The Beach

This whole week of vacation has boiled down to one important thing for Gavin...the beach.  These words came up frequently throughout our drive down to Florida.  All he wanted to do was go there.  This would be his, and Sophia's, first real view of the ocean. 

Yesterday, we spent at least an hour packing up necessities, all the while Gavin was ordering us to put in things into the bag that he would need to have for the big event.  Not sure about the relevance of some of the chosen items, but we went with it.  After many trips to the potty and Sophia pooping in her swim diaper before we even left, Todd and I were exhausted before we even got in the car.  Finally, we get there, we park, we get up to the top of the ramp to see that it is high tide and everyone is crowded at the top of the bank.  Then we hear it, screaming from our eldest.  He is terrified of being at the beach and the loud banging of the waves on the shore is more than he can take.  He begins to yell "I've got to go pee-pee" as loud as he can to try and escape.

During this time, Sophia begins giggling.  We discover that this is a place that she loves as she immediately wanted to get out of our arms and onto the sand.  Todd dug out a sand "bathtub" and she hung out in there trying to "bathe" herself in sand.  Her favorite part was when the waves crashed into her.  She thought this was hysterical.  Completely opposite children and completely opposite predictions as to how we thought this would go.  Tomorrow will be a quieter day as we will head towards the tide pools, a quieter version of "the beach."