Beach Bums

So we got to take a little trip to a little place called Aruba :) The last time we were there was 2012 and perhaps the biggest difference between that year and this year was Ashton!

Um no that's not correct. The biggest difference was that this year Alex, Callie and Erik were with us! Alex and Callie didn't exist in 2012 - hard to believe looking at their sweet faces :)

Erik did but he couldn't come then :P So our group was made up of 14 people total! An upfront thanks to Poppy, Mema, Amy, Jason, Mckenna, Brody, Ben, Kari, Callie and Erik for an unforgettable week. THANK YOU, especially to Poppy and Mema - you know we know how lucky we are!

Back to the Nills. Well we did mostly the same things we did in 2012: snorkeled, floated, laid by the pool, lazed in the lazy river, played in the sand, ate, drank...all those normal vacation things. We went to the same beach and guess what I even wore the same bathing suits. But experiencing the trip through Ashton's 4 year old eyes especially made this year that much better. He was so excited and soaked in every minute. We fed the iguanas some lettuce (more fun than you'd think!), he found a giant sea star, paddleboarded, swam, sailed, tried his luck at poolside Bingo and played his heart out at the beach. At one point he dug a large deep hole in the sand and every time a wave came and filled it he would go "Yes! YES! YEH-HEH-HESSS!!" Whenever Alex tried to come near it he would snap at me to "keep Alex occupied doing something else! This hole is mine!" He actually used the word "occupied"! He didn't pronounce it right, but still.

The boys also each had their own set of puddle jumpers, which I know isn't the best for actually learning how to swim but I was most concerned about their safety for the week. They made them so independent in the water and Alex just floated and smiled, floated and smiled, all by himself.

While the boys had their fun, the grownups certainly did too. We had probably the best setup you can have while being on vacation in a hotel: a 2 bed 2 bath condo separated by an kitchen and living space. Which means, you can put the kids to bed, shut the door, and still hang out! Also makes babysitting easy as we shared a condo with Kari and Ben and Callie. Pretty much every night we headed down to the beach bar, sat under the thatched roof with little twinkly lights and generally enjoyed ourselves. Signature drink of Aruba 2015: the Phase 3 Black Russian.

The view from our balcony was also quintessential tropics! To the left:

To the right (the swim up bar and beach, and where we spent a lot of our time because that pool is zero entry at the end. Also, as I mentioned, the swim up bar :D )

Directly below (the lazy river and hot tubs):

See in the upper left hand corner of this photo, that teeny bridge? That's one of the main kiddie pools that the resort has and the boys loved it. Water guns, waterfalls, etc. That Marriott, they know what they're doing. Between that and the 5 pm standing group float on the lazy river, things were good.

But let's talk about the elephant in the room. The flights. In fact, we hadn't flown anywhere since the last Aruba trip three years ago! There were two each way. They were long. Each boy had his own iPad, loaded up with apps and videos that were age appropriate, and a set of headphones.

While I was sandwiched between two kids for all 4 flights, Jason got to sit across the aisle in a seat I affectionately nicknamed "Paradise". Overall, Ashton did great - the older he gets the more "manageable" he is. Thank goodness we had Alex's carseat. Not feeling like being a human jungle gym for 6 hours, we had bought him his own seat and I strapped him right down. His little legs were *just* long enough to kick the seatback in front of him, but only on the last flight did we sit behind someone who was clearly annoyed by it (AND she had her own small kid with her! It was quite bizarre). A few times Alex really needed a nap and cried his face off. But overall we did ok. By the end of the travel days the boys had had way too much screen time and way too many snacks and got off the plane in a googly-eyed daze. I don't think they knew whether to run a marathon or pass out cold on the floor. Luckily on the way down we had the pool to look forward to and on the way back, Thanksgiving and all the holidays!

So it's time for the photo dump. I'll try to keep it to a minimum. I actually didn't take nearly as many as I thought I would, mainly because I was swimming with the boys most of the time! Off we go...

So there we were, all happy with a little bit of a tan and refreshed from a week in the water. We came back to cold, damp, dark Massachusetts and our weekend was spent gathering up the completely and utterly ridiculous and I mean ridiculous amount of leaves in our backyard. The whole neighborhood is massive oak trees and even though we have a blower, it's been an ongoing process. Yard waste day (the town's only one!!) was Monday so we bagged up forty nine bags of leaves and I am so sore I can barely move, even two days later!

It's a lot more than it looks like, okay? But the whole time I was raking under the drizzling, gray cloudy sky I could easily imagine the blue water and sun and sand from a few days prior. It helped.

Next up...turkey day! We are headed to Long Island at 6 am tomorrow morning (Wednesday) because we procrastinated and there was not much left by way of ferry reservations. Us Nills are not letting much grass grow under our feet lately...here come the holidays!