Beach Trip Part Three

On day 5, we had more great weather.  Drew hung out with Mimi and me on the beach.  He didn't go into the water much.  This was the most relaxing vacation I could hope for with this typically wild little man.  Who knew the ocean would be the best corral?

Unfortunately, the corral did not work for Isaac.  Isaac started getting time outs on the beach for wandering off.  He would just wander down the beach looking for a friend he had made the day before without telling anyone.  Thankfully, I got him a bright orange swim suit, and I could spot him a good distance away easily.  I don't know what got into him, but after a few time outs he was doing much better.

That afternoon, the girls all went shopping while the boys rested with Papa Boat.  I ended up being totally exhausted once we got shopping and mainly just found somewhere to sit while everyone else shopped.  Brian was thrilled that I bought nothing on my trip.  :)  The girls bought something with their money.  When I went up to the cashier with Genna, she had something to say to the cashier.  It was adorable!  She said, "Hi, my name is Genevieve.  I was just wondering why there are so many things with so many different names on it here and Genevieve is not on any of them.  I just think it is a pretty great name."  I got tears in my eyes because it was so cute.  We did end up finding something in another store that had "Jenna" on it and it said that it was "a form of Genevieve."

On day 6, it was super hot in the morning, but actually cold in the afternoon on the beach.  Lifeguards even had sweatshirts on in the afternoon.  Weird weather.  My sister took the big kids on a walk on the beach and Drew threw a huge fit when I stopped him from trying to follow them down the beach.  And I mean big.  The sad thing is my mom would have taken him on a short walk, but he immediately threw this gigantic fit that I wouldn't let her.  He eventually got distracted by some boats in the ocean.

We saw some dolphins swimming and jumping out in the ocean a few different days which was exciting.  The waves were pretty rough, and over the week we lost two hats and a bucket.  Since we didn't lose any kids to the sea, I call it a win.  I think everyone wiped out at least once, except for Isaac.  Hannah scraped her knee trying to rescue a bucket from the waves.

We tried the pool without Drew that day so we could all go in the big pool.  Isaac's new thing that day was floating unassisted on his back.  I couldn't talk him into 5 seconds this time though.  So it was less than 5 seconds, but he could have done it longer if he wasn't so afraid and tense.

That afternoon I helped the girls get started on their friendship bracelet kits that they have had for a long time.  It just takes a long time to sit down and teach them something like that so I figured the beach trip was the perfect place to bring them and try to teach them.  I couldn't believe we didn't get to it before day 6.  I went back over to Hannah to see how she was doing after I had helped her and then Genna.  I said, "Oh, but Hannah I think you were supposed to..."  Hannah interrupted with a quick deadpan, "I don't care."  I just laughed and said, "Okay."  When I told the girls we had to stop, Genna says, "Can't we do more?"

 Drew fell on the coffee table that evening as well, hit his chin, and bit his tongue on both sides really hard.  His mouth was full of blood.  Who does he choose to comfort him?  Not mommy.  Hannah.  She was more than happy to hold him while he sucked on a frozen washcloth.  (My nephew was teething so we already had on in the freezer.)  I could tell that Genevieve was a bit jealous, but she is such a trooper that she didn't say anything.

The last day we hit the beach once more in the morning with the kids.  Everyone had fun and Drew got to go on his walk with Mimi.  We went to dinner at a Mexican food place that night, packed, and cleaned up the house.  We left pretty early the next morning and hit the Sonic on the way home to get limeades for the kids and a slush for me.  The closest Sonic to our house is an hour away so this is quite the treat.  The girls had a birthday party that we just couldn't miss in the early afternoon and we made it with no problem.  On the way home we listened to A Little History of the World CD which was super fun for most of us.  Drew wasn't interested, of course, and Isaac declared it was very boring.  It is a full account of history from the beginning of time.  We only made it to Confucius during the trip so we have some more to listen to this summer for our review of ancient and medieval history.

Genna in all her jumping glory, this girl can jump waves!

All beached out and ready to go home!

Beach trip over and now we move on to the long, long to-do list before Tad's *hopefully* timely arrival in mid August.  I only have six weeks left until my due date!  I do have some more pictures from the beach though on my mom's camera.

Beach Trip Part Two

Somebody was ready to go to the beach!  I guess he liked it!  He didn't  like his hat at first, but started asking for it when he got hot and decided he liked it a lot.  Since the girls and I all got sunburns on our scalps, I am glad he wore it the whole time.

After another fun day at the beach and pool, the girls even napped.  This was mainly because I promised them they could stay up later and learn to play our family game, canasta, if they took a much needed nap.  Teaching them canasta has been a long anticipated event for them.  Brian and I just haven't had the time and stamina to do it.  They know how to play chess, so they are obviously equipt to play this game.

It was a lot of fun.  Hannah was on my team to "watch and learn," and Genna was on my sister's team.  They helped us out and were quick learners.  Genna was a clown as usual, waving to us to signify the end of her turn.  Since you need four people to play this game, we can play whenever we want now at home with Brian, the girls and myself.  Usually we just get to play when my family visits.

I should mention also that at the pool on day 3, Isaac progressed to putting his face in the water in his streamline position for 5 seconds.  It was slow going at first.

On day 4, Drew was getting braver at the beach, but then he was knocked down again by some waves.  The girls and Isaac found tons of shells and rocks to identify.  They were super excited to find a crustacean.

That night we went to a restaurant and got ice cream afterwards.  You could say that Genna's love for sweets was "written all over her face."  She was covered in chocolate ice cream.  It was on her dress, all over her face, and it even made it onto my sister's shorts somehow.  She was the only one that was a mess.  I fed Drew his, and you could barely tell that Isaac and Hannah had even had any ice cream.

The only other notable part of the day was the parking tickets we got for misunderstanding what our parking pass was for exactly.

I love these beauties!  I wouldn't trade a beach trip alone, however peaceful it may be, for all the fun and chaos we had all together.

BeachTrip Part One

We just got back from Bethany Beach.  It was a long trip that turned out to be more relaxing than I thought it would be with Drewy in tow.  Brian had to stay and work, but my parents, sister, and nephew were able to go with us to make it one exciting trip.

The first day we took our time getting to the beach and stopped at Cracker Barrel for lunch on the way.  Once we were there and in our rental house, the big kids (I didn't take the infamous Drew because I'm not crazy) and I took off to the closest Catholic church for the Saturday Vigil Mass.  That was a wonderful way to start our trip.  It certainly put me in the peaceful and joyful mood.  Hannah made me laugh because when the music started up she turned to me with a confused face and asked, "What is that sound?"  "Drums, I think," I replied because we were so far in the back that I couldn't see.  Later during the Mass we even heard a guitar and some kind of chimes.  Not really our family's kind of music for a Mass, but to each his own I guess.

Day 2, we were able to hit the beach by 9am.  We had about a .3 mile walk each way to and from the beach.  It was some well needed exercise even if I would have preferred teleporting to the beach and back.  I had to walk it about 4 times a day since my sister, mom, and I went to the beach in the afternoon, kid-free, during nap/rest time.  My dad held down the fort, all too willing to read and be done with the beach by then.  On the beach Drew was easy to keep up with since the waves were pretty rough and knocked him down.  This made him a little more hesitant with going into the water and he was easier to keep track of then.  He liked the dino cups I brought and we sat and made little dinosaurs in the sand for a while each day.  His favorite thing was snacks on the beach though.  The girls and Isaac were constantly jumping waves, digging, and building sandcastles; I barely heard a peep from them unless Drew was getting dangerously close to one of their sand creations.  Walking back we came to a big ditch by the road.  Isaac says to me, "Mimi told me I can't walk in a big ditch or I'll break my leg."  That made me laugh because she had just been explaining the danger of walking into a deep hole without noticing, but he thought walking in it at all would make his leg break somehow.

Drew and his cousin, Dylan.  That is Drew's attempt at a smile into the sun.  Drew did pretty well with Dylan as it turned out.  He has some work to do on his "soft baby touches" that we've been practicing, but he really enjoyed the "baby."

We went to the pool after nap/rest time and discovered the most ridiculous pool rules ever.  They don't allow children under 3 years old to get in the big pool at all - just the tiny baby pool.  Then they don't allow children over 6 in the baby pool.  So how would someone like me ever be able to go to that pool alone with my children ranging in age from 1 to 8 years?  It's discrimination, if you ask me!  Discrimination against big families, don't you think?  Anyway they also wouldn't let flotation devices or balls, rafts, toys, or fun of any kind in the pool.  We didn't spend much time there, needless to say.  My goal though was to get Isaac a little more used to the water since his swim lessons started right after we got back.  Last year he was almost swimming at the end of the summer, but this year he's back to being a weenie in the water.  It took me forever to get him to put just his face in.  I told him he had to put his face in for 5 seconds, and then I would leave him to play.  He eventually did it with goggles, and when he did he comes up and yells, "Wow, I could see under water!  That was so fun!"  The lifeguards were laughing since they had seen all it took to get him to do it.