We left for the beach around 12:45pm on Thursday afternoon. I know what you are thinking...."Didn't Aidan have to miss school?" Well, yes....yes he did, and let me tell you, he was all broken up over it. Cried the whole way down. :-( Obviously, that is far from the truth, and in actuality Lori and I felt pretty guilty about his truancy. We just figured that he had only missed 1 day of school this year, and they were having the end of the year talent show on the day that he missed. Missing talent show = no big deal. He had perfect attendance for the first three, "nine week" sessions. Anyway, we made really good time with only one stop in Centerville on our way down. The good news was we made really good time getting to Houston. The bad new was, we hit downtown Houston at 4:45 in the afternoon. Uhhhhhh.....rush hour. All I have to say is their city engineer must have worked for Spiro Graph before being hired on by the city of Houston. You would not believe me if I tried to explain the complexity involved in finding and getting on the HOV route. That guy or girl should be fired on the spot.
Once we made it through the concrete maze in downtown, the traffic in the HOV lane was cruising south at a steady 70 mph. Wooo Hooo. We were passing some serious cars stuck in regular traffic, and suddenly the "labyrinth of frustration" did not seem so bad. We got to Kenny and Hailey's beach house in Sea Isle about 6:30pm. After unpacking the car, and getting our stuff upstairs, I made a trip to the closest grocery store, and bought a couple of frozen pizzas. We ate a quick dinner, hopped in Kenny and Hailey's ultra sweet jumbo monster mudd'in golf cart, and drove to the beach.
By the time we got there, the sun was just starting to go down. We did not have time to swim, but just being there and hearing the waves crashing and smelling that salty air made all of the anxiety of the trip instantly evaporate. We stayed for about 20 minutes, just enough time for Aidan to disobey our pleas to stay dry, so we headed home with one soaking wet boy. Hey, what are you going to do. Keeping a 6 year old out of the ocean while his dog is standing in butt deep water egging him on is practically impossible.
We got back to the beach house just in time to snap this:
Wow, just magnificent.
Kenny and Hailey got in town about 9:00pm, and after visiting for a while, we all made it to bed at a decent hour. We all knew the kids would be up an some ungodly hour in the morning repeating over and over....."when are we going to the beach"..."is it time yet"..."how much longer"....etc..
We got up early as expected, and Hailey made a scrumptious breakfast casserole. MmmmmmmMmmmmmm it was gooooooooooood! After digesting, Kenny and I headed out to purchase Friday night's steaks, and Saturday night's Shrimp. Lori and Hailey went to Wal-Mart to do some last minute grocery shopping. After everybody returned, we finally made it out to the beach.
Just seeing the look on Christopher face as he would run in and out of the water was simply intoxicating. He is such a little ham.
Aidan just flat out loves the water. 95% of the time we are at the beach, he is either submerged or riding his boogie board. Here he is making his way out of the water, with the ever protective and watchful Mystic not far behind.
She looks after those boys while they are in the water, like a Great Pyrenees watching his flock. We could not ask for a better companion for our children.
After we got back to the beach house, Kenny and I fired up the Charcoal and got ready for some serious steak grilling. Mmmmmm....Steak........
Lori and Kenny and Hailey went for the filets, while I stuck with my favorite...a delicious Rib-eye. Kenny cooked them to perfection, and with the addition of the roasted corn on the cob, salad, and sautéed mushrooms, we gorged ourselves. After dinner, while the kids were watching movies, I peeked over and noticed Aidan doing this,
while Christopher and Carley were doing this,
Yep, even the 4 year old, and the 21 month old stayed up longer than the uber tired 6year old.
After getting the kids to bed, Lori and Hailey and Kenny and I made our way downstairs, and played darts, drank, laughed, and smoked cigars into the wee hours of the morning. Good times. Our good friend Kirk drove in from Houston and got there a little after midnight, and it was certainly enjoyable seeing him again. We finally got to bed about 2:00am, as visions of the much anticipated annual Memorial Day Weekend horseshoe tournament danced in my head. Oh yeah, in a few short hours, it would be, once again, time for the "King of the Beach" to make his appearance. I'm sure most of the other entrants laid awake most of the night shivering in fear. Ok, maybe not....hell to tell you the truth, most of them had probably actually thrown a horseshoe in the last 365 days, unlike the current "King of the Beach"
Saturday morning started out beautiful, but as the morning wore on, an ominous dark presence was rolling in. Thunder clouds, with malice on their minds, slowly engulfed the blue sky. By the time the tournament started at "high noon" the question was not if it would rain, but when. That question was answered during the very first set of games. It rained hard on and off for about 2 hours, but that did not keep the 12 two man teams from competing. Some competed more than others, and it makes me sad to say, my partner and I were eliminated in the quarter finals. My "King of the Beach" title and trophy are now only distant memories. Vengeance will be mine.......next year! Here is a shot of the loser (me) getting ready to pitch some shoes.
While I was playing shoes, Lori had her hands full with the little Rooster boy. Luckily there were quite a few toys to capture his very short attention span, and he even had a little 3 year old girl playing companion to pass the time with.
Here is a picture of Aidan sitting on the back of Ken and Hailey's golf cart looking mirthful.
We stayed at the beach until late afternoon, and then headed back to the beach house about 5:30pm. We needed to start working on the shrimp, and dinner was to be followed with cupcakes that Lori made for Hailey's birthday. The 7 pounds of cream chess jalapeno stuffed shrimp we cooked turned out just as mouthwatering as it sounds. Lord they were delicious. After the feast, everybody went outside on the upstairs deck, and sang Happy Birthday for Hailey. Here she is blowing out the candles with eager children surrounding her.
Speaking of eager children, here is a shot of the children surrounding the cupcake dish.
It reminded me of watching the discover channel as the lion pride encircles the local watering hole. You just know that carnage is soon to follow, and follow it did.
After getting the kids to bed, we once again went downstairs, and celebrated life and friendship. Our friends are really quite something. You can not see each other for 6 months, and as soon as you are in each other's presence, the comfort level is immediate, and conversations flow like water. How great is that.
Sunday morning we woke to more dark clouds. There was a neighborhood crawfish boil scheduled on the agenda for the day, and showers would not be appreciated. 110 pounds of crawl daddy's were purchased and cooked, along with bags and bags of potatoes and corn. Yummy. The rains eventually did come, so after eating, we retired to the beach house and set up a water slide for the kids. As you can see from the following pictures, the kids had an absolute blast on the slide.
After getting out of the water slide, Christopher challenged Lori to a lightsaber (noodle) duel. On Guard!
We all were wiped out on Sunday night, but that did not stop us from have a great game of Texas hold'em. Hailey, Kirk, Kenny and Lori and I stayed up for hours playing. It was great, and for it being Lori's first time to play, she did remarkably well. It's a good thing that Aidan was already in bed, or he would have probably cleaned us all out. That boy is a card playing fool.
We got up Monday morning early knowing it was our last day. We set out for the beach at 9:00am in the morning. The weather was gorgeous, and the water was still. Lori snapped this picture of the boys right after we got there, and I thought it turned out fantastic. (click to enlarge) I call it "Shimmer of Hope".
Here is one of Lori, Aidan, Christopher, and the ever protective Mystic enjoying family time.
You know, the island has done a pretty remarkable job of cleaning up most of the debris left from the devastation left by hurricane Ike. Some stretches of the beach you would never even know that there was such a violent storm less than a year ago.
While others like this one are still waiting for repairs.
With the water so calm, Kenny broke out one of his rod and reels, and did his best to hook a lunker.
Aidan and I were content floating on our boogie boards and soaking up the sun.
In the mean time, Carley and Christopher we soaking up some Zzzzzz's in the back of the CX-9.
We stayed at the beach until a little before noon, and then made the sad journey back to the beach house. I started packing up our things, and after showering and having lunch, we started our journey home about 2:00. Just before we left, we shot a few parting pictures. Kirk and Christopher.
Our gracious host Kenny and Hailey with a portion of their sweet golf cart showing in the background.
And finally....the gang.
We got home a little over 5 hours later, and all of us were left longing. We can't wait to go back.
Once again Kenny and Hailey, thanks for having us down. It was awesome.
William
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