the heinricy family: Our Family Vacation

Oh the anticipation for our first family vacation had been wearing on me for about two months. I was so excited to go to the beach with our family and could not wait anymore. Tuesday finally arrived and we packed everything up, and I mean EVERYTHING, and headed to Avila beach for our vacation. We were set. We had food, clothes, cameras, beach gear, baby gear (bottle brush included), shoes, books, and portable dvd players for the car! It went surprisingly well aside from the fact that on Thursday morning Kaden woke up with a fever and puked and then on Friday morning Keira woke up with a fever and puked. Oh. . .well. . . and there was also Cooper waking up two times each night, needing a bottle each time. And let me see. . . then there was Kaden going to urgent care with Daddy in San Luis. My picture of our vacation definitely did not include sick kids! It was the worst vacation.

BUT. . . it was also the best vacation! We had so much fun being together. It was the first time we had taken the kids to the beach at an age they could enjoy it. And they loved it! I don't know how to describe the feeling, but it was so neat, for lack of a better word, to see Kaden and Keira experience something new with such joy and excitement. They both loved it and were able to play and play and play! Keira spent most of her time digging in the sand and filling up buckets while Kaden loved digging in the sand too but loved more to play in the little wading pools left behind from the tides. He would lay in it, jump in it, crawl like a tiger in it and run through.

I think I might have loved the beach more than the kids. I seriously think my body has not seen the sun in over four years because of being pregnant and because Matt is not a big fan of the beach. I have always considered myself to be beach girl and the idea of being out there all day is life giving to me but it kills Matt. I could lay there all day and he can tolerate it for 30 minutes. But this time it was different for Matt since we were with the kids and it gave him something to do. We took turns playing with the kids while the other stayed close to Cooper while he hung out in his little beach tent. Matt and I were so happy to just play with the kids and watch them have fun. Kaden and Keira are still talking about our trip and can't wait to go back. I can't either. It was a real bummer that the kids got sick. It broke my heart to see them so miserable when I knew how much fun they would have if we were down at the beach or at the park playing. But such is life, and it's just a great picture of what life is like for us right now. Just embracing it.

AT THE BEACH