A Hop, Skip and a Jump Away: A Quick Trip to PEI

On Friday morning, we packed up the Loser Cruiser, picked up Zoe's friend Jill and headed to Prince Edward Island for the weekend because the girls had a soccer tournament there. It was a fantastic weekend! The weather was perfect, our cottage was adorable, and the U16 girls played some awesome soccer games. In fact, they won 2 games out of three, which won them a spot in the finals, and in the end, they came home with the gold!

Baby Girl even won Player of the Game for the second game they played! Zoe's game is not about glory. She plays the middle field, and rather than getting goals or saving goals, she sets up the plays. She looks for openings and passes the ball. She stops the opposing team from heading down the center of the field, and she keeps the ball in her half. I imagine it to be a hard position to play. Rarely, are you ever cheered from the sidelines, and rarely, are you ever the star of the game. So, on Saturday afternoon, after Zoe played probably the best game of her life in the baking PEI sun, we were thrilled to learn that the opposing team's coach took notice of Zoe's efforts and skills. He saw what a valuable player she is, he noticed how influential she was in the game even though she never scored a goal, and in the end, he awarded her MVP. I am such a proud mama!

Since the soccer games were in Charlotttetown, we found a tiny cottage twenty minutes outside of town in Stanhope, PEI, and I was pleasantly surprised to learn that that we were only a ten minute walk away from Brackley Beach. With Zoe's games being played on Saturday, we were able to spend Friday afternoon at the beach. While the girls jumped in the surf and attracted the attention of a young man visiting from Ontario (tee hee!), Mr. Level-Headed built sandcastles with the boys and I fell asleep on the beach blanket. Sun and pregnancy do not mix well!

Later that evening, we met up with some of Zoe's teammates and their families for dinner. Afterwards, we headed back to our cottage, where the boys (Mr.Level-Headed included) became enthralled in a documentary about King Tut on the History Channel. The girls headed back to the beach in the guise of wanting to play beach volleyball, but we knew they were really hoping to bump into the blond cutie from Ontario once again . . . wink, wink. Unfortunately, they had no luck and ended up watching the tail end of the documentary with us.

The next morning, we woke up early for the girls' first game. Mr. Level-Headed in all his wisdom, offered to take them so that I could take the boys back to the beach. Elliot was entirely off his rocker this trip. He needs time to get comfortable in his new surroundings and to adjust to the schedule of vacation. Unfortunately, a three day trip does not provide enough time for him to do this, and so to help us all cope with his nervousness, his negativity, and his inability to remain in the same place for more than thirty minutes (sounds fun, right?), we gave him plenty of down time. We took many mini trips to the pool (again, never longer than thirty minutes), we took him to the beach, we allowed him a lot of screen time (the only thing that settles him at these times), and we fed him pizza (his favourite food!). When he did have to watch a soccer game, only one I might add, we let him sit in the shade behind my lawn chair and play on his Ipod. It breaks my heart to see him so disengaged from what is going on around him, but, Mr. Level-Headed comforted me by pointing out that our first priority was to help Elliot feel at ease, and if that meant we spent lots of time in the cottage letting him watch TV or allowing him to play on his Ipod during dinner with people he did not know or while watching a soccer game in a place he was unfamiliar with, then that's what we needed to do. Gosh darn it, I love that man!

Apart from one epic poutine binge (more details tomorrow), that was pretty much our trip. On Sunday morning, we woke up and went to church in Charlottetown, where we got to see some good friends we have not seen in a long time. Mr. Level-Headed was not impressed with how many Young Men there are in the Charlottetown church, but Zoe did not seem bothered by it at all . . . tee hee! The boys immediately made new friends and Zoe added lots of new names to her list of Facebook friends. She is very eager to catch up with them all again on a youth trip they are taking to New York state later this week. Poor, Mr. Level-Headed!

On the drive home, as we crossed over the bridge, we all turned and bid farewell to Prince Edward Island. We have so many fond memories of the family vacations we have taken here. Some short, some long, and some really long (thanks to car trouble), but all of them fun. I was a little sad to see this family vacation come to an end, especially since we rarely ever get to spend three whole days with Mr. Level-Headed lately, but I quickly consoled myself with the thought that next time we cross over that terrifyingly long bridge, we will have Thing 4 in tow and will be able to create a whole new set of Island memories. Yippee!

And now here come the dreaded vacay photos: