St. Simon's Island!!!

Last month, we headed down to St. Simons Island for a little getaway. It was our very first time and we LOVED IT. Loved it so much I started looking for real estate!!! Heehee!! Such a groovy little place.

Of course, the first thing we did was run to the beach to do some sunset-gymnastics:

A boy and his dog:

We weren't there for 10 minutes and already had a speedo sighting!! This place was for us!! :)

Heading out to the sand bars in the ocean:

It drove Henry crazy when his family went all the way out to the ocean. He kept digging and crying to try to "save" them. When he gets upset, his ears get really stupid.

Not that anyone was taunting him or anything:

And even before unpacking, we had to check out the pools for a little night swimming:

 On our first morning, we had coffee with the mermaids.... 

 .....and ran straight back to the beach!!

 A few more flips, of course: 

 Daddy relaxes for a few minutes....

 .....but it doesn't take long for him to hit the water. He's my biggest kid. ;)

 Here come the BIRDS!! 

(note these cheeto in the bird's mouth) :)

 Back to the pools: 

 Time to go eat and explore a bit (btw, St. Simons has the BEST food EVERRRR) 

 Shopping for nonsense. A vacation tradition: 

 Checking out the lighthouse (that we PROMISED ourselves we would climb the following morning). :)

My favorite thing about St. Simons is the TREES!!! The kids loved them, too!!

Many of the trees had "tree spirits" carved into them. We could only find two, but they are apparently hidden throughout the island. We hope to find them all during our next trip!!

We found a groovy (and LARGE) playground. The girls squealed like we were in Disney when we saw it:

Even fun for Mama & Daddy!!

The next morning, we kept our promise to ourselves and got up early to climb that lighthouse!!

We first had to watch an "educational" video, which was rather boring, honestly.....

....except to our little brainiac who found it fascinating :)

And, we're off!! Up, up, and away!!!

We finally made it to the top (Nora and Daddy weren't feeling it AT ALL - scaredy cats) :)

Lovely view of the water park and ocean:

Heading back down like our life depended on it:

Checking out the lighthouse museum:

Nora was so excited to find a little statue named "Nora." She said, "Oh, she's beautiful!!"

Since we spotted the waterpark from atop the lighthouse, where do you think we had to go next??

Play a little cornhole before lunch, one of Nora's hidden talents:

Chilling out by my trees to digest:

Normally, I like to get some family photos at the beach, but this time, we wanted some photos by our TREES - they made you feel like you were in some wonderland. Or fairyland, as the girls say.

Right.

We have real-life fairies :)

After taking some family pics, we headed over to the Crab Trap - literally one of the BEST restaurants on the planet. I would drive down for the day JUST to eat there, no kidding.

Killing time while waiting for a table:

Ella had a slight wardrobe malfunction while eating:

Then, we headed to the Pier to walk off the massive amounts of crab that we consumed:

Intrigued by all the fishermen:

Turns out, God was putting on His own fireworks show. So perfect and beautiful:

We ended our late night with more shopping and ICE CREAM!!

Our last day at the beach. Perfect day!! We stayed there from sun up to sun down:

One more "night on the town:"

 OYSTERS!! 

Ended our trip with a visit to the candy store, equipped with candy flamingos (for Grandmommie):

Biggest lollipops ever:

And check out the size of those gummybears up top!!

It was such a fun and wonderful trip, and we have fallen in love with St. Simons Island. We can't wait to go back. I'll leave you with a picture of my favorite tree (and my favorite people):

Cheers to island life, with giant gummies and gypsy trees!!!