Florida!

You've got to love having a spontaneous, adventurous sister-in-law that is tired of the dreary weather and asks if you want to drive fourteen hours through the night with 6 kids to Florida!  

My answer?  Sure!

Leann found a deal on Bookit.com and booked a condo for us to share 

for four nights near Destin, FL. 

Doug and Derek couldn't take time off from work so didn't come along.  

We missed them, but had a great time and thoroughly enjoyed the beautiful beach and sun!

It was a bit of a bummer to be gone during Holy Week before Easter,  but we called Doug every night and did our Holy Week readings together and had our Good Friday/Easter brunch and dinner together on Saturday.  (We were also back in time to enjoy the big Sauder Family Easter dinner on Sunday night)

Our van packed with the kiddos and gear!

We head out Sunday night at 9:30pm.  

It was not as bad as I thought it would be to drive through the night for so long.  

It helped that the kids all slept until about 7 or 8 in the morning.  

We thought we were going to be in Destin, but it was actually Navarre Beach about 24 miles West of Destin.  A smaller, sleepier town, but still beautiful white sand beaches with beautiful, turquoise water.  

We were right on the beach and pool, which was very nice.

So pretty!

This was the beach on the other side of the pool. 

The kids loved it, too!

We took a walk down the beach looking for seashells at sunset.  The kids had bags and bags of shells they had collected over the time there, but we told them they could only take one bag each home :).

The sand was so soft and beautiful and wonderful to walk along.  I ran along the beach in the mornings, too.  One of my favorite things!

Little Kerr Kerr

Love photographing her when she'll let me :)

Sutton with a crab she caught inside the beach toys and her bag of shells from this collection time.  She wrote me sweet notes in the sand :)

Hanging out in the hot tub.  

I felt so bad, because my kids burned the first day.  I put lots of sunscreen on them, but neglected to reapply and missed some spots (ears, thighs) so poor Sutton's ears were blistered :( (hence the braids over the ears to protect them & the t-shirt)

We had our own personal nanny free of charge :).  

The kids quickly befriended and had lots of fun playing with Ally in the pool and on the beach.  

There were also some marines that were on leave that played football with Hudson, 

which he had fun doing.

Since we were so close to Destin, we had to go check it out.  So glad we did.  

Navarre Beach was great for our purposes this time, but was great to see Destin and all that it had to offer for another time.

The kids found a coconut that washed up on shore and were trying to crack it.

The beaches were a little flatter and a little more kid-friendly there and just as beautiful.

The kiddos/cousins

They had a great time together

Couldn't get over the white, white sand.  So beautiful and even more so with the turquoise water!

 

The kids had run ahead and I found another love note along the way :)

Awww.

There was a purple flag up at the beach which means 'dangerous marine life'.  We asked the attendant at the state beach entrance what marine life was out and she said some Man of War had washed up on shore.  We were excited to find one!

Sutton and Lexi enjoying walking along the beach.

more sweet Kerrigan :)

I liked the artwork in the sand on the dunes

We had yummy fresh seafood at Pompano Joe's on the water.  Hudson and his hot sauce :)

We drove home on Good Friday, leaving at about 5am.  The kids slept a few more hours in the car and we stopped to have lunch in Nashville and see Aunt Tiffany, too, who lives there!  The drive was easier in the daylight and after a night of sleep, but harder for the kids since they were awake most of the time.  We drove through the panhandle of Florida, Alabama, Tennessee, a little bit of Kentucky and Illinois. 

 The change of scenery from state to state was interesting.  It was much more green, hilly and dense forest the more south we were, not to mention warmer and sunnier.  I liked Tenessee the best, with a good mixture of hills, trees and meadows in between trees and very green.
Driving through Birmingham and Montgomery, AL was quite the experience being in the deep south.  

(the pictures above show Alabama in the top left, then into Tennessee, 

with Illinois being the bottom right).  

So glad we did it.  It went as well as we could've expected.  Good news, too, because, for years, I have not been able to drive for 45 minutes without falling asleep, due to being so tired and fatigued from Lyme Disease.  Well, I did well on this trip!  More evidence that my treatment is working and I'm getting better!

Thank you, Leann, for inviting us and initiating this idea!!