Section Fall Retreat: Cape Cod

Last month we packed the kids up for another weekend at Red Jacket Beach Resort, this time for Ben’s business school fall section retreat. HBS organizes the 900+ first year students into sections of about 90 and they have all their classes together that first year. In addition to the parents’ club and the LDSSA (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint’s Student Association), Ben’s section mates and their significant others feel like our family on campus, or at least our dear friends. Ben doesn’t have classes with all of them this year but there are still lots of social events planned around the sections and it’s always fun for an excuse to get together.

We drove down to Cape Cod during naps on Friday to take advantage of sleeping kids who woke up just before we pulled into Chick-fil-a in Hyannis. After a late lunch we drove the last few minutes to the Red Jacket Beach Resort, sitting on the beautiful coast of the cape.

We spent the weekend catching up with friends, sleeping in, antiquing (me), laser-tagging (Ben), eating yummy food, and staying up way too late. There were big dinners each night and then assorted activities during the day. Our final night was a Hawaiian themed pool party and we warmed up from the freezing day in the hot tub.

We had two babysitters for the weekend to watch all the section kids on-site (a family friend we’ve used for both section retreats last year) and it is a great way to vacation. It means being able to do fun things with the kids (taking them to the beach or pool, playing games, snuggling and reading stories) but also sleeping in after late nights, enjoying long uninterrupted conversations over meals with friends, and not checking baby monitors once the kids are in bed. It’s the perfect combination of not missing my kids and still having a rejuvenating weekend for this mom who spends almost every waking second with them, usually.

Red Jacket Beach Resort has these great family-style rooms with separate sleeping areas for kids. Our room had a bunk bed area with a sliding door so you could close it off when the kids were asleep and still have the lights on/ be hanging out. Lincoln was pumped about the “double-decker beds” and I loved that no one had to tip-toe in the dark when going to bed at night. You can see a full review of our stay at the property in June with my whole family here.

Here are a million more pictures from the weekend: