Family Beach Trip

June 14th through the 16th, I went with my family to the beach for a relaxing get-a-way to celebrate the end of my schooling. Chad had to stay home because he's so close to finishing school and wanted to get as many hours in as possible. We ended up going to Rockaway Beach, the beach we've been going to since before I was born. We always stay at the Silversands Motel that's right on the beach. The best part is their heated salt water pool.

Thursday we headed down around 11:30am. I carpooled with my dad, mom, and nephew Austin. We made it down to the motel and they had our room ready to go early. My parents got us two rooms that had a connecting door. I stayed in one room with my sister and two nieces and my parents and nephew shared the other one. The first thing we did after unpacking the car was to find food. I was starving! We took Alexa and Madison and drove back to Tillamook. First stop was the smoker outlet for beef sticks... yuck! Then we went shopping at Freddie's and finally stopped at Taco Time for lunch. The rest of the day was spent hanging out on the beach. They closed down my mom and my favorite place to eat, Mazatlan, so we chose to go to Upper Crust pizza. They offer gluten free crust so Alexa was able to enjoy dinner too. After dinner it was back to the beach to enjoy the beautiful sunset and a fire.

We couldn't have asked for better weather for a June beach day.

Maddie helped collect wood for the fire.

A rare moment when all 3 kids were getting along.

Austin was in charge of lighting the fire.

We had a swing set right outside our room.

The sunset

The fire. Unfortunately, no s'more's this trip.

Friday we woke up to another beautiful day. We went on a walk for coffee and to Flamingo Jim's to look at their fun souvenirs. This tiny shop has everything under the sun and each of the kids had their own fun money to spend there. Austin ended up with some "pirate money" and a mood ring, Alexa chose a mood ring and a pretty jeweled ring, and Madison bought some temporary tattoos and a mood ring. Once we were ready for the day and ate breakfast, we drove up to Seaside for the day. They were having their old car show that day, people from all over bring their old cool cars and display them on the main strip. I like looking at all the cars but it took away so much parking available to visitors. Luckily we found a spot in the public parking lot right up front. Austin had no interest hanging out with his sisters (being almost 12 is SOOO hard sometimes: note the sarcasm) so he and my dad went off on their own and it was just all the girls for the day. We went into the mall to try to find my sister some shorts to buy. We also found sweatshirts for all the kids including a really cute one for baby boy when he gets here. The girls were able to chose one ride to go on as a treat from their favorite aunt (me!) and they chose to go on the Tilt-a-whirl. My sister and I loved this ride when we were kids and it was so much fun to watch the tradition passed on. We walked down to the promenade for some photo ops, stopped in this weird "museum" with sharks on display, then went to Subway for lunch. After that we met up with my dad and nephew and ended the day at the candy shop. Everyone spun the prize wheel they have in the store. We all decided we were going to be lucky and win this time except my mom... and she's the only one who won!! We all got the normal complimentary salt water taffy and she won a bag of popcorn. Last treat of the day was an ice cream cone. I love Tillamook ice cream, so does little man inside my tummy. Then we headed back to the motel.

Ready for some tilting and whirling.

I don't know who taught these girls how to smile, or not smile.

More silly faces.

One of the many cars on display in Seaside

The rest of the down time was spent walking around and swimming in the pool. I think we went to Flamingo Jim's at least four times. I spent many hours in the pool. Being so pregnant, and heavy, it was so relaxing to feel buoyant for awhile. My mom shocked the kids with her swimming abilities, I guess they just see her as gramma, not a former competitive swimmer. We gave the kids some swimming lessons and played and played and played.


Saturday we woke up, got packed, and spent the last few hours getting in last minute trips to the store and time playing in the sand. As we were heading back into town, my poor nephew looked down at his arm and there was a bee stinging him! To help make him feel a little better we made one last stop in Tillamook at the cheese factory for some cheese samples and another ice cream cone. Finally on our way home we had one more crisis. My parents were following my sister's car and we heard a loud noise. She had been having engine troubles and my dad thought she blew out her engine. Luckily it was just a blown tire and between my dad, mom, and her they had it fixed in under ten minutes. I stayed up in my parents car with all the kids. We still made it home in good time and I got to see my husband after three days of being away from him.

After some benadryl to make sure he didn't react to the bee-sting, he crashed.

I had so much fun and was able to get some much needed relaxing done. I missed Chad like crazy but was happy I chose to go. We'll be going back just the two of us to celebrate our 1 year anniversary and get one last vacation before baby comes.