First Beach Day 2013

We went to the beach for the first time last weekend. We went a few times last summer and Avery liked it, but she really got into it this year. She loved walking down the beach and looking for seashells. She would run to the water, but when a small wave would roll into the sand, she'd run away giggling and screaming with delight. She's also a people watcher and she's not exactly discreet either. She will walk up to people until she's just a few feet away and just stare...AWKWARD! Good thing she's cute and her smile is infectious so people just laugh and say hi. How do  you teach an almost 2 year old the concept of "stranger danger"?

Parker also had a blast. He loves playing in the sand. I think he could have laid around in the sand all day and would have been fine. I've also realized that he gets tanned fast!!! I put SPF 50 on him about 1 hour before we left the house and sprayed him a few times with SPF 70 in the 3-3.5 hours we were at the beach. He def got my skin tone and my ability to even tan in the shade!

So here are some pics...

walking to the beach...note to self: Avery is a very slow walker on sand...taking her flip flops off helps a little bit

pretty girl! LOVE this color on her. It's more of a coral color, but looks pink in the pics

3 little loves enjoying a gorgeous Sunday morning

another note to self: do not use rubber bands in Avery's hair then spray her head down w/ sunscreen (her hair is thin and she's got Kevin's lighter skin tone) b/c the rubber bands will become brittle and literally snap halfway to the beach and she'll have these "wings"...thank goodness Aunt Missy had an extra hair tie even though it was a large one and gave her a funky ponytail

pb&j sandwich + apple slices + sand + sprinkles of salt water = lunch

stuffed his mouth after I told him to hurry up and eat his lunch before the seagulls dive in and grab his food! lol

picky girl got to eat 2 granola bars, apple slices, and 1 tiny bite of pb&j

look at how tanned his back got! his first day out on the beach! and look at those ginormous feet! He's wearing size 12's at the age of 3.5. How is it that the next size is a "big boy" size???

LOVE his dimples...I rarely get a pic of him with a true smile that shows off his dimples

picking seashells...too bad Parker grabbed our bucket of seashells and decided to set them free in the water

would you believe me if I said she's wearing a 3T bathing suit at 23 months old? It's a little big on the bottom, but not much. Maybe it will still fit next year when she's hopefully potty trained!

Florida life...relaxing on a beach chair and watching my family play in the sand and water

Parker and DD playing with sand trucks

Avery and Lila looking at the planes flying by advertising nearby beach restaurants. Avery adores her older cousin and wanted to copy her and kicked me out of MY beach chair so she could sit down next to her "Why-wa".

with just a few minutes left til we got home, Avery started to fall asleep in the car. She clung on to Kevin and just sat down on the kitchen floor when he put her down. She then cried, pointed to her crib, and said "bed, bed, bed!" when I went directly to the kids' bathroom to get their bath going. Poor baby girl!

We had so much fun at the beach! The not so fun part was giving the kids a quick rinse with the VERY cold showers near the parking lot. Have I mentioned that my kids HATE showers and refuse to shower. They love their baths. Parker screamed blood murder and I caught a few people looking at us to make sure we weren't beating him up or something. No people, it's just a cold shower. So while Kevin got Parker changed in the car, it was Avery's turn. Well really OUR turn b/c I couldn't just put her on the ground, press/hold the button to get the shower turned on without getting wet myself. She too screamed blood murder.

We will go to the beach again soon since the kids had such a blast, but I think we will wait until our eardrums recover first.