The Ultimate Mother’s Vacation (Spoiler Alert – it was in Jekyll Island)

Disclaimer – This is a sponsored post by Jekyll Island.  All opinions are 100% my own.

For Mother’s Day this year, I got the ultimate vacation.  We got to spend the time as a family together on my favorite Georgia coast vacation spot – Jekyll Island.  Okay so things you should know about Jekyll…it’s about as quaint and beautiful and quiet as it comes.  I am gonna tell you the honest to goodness truth….this island is made for moms and families.  Here are my reasons why I love it….

Reason #1 – The Quiet Beaches.  The beaches on Jekyll Island are public and the island itself is a state park….BUT they are so quiet, it feels like a luxury private beach meant all for you.  I mean…we aren’t talking about a beach with a hundred girls in thongs or college breakers getting rowdy.  We are talking about one of the most secret little beaches with plenty of room to run and explore and not get run over by a float or step on a beer can.  This is one of my absolute favorite things.  It’s hard enough to squeeze my mom-bod into a bathing suit, or worry about watching four kids near a giant body of water….this beach makes it completely worth it.

Reason #2 – The Kid Friendly Activities.  We have gone to a bunch of different beach vacations but we keep coming to Jekyll because there are always lots of fun activities that the kids love.  We can bike, play mini golf, go to the water park, fish, take a boat ride, or visit the Georgia Sea Turtle Center….the options are really impressive for such a small place.  And all of the events are not super crowded so you feel like the quality time is THAT much better.  And isn’t that what all moms want on vacation?  A wholesome activity filled time where you feel like everyone is making the best memories?

Reason #3 – It’s Quaint.  Basically you can ride your bike all over the island and never see a string of commercial fast food buildings.  The scenery is straight up beautiful and picture worthy.  Everywhere you go, there are picturesque backdrops for taking photos of your kids.  And because it is so quiet and inviting, it just makes everyone really pause and appreciate the beauty…instead of rushing off to the next thing.

Of course, there are probably about a million other reasons to go but honestly, a picture speaks a million words and that is why I am sharing our most recent family vacation – a short three night jaunt to Jekyll with one long weekend celebrating Mother’s Day.  I think we should vote that every mom goes on vacay for Mother’s Day….who’s with me?!

We actually arrived at the cottage on Jekyll really really late at night (after midnight and we just transferred the boys to bed!) so in the morning, we had a nice time sleeping in and waking up to the sounds of crashing waves.  Euphoria people.  Also – so many people have asked us where we stayed and it was The Cottages at Jekyll Island.  They are individually owned homes in a community that has a pool, a clubhouse, and all the modern amenities that you would expect.  I will show y’all more photos of that in my next post and so you can see how beautiful it was!  (***UPDATE – So many of you have asked about the cottages and how to secure it for your next vacay….they can be rented through this site – www.Parker-Kaufman.com – each one is different and most can fit 6-8 people)  

Since it was Mother’s Day, we decided to have the ‘legendary’ brunch at the Jekyll Island Club Resort and it was incredible.

We have never actually been inside the hotel but it was GORGEOUS.  Will’s favorite part was the ‘infinity mirrors’ 🙂

We hung outside till the brunch was ready and I love this one….Weston is pointing to his baby 🙂

Right near the main building is this quaint villa that has a beautiful lawn and fountains.  The kids were immediately drawn to it.

William decided to go nuts with my camera and he would tell me all these poses.  He also took some really good shots of the plant life and about seventeen hundred of a bug he saw 🙂

  

The boys found a couple playmates that were staying there and they all decided to play a couple rounds of touch football.  It was so cute.

Once brunch was ready, I was starving (#alwayspregnant #alwayshungry) and they allowed me to snap a few photos before they opened for the masses!

It’s an ice sculpture guys.  An ICE SCULPTURE.  For Mother’s Day!  They really know what’s up.

They had all these different sections….meat carving, your custom omelet, fruit, crab legs….

One of my favorite was these little salads in cups.  It was the perfect way to make something ordinary into a special side!

And the desserts!  SO good.

The entire place was very fancy….we had to remind the kids to have good manners and prayed they wouldn’t melt before we could snag them a muffin!

Thankfully they were extremely good while we got the food (those iPhone monster truck games always help!).

This was my second plate.  I know.  Should have gotten more claws 🙂

And William and Weston made me this very special Mother’s Day cupcake.  My favorite part is the upside down chocolate.

Since we were in walking distance to the Georgia Sea Turtle Center, we scooted over there after brunch and the kids loved it just as much as last year.

The Georgia Sea Turtle Center is a big educational building and attached is a little sea turtle hospital where they rehabilitate turtles that have been hurt or gotten frost bite, etc.

It’s not a petting zoo – it’s very educational and the boys thought the most interesting part was asking what happened to each shelled friend.

They also liked seeing the ‘booboos’ and telling us about how they want to help each one.  I appreciated the fact that this center helps them understand that most animals are wild and we are supposed to help them.

Inside the center, it was a lot less crowded this time (could have something to do with it being Mother’s Day at around noon!).

And Jeremy found his wardrobe twin 🙂  We were dying laughing at this….

The babies were needing a nap, so we went back to our cottage and had a snack and put the boys down.  The big boys got to change and go swimming with daddy 🙂

And then once everyone woke up, we loaded up the car and headed down the street to the Jekyll Island water park called Summer Waves.

This was actually the second day it was open this year and I am now obsessed with it.  It’s a MUST-DO place for this island.

It was perfect for our age kids and for some that are a bit older.

The splash pad area was not crowded at all and the boys took a little time to warm up to the idea….

But soon, they all were LOVING it.  I wish we had one of these in our town!

Also – this happened and I might frame it 🙂

The park also has one of those giant wave pools and the kids were really brave and decided to all go in.

Also – I can’t tell you how much I appreciated it that this entire place was clean and I didn’t have to shield anyone’s eyes from excessive PDA.  I mean….I don’t know why that bothers me….obviously I canoodle a lot with Jeremy Bower….but it just made the entire park feel so much more family friendly!

Hands down, the favorite for the little ones was this new area with kiddie slides.  They have life guards at the top and bottom to help man the slides and they all did this for about an hour.

For those mama’s out there….LJ is size 2T – he is a little dude but he had no problem navigating any of the slides or areas.

And I got to sit under the umbrella when I wasn’t obsessing over that VW Beetle van part of the water play area.

William however thought the best part was the slides and the lazy river.  He is officially a swimmer and tall enough to do all the big kid stuff…so he would go with Jeremy and did every.single.slide.

That day we literally shut the park down.  We were one of the last to leave and the kids kept on saying that it was THE BEST.

We didn’t even change them out of their clothes and we just headed straight to dinner.  That night we went to Beach House and it was seriously the cutest.

I wish I had a better picture of the inside…it had shell light fixtures and coolest beachy vibe.

We hung outside near the ping pong table and the corn hole games till we were seated.

Also the light in those magnificent trees was begging me to take ALL the pictures.

We got to sit outside near the outdoor fireplace and it was literally such a great kid friendly place.  It was also dog-friendly….that’s right….making me wish we brought Bear.

Apparently I ordered the wrong thing….a pasta with shrimp…because as I was leaving someone told me that next time I should get the broiled shrimp or fried shrimp.  Whoops!  I guess that is my excuse to come back next time! ha!

And dinner time was the perfect time to also go down to the beach.  We were literally the only people we saw.

We totally had a Kardashian moment where the world felt like it revolved around us.  I mean….who is spoiled enough to get an entire beach to themselves?!

It really was the perfect way to spend the day….I couldn’t think of a single thing I would have changed and I felt BEYOND spoiled.  And our vacation wasn’t even over!  We still had a full day of activities the next day and one of them included me getting one of my favorite maternity photos ever.  That’s right!  Stay tuned for all of the details on day two of our Jekyll getaway!

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Jekyll Island Authority. The opinions and text are all mine.