Maine: York Beach

Ever since we moved back East I have wanted to go up to Maine and spend a day on the beach.  There are so many famous beach towns that I cannot wait to someday visit such as Nantucket, Cape Cod, Hampton Beach, and Martha's Vineyard.  When I found out that Jesse was going to be gone all summer and that I would be working much less, I knew that visiting Maine had to be on the agenda at some point.  After pushing it back several different times, I finally took the children to Maine with me a few weeks back and we had a BLAST!  We drove a little over two hours and then perched ourselves at the beach for the entire day.  It was so relaxing to just let them wander and play.  The only thing that could have made it any better was if my hubby would have been with us......next time of course.  One of my bucket list additions after this trip, is to someday spend a good month at a vacation house in Maine with the children and have lots and lots of beach time together.  Maine is just so pretty with it's 3,000+ miles of coastline, amazing seafood {especially lobster}, and quiet charm it's easy to understand why it is known as "Vacationland".

Over the past year we {Jesse and I} have had TERRIBLE luck with cell phones.  Like embarassingly bad luck.  After getting both phones replaced in April due to a malfunction on each, both of our new phones started having problems by June.  Then Jesse's phone was stolen while he was in Baltimore. This left us with one semi-working cell phone.  When Jesse came home in July, I ended up giving him my phone to use for the remainder of the summer.  For this particular trip to Maine, I was quite proud of myself.  I managed to mapquest before I left and then completely navigate my way without use of a phone. 

I really am lucky to have such good children that are willing to drive several hours to play at a beach and then drive several hours back home.  Kindle's were a necessary addition to the trip, but all in all they were phenomenal traveling companions.

Eli loved trying out the boogie board on the little waves as they crashed into shore.  My children are tough stuff.....this water was freezing cold!

Robby's "big muscles" picture

Eli recently learned how to write his name and he had a great time practicing his handwriting skills in the sand

After finishing up at the beach, we took a drive over to "Nubble Lighthouse".  We would have walked around a little more, but Robby lost one of his flip flops between the beach and the car and so he had to ride backpack on me whenever we got out of the car.

Miss M with her top knot 'do

Our ice cream dinner after a day at the beach.

 --the only irritating fact from the whole day interestingly enough happened at this very same ice cream stop. The Olympics were currently in full force and the day of our beach trip was the Women's Team Final.  I was trying so hard to not get online, listen to radio stations, or watch television until that evening so I could watch it in surprise during the nightime showing.  Eli kept tumbling around on the ground as we waited for our ice cream.  Another well-meaining customers turned and smiled at me and said that I should put my son in gymnastics.  She then said "Hopefully he can help the US men's team do better than their pitiful finish this year.  Thank goodness the Women's team made up for it and won today".   I gave her a feeble smile and internally was steaming that I would no longer would be surprised.

I am seriously in love with all the houses up in Maine ♥

Perfect day: beach, ocean, sunshine, ice cream for dinner, and now womens gymnastics. My kids told me I'm the best mom in the world (shocker right?!)