A run down of our Vacation!

So, i finally have a minute to sit down and document my trip. Other than adding the pics to my blog...i just haven't found time to do much other than WASH CLOTHES....and MORE CLOTHES...and MORE CLOTHES! UGH! I can't believe how many clothes 5 people can go through in 5 days! I guess if you figure each person uses at least 2 sets of clothes a day...plus pj's and 2 swim suits...that's a LOT of clothes to wash multiplied times FIVE! Anyway, i'm on the last few loads of laundry and i should be done by the end of the day!

Other than knowing i'm coming home to lots of dirty clothes we had a great time on our first vacation!

We started out Monday Morning at 330am..probably before because Sunday night was kinda crazy. I think we went to bed about 830p Sunday night and then at 945p the darn house alarm went off and freaked us out...then we couldn't go back to bed(thanks to crappy comcast the phone lines just went out for no reason). Then at 2a Hannah woke up and came into our room and said something about monsters...after that, Paul & I really didn't go back to bed. We probably should have just got on the road at 2a...but Paul was frightened that the drunks from the night before would still be on the road...and we just thought it'd be safer to wait a little bit longer. At 330a we woke up...got the drinks loaded into our new cool plug in ice chest...had everything all packed up..then went in and got the girls and put them in their car seats and headed out. They stayed awake for a bit but finally went down about 415a and then woke back up around 530a! We had decided we'd stop about 8a to eat breakfast, change the girls and let them run around a bit. I think we finally stopped in LA at McDonalds and let the girls roam for a bit, eat a bit and stretch out some. Then we got back in the car and headed off for another few hours and stopped again about 1030a at a rest stop in Mississippi and let the girls have snacks and run around. Hannah had a blast giving the 18 wheelers driving by the "HONK HONK" sign...they all obliged and the girls all got so excited that they'd all start waving! It was really cute. Then we got back in the car and decided we'd stop for lunch about 1230p we stopped in Alabama at Charleys for lunch. UGH! That was a long lunch...i had to change one diaper after the next...then Hannah had to pee, then go back to take care of some business...and that was the longest stop we had. People probably thought i was a freak taking all these kids back and forth to the restroom! We had lunch and then headed off again. I think we filled up the gas tank right before lunch...so we had enough gas to get us all the way in to FL! So lets see, total stops would be 4 on the way there..OH NO FIVE...Hannah had to pee after lunch so we pulled over in a parking lot down some dead end road and we whipped out the cool new port o potty(which is really cool btw)!! Come to find out as we were driving off...it was a CHURCH PARKING LOT! OMG... After lunch we kept thinking..there has to be a time change along the way...so we needed to get moving. We never did figure out if the time changed or not, someone at the resort explained that the part of FL we traveled to was still on CST. That whole time thing got us all screwed up...and till this day i still don't know if we were in CST or not! :) We finally arrived in to FL around 300p but totally screwed up and took the "scenic" route which was a BAD IDEA! Of course it was Memorial Day weekend so traffic was horrible and the scenic route meant literally 50-100 red lights to stop at along the way! What in the world were we thinking i don't know. Paul, for some reason thought there was a toll bridge we were going to get onto and that never happened! Next time we will take the 20 mile longer, not so scenic route! We'll take that as a lesson learned for our first trip. We probably would have made it there by 330 or 4p if we had just gone around all the scenic stuff! O yeah i can't forget about the 10 movies we watched along the way. We watched every wiggles movie we bought and milo & otis and the jungle book! FUN FUN FUN! I just wonder...what did people do before we had t.v's and videos in the car, when traveling for such long periods of time. I guess we used to play games(slug bug, i spy and anything else we could think of), and hmmm.. O yeah, i remember since there were three of us girls...fighting over who was going to sleep where in my parents clunker. TWO would get the foot board(one on each side all snuggled up) and one lucky girl got the actual seat! I don't recall getting the seat many times...i was somehow always sleeping on the footboard of the car. I also remember before having port o potties...peeing in the car while my dad drove in a puke pan my parents got from the hospital years before..and pulling over to only pour it out the door. That's the bad part of having 3 girls...you can't just pull over and pee by a tree! LOL!

So, we made it there...checked in to the sunspree holiday inn and jumped into our swim suits and ran down to the pool! The girls were ready for the water and sun...and to get out of the darn car seats they had been sitting in for so long.

We made it down to the pool and got to hang out for about an hour..then headed back up to get changed for dinner. We had decided to go downstairs to eat...BAD IDEA! Sarah, my drama queen, was a wreck! She was screaming before we even put her in the high chair. We decided that eating at the restaurant just wasn't going to work. SO, we ordered room service. It was not great food...but very entertaining to feed 3 kidos on the balcony with a itsy bitsy plastic nasty cigarette burned on, who knows what else was on it...end table. I got out the anti bacterial wipes and wiped everything down as well as i could and put a make shift table cloth down and we fed the girls cold french fries, milk & some chicken tenders. After dinner, we sat out on the balcony and watched as the guys below did the little Hawaiian ceremony and then played "I'm proud to be an American"...it was beautiful! Then we watched as they put everything together for the Kiddie movie downstairs on the pool patio. Then we put their pj's on and put the girls to bed. It went fairly smoothly for the first night. We just let them fall asleep on our laps and we put them to bed. Then Paul & I went out on the balcony and had a beer and relaxed and listened to the sound of the beach!

The next morning we still didn't know if we were on eastern time or standard time...but we got up early and headed down for breakfast. The girls were slowly getting used to the place. We ate breakfast and then headed back up to put on our suits and head down to the splash pad. They LOVED the splash pad. LOVED IT! We played down there till 1130a then ate lunch and then went up for a nap. I figured the sooner we took a nap the sooner we could go back down to play in the water. We got back down about 230p and stayed down there till 5p. Then we went to dinner at dicks restaurant. The food was ok although i made our waiter mad b/c the people on the side of us had piled up all their nasty dishes between us and them and i made her pick it up. When i asked her politely to pick it up(b/c first off it was rude for those people to not move it when we sat down & second of all my diaper bag and purse were on the chair right below the nasty food), the waitress said "oh yeah, i saw you had a really nice coach purse...i wouldn't want that to fall on my purse either." Anyway, the food was ok except for the fact that poor Hannah didn't know that there was red syrup in the plastic shark the lady brought with her drink and spilled it all over herself. Anyway, we had dinner and went back to the hotel and did the same drill for the second night.

Then Wednesday got up, went down for breakfast and up to get changed to go to the BEACH! The girls were a little hesitant at first but we took them all out and let them play along the edge. After that, we decided to rent a umbrella & 2 chairs and hang out there all day. We played in the sand for hours! It was soo much fun. Then, one at a time we took them out into the water. Paul took the twins and i took Hannah...she refused to go with him at first(probably b/c she knows he's not as careful and she'd probably end up drinking some salty water...LOL) but he took her out later in the day. Then we did our normal..went to have lunch at the grill and up for a nap. After naps we got on our swim suits and went back down to the splash pad! Then went back up around 5p and went to sharkys for dinner. We had a great time..but this was the day Sarah had another massive break down at dinner. It was so bad i had to walk her around the restaurant and finally she settled down...i honestly think they are teething or something. After that, we went back to the hotel and put the girls down and had a few beers out on the balcony. Although it was all about family, it was nice to have a few quiet minutes alone with my hubby, so we could pretend like we were newlyweds without children! LOL! I know i'm just dreaming...but it was so peaceful out on the balcony for the few minutes we were out there while the kidos were all sleeping!

Let's see...Thursday we went to ZOOWORLD! We didn't get there till late b/c we went to walmart and had some t-shirts made for the girls and Allison. I guess we got there about 11am. which was almost lunch time. We made the whole lap around in less than an hour and a half. The girls had a blast...we saw a ton of animals and the zoo was actually REALLY nice and small...and you could get up close to all the animals. There weren't many people there so we went at our own pace and no one was pushing or shoving and the girls could stay in front of any animal they wanted as long as they wanted. It was totally worth to money. Then we went to McDonalds...had some lunch and went to the hotel for a nap. After our nap we had planned on going to swim and then we were going to order pizza. We went down to play at the splash pad then we decided to have dinner at pineapple willys. That was a GREAT TIME! The place was RIGHT ON THE BEACH...and the girls had fun. Sarah & Sam got to sit in these cool high chairs that looked like rocket ships(totally forgot to take a pic of them in their rocket ships). So we had dinner and then went back to the room for our last night in FL! I was sad, but yet ready to head home and get back into my OWN BED!

The whole time we were in FL, I slept with Hannah and the girls slept in their cribs some...and Sam slept with Paul every once in a while. Paul & i really couldn't sleep in the same bed b/c i was scared Hannah would fall out of the bed if i didn't hold her close to me. Plus Paul & I can hardly fit in a queen bed together...it would have been tight. SO, getting home was nice. We got up, again at 330am and had everything packed the night before...loaded the girls into the car and headed home.

Our journey home wasn't too bad...but it was a bit harder b/c you don't have the adrenaline rushing through your body ready to get to your destination. I was exhausted...and Paul was too. I drank a couple of shots of expresso...had a couple of cokes and it wasn't horrible. BUT i was exhausted...but i REFUSE to sleep when Paul is driving...i just can't do it. So, i stayed awake while Paul drove and then i took a few turns driving some. It wasn't too bad...i did find a buddy speeder that i followed behind for an hour or two(you know if you get clocked the cop always tickets the one in the front of the pack...i didn't know that till i saw some special on 20/20 about it). SO, i stayed behind others that would speed...and followed behind. :) I'm not a big speeder...but i've done my share of 5-10 miles above the speed limit! :) Anyway, we got home Friday around 4pm.

OHH...the girls were soo ready to get home...play with Gracye and Sugar and just see all their old toys. We went straight outside and they busted open the sand and water table and played and played. It was nice to be home...and get to washing the clothes.

Everything at home was fine while we were gone. Ashton, our babysitter, watched the dogs and house. The dogs did good...but Gracye was so excited to see us.

This weekend we didn't do much. I'm still not done washing clothes..although i've been doing clothes for 2 days straight. Everything is unpacked though...and we are all settled back in to our house. We finally went grocery shopping today..and i'm ready for Paul to go back to work! LOL! I thank goodness everyday that he works at the shop...i don't understand how husbands and wife's' can work together...and be together all day everyday! Maybe it's just because i'm so organized and do everything a certain way..and no one else can do it right, PERIOD! Maybe i'm just ready to get back to the grind of everyday life. OR maybe it's a little bit of both! Either way, tomorrow we start back to the grind of everyday life and i'm ready for it. I don't' think we'll ever be a family that can take more than a 4-5 day vacation together. We've always been a 3-4 day vacation family anyway...so we kinda pushed it with 5 days..but with 24 hours of driving, we really needed that extra day for the girls.

All right well that's all for now. I hope to get back to normal blogging and back to reading all my friends blogs asap. Gosh i missed blogging...but Paul took his computer and it's not like mine, kinda slow...keys are different and i just like my laptop better than his...so i wasn't very motivated to do much blogging.

Hope everyone had a great week.

O yeah, one more funny for the day:
So we were on the beach/out in the sun for 3 days straight...3-4 hours a day. I only ONCE used sunscreen on myself. Didn't get burned...maybe a slight tan but nothing bad. Well, this Saturday after lunch we took the girls outside and let them play in the pool. I thought, what the heck, i'll put on a swim suit and lay out for an hour or two. YEAH, BAD BAD BAD IDEA! I am as red as a lobster. How can that possibly be? I didn't wear any sunscreen for 3 days and didn't get burned...and NOW i lay out for 2 hours and get toasty! What in the world did i do different. Anyway, i'm miserable...last night was HORRIBLE. You know the freezing...but your body is burning up hot. UGH! I just thought it was funny how i didn't get burnt for 3 days on the beach and i come home and toast in the sun...i won't do that again..i've learned my lesson this time!

I know i didn't write much about the actual resort...but it was really nice. The service wasn't great...but the resort was awesome. We met soo many people from all over. Hannah met soo many new friends. We met people from Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Georgia, Kentucky, and some really friendly people from Huntsville TX which isn't too far away. They are both max security prison guards...and me and the lady really hit it off. I didn't even get her name...but she was so sweet and she had some great stories to tell me about the prisoners in her prison. Very interesting stuff! Everyone was so friendly...besides the people that work/live in FL! Not sure what's going on with that...but everyone that worked there seemed not very friendly. Weird...but true.

All right i really need to hit the sack...Have a great week!