Kid Free Vaca!

I had a wonderful time with my bestie Jess in Charleston for my first kid free vaca of the year, and the first one since Mason was born. It’s become a bit of a tradition, it seems because I went for my first kid free vaca when Parker turned one. Of course, it was wonderful to see Jess. We’ve been friends since middle school, so when I see her, I have no inhibitions, and I can completely let loose and relax with her. I love that. Although we had lots of fun activities planned for us to do, you know what activity I was MOST looking forward to? Sleeping in! I couldn’t remember the last time I slept in, it was probably when we had our little mini-babymoon before Mason was born. So, sleeping in was nice. Especially since Parker has the tendency to wake up between 6:45 and 7am and go potty, and then sleep a mere 15-30mins more after that. It can be so tiring every single day. Of course, I could just go to bed early, but that would dig into our personal time of doing chores, updating the blog, catching up on our favorite shows, so we typically don’t get into bed until closer to 11:30 or 12. What a treat it was to roll out of bed after 9am, without two kiddos pleading for my attention? Very very nice.

I got there around 6pm on Thursday, and since it was the first night, we just took it easy and grabbed some sushi to go. We stayed up and caught up and chatted, and then hit the sack. The next day we decided since the weather was perfect, that we would do some paddle boarding. One awesome thing about staying with Jess, is that her fiance Chad has every outdoor sport gear imaginable, so they had two paddle boards ready to go, they just needed to be loaded on the rack of the car. Since Chad was out of town, that left Jess and I to figure out how to secure them, thinking it wouldn’t be too hard. Well, we got a reality check when we took our first turn gassing it out of the neighborhood. The boards went-a-sliding! Jess pulled over in time to avert a real traffic disaster, and we re-secured the boards, but Jess wasn’t impressed. We went back to the house to see if we could reach Chad on his cell, but he was out surfing. We decided to do some youtube searches, and finally we were confident enough after watching a few “how to” clips, to try our hand at securing the boards the correct way, and make our way to the beach. It was SO worth it! Paddle boarding is so fun, relaxing, yet takes core muscles and focus. It was perfect!

It was amazing how much we could see and do without kiddos! We later did some shopping, mani/pedi and enjoyed a nice dinner on Sullivan’s Island. It was weird not having to worry about a nap schedule, or cooking, or anything kid related! It was nice to get updates on my phone from the hubby of cute little things the boys were doing. Dan took them out to the Aquarium one day while I was gone, and also took the boys out for frozen yogurt. This was a real treat. It was Mason’s first cone, and Parker’s second, so I guess it was pretty well deserved. I know both Daddy and the boys loved having some extra attention paid just between the three of them, as much I loved some time with Jess.

On Saturday, We walked the bridge to Mt. Pleasant where we enjoyed some beautiful views and that evening we celebrated Jess’ birthday by going out to a swanky restaurant. Honestly, I don’t even remember the name, but it had some amazingly delicious salmon served with a “corn pudding” that was very delightful. We got all glammed up to go to the Charleston Fashion Show. We didn’t really know what to expect, but we had a wonderful time! We had great seats, and there were very upscale and stylish fashion lines. There were a few emerging designers that had interesting lines, but it all made for great entertainment!

On our last day, we just took it easy, played some tennis… okay, well we just smacked some balls around and ran after them, it was still fun! We enjoyed a leisure lunch and then walked the pier at Shem Creek Park. We were able to spot some dolphins and see kayakers during the walk, as well as quite a few fiddler crabs in the marsh. It was so peaceful and beautiful. The perfect way to end the vaca!