Our VERY last day of vacation...

You thought it would never end didn't you?

Normally when it's time to wrap up a vacation, I'm ready to go. Either the kids are driving me bananas, we've seen all there is to see, and/or I'm exhausted. The last time we were in Maui, Alex was at home with his grandparents and I was dying to see him. I had a reason to go home. This time it was entirely different.

As much as I'm not a beach person, Brandon is not a resort person. Prior to having children, we never--not once-- made our way to a hotel pool or a beach while on vacation. Brandon is an activity guy. He likes to participate in every tour or activity a place has to offer. He gets it honestly. Trust me. I love living the resort lifestyle and the kids especially love a new place to swim, which Brandon doesn't understand. "We have a pool at home. You guys swim there every day. Why do you need to swim here?"

So, with trepidation I asked Brandon if we could request a late check out and just fiddle around the resort until we absolutely had to leave. I braced for the usual, "Uh, we don't really have time. We need to get organized and packed." Instead he said, "Of course. Whatever you guys want to do." I think he was afraid I was about to crack.

That's just what we did. We spent a couple of hours on the beach, playing in the waves. Then, we went to the pool and swam with the kids. We ate lunch at the pool-side restaurant and then made our way upstairs to pack. We thought we had oodles of time, but it turned out, we had an hour and a half to shower everyone, dress, and pack up eight days worth of stuff. Oops. I was literally stuffing my toiletries into the luggage while the bellman loaded the cart.

Before we left, I walked through the rooms and just tried to soak it in. Then, in order to fully torture myself, I stepped onto the balcony to commit the view to memory. I burst into tears. Ugly cry. The whole nine yards. Brandon really started to fear the worst and suggested we go shopping and have dinner at Cheeseburger in Paradise. He knows how to fix everything.

Our plane didn't leave until 8:00 p.m., which allowed for several hours of shopping and shave ice eating. We did eat dinner at Cheeseburger and I was so stuffed from my ono sandwich at lunch, I couldn't even finish half. That usually means I have a stomach virus.

We happen to sit on the second floor of the restaurant, because I wanted to sit by the water! The entire place is open-air, so keep that in mind...We were finishing our dinner and I had the camera out taking pictures of the kids drinking out of pineapples, when out of nowhere, we hear squeals and our table is drenched.

I freak out and start wiping down my camera with any available dry napkin I can scrounge. What the hell?! We're on the SECOND floor, at least 20 feet in the air. I asked a waitress, who looked like she'd been around for awhile, how often that happened and she said, "I've worked her 16 years, Cookie and that's the second time it's happened." I think it was the island trying to wash us out to sea, so we couldn't leave. If I could have paid it to do so, I would have!

We finally boarded the plane around 8 p.m., and settled in for a really long flight. I don't sleep on planes, unless I'm in the front, where I can stretch out and I have a personal TV screen, otherwise forget it. I'm an owl! Fortunately, the rest of the family can and did. In fact, they slept pretty much through to Minneapolis. Although, they were a wound up bunch in Seattle at 4 a.m.

I knew we had to come home and get back to reality. I just wasn't ready to. I mentioned something to my friend Jennifer about it and she said, "Well, honey you've had a hard year. So much has happened. No wonder you didn't want to come back to reality."

I guess we kind of have had a stressful year. I didn't think of it as all that stressful, because Brandon is still employed, we have our house, I'm still able to stay home, we have insurance, the kids are healthy, etc. All the things I worry about are in order, and because I'm so busy being so thankful for all of that, I tend to forget about the other stuff. But, when I look back we've had a lot to swallow. Amid the economic insecurities, we lost Brandon's mom, we lost a sweet little friend in Rowyn, I lost my aunt, and reconnected with (and subsequently lost) my dad again, and another good friend is losing his battle with cancer.

Whew! It has been an interesting six months or so. But, that's what life is about. The joys balance the heartaches and this trip was a complete joy. We have so much to be thankful for and feel blessed beyond words to experience all that we do.