Vacation by the Numbers

When the girls were little, we were going to St. Louis for the weekend. As Butch was loading the car, he couldn’t believe all the stuff we had. When I added it up, the 3 girls and I had 26 pairs of shoes. He finally got over it. But ever since, I love learning the “numbers” when we travel. On this trip, there are 11 of us---3 guys and 8 girls.

Here’s how it stacks up:

Shoes---exactly 50 pairs---Mindy wins with 10 pairs---Jordan and I brought 3 pair.

Swim suits---37 total---Morgan wins with 7---only 1 for me*

Dresses/skirts---again, an even 50---Mindy and Morgan tie with 12---zero for me.

Pashminas---we girls love ‘em---8---I brought 2---everyone else brought 1 except Elizabeth who is too little to wear them yet. Included in this number is the one Jordan "borrowed" from my closet before leaving.

*I believe in packing light. I always wear the outfit I came in to go home. I brought 3 outfits for day and 3 outfits for night and planned to wear each twice. There is one outfit I won’t wear at all, so I could have gotten by with 2 for day and 2 for night. When you are in your swimsuit all day, you don’t need a lot of clothes. But you definitely need more than one swim suit. Faced with this dilemma, there was only one thing I could do---laundry. I figured the easiest way to do it was to wear my swimsuit and cover up in the shower. I got myself good and wet. I then squirted myself down with shower gel and proceeded to scrub. Once I had my cover-up clean, I rinsed it out, took it off and rinsed it some more. I wrung it out and threw in in the tub next to the shower. I repeated the same process for the swim suit. Worked like a charm except they didn’t dry overnight---too much humidity.

What I hate about the beach:

sand

that damp feeling all the time

sand

What I love about the beach:

French braiding all the girls hair

Family togetherness

We're having a great time and couldn't ask for better weather. Day 5 & 6 report tomorrow.