Remember that week mid-August that OSAH went black? We were at the Cake House (what two-year old Hazy called our Cape House) with our friends the Chans and the Ostroms. We’ve done a Cape vacation with some combination of these two awesome families almost every year since 2011 and it was no time to mess with perfection.

This year, our buddy Matt outdid himself by getting us a special ballerz deal on a totally sick house that we would never ordinarily be able to afford.

The house featured a tennis court, pool, pool table, piano, wine cellar, an elliptical machine, and a bathtub with jets in every room. This was perfect for us because, as you know, we’re extremely sporty, cultured and fancy.

 

We didn’t want to put our box wines in the wine cellar because w̶e̶ ̶d̶i̶d̶n̶’̶t̶ ̶w̶a̶n̶t̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶h̶a̶v̶e̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶g̶o̶ ̶d̶o̶w̶n̶s̶t̶a̶i̶r̶s̶ ̶a̶l̶l̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶t̶i̶m̶e̶ it’s not classy.

Here’s a secret: at a certain point, having more kids is easier than having fewer kids. They basically entertain and police each other. Maybe the Duggars are onto something. (Just kidding, I don’t trust anyone who names their kid Spurgeon.) So even though we were outnumbered eight to six, things went pretty smoothly. It helped that they got along great.

This crew enjoyed swimming in the pool, playing at the beach, eating ice cream, watching horrible kids’ shows, playing hide & seek, having covert meetings in the “lighthouse”(crow’s nest), and raising their hands if they’re awesome (my photo trick) together.

They also gave each other mani/pedis:

Engaged in intelligent conversation at a restaurant:

And they held up traffic in the most adorable way:

Having a pool at your vacation house is like having the Fritos & chili-topped burger at the Gallows; it’s hard to go back to a regular vacation house/burger after that.

Post pool, we took advantage of all those hot tubs. Fun fact: Burt’s Bees bath soap makes better bubbles than Aveeno bath soap. Other fun fact: if you leave the kids unattended while the tub fills, you’ll end up with a Bobby Brady overflow situation.

For a while, George and Paloma had a little romance brewing.

I mean, it’s hard to resist this:

Despite George’s strong game, Paloma eventually moved on to Eliot, and George set his sights on an older, more mature lady, Estela, who was very kind about humoring him.

Young romance wasn’t the only excitement though. We also jumped off a bridge (!). Hazy, Jesse, Evie, and even Eliot and George jumped off. It was about 30 feet above the water.

And, we went bowling. A great time was had by all, but more importantly, I beat Matty.

Plus, we had some pretty epic dance parties.

Even though the kids wanted to go to the pool all the time, we did strong-arm them into going to the beach quite a bit. You know your kids are spoiled when they throw fits about “having to go to the beach.” When I was your age, kids, I’d be lucky if I got to make my own beach by sanding down a rock and sprinkling it in front of a plastic kiddie pool full of hose water with store brand table salt in it.

BTW, if you didn’t know, MAD Magazine is a big hit among the 4-7 year old set.

And of course, there was ice cream. Matty and I love ice cream so much, we snuck out and got some while we told the kids we were going grocery shopping. George loves ice cream so much, it makes him levitate.

You’re a real life fantasy, Cake House.

I-I-I-I keep on hoping we were at the cake house by the ocean. (Sorry, not sorry for getting that song in your head.)