Myrtle Beach Family Vacation

Whoa, hold the phone! What's this?  Is this a blog post??  Well indeed it is.  I have a few tricks up my sleeve that I'll be sharing in no time but for now just a little post about our (not so) recent family vacation to Myrtle Beach over Labor Day weekend.

I'll be honest, every time we go to Myrtle Beach we say we're never going back.  And every year...we go back.   It's just so dang convenient, cheap, and the kids absolutely love it!!   Oh, and you can book it last minute for mom's like me who plan trips on a whim.  (I was just reminiscing of our trip two years ago.  Look how little James was!!)

Our last beach vacation this year was back in May.  May felt like a REALLY long time ago and given it was cold still the boys didn't really get to enjoy the beach like I wanted them to.  So two weeks before labor day weekend I decided to call our old faithful Dunes Village Resort to see if they had anything available.  Nothing Friday night which worked out perfect in hindsight because Hermine blew through on Friday, but we booked Saturday, Sunday and Monday night.

We always stay at Dunes for several reasons:

One, there is SO much for the kids to do.

WATERSLIDES 

LAZY RIVERS 

A PLAY GROUND 

GAMES (chess anyone?)

And all RIGHT on the beach!!

Another big selling point for us is the Oceanfront rooms with balcony's.  Nothing beats sitting on the balcony and hearing the ocean at night with a cocktail in hand after we put the kids to bed.

And all the rooms have separate bedrooms and kitchens.  We usually go out to dinner a couple nights and then stay out later on the beach one night and eat in.  But its really nice to have the kitchen for breakfast and lunches and the separate bedrooms are absolutely necessary considering the kids go to bed at 8:30/9pm and we'd like to stay up later.

And lastly, its a 3.5 hr drive from us and only a couple hundred dollars a night, this works perfect for our needs with two small kids right now.

With that said we were on the road Saturday morning by 8:30am and on the Water Slides by 12:30pm.  This was the first family vacation to the beach where both boys were old enough to enjoy it.  They could both ride the waterslides, they're both obsessed with the beach and neither of them were going to melt into a puddle of tears if they didn't get a nap by a certain time.  I feel like we've made it!!  Time for another baby right!? ;)

Hunters favorite part was the ice cream truck, James's favorite part was the water slides, and mommy and daddy's favorite part was nap time on the beach with a cocktail and snacks.

Speaking of snacks...have you tried these new Chobani Greek yogurt dips yet?  If not go get em!!  They were delicious.  We tried both the Chili Lime favor and the Sweet Onion flavor and both were amazing.  A good change of pace from french onion chip dip or hummus.  We had them with corn chips and pretzels just out of convenience at the beach but they would be great with cut up veggies too.  I found them in our grocery fridge section where they keep the pimento cheese and hummus.




Now that we've had a wonderful beach trip to end the summer I think I'm ready for fall. (I think) Sad to see summer go, but ready for some apple picking, college football and trick or treating!!

Work Hard. Play Hard.

Work Hard.

I always check in with my customers a few weeks after they order their new skincare regimen.  Here’s just a few of the responses I’ve gotten lately…. 

Play Hard.

Still reminiscing from our recent trip to Jamaica with friends.  5 kid free and work free days.  The only thing I did with my phone was post on social media which resulted in my own brother defriending me for the week because he got so annoyed with my posts LOL.  Ooopsie, we may have been just a tad bit excited for our first adult vacation in 5 years!!

#lunsfordfamilyvaca2014

After seeing pictures from everyone’s awesome end of summer beach trips, I think I speak for most when I say today was especially hard to return to work. Our trip wasn’t long awaited but I’m so glad we went. Sometimes life just takes us by the horns instead of vice versa and opportunities to create family traditions or make memories are missed. I was craving some family time at the beginning of last week and now we have agreed this will be a yearly tradition to do a family beach trip, just the four of us (or maybe 5 of us one day : ) )

We ended up going to Myrtle beach and stayed at a resort called Dunes village. We typically aren’t the touristy type people and prefer more secluded beaches but our kids are too young to spend all day at the beach right now and therefore you can’t beat Dunes Village, waterslides, playground, lazy river, and pool for the kids, all right on the beach for mom and dad to enjoy while the kids napped. We got into a good little routine while we were there and def could have stayed a few more nights with typical days like this…

7am-ish – Arouse with the kids. Coffee, breakfast, cartoons…just like at home except with a better view

9am-ish – James went down for his morning nap in the room, and I stayed back to pack up the bags for a day on the beach, while Hunter took Hunter V down to the playground to burn some of that 3yr old morning energy.

Hunter would also claim our spot on the beach at this time by setting up our umbrellas and chairs before it got too packed.  After they got back Hunter would pack up the coolers and by 10/10:30 we were off to the waterslides!

10:30am -ish – Waterslides for the little man. This was by far Hunter V’s favorite part of the trip. From the time he was little he has been a sliding machine. The sand on the beach is “too messy” and the beach sun is “too hot” but my fearless two year old never met a slide he didn’t love. He started going down with us and then quickly gained confidence to do it on his own. (Now if we could just teach him to not cut in line!!!)

11:30am-ish – A loop around the lazy river after the waterslides and then off to park our bums on the beach. Once we got to settled in I would give Hunter V his lunch to eat and feed James. For the next hour Hunter V would contently eat his lunch on the beach while watching a show on our phones before he settled down for his nap.

12:30pm –ish - Hunter asleep in the stroller, James asleep on the blanket. We also brought battery operated fans so with the cool fan blowing on them, and the sound of the ocean in the background they had no reason to not nap great!
And for the next 2.5 hrs Hunter and I got to enjoy ourselves.

James would wake up after 30mins to 1hr nap but that was okay too. I remember the days of thinking a 6 month old was hard work. HA!! He’s not mobile yet, and loves to sit on our lap and play so we enjoyed some one on one beach time with him.

3:00pm – ish – Hunter V would wake up from his nap, we would attempt (with fail) to get him to go in the ocean or play in the sand and then give up and just head to the pool. Banana daiquiris daily while at the pool and all were happy.

4:00pm-ish – Back to the waterslides ( you have to walk by the waterslides to get to our room and there is not way the boy will walk by them without riding them)

5pm – ish – Back to the room for showers and to head to dinner.

It was such a good routine and the key was the waterslides, playground and pool for Hunter V to enjoy his vacation as well being he’s not a big beach kid (YET!) 

But Hunter and I LOVE the beach and really got our time out there too, thanks to my good little nappers.

I also highly recommend plenty of shade whether it be two umbrellas like we did (myrtle beach so no tents), a battery operated fan, the bop (for music), and lots of snacks for the kiddos.

Next family event on my list is …Apple Picking!! I say this every year and by the time I get around to looking up places, its October and Apple picking season is over.