For the last couple of weeks I have been scouring the internet and Pinterest for ideas/suggestions on places to stay and to see on our next family vacation. When we get to go on a vacation…I find picking a place to vacation is always so hard. I’m always torn between wanting to go see new places and wanting to go to familiar places I know and love.

Do you have that one place that is your favorite? I do. Actually, I have two places. Branson and South Padre Island. I know. I’m weird.

My Facebook newsfeed has been flooded with all kinds of posts and pictures of tropical island getaways that people are going on, have been on, or wanting to go on. It is making me ache to go to South Padre Island.

I love South Padre. It isn’t fancy. It doesn’t have white sandy beaches with sparkling clear blue water as far as the eye can see. But, it is like home to me.

It is a place I have been going since I was a little girl. I grew up just a couple of hours from S.P.I. and we would visit it frequently. I have so many great memories there. Building sandcastles, body surfing on the waves, eating at Blackbeards, walking the jetties, walking from sandbar to sandbar and then getting scared because I’ve ventured out too far into the water. Sigh.

My dad and I…one of our many many visits.

I truly don’t have a bad memory of this place. Well, if I could remember the time when I was a little girl and a Portuguese-man-of-war stung me, then, I would probably have a bad memory.

Of course, maybe I should count the time my sister and I thought it would be a GREAT idea to get our hair braided (and by braided, I mean having cornrows put in) while vacationing as a bad memory. My scalp burned…it burned bad.

Speaking of burns…my sister, cousin, and I have seen our fair share of BAD sunburns…you think one would use sunscreen while at the beach and walking a mile in the hot sun…to the jetties…barefoot.

And my hair…yes, I know. It looks like I poured hydrogen peroxide over the top of it.

South Padre…From family day-trips, to summer family getaways, and spring break rendezvous, to a place I now can bring my own family to and create special memories.

It will always feel like home. I am just itching to go back.