Beach Day #1

Amber found this great beach house in Gulf Shores, Alabama with 4 bedrooms and 3 full baths, a large living area and a great kitchen!  Seating for 10 with the table for 6 + seating at the bar + a table with two chairs from the living room. Perfect for a Family Vacation which includes the quads, parents, and BOTH sets of grandparents!

The beach is a 2 minute walk across the street!

We stopped at Best Buy on our way down here to buy a camera for Louis Dean.

He has a really expensive  good one at home but he can NOT find it! He has a penchant for putting things in TUBS and we will probably find it - sooner or later! This pic of me in the dining area of the beach house was one of his first shots on his new camera.

Today - Monday - was the first of three Beach Days!

It was a PERFECT one here in Gulf Shores, Alabama!!

While Louis Dean did NOT spend the day on the beach as the rest of us did - he DID come down to check it out and take a few photos.

THIS is his version of 'beach wear!'

The same as he wears every day!

H eonly rolled the legs up!

He promises he will actually wear a swimsuit and get in the water tomorrow! We'll see!

I will document it for sure!

The water and the surf and the sun were awesome today and I loved every minute of it!

Okay! I KNOW I am short! Five feet and one half inch - down from the 5'2" I used to be!

But I had no idea how that looked next to a guy that was over 6 feet!

While I don't feel 'itty bitty' anymore.....I guess I am - in comparison to HIM!!!

It was a wonderful Beach Day!!

ALL of us are on the same laid back schedule.

Late to bed and late to rise.

Amber and Mike were in charge of breakfast - which was served up at noon.

Crisply fried bacon and Amber's homemade pancakes - both plain and with chocolate chips - along with orange juice, coffee and fruit was a meal to remember!

It was a wonderful to eat together while we planned out the rest of the day.

We ate a lunch type snack on the beach and the kids played and played and played.

I sat and thought and meditated and soaked up every ounce of the sun's energy today.

Thinking and being takes time. I had some of that time today. I came to terms with a few things and I made some plans. I am determining where I plan to spend my life's energy and what I want to accomplish in the next few years ahead. Change is the normal theme of life and life is always changing. For the last 6 years we have been totally invested in the Quad Experience. Louis Dean did an absolutely amazing job of restoring the camper and then taking it down to Katy where we lived in it for 7 months. We closed up our house in Irving and our life as we knew it and put all our energy into supporting Amber and Mike and the babies.....then unborn. The quads are now 5 years old and starting Kindergarten later this month. Times change and needs change.

While for over 5 years I have shared our journey with them - from the pregnancy through their births and Harrison's struggle to survive and Kailey's open heart surgery and all the milestones in between - I must now respect their privacy and, at the request of their parents,  I will no longer be sharing their journey in pictures. They are starting school soon and this is just the beginning of all the changes they will be facing in life.

Since I have shared all the sorrows as well as the joys of our journey - I do not want to be coy and only show shadows of their photos and I don't want to seem to be playing games with them.

This is what the parents feel is best and so we must respect those feelings.

This evening I was at Target in the Starbucks area there, waiting for Amber to finish her shopping when the storm clouds blew in and built up in a short amount of time. We managed to get back to the beach house before the storm hit.

While I may not be able to share the joys of photos and videos of our life with the quads - I will continue to share my heart and my life!

And tonight - after the quads and their parents were in bed, both sets of grandparents sat out on the beach house balcony together sipping wine and talking about our wonderful grand quads and their amazing parents.

I love you all and thank you for every prayer and all the love and support though this journey.