Don't get me wrong, I'm excited about having a kid. We're almost to the halfway point in January's pregnancy, and I'm currently between the initial "holy crap, I'm having a kid" freak out and the secondary "holy crap, I'm having a kid soon" freak out, and my attitude toward the whole thing is overall really good. I am, however, under no illusions to that the fact that we're only 20 weeks away from our lives being changed forever. I'm going to miss spending the weekend doing anything I want to do. It will be a little inconvenient that our office is now going to double as someone else's bedroom. And it's going to be a good while until January and I can once again pack up the car with minimal planning, point our car somewhere we want to go, and just have a nice relaxing vacation. So this week we loaded up the car and, along with Gus, went out on one last childless vacation. Destination: The Outer Banks.

We made it to Corolla, North Carolina last night and our first day has been a bit rainy. We didn't mind much, since the rest of the week is supposed to be 80 degrees and sunny, so we made do and found our entertainment where we could. Our first adventure came in the form of a tiny, tiny frog that hopped into our room first thing in the morning. While Gus tried to assure us that he had the situation well in hand, we opted for the more humane approach of trapping the little guy under a glass. This, unfortunately, involved moving just about every piece of furniture in the bedroom in order to track him down. He clearly did not want to be trapped under a glass. In the end, perseverance prevailed and he was trapped and released back into the wild.

By late morning, January was feeling a little stir crazy and wanted to go for a drive. We are already pretty close to the northern end of the Outer Banks, so we thought we would continue north and see what else was nearby. After a mile or so of driving, the road swerved suddenly and directly into the beach, where capable cars can drive right on the shoreline up past the nature preserve. We recently traded in our pair of older, less reliable cars for a more dependable 2005 Honda Element, and I am so glad we did. As soon as we saw that sand and the pickup trucks and SUVs just plowing right through the beach, we put the Element into all wheel drive and went for it. Having never driven on sand before, I was pretty nervous about the situation, but it was so much fun. January got a couple of pictures from shotgun while I navigated the shoreline.

We did manage to get stuck trying to turn around, but some folks in a much more sand capable pickup truck gave us a hand and we got back on track without a lot of trouble. Lesson learned: If you're driving in sand, momentum is the key. Just keep on the gas until you're back on solid ground.

Tomorrow should find us with better weather, but we really enjoyed our first day our last vacation as a childless couple.