Beach Family Vacation

We just got home from a beach trip! We joined my parents, sisters, and my sisters' families for a week at Corolla Beach in the Outer Banks. It was such a fun week of playing in the ocean and on the beach, hanging out by the pool, eating way too much food, and enjoying our adult time in the evenings once the kids (all 9 of them!) had gone to bed. It was Madeleine's first trip to the beach, and she absolutely loved it! It was such a joy to watch her enjoy the sand and the water like both Caleb and I do. For the first time we stayed at the 4x4 part of Corolla, which is less crowded since it's accessible by 4WD only. There are wild horses that roam that section of the Outer Banks, and they would walk right through our yard! I'm always sad when a vacation like this comes to an end, but I'm grateful for the fun memories we made! Here are a few pictures, if you'd like to see...

In My Pool Bag

My favorite place to be in the summer is the beach, but if I'm not at the beach you can find me at the pool on the weekends. I absolutely love relaxing after a week of work in the sunshine by the pool. Here's a look at what's in my pool bag:

1. A towel. I don't need anything too fancy, but I do need something to dry off/wipe the sweat that's dripping down my face. I'm pretty dedicated to staying in the sun for several hours, so that means quite a few dips in the pool to cool off and a lot of sweating. Sometimes I take two towels just to be safe.

2. Sunglasses. I actually prefer not to wear glasses for the majority of the time I'm in the sun (I don't want a sunglasses tan), but I like to have them as an option if need be.

3. A good book. Last Saturday I read Divergent (yes, I just jumped on that bandwagon - and it was so good!), and I just recently bought All the Light We Cannot See. I like to have a long book to last me the whole afternoon.

4. Lip balm with SPF. This yes to carrots pomegranate kind is my absolute favorite for the summer. It goes on smooth, it isn't too quick to melt in the heat, and it smells so good. The only thing worse than chapped lips is burned lips, so I frequently apply this stuff and love it.

5. Sunscreen. I haven't always worn sunscreen (hello 17 year-old self), but in the past couple of years I have changed that. I love being tan but I do not want skin cancer, so I always have sunscreen with me now. I've been using Coppertone Clearly Sheer this summer and really love the lightweight formula. It isn't sticky or smelly (it actually smells good!), which is key since I have to reapply frequently. I tend to have sensitive skin but haven't had any irritations or issues with this formula.

6. Drinks. I usually bring a couple of drinks to try to stay hydrated. Summers in South Carolina are brutal y'all, so the more beverages the better.

So there you have it, my pool bag. What do you take to the pool or the beach?

Disclosure: I received the Coppertone Clearly Sheer sunscreen for free from BzzAgent, a word-of-mouth program. All opinions are honest and 100% my own.

Learning to be Spontaneous

I am not what you would call spontaneous; I'm a planner and an organizer, and I'm constantly learning to be more flexible. But! last weekend was spontaneous, and I LOVED it! We decided last Thursday night to go to the beach for part of the weekend. We booked a hotel right before we went to bed on Thursday, and headed to the beach after work on Friday. We needed new beach chairs, and Target and Walmart here have gotten rid of beach things and brought in the back-to-school stuff (which, by the way, drives me crazy because it was the first weekend of August! We are still in full-on summer mode over here!), so I just figured we would find beach chairs along the way. Friday night we had a great talk in the car, our hotel was nice, and Saturday we woke up to a beautiful, sunny day. We started heading to the beach, hoping we would find beach chairs and also hoping we would find a place to park. We had never been to Isle of Palms, so we didn't know where the public beach access was or what kind of parking would be available. We just went for it! After driving around for a while we finally found an awesome parking spot right near the beach access. But, no chairs. We headed down to the water anyway, saw some rental beach chairs, called the phone number on the umbrella, and they delivered us our chairs for the day. The weather was perfect all day, the water was so refreshing, and we had such a great time. Everything worked out just fine and we are so glad we went! I'm hoping this experience will teach me to be more spontaneous in the future:) I hope you have a great weekend, and do something fun and spontaneous! xx