Family Vacation to Manasota Key

Whew!
We made it home this weekend after a fantastic family vacation.
It feels like forever ago that we left and were dealing with the BS of flight delays, missing connections, and early morning takeoff.
But once we arrived we were in full on vacation mode. We met my in laws at an amazing beach house in southern Florida and though it can be tough vacationing with little ones, we had lots of help and Charlotte had a built in playmate with her same-age cousin.

She's such a copycat, and he's such a leader. They played hard every day. 

The weather was mostly great, with 3 out of our 5 days being next to perfect. There was a red tide advisory and it produced a pretty annoying cough. I had heard of it before but wasn't familiar with what it actually was.

A little scared of the water, but Charlotte coaxed him in. 

We spent the nice days on the beach just steps out of the door. The beach along the water was loaded with shells and sharks teeth, but we had a nice sandy spot where a new deck was going to be built. So the kids had a spot to play without getting washed away into the sea.

Excited about just about everything

On the less nice days, we lounged around just like we would at home, but it was better because we weren't at home. And I would eat lots of things like dip, and drink things like lime-a-ritas.

We captured one of Lena's finer moments.

My little beach baby

Lena did so, so well the first few nights. Slept completely through the night 12-13 hours. It was amazing. I of course couldn't sleep because I was obsessively checking on her. Then she went back to normal, and then worse than normal, which is really hard when you have a screaming-in-their-sleep baby sharing a room with you. And you can't take her out of the room because there's 10 other people sleeping somewhere. So in that respect, it was good to get back home and into our own spaces. 

Coming back home from a busy trip with lots of people has been tough on the girls (and ME.) It's been a rough week to say the least. I don't know if they're adjusting, sick, being babies and toddlers, or what. But yesterday there wasn't a moment except for the 30 minute nap overlap that at least one kid wasn't crying. 

By the time we got home I felt like I didn't need a vacation in a while, and we live to plan our next trip. But after all this needless whining and protesting, I'm ready to leave again. alone.

But overall, a beach vacation was totally manageable with the two kiddos and I'd definitely do it again. Just not for a little while. :)

Where is the best beach you've ever visited?