Time to take the 3.5 hour trek to Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina. This is an optimistic estimate- one that can be done for all of you readers who make “normal” times without children.

Where is Ocean Isle Beach?

Ok ok, I am a nerd and like to talk FACTS and history and stuff. But, I won’t bore you with the details about the island, just this one thing to get an idea of exactly which part of NC we are talking about:

Every year?

Yup. This has been going on for a long bit. I just married into it. And here is a fun flashback down memory lane, for most of the 15 years that I have been a part of it:

For the images above, I made it so you can look at the full-size pic if you click on it.

The Menu

Oh, this is good, and it is unshakable. It is almost unchanged, except when someone gets married and has to start contributing their own part of the week, but is as follows:

• Saturday. Lasagna. This is new, and replaced the seafood boil, which was a tall order to pull off on the day we all arrived. It does take quite a bit of prep work.
• Sunday. Pulled pork, Mac and cheese.
• Monday. Hamburgers and hot dogs; but they are really, really good hot dogs, not your average Oscar Mayer.
• Tuesday. Fish Tacos/Shrimp Tacos. This is the one Taylor and I help with. I just warm the corn tortillas, but I am still trying to work my way up the totem pole to contribute my culinary skills.
• Wednesday Steak and twice baked potatoes. These are a home run, as always.
• Thursday. Pizza. Its easy. And a good pizza joint too.
• Friday. Leftovers. We are all exhausted and have to clear out the fridge.

The Beach.

The house is on third street, which means the sand is about 300 yards from the steps of the house. In the olden days (pre-kids), this journey would require:

• chairs
• Bocce ball
• corn hole
• sunscreen
• towels
• coolers, ice and beer
• Koozies
• Boogie board
• Bottled Water
• Snacks
• A book

Now that we have a Rosie, Mercy, Everly and a Sadie on the scene, there have been a few adjustments:

• No time for bocce ball. Gotta keep those kids alive in the ocean all day.
• No corn hole either.
• Yes, we need booze.
• Rosie is big enough for a boogie board, that is fun.
• There are never enough snacks.
• Books? Yeah right.
• Umbrellas. Gotta take skin care serious now. And no one wants to get burned out there all day.
• A bucket of kids toys. They love them.

Ted (my father in law) was awesome enough to set up the umbrellas and chairs just about every day, which helped a ton for when the troops made the journey down to the sand every day.

The kids.

My first 5 years, there were no kids. The second 5 years, Rosie was the only kid. The past 5 years, there have been several kids. Ok, that math isn’t exact, but is is a round about idea of things.

They love it. You wanna talk about fun? Talk about a week at the beach with ice cream and your cousin:

Or, a week hanging out with your big sister:

Derek makes some things look easy.

Mercy is getting bigger and was eager to try out anything her big sis does. Rosie got a chance to play with her friend Hadley, and they were on the boogie board for about 3 hours straight. And Mercy wants to do everything her big sister does:

One of the staples has been the July 4th parade each year. It is completely open to anyone, and doesn’t require any pre-registration or work. You just have to show up an hour before the parade starts. Cars go first, and then golf carts. They did away with the throwing out candy, but people still did it.

The parade is always a highlight. This year, Mercy was old enough to stay up and watch the fireworks, which we can see from the house:

No matter what is happening, the kids will have fun, and it really is fun to be a part of:

If the kids are having too much fun, beach patrol will let you know about it, just like they did to the group next to us on the beach who dug a hole too deep. Beach Patrol got out and ensured it wasn’t beyond acceptable depths with his tape measure:

Rosie is 9 years old and it is great to see her old enough to have her own fun. One of the highlights of the week for me was to take a short walk to the pier (1/4 mile). It was at the end of the week, and we just had a good old time talking about rollercoasters. She asked, “if you could design any roller coaster, what would it be like?”. I just thought it was sweet, and we got a good pic of the moment:

The house is full and it is a good old time. There are noisy kids playing games, early in the morning whether you like it or not. They are sweet though, because this phase of life is going to be over soon enough.

In addition to the kids, there are many adults with many different opinions- on just about everything. It isn’t any different than any other family vacation when a bunch of people are living under the same roof. I have learned to get through the week by balancing some introvert time into my day, which means reading a bit in the morning, and playing Zelda on my Nintendo Switch in the afternoon, and it works great. We went to the public library this year before the trip, and I got this one:

Maybe I am getting old if I am interested in history more than many other topics. But, Genghis Khan was a badass, and this book confirmed it.

Since most of you reading this blog were on the trip with me, and I don’t really have any witty insights, here are a bunch of pictures from the week:

Also, here is the link to beach week last year (2023): https://www.theloganfam.com/2023/07/10/beach-week-2023/

And from 2022: https://www.theloganfam.com/2022/07/11/beach-week-2022-birthdays-and-breakdowns/