go to the beach?" Well we tried to go in 2008 and but there was a hurricane and a brother getting married, so we didn't go that year and the year after that we were sick. So this was the year! The kids had a four day weekend and we made plans. We made reservations to camp at Mustang Island on Padre Island, just outside Corpus Chirsti, Texas. We ending up having to shorten our trip by a day, Brent and I bought Texas Rangers playoff tickets and the first game ending up being on Saturday of our four day weekend (but thats another story). So we headed down to Houston first to visit Brent's brother and family. It was a nice half way point from Dallas to Corpus Christi (four hour drive), and they were kind enough to feed us dinner and put up with us for the night. The kids really enjoyed spending time with the cousins and needed that break for the second leg of the trip, another four and a half hours to the beach.
Of course the whole way down there we were constantly asked
"Are we at the beach yet?" "How many more minutes?". The nice thing about having a child who can read it being able to teach her how to read the signs. It helped a little but the mileage number confused her since she thought it meant minutes...ugh.
We finally arrived at the beach and it was beautiful the temps are in the mid 80's and a slight breeze, the water was just about as warm and we had the beach to ourselves! Did I mention the slight breeze? Well if you asked Tyler (age 3) he would have told you it was going to blow him away and he screamed for about the first 30 minutes or so because of the wind, once he got adjusted to it and involved in digging in the sand he was ok...until the jellyfish (more about that later). We were on the beach for about an hour and decided to eat lunch, and get some sunscreen since I forgot to pack and apply some before hitting the beach. And yes we suffered the consequences later.
After lunch we head back to the beach and we start working on
a sand castle. It was awesome to feel like a kid again and have
so much fun, and everyone helped. The boys dug a moat with daddy, Amanda and I collected shells. And if I do say so myself we made one fine sandcastle!
As we finish our sandcastle I spot a jellyfish floating in the water, then I see another one so I show the kids and tell them to stay away because they can sting you. Well, Tyler flips out, every time Amanda or Matthew went into the water he would scream and fuss, "The jellyfish are going to eat you!" it didn't help that he was exhausted. So after I sat with him, he fell asleep, and Brent and I sat and watched the kids play.
After dinner we put up the tent. No biggie right? Well...the mosquitoes were eating us alive, the wind was whipping the tent around, and since we had a long drive home the next day...it was decided we would 'camp' at the local Best Western. And nurse our sunburns with some aloe.
The whole time we were there I saw nothing but smiles and hear a lot of "This is awesome!" from Matthew. So I think we may have to start making this an annual trip, barring any hurricanes!
*Side note always check media compatibly before you leave on a trip. I put in a larger card into my camera so I could take lots of pics but my camera didn't like it so I had to use my cell phone camera instead! Live and learn.
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