The First Few Days

When we arrived to the beach, tropical storm Lee was swirling its way toward us.  The wind was incredibly loud, howling past the house at all hours of day and night.  And fiercely strong, too.  Our bedroom was on the 3rd story of the house, which was on stilts, and we could feel the room rock back and forth constantly.  The humidity was so intense and the rain so great that the air conditioners froze over and water leaked from spots all over the house.  But--and this is a big but- we never lost power.  Woohoo!

Now, if we'd been on a pre-babies beach trip, I suppose we would have all cozied up with books and the Alabama game and snacked ourselves silly and taken long naps.  As it was, with four babies in the house, there had to be entertainment!  Feeding the seagulls worked well.  {As you can see, the wind was seriously messing with our 'dos.}

 Until they got all Birds-like and started swarming rather aggressively.

There was also this mechanized fishing game that was played, oh, nonstop for days on end.  Like all toys of that sort, it has a truly lovely soundtrack.  This game probably occupied about twenty solid man toddler hours, though, so we were all willing to suffer the tune.  For the aforementioned twenty solid hours.  I shudder to think what we would have done without those little gap-mouthed fishies.

The younger set engaged in lots and lots o' walking practice.  They cruised 'round and 'round the large coffee table and up and down the length of the living area, thrilled to have a buddy in each other.  All that practice paid off, as Buddy Boy started really walking on our last day at the beach {yay!  while the Mister was there to see it!} and his cuz is just moments away from trotting off on her own.

And then, after 3 stormy days--THEN!--the rain stopped and the wind slowed and the clouds parted and--Hallelujah!--there was SUNSHINE!!!

You better believe we were out there when the sun peeked over the horizon.  {Might as well be, when the children like to wake before six.}

Jammies and all.

It was still chilly enough that the sand stung tiny, bare toes.

But the promise of beach days was in the air.