Spoiled Rotten

We just returned from a five day vacation to Marco Island, a secluded little beach off of Naples, FL.  

With my husbands knack for finding good deals and our plot to save up credit card points to use for occasions such as this, we found ourselves in luxury that I am not used to vacationing in.  Now my kids and I are spoiled rotten.  Poor Jason, he has raised the bar to the point that a normal hotel room  will never again do the trick.  Not really.  I'm just saying that if one of the perks of him traveling all the time is having enough  Marriott points to vacation in luxury, then I'm all for it!

Our room  had two bedrooms, a full size kitchen, and a full size living room and dining room.  Then it had an ocean view porch that wrapped around the entire room with lots of comfy furniture to lounge around on.  Without children, I could have had a vacation without ever leaving the room.  Lounging on the lanai with the waves crashing me to sleep would have been enough.  

The only down side was that the pool with waterslide was so much fun for the kids, the beach was more like torture to them, or something that must be tolerated in order to get back to the pool.  Our plan was to go to the beach all morning, go up for lunch, and swim in the pool all afternoon.  By the second day, we found ourselves skipping the beach just so we wouldn't have to hear the kids every five minutes, "Is it time to go to the pool now?" or worse, the slow whine, "I want to go to the poooooool".  No amount of food, sand castle building, or shelling could deter them.  I think the story would have been different had the ocean been calm enough to play in.  With storms blowing through every day, it was a bit rough for even me.  

Jason and I enjoyed vacationing with friends because when the kids were in bed, we had a nightly card game with the Pardue's.  I should say, Stacie and I, one team, took it to Cliff and Jason, the other team, winning three nights to two.  It was competition at it's finest.  Seeing as I usually don't have a competitive bone in my body, it seeded a fun rivalry that I'm sure will now continue.  Jason also had a partner to play two rounds of golf with, which made it more of a vacation for him since his tolerance of the sun and the beach is limited.  

Both families took turns sitting through the time share presentation which resulted in a good laugh at the prospect of that as well as two free rounds of golf and two almost free spa pedicures.  A little something for everyone!  

We had a great time spending time together as a family.  Jason and I must have went down the waterslide 100 times between the both of us taking Owen down or riding with Amelia for fun.  Lane was, "a liddle scarwed" of the slide and stayed closer to the water fountains where he thought it was hysterical to stand on them and pretend like he was peeing.  That's my boy!  Owen amazed all on-lookers as he is at that no-fear stage with the water.  He loves being thrown up, sunk under, floating on his back, and doing his impersonation of a duck as he puts his head under and kicks.  

Daily rain showers or thunderstorms were little more than an inconvenience and served as a great time to come in out of the sun and rest a while.  Speaking of rest, I think I napped with Lane and Owen almost every day AND got to sleep in past 8 o'clock each day.  Talk about a treat!  I guess the sun and water just wore the kids out because it is highly uncharacteristic of them to sleep a minute past 7.  Of course it didn't even last one day at home as they were bright and cheery again this morning at the first sign of daylight.  

Now we have the weekend to ease back into normal life before Jason returns to work on Monday.  It was the best vacation we've had yet and look forward to returning to Marco Island again soon.