Last Day

One thing my kids (read: mostly my husband) looks forward to is the crab legs that his mom cooks him. We decided to do it on our last night here.

 I don't DO seafood. Anyone who knows me knows that.

But this year was much easier on my nasal passages since I am not pregnant like I was last year. Even still, the house REEKED so I had to go on a few golf cart rides.

Pat and Brooks cleaned up the crab pretty quick so I wouldn't have to smell it as long but I saw some crab that had dropped on the floor and joked with Brooks to make sure he cleans THAT up since I wasn't going to touch it.

Then the crab was picked up and I was promised a $100 shopping spree if I ate it.

Did I do it?

Um.....YEA!!!!! Everyone has a price!!! HELLO!!!!

The sand on the kitchen floor that was stuck to the crab added such a welcomed extra crunch.

But hey, I'm-a-goin' shopping soon!

We grabbed our flashlights and headed out to the dark beach for a crab-finding-face-off.

We grouped the kids into teams of two (3 teams) and told them the team who found the most would win some money. 

 The Bronson-Royce

and Camden-Iris

teams tied with 9 crabs each.

(They were TINY little spider-sized crabs at night on the sand. Apparently we could've gone into the ocean and found two-fist sized crabs with our flashlights which I said was a big-fat-no)

The Emerson-Aleeya team were NOT happy.

And.....that would be a pretty big understatement.

(The ironic part about this story is Emerson was weeeeeeell in the lead at the first and Iris hadn't caught any. So Emerson found Iris one for her. When I told him how pleased I was with him for doing that he said, "It's just a competition Mom, and family is more important then a competition."..........well, unless you lose, and then apparently that wasn't his motto anymore.)

The next morning we had to be out by 10 but of course there's always that we-need-to-go-to-the-beach-ONE-last-time in the early hours. And I also wanted a quick group picture there so we grabbed our photographer (R.A.) and headed to the beach.

R.A. had a really good idea (at least, at the time I thought so) to make a pyramid out of my kids. 

*OH MY WORD!!! WHAT A PERFECTLY COOL IDEA*!!!!!

In. Theory.

So this is the best one that we got.....

And it wasn't as easy as you might think to even get THAT one! We went through a lot for it.

There were tears (Iris and Kellyn), baby falling, complaining, all the while with Bronson in the middle hating EVERY second being the base and all.

Whoa, okay, pick up the baby again, but don't pick her up because you might make the pyramid fall....

Oh, the torture of it all....

And I STILL wanted a family picture!!!!!

Which I knew we wouldn't get normal faces......or poses, but you never really know WHAT you will get until you go over the pictures later.

Thank you Iris for the lovely face and Emerson for Royce's head massage!

Obligatory muscle shot

Okay so here we go....a typical Smith family picture with someone being hidden and of course more faces and poses. But man, I love all those faces.

See you later Myrtle Beach!!!!! It was an AMAZING and perfect trip....

just next time, can you make us not have the traditional blow-out-in-the-carseat-on-the-way-home?

Beach Time

As Grandma said my "kids are made to live by the beach". 

They really have the BEST time in the water.

Oh wait, let me rephrase that.....all my kids except Kellyn.

But that's kinda a given right?

She DID like the sand a lot though.

And I pretty much can't stop taking picture of her eye-less grins.

The love of water goes all the way up the line too. This might be one of my favorite pictures of the whole trip with Brooks dunking his dad in the ocean.

or this.......I can't decide.

Royce absolutely LOVED the water and liked going and riding the waves with Dad. It was cute seeing the double-decker effect with him on Brooks' back.

Royce really couldn't be happier!!!

And on the FLIP side Kellyn wasn't too happy a lot of the time while on the beach. I tend to tune it out a lot so she probably cried a lot more then I remember. (vacations are rough on a toddler)

Nothing too big that Grandma couldn't cure though.

Here is Pat and Miss Kellyn PAT together.....her namesake.

Even Pat got in eventually to ride some waves.

She came back on shore and told me to go on out. 

I kindly declined saying I was good since I didn't want to be stung by a jellyfish (or, ya know, EATEN BY A SHARK). She told me she had just gotten stung by a jelly fish on the leg and it wasn't too big of a deal. 

(After seeing Aleeya's reaction earlier in the week I knew it COULD be a big deal....and I think the boys would line up all too happily to pee on mom)

Anyway, she convinced me to go in since I had my pants on anyway, so my thinking was the jellyfish wouldn't hurt too bad if he DID get me since I know he was just waiting for me to come in.

I get out in the waves and told Brooks I was good because I had my jellyfish-proof pants on and he smiled and said, "You're right, it won't hurt as much, but your nice black pants will look juuuuuuust like a seal to the sharks." Lovely.

The fact that I'm typing this will prove that I lived shark-bite-less AND jellyfish sting-less. Phew.

With exception of the first day, RA would show up to the beach in full clothing and shoes and socks. He cracked me up because he kept running away from the waves so he wouldn't get wet.

Every once and a while I would look around for Iris and she would just join another family or something. She was ALWAYS making friends and just inviting herself into their fun (because I CLEARLY haven't BIRTHED her enough playmates!)

That's her on the end of the chain....I have no clue who the other two people are.

Good ol' adventurous Aleeya.....

A few pics of Bronson...

Camden found some little crabs but couldn't reach them, so he recruited his two little sisters to fit down the hole to grab them.

And they CAUGHT some!

My girls LOVED them!

Oh wait......once again, Kellyn did NOT like it.

Kellyn decided to go as FAR away from her crab finding siblings as she could. 

They are on the left finding them and Kellyn is the liiiiiiiittle speck of green on the right.

Besides the crabs the kids also found the washed up jellyfish interesting.......

if, ya know, you're into jellyfish.

I will admit the top of them DOES feel cool.....like gel insoles for shoes.

More lizards

and a turtle while golfing.

And why not stick the turtle in the sink because heaven knows we wouldn't need it for anything else!

The Much Awaited Trip

The week the kids have been looking forward to all year long FINALLY came!

We are OFF to Myrtle Beach!

Once we drove for a while Brooks and I both commented how nice it was that on the way to the beach this year we weren't stranded on the side for 4 hours like last year.

Pretty soon after our comment we saw a lady on the side of the road changing her tire and knowing EXACTLY how she felt we stopped, which is always a welcomed idea to the kids, especially when there are "cool trees" with a creek by it. (Where was THIS oasis last year Linsey?)

But even BETTER then the location, Aleeya found a lizard. With that new passenger (the lizard) in tow the 11 of us set out to the beach.

We ALSO commented on how nice it was to have windshield wipers that work (unlike last time). Just then it started raining, we hit a big bump and then the windshield wipers stopped working. It wasn't just sprinkling, it was COMIN' DOWN. I told Brooks I was gonna pull over but he kept telling me I could do it. The only way I COULD was getting really low and looking through this one spot. Brooks kept making fun of me, but I got us there safely..... albeit with a sore, hunched back.

As soon as we got there, there was MUCH hugging with Brooks' parents (who flew out to meet us) followed immediately by "LET'S GO TO THE BEACH!"

Oh, and then they all opened up cans of pop since pop is kind of a free-for-all while on vacation.

Pop and Boiled Peanuts.

So besides the obvious beach-ing, I've compiled everything else that we did our week there.

The menfolk went golfing....

A. LOT. 

My boys couldn't be happier.

(sporting the new BYU hats R.A brought them)

There were some MAJOR Ticket To Ride games going on. I bought the game for the trip and loved that my kids liked playing it as much as I do......well, except when you are LOSING TO YOUR MOM LIKE EMERSON WAS!!!!!

I went to How To Train A Dragon 2 with Grandma and the older 5. Movies are such a BIG deal anyway to my kids but even BIGGER when you are the ONLY ONES THERE!!!!!

Krispy Kreme run with Grandma since she is the QUEEN of Krispy Kreme. 

Oh, did I mention there was a TON of golfing?

Which gave the rest of us plenty of time for swimming!

and my personal fav......golf cart rides.

(Any time I could I would sneak away in the golf cart with whoever wanted to go. I just loved the beachy air driving around)

And daily visits to the ducks/geese/swans to feed. This was Kellyn's favorite part. She was so happy there. I just love hearing her excited squeals after she pats me saying "MA!!!" to make sure I see what she sees.

Speaking of feeding, the older kids walked down the beach with RA and Brooks to a pier that was maybe a little under a mile away. It went way out into the ocean  and there were a lot of fishermen on the end. As usual, Brooks starts talking with them and the fisherman said, "Hey, watch this..."

Then he threw a fish in the water and a SHARK jumped up and grabbed it.

Let me repeat myself, A SHARK!!!!

They saw TWO of them and told me they had to be around 6-8ft long.

(Bronson said that was the coolest part of the whole trip for him actually)

(*insert shiver up my spine*)

Everly was so spoiled with Grandma.....I'm actually shocked I got a picture without Kellyn all over Grandma though.