the beach.  No wonder people end up lobsters by the end of the day!!!

 

One of the mornings we got up and after breakfast took J to an art class across the street from the condo.  This adorable children's boutique has daily activities for children of all ages.  My mom found out about a toddler art class, so we took J.  J wasn't all that interested in the project, but my mom and I taking turns we got him to stick with it long enough to see his sea turtle complete.

Another morning we headed to the pool before lunch at Pickles for hamburgers.  Then, we went to the beach for a few hours in the afternoon before naptime.  J LOVES the water!!!  As you can see GPa and Daddy enjoyed a game of water Frisbee!!!!

 

J LOVED playing the sand almost as much as playing in the waves and water.  Daddy introduced J to the wonderful world of drip castles.  I was also thankful that I picked up this amazing bucket of sand toys at Costco back in May. 

AND TONS of beach pics----

 

 

 

 

I know he's mine, but have you ever seen a 2 year old rock a pair of sunglasses better than this kid!!!

^^^^^^^^^^^  I LOVE his beachy hair coming over the sunglasses ^^^^^

          We had our own private DJ on the trip, too!!!  J was rocking the songs!!!

 

 Headed home after a morning at the beach.   All my favorite people in the world in one picture!!! My dad's in there, too.  He was rocking the flip flops or like he calls them "thongs" to the beach each day.  He HATES them!!!  He had blisters between his toes, so he was always about 20 steps behind us!!! LOL

 

We were on the third floor of the condo like last year.  And J LOVED pushing the button of the elevator!!!  He ran and squealed each time!!!  Oh to be two and find joy in the little things!!!

 

 

One night we walked into Seaside and ate at The Southern.  Aaron and my mom raved about the shrimp and grits they got when we went there last year.  So this year all of us ordered shrimp and grits.  Oh my!!!  Now, I understand why they wanted to go back so much.  Probably the best meal on the trip!!!  Delish!!!

 

 

After, we strolled around the area behind our condo.  Watercolor is absolutely beautiful and peaceful!!!  Just look at the pics!!!

 

 

 And because I am going to make this the longest post EVER.

Here are some more---

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When we weren't at the beach, we did some of this, too!

 

And our last night at the beach!!!  And the only picture with all of us in it!!!

 

 

 

If you made it this far, you must really love us!!! Because this is one long post!!!

 

 

 

A big thanks to my fabulous parents who offer and want us to join them on their beach vacation!!!  Trust me we get the better end of the deal!!!

 

And because we were having such a good time, we extended our trip by a day.  Instead of leaving on Friday and breaking the trip into two chunks like on the way down, we left on Saturday with my parents and drove the entire 12 hours in ONE day!!!  All I can say is J was a trooper and Mickey Mouse was a life saver!!!

 

 

Until hopefully... next year!!! Good bye Florida beach!!!

 

 

 

 

 

Boy Mom Post-- FINALLY!!!

This has been a long time coming, but I am finally posting the Boy Mom Series on the blog.  It's been over a month, I know.  But I still want to have it on here for my own personal memories.

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Hey Ya’ll!!! I am Hayley, and I blog over at Memories of May. I started my blog a little over a year ago because I wanted to document all the precious memories of my little man, Jackson!!! If you stop by my blog for long, you will see that my content revolves around lots and lots of pictures of him.

I am super excited that Elizabeth asked little old me to write a guest post in this fabulous series. If you had asked me five years ago what kind of mom I would be, I would have said a mom to girls. After hanging out for a few minutes, you would quickly learn that I am a girly girl. I could care less about sports or being outside because I would much prefer shopping and baking!!! Well, let’s just say—God had other plans for me when he made me Jackson’s mommy!!! He knew I would LOVE being a mommy to a sweet little boy. He also knew it would be good for me to break outside my girly girl ways and get outside a little more. And outside I have gone!!!

J loves being outside!!! It doesn’t matter if it is freezing cold or blazing hot. He wants to be outside. Some of his favorite things are… playing in the water, blowing bubbles, drawing with sidewalk chalk, playing with cars, watering the flowers, swinging at the park…and the list goes on…

He also LOVES him some Mickey Mouse!!!  He keeps his crib crammed with a variety of stuffed friends but by far Mickey is his fav!!!

 

 

And like any true Texan, he loves his Tex Mex in the form of rice and beans, burritos, and chips and salsa!!!

 

 

Plus, the planner in me still gets to plan some pretty fun parties.  Now, my mind works on themes involving monkeys and cars.  Like for J’s 2^nd birthday, I chose to plan around his obsession with cars.  Let me tell you--- J LOVED it!!!!

 

 

I have learned a lot over the last 2 years being J’s mommy.  I have learned that letting the wind blow through my hair can be a lot of fun.  I have learned that precocious little boys can be a little crazy but deep down they are really super sweet.   But by far my favorite thing is that little boys really do love their mommies!!!  Because for now, mine is a major mama’s boy and that is totally fine by me!!!

 

 

 

Thank you, Elizabeth, for allowing me to share about my favorite thing in the world- my boy! 

 

 

 

If you would like to follow along in our everyday adventures, you can find us over at Memories of May.

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 That's my post!!! And I still LOVE it!!!