Toes in the water, ass in the sand, not a worry in the world, cold colada in my hand... life is good today!!

So here we are Monday, August 6, 2007. Back from a long 8 day beach vacation...ahhhhh... boy do I wish I were still at the beach! :)

The vacation was wonderful! There was a total of 15 of us staying at the Beach House on Pensacola Beach, Florida. 8 adults, 7 kids. (adults = Mom, Dad; Nina, Keith; Eric, Mindy, Marcus, me; kids = Coy, Colton, Jonathan, Christian, Anna, Jessica & Hannah). We were a crew. Pray for those restaurants that serviced us, they were wonderful, patient, & might deserve a medal. Though I must say we have the most well-behaved bunch of kids I have ever been around. As for the adults, one might question our behavior at times :)

We arrived tired, but ready for a week of sand & surf! The first day was eclipsed by travel, settling in, stories, & laughter. Sunday we hit the beach! A beautiful sunny day welcomed us onto white sand and into turquoise waters! The Emerald coastline is so beautiful! Waves softly lapped at the edges & as High Tide came in the more white crests meant even more fun on our boogie boards & skim boards! Our area of the beach that we claimed for 8 days looked like a mini-amusement park. Rainbow umbrellas, a scattering of chairs, beach mats, radios, boards, sand toys, & coolers created an oasis fit for a princess! (or in our case a whole Royal Court!) We all wound down back a the house after a long day of beach tidings to enjoy Hamburgers & Hotdogs on the grill!

Monday found us with a wonderful breakfast of pancakes, sausage & bacon! MMMMM!!! No day begins poorly if you have had Mom's pancakes, YUM! Considering my silliness of rubbing sand all over my right leg on Sunday, it appeared that I had some sort of "rug/sand" burn on that leg. Let me tell you that the sun may burn sometimes, but nothing has ever hurt as bad as a full leg carpet style burn like I had on my right one, YIKES!!! Mom, Nina & myself packed up & decided to head to Foley to hit the outlets (okay, Dad, Eric, Mindy had to return to Camden for various reason just for Monday & returning on Tuesday evening. Considering Mindy had already had her big shopping trip with her sisters, she said she might not want to be tempted and go again, so we chose Monday to go). We left the kids with Marcus & Keith for the day. Our trek to Foley should have taken about 50 minutes, well, lets just say we missed one turn on 98. We end up on 292 and enter Perdido Key, Fl, then Orange Beach, Alabama, then Gulf SHores, THEN Foley. Took about 2 hours, but we did take the scenic route. We saw 3 beautiful beaches. Needless to say, we bought a good bit, the drive home only took the 50 minutes, and we stopped at Landry's in Pensacola on the beach for some GOOD seafood & creme brulee! The kids were good, they had about 2 hours of serious whining with Keith & Marcus, but all in all it was good. We walked in the house around 11 p.m. to find Keith stirring a bit, the kids fast asleep & Marcus right in the middle sleeping like a baby! :o)

Tuesday was a blur. Due to my leg still giving me some issues Marcus & I decided to let everyone else go to the beach & we would run some errands & explore a little. He happened to have busted his cell phone while keeping the kids so we sought out a cingular location. Turns out the guy there was awesome, gave him a discount & boom Marcus got a new really cool phone. We then hit Wal-Mart for some groceries so we could cook that evening for everyone returning. Grilled CHicken & Fried Chicken Tenders was the menu. Boy was everything good!!! Our travelers arrived pretty late so they missed out on some of the entertainment (kids) & the food (we did save a lot because we cooked enough for an army) but everyone returned safely!

Wednesday met us with another trip to the beach & Marcus & I getting ready for concerts!!! Colbie Callait, Lifehouse & Goo Goo Dolls! IT WAS AWESOME!! They all 3 put on a great show. Colbie even signed autographs between the other two performers, it was awesome!! We also went to Peg Leg Petes for dinner before hand & had a great seafood meal!Thursday was a beach day again. Imagine that! Again it seemed we staked out our little oasis, bringing food to eat. The waves were incredible!! High Tide came in early & the waves were impressive enough that surfers were out all over the place! We all had to kind of man each kid so that no one got swept away. The boogie boards were awesome to have. I got air a couple of times due to the waves, pretty impressive I must say so myself ;0). Our bodies were give out that evening!! Mom & Dad decided they needed a date night so they headed off on their own. The 13 of us remaining went to Peg Leg Pete's for some good dinner & laughter. A nice beach storm came through & drowned out our idea for putt putt, but we went back to the house to just chill out & relax a little. The rain sounded great & the lightning show was sensational!

Friday our last full day = putt putt, go carts, pool, whatever! Mom & Dad went souvenir shopping & we took the kids to putt putt & the arcade. After successfully winning over 200 tickets on SkeeBall I got the kids some arcade prizes. Then we all walked over to Sidelines grill for lunch. I tell you the food was great everyday! We ate all the time it seems like! Some of the kids went to the go cart track while Nina, Marcus, Christian, & I headed back to the pool. Marcus took a nap, I swam for a good 2 hours just relishing the relaxation & quiet time. The evening event plan was Crabs with the whole family on the beach. late dinner was good, but we really prefer Peg LEg Pete's over any other seafood restaurant down there!!

Saturday was crazy. Packing, loading, last minute shopping & the drive to the big City of Camden!!! As you can tell from the next pics, Peanut was tired from the vacation and ready to relax on the drive home. Overall the vacay was a lot of fun. I would have been more story like, but for this one I felt day to day & pictures were the best route! I will post even more once I get some from Mom & Nina's cameras! Love y'all!