Party of Six: Life's a Beach

Spring break this year my family rented a house on Grayton Beach, FL. Which is a bike ride away from Watercolor and Seaside. It was us, my mom, Kelly, Steve, Braden, Carter, Riley, April, Ben and Brian.

The house was amazing! 4 bed rooms, one large bunk room that slept all 6 kids and 7 bathrooms. The views of the beach from the house couldn't be beat.

We started each morning with some breakfast and, of course, the beach!

This was Ella's first time sitting on the beach. She was OK with it at first. She watched the waves go up and down and was touching the sand not knowing what to make of it. She started screaming once the cold water went up to her legs. She didn't want ANYTHING to do with the sand or ocean after that for the rest of the day. She would start to cry if I tried to put her down even on a towel. By the end of the week she was eating and crawling around on the sand with no worries.

Followed by lunch by the pool!

Downtown Grayton Beach

One morning that was a little too chilly to head to the beach we decided to walk into Grayton Beach. It is a cute little town on the beach. There is not much there, a souvenir shop and Red Bar. We decided to stop in there since I have heard such great things about the place, we had beer and some fries.

I felt a little weird bring the kids into Red Bar. It looks like it would be fun at night, it is always packed so it must be, but it was a little shady in the middle of the day.

Cheers!

Ava and Gavin's 5th Birthday at the beach!

Ava from the minute she woke up put on her HAPPY BIRTHDAY headband and wore it all day long. It was so cute. She was a little embarrassed when people kept coming up to her saying Happy Birthday.

It was a fun day to have a birthday! We took a ride into Seaside to go have lunch and look around. We started off taking a picture at this little mexican food shack. We ended up eating there another night and it was really great.

Then we had lunch at this great pizza place right on the beach. The outside seating was amazing. Gavin wanted shrimp so they let us bring in some from the Shrimp Shack a few doors down.

After lunch we walked around the town a little bit looking in stores. I thought their post office was just too cute so I had to take a picture.

We stopped at Queen Bee Cupcakes and let Ava and Gavin pick out their birthday cupcakes for that night. Almost everyone got a different flavor. I had the Key Lime and it was so yummy!

Next we had to get some gelato. I think Aaron had more fun there than the kids!

After we finished the gelato we headed back to the house to hit the pool.

Then had dinner, sang Happy Birthday and opened presents.

Ava and Gavin's Birthday 5

Ava

1. Wants to be a princess when she grows up

(which she will be perfect for!)

2. Hasn't met a dress she didn't like

3. Wants to live on the beach

4. Loves to color

5. Loves taking pictures with my camera

Gavin

1. IS going to be Batman when he grows up.

Including the Batcave, Batmobile and motorcyle.

2. Favorite song is Gives you H*ell and Pink's Rockstar

3. Favorite colors are Green

4. Favorite foods- Hotdogs, chicken and sushi

5. Favorite activities playing outside, riding his bike

and being with his cousins

*********

The last morning at the beach house I wanted to take some pictures of the kids. Well, it didn't work out exactly how I planned... It was really cold. Poor Ella's hands and feet were turning blue. Ava and Gavin wanted nothing to do with this whole picture taking business. I am lucky Ava is looking at the camera in this picture. Gavin, no such luck. This is the best of the bunch which I still think turned out pretty good.

Grace has never met a camera she didn't like!

The last family night in Florida

We headed into Seaside on Friday night for a family dinner at the pizza place and a movie on the lawn. We all were really bummed that it had to end the next morning with goodbyes but it was still a fun night.

After dinner we headed over to get our seats on the lawn for

Alvin and the Chipmunks 2

Saturday morning we packed up the house and said goodbye to everyone. They headed to the airport and we drove a mile over to the Watercolor Inn. We were not quite ready to leave FL yet so I went to the front desk hoping they had a room available. Thankfully they did! We unpacked what we needed and headed out on a bike ride through Watercolor. It is absolutely beautiful. I am in love with almost every house there and would love to live there the whole summer.