Summer Lovin’: Nights in Outer Banks
Hey y’all! I’m Jessica and you can normally find me blogging at my own little corner of cyberspace, Heart on Homestead, but when Couple of Crumbs asked me to guest post, I could hardly pass it up. My blog normally consists of all things me: life, love, cooking, and my dog, Bodie. However, when the weather gets warm, and I’m not at work, you can bet my butt is gonna be on the beach.
It’s hard to believe another Summer has almost come and gone. Before we know it, Fall will be here and there will be pumpkins on our doorstep and the Autumn leaves will be on the ground. However, the recent heatwave has really got me reminiscing about the past year and how I’ve spent my Summer vacations.
Every June, as soon as school lets out, the countdown begins. My nieces, 10 and 13, become restless and stir crazy sitting at home, ready to hit the road to the beach. I can’t say that I blame them because I normally start packing a good two weeks in advance myself. I’ll start my “to take to the beach” pile which includes countless bathing suits and beach towels, hats and sunglasses. And we can’t forget the sunscreen. Once my bag is packed and the day finally arrives, it’s like Christmas morning. Running on just a few hours sleep, my husband and I load up our vehicle and join the family convoy heading South. After six hours in the hammer lane, I’m finally home.
I say home because I truthfully feel that way about the Outer Banks. It’s where I fell in love with my husband, where he proposed and where we got married. It’s almost like I’m living a real-life Nicholas Sparks novel, which isn’t surprising because he’s my favorite author. I can’t help but connect with his words and characters and picture myself right there in the story line. I mean, how can I not picture myself alongside my favorite characters when I’m on the exact beach where they filmed Nights in Rodanthe? I may not look like Diane Lane and my husband certainly is no Richard Gere (my husband’s better looking!) but we certainly know how to bump up the romance while we’re on vacation. Call us cliche but we’ve been known to take nightly walks at sunset along the beach, have candlelit dinners on the deck by the water and enjoy the quiet evenings, just the two of us, away from the family. If that doesn’t rival Nicholas Sparks, I don’t know what does.
By the time our two weeks at the beach come to a close, it’s almost as if my husband and I have rekindled our relationship and we’ve become closer to our family. However, on that last night, when the entire beach house is cleaned and all our bags are packed to come home, a wave of sadness seems to overcome everyone. We all get quiet and melancholy and head to bed early, dreading the following day when we leave our paradise behind us.
Nonetheless, we get in the car and drive home, we’ll start the countdown to next year’s beach trip. Our “Nights in Rodanthe” will begin all over again next summer, we just have to be patient. 334 days to go my friends.
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Back Where I Come From is part of our Summer Series.
