we'd do it all over again

♥ a side note : voting ends some time tomorrow for Circle of Moms Top 25 Creative Moms. You can vote once a day. Would you mind taking a moment to cast a vote for me? Thank you! ♥

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I travelled a lot as kid. A father working for commercial airlines meant the freedom to explore lots of places and states, countries, national parks, attractions...

But with all this traveling, many of the "attractions" just a few hours drive from my home, are places where I have never been. 

And so, when given an opportunity through Dan's work to take a (free!) weekend to Ocean City, Dan and I knew that despite our lack of attraction to the beach scene (not to be confused with scenery), we had to cash in on the offer. 

My children (who apparently don't get out much) were through-the-roof excited about the trip. (In hindsight, I'm thinking I could have saved myself a lot of repetitive clarification and re-telling of every minute detail about the trip, if I'd simply sprung the plan on them 20 minutes before departure.)

Anyhow, from the roadtrip (that excitement lasted about 20 minutes), to the hotel stay, to the pool, to the dinners out, and to dream-of-all-dreams: a visit to Assateauge Island, the girls were mildly enthusiastic.  Since January, every journal entry (65 more days until Ocean City!), every dinnertime prayer (thank you God, that we get to go to Ocean City!), every bedtime conversation (How many hours does it take to get there? How big is the pool? Will we really see wild ponies?) has had something to do with the trip.

And so, last weekend it finally arrived. Ocean City is a quiet place in the dead of winter. But in a way, it was kind of nice. The beach is cold and windy and seventeen different shades of grey. And it is beautiful. 

We went to the beach. We ate hotel food and sat through banquets and videos about the history of Dan's company and International Harvester. We swam in the hotel pool and spent dollar upon dollar on wacky arcade games. We collected shells and saw wild ponies.

We had meltdowns.

We (meaning me) wondered at which point the parents begin to have fun on vacations. 

And we slept like rocks that first day back home in our beds. Birdy, clocking a 15 hour sleep.

And I've decided that for me, the best part of vacation is this part. The looking back. The relief that it's over and the joy that we did it. 

The forgetting of the maxed out tired baby, the endless laundry, the packing and unpacking...

And the remembering of their pure joy and excitement and enthusiasm....

And that we'd do it all over again.