Tuesday, July 26, 2011

First Beach Trip

My younger three girls all have birthdays within weeks of each other, so my parents gave them a combined birthday weekend at the beach (super generous and a treat for the whole family). I love that kind of present because it doesn't take up any space, but still leaves great memories.


Here's a shot of all the kids on our balcony (it took about 10 tries to get one with everyone looking).

The hotel had a great pool with a water slide, splash park and lazy river.

Rahel wasn't too sure of it at first (she even backed out the first time and had to walk all the way back down).
But once we got her on it, she wanted to go again and again.


All the KIDS had a great time on the slide :-)


I wish I could have had a picture of Rahel's face when she saw the ocean. It was complete awe and joy. She smiled ear to ear and said, "look mom" and pointed to the ocean. She grabbed a boogie board and headed right in. She's done an amazing job learning to swim in less than 2 months. All of the kids except Colton are now swimming fairly well, but I still insist on life jackets in the ocean for everyone. Caleb said, "but mom, that's going to embarrass me." (his cousins were there and he wanted to be cool) I said, "Caleb, I'm not concerned with your coolness factor, I'm concerned with coming home with all 6 children intact." He got it and finally got in WITH his life jacket on--I just have too many kids to watch in open wave filled water--not going to risk it (sort of a phobia of mine--lakes are even worse than oceans--can't see the bottoms--whole thing freaks me out).







Caleb chillin in the sand

Meron completely melted after we came up from the beach and crashed in under 2 minutes (protesting of course and saying that she wasn't tired...) in a lounge chair. She slept by the pool for over an hour-that girl can sleep anywhere (and don't miss that nap time or you'll be sorry b 4:00 :-)

There was also a great indoor playground that just happened to have 5 slides in all of my kids' colors (well, except for a yellow one for Hermela, and Caroline is really pink, but red is her alternate....). Our kids are all assigned a color for their cups, toothbrushes, towels, wash clothes....to keep things straight around here and avoid using 30 cups a day and to keep laundry down a little. They all happened to be wearing their colors as well which made for a fun picture.

We had a blast! Thanks Gee Gee and Paw Paw



3 comments:

  1. Looks like such a fun trip. Love the balcony picture.

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  2. Oh I love those pictures. The beach is just amazing. I can't wait to move back to a beachy area. I miss Hawaii terribly. We're hoping to move to FL next year (we're hoping Brad will get stationed there with the Coast Guard). The kids all look fabulous. I love hearing the great progress of Rahel, and oh so fast. Amazing things God does. Wow!

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  3. You crack me up with the color thing. I'm ALMOST there though. We all have our own cup with our name sharpied onto it.

    I'm with you on the water thing though. Harrison just went to camp where they stayed on a house boat. My prayer life was very strong that week!

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