The Murphy Family Adventures: 31 for 21 - Goose Rocks Beach Vacation

In July, we went on vacation for a week with friends and family in the Kennebunk, ME area. I was so excited for this vacation for many different reasons. First of all, it was the first time since our honeymoon over 7 years ago that I was taking an entire week off from everything! I have taken lots of days and and half a week, but never a full week away from it all so that was very nice! No work, no therapy sessions, no running around like crazy. Secondly, we were going on vacation with some of our best friends...my brother Mike and and sister-in-law, Miss and my beautiful neices, Madi and Emma, as well as our great friends, Mel & Luke with their kids Jack and Piper, Becky and Liam with their kids Alana and Liam, and Joel and Andrea with their son Sam. We started looking for a beach house over 6 months ago, and found one that could accomodate us and was in a decent price range that was described as minutes from the beach. After booking the house we realized that minutes from the beach actually meant driving minutes and the house was 7.3 miles away from the beach. Though I was a little disappointed by this at first since it meant I would not be able to run on the beach in the morning, it worked out really well in the end.

When we first arrived at the house, we were a little shocked! It looked very nice from the outside. Large house that could technically be broken into a duplex attached to an old barn. Upon entering the house we realized that it was very old as it had the musty, cat pee smell in every room. It was extremely stuffy and about 95 degrees in the house. No air conditioning. It had 2 separate kitchens and 2 living rooms which was a plus with the amount of people who would be there for the week. It also had 2 separate staircases leading to the 7 bedrooms upstairs. The rooms were all decent sizes, however, the stairs were very steep and not great for the young kids! Luckily we had brought 2 gates from home and found some extra's at the house. One of the rooms had the stairs as part of the room with no door or railing...definitely not safe! But we moved a dresser and blocked them off so it all worked out.

We were all a little skepticle on how the week was going to turn out based on the conditions of the house, but it turned out to be a fantastic week and aside from the house being so far from the beach, I really think it was a nice place. We didn't have to worry about the kids breaking anything and I know for a fact that Koolaid and Milk were both spilled on the carpet and no one will every know about it =) By the third night it had cooled off drastically so sleeping was a lot better!

We went to the beach everyday and could not have asked for better weather. It was absolutely gorgeous. The beach was beautiful and very quiet. The water was cold, but not bitter cold. Connor loved the sand and the water. He played in the sand for hours shoveling and building and loving every minute of it. He loved to watch and play with the other kids. He enjoyed playing in the water as well. He crawled into the waves and would then crawl as fast as he could to outrun the waves! Makayla loved the beach as well! She has always loved both the sand and the water and of course had a fantastic time.

Mom and Makayla