The BIG Vas...

My little shark watchers!

We went on a little family vacay last week to the beach, better known in this house as "the big vas", and boy did we ever have a great time! It was Sawyer's very first trip to the beach and he loved it. Especially the playing in the sand part! As for Hayden, he could not get enough of the BIG vas! Yes, he calls water "vas", and the entire time we were at the beach he would refer to the actual beach part as "the BIG vas". He always put a giant emphasis on the "big" part. Funny enough, he can say beach perfectly, he just chose to rename it once we got there. I had been telling the boys we were going to the beach all week and by the time we were actually ready to leave, it was pretty much all Hayden was talking about. He could not wait. And he could not stop telling Sawyer about it either. So cute! We had to make a couple of stops(like to eat breakfast, etc.) on the way down there and at each and every stop we heard "Yay, the beach!" Poor Hayden, he had no idea it was going to take more than a couple of hours to get there!:) The anticipation was killing him! Luckily for us, both of the boys slept most of the way down there(we left at 5am) which was nice. It makes the drive a little easier on all of us! The first day we didn't actually go down to swim or play at the beach because it was pretty late by the time we got all checked in and cozy in our room. I did however take Hayden down to the water while we were waiting at the restaurant to eat dinner. Daddy stayed up in the air conditioning/shade with Sawyer because he had already had such a long day. The very first thing Hayden said when we actually got down to the water was "Whoa, that is big vas Momma!" It was in that moment that the beach was no longer the beach to Hayden. It was the "BIG vas!" And he made sure we all called it the right thing... including Sawyer! At our resort(Holiday Inn Resort PCB) we had a pool, a splash(splash pad) and a big vas. It was so cute to hear him talking about it. He really was amazed at how big it was. My favorite was when he would be talking about it to Sawyer. They would be sitting playing in the sand and you could hear Hayden saying, "you see that big vas Saw?" And of course Sawyer would amuse him by looking at the water and clapping, waving or just "talking" with him. Such sweet boys!

These were that very first night while we were waiting on dinner.
I knew then it was going to be a great beach trip!

Hayden had tons of fun attempting to make his very own Sandcastle...

And Sawyer LOVED making it tumble down!:)

As a matter of fact, Sawyer loved everything about the beach...

Except maybe the hat wearing part. He was not a huge
fan of the hat. At first he was always trying
to take it off. He did however get used
to it by the end of the trip!

Or the sunglasses part. He just wanted to have them in
his mouth worse than over his eyes! I eventually
gave up on the sunglasses thing...

But not before I got this cute picture of him peeking
at me over the top of them! Yes, his bottom fell
through the back of this chair... and he
thought that was the funniest
thing ever!

Needless to say, Sawyer's first beach trip was a huge success. He was in amazement the entire time and just loved it more than you could imagine. He loved the sand. He even enjoyed eating a little of it. OK, it was a lot he ate. So much he threw it up. Oops! I didn't realize he was enjoying the taste of it that much...

I think it was after this handful that we had
a little oops to clean up on the beach!

At least he was having a good time right?!? He didn't even seem to mind when the sand came back up. He just went own about his business playing. I did notice he didn't seem to try eating sand for a meal as often after that though!:) He also loved trying to get both the ocean and pool water in his mouth. Luckily for us this was not quite as easy for him as the sand. I did have to keep a close watch on him though, because if he had a toy or if Hayden had one he could give him, it would be full of water and in his mouth in a nano second. He especially loved the taste of that salt water on his fingers! The splash pad that was at our resort was Sawyer's water drinking dream.... so many fountains!

Loving the splash pad!

And the pool!

Honestly, all of us had a blast playing at the splash pad and the pool. It was great fun because we could all interact with each other at the same time. There really was something for everyone. Daddy and I loved getting a little sun while getting splashed by all the water and the boys loved doing the actual splashing!:)

Hayden enjoyed helping Sawyer take a little ride on this froggy!

And Sawyer LOVED the ride!

Silly boy!

Hayden's favorite part was chasing Daddy through all the different sprinklers. He would go any and everywhere Daddy would go. It was so cute to watch them play! Surprisingly enough Hayden was not a huge fan of the slides they had there. I think they were just a little too fast and you got a little too wet. He did do them, but he didn't love them or beg to do them over and over. He enjoyed splashing around with Daddy much more! One place he did love the water slide at was Big Kahuna's. We met up with Auntie May and Uncle Danny one day when we were down at the beach and the boys had so much fun at the water park. This is something we most definitely would not have done had Auntie May and Uncle Danny not been there, but I'm sure glad we did. The boys got to spend a little time with fam and had fun playing at the water park at the same time!

I'm pretty sure he slid down close to 1 million times!

And at one point he even stopped to take a little break!:)

I did manage to get him to sit in a chair to rest, but I'm
pretty sure it was for no longer than 5 minutes.
I think the goldfish and juice bribe helped!

Sawyer got the best nap ever!

And Hayden had tons of fun exploring this submarine!

This is probably my favorite family pic from the whole trip.
Some random nice lady snapped this for us as she
was walking by. Thank you nice lady!

I love how in the pic you can see Hayden going to tickle Sawyer. He is saying "tickle, tickle" the whole time she is taking the pic. That is one of the ways I will try to get Sawyer to smile for a pic and Hayden loves when he gets the chance to try it out. There is actually a picture of all of us looking at the camera and smiling, but of course this one is my favorite. I'm pretty sure she didn't even mean to take it, but I sure love it!:) Speaking of pictures, I must tell you here that I am so upset with CVS right now. We got an underwater camera when we were there because I didn't want to mess up my other camera in the water, and somehow just somehow the pictures got messed up once I dropped them off to get developed when we got home. Uggghhhh... I guess I am going to have to get a little mini digital waterproof camera for next time. You will just have to imagine all of the pictures from the lazy river, pool and actual time in the beach water. So sad. Of course we enjoyed all of our time in the water, but the lazy river was definitely our favorite. It was so much fun riding around together. Daddy and I held the boys and we rode around on our tubes. Of course we did a little splashing and pushing of each other under the waterfalls. SO fun! Almost as much fun as Hayden had playing with his waboba ball and tennis ball on the beach...

SO much fun!

Boys will be boys...

You don't even need to see his face to
see how much fun he was having!

Sawyer even tried to join in on the fun...

But really had more fun just playing with the basket of beach toys!

This was how Hayden would quench his thirst!
Guess he didn't want to get the cup sandy!

Daddy and Hayden(and even Mommy and Sawyer a few times) played "ball" for more than a few hours while we were down on the beach. Hayden could have stayed on the sand and thrown the ball towards the water all day long had we let him. He had so much fun watching to see if the ball would make it to the water. He would jump in anticipation the whole time he was watching it roll towards the waves. Hours of fun I tell you, hours. It's the simplest things that make the most fun. He also loved filling his buckets with water and then pouring the water over the dry sand.

Getting help from Daddy!

This poor bucket was played with so much
it doesn't even look the same anymore!

Can you believe he would even attempt
to fill this huge thing up with water?!?

He would always stop right before he would enter the
water to fill his bucket. I guess he was getting
his nerve up to enter the waves?!?

And he would stand like this and wait for it to fill up each and every time!

Occasionally Daddy would jump in and help him out!

And this was his favorite part of all!!! He had to
work hard to pick up that bucket and dump it,
but it must have provided him with lots
and lots of joy because he did it
over and over and over!

Oh, and he liked playing in the "big vas" and admiring the ocean as much as he liked talking about it and dumping it out of his bucket...

Jumping the waves!

Looking at all the birds, boats and even a few jumping fish!

And I must not forget Hayden loved showing Woody and Buzz around the beach...

What can I say, they go where he goes!:)

Sweet little Sawyer spent much of his time on the beach sleeping like an angel...

Doesn't get much better than that huh?!?

Sand storm 2011...

During one of Sawyer's long beach naps a huge gust of wind came and blew up tons of sand all over him. I thought for sure that was going to be the end of his nap because sand was all over the place. I mean it even ended up inside his ears. I actually kind of wanted him to wake up so I could hurry and clean him up. Well, it didn't affect him at all. He slept right through it. I did try to clean some of it off of him while he was sleeping, but I wasn't too successful at that.

He did decide to turn to a new position... crazy one huh?

And the rest of us tried taking a feet pic!

He slept so long that day we finally had to wake him up which I NEVER do. A sleeping baby is a happy baby has always been my philosophy, but this nap was just going on for an eternity...

He obviously wasn't ready to get up when we woke him...

I kind of figured Sawyer would have an easy time napping on the beach, but had no idea it would be as easy as it was. And as LONG as the naps were. Of course, Hayden never even dreamed of taking a nap on the beach. He had to be inside away from all the fun to even think about laying down. So, most of the time the boys didn't actually nap at the same time. Go figure. At least they did nap! Oh, and when Hayden would nap it was nice and long as well, so it was great fun entertaining Sawyer while Hayden was sleeping...

We played with lots of toys and took lots of pictures!:)

Even went out on the balcony and took some pictures!

It was well worth it to let Hayden have his full nap...
he was so happy when he would get up!

Those long naps allowed us to have more fun at night doing things like putt-putt...

There was a place really close to the place we were staying that
let the kids play for free so we just had to let Hayden
experience his first round of putt-putt! He loved it.
Way more than I thought he was going to.
He wasn't exactly great at it, but he
sure did enjoy himself!

Daddy even helped Sawyer make a putt!:)

We will most definitely be playing more putt-putt in the future! It was almost as much fun as bath time!!!

They love it!

I am guessing the boys night time sleeping pattern while we were beachfront had a pretty big impact on those long naps they would take. The whole time we were at the beach the boys would get up around 6:00 or 6:30... super crazy huh?!? There is the 1 hour time change, but still, they don't get up at 7:00 at home. It proved to be interesting to say the least. We had a few extra hours to entertain each and every morning!:) A couple of the mornings we filled those hours with walks on the beach where I was able to get a few family pics...

Family beach fun!

I love these pics of the boys looking at the water...

And at the birds!

One happy little boy!

Having fun with Daddy!

And Mommy!

So sweet!

Our attempt to get a family pic!

Feet in the sand...

Love this!

Flexible little guy!

Bye, bye beach... see you next time!

Beach Vacation 2011!