Notebooks

Nelson and Alice reflect in their journals about all the fun had at the beach.

Aquarium & Dinos

On Monday morning, we had vacate our vacation home by 10am, so we packed up then drove to the aquarium on Roanoke Island.  Alice got to see a real life scuba diver in the shark tank and Simon was so happy to watch the fish.

Outside the aquarium, they had a little walking trail with some animatronic dinosaurs.  We just lucked into it, and it was the last day the exhibit was open.  Alice was scared of the first dinosaur, but got braver through exposure.  That was fortunate because the last dinosaur was a pretty scary T-Rex.

Sunday Wright Bros and Beach

On Sunday morning, we headed up the coast to the Wright Brothers Memorial.  We hiked up to the monument and had a snack, then headed back down to listen to a talk about the Wright Brothers.

Back at the house, Alice was pretty good at entertaining herself in the new environment.  Staying in other houses is always hard though because we have to keep a constant eye on the kids.

In the evening, we went back to the beach for the last time.  Alice was very brave and actually went swimming.  At first she held on to us, but then she held on to a wake board, and eventually she just bobbed around in her life jacket for a few moments.  While Zac and I were in the water with Alice, there was a picture not taken with a camera, but that I want to remember.  It was of three beach chairs lined up, with Nelson and Stana on the ends and Simon sitting in the middle.  He sat there for a long time, just watching the waves and the birds and chirping away in his own language.  It was such a cute little picture.  After the swimming, there was lots of playing in the sand.  I wish travel wasn't so much work and so expensive because it was such a nice time and the evening went way too fast.

Saturday at the Beach

After breakfast Saturday, we got all packed up and headed to the beach.  The house came with a little wagon, but the sides had fallen off so the short walk to the beach took a long time because we had to keep restacking the stuff that fell off.

It was a beautiful morning at the beach.  Alice was still wave-shy and so both kids mostly played in the sand.

We went back to the house for some relaxation, lunch and naps.  It's so easy to type that transition, but in reality it was a lot of work to remove all the sand from the kids before letting them back in the house.

The view from the dining room.

After naps were taken and everyone had been fed several times, we headed back to the beach in evening.

Simon really enjoyed playing in the sand and Alice enjoyed flying her kite.

Sandy boy!

Friday Evening at the beach

It seemed like it took us forever to get to the beach.  The trip started as an idea back in June, and after much planning, packing, and preparing (and all the accompanying lists) we were finally ready to go Friday morning.  Except Zac and Simon woke up with eye infections.  A few phone calls later, we had prescriptions waiting for us at a pharmacy on the Outer Banks and we were really ready to go.

The drive should have only taken 3 1/2 hours, but with stops for gas, lunch, and a screaming child who appeared to be trying to poop (but with no results) we arrived at the outer banks something like five hours later.

We went to the pharmacy and the grocery store, then headed to our beach house.  We made a quick supper, then finally, finally, went to the beach.

Our beach house was in a little cul-de-sac one block from the beach, so it was a quick little walk to the beach.  To Alice's delight, the beach house came equipped with a bucket and a net.  She was all ready to catch some fish.

It was windy that first evening, and Alice was afraid of the waves, so she stayed pretty far from the water.  But we took a nice walk along the beach and enjoyed the seashore.

Flotation devices

Today's we went to Lukas's house for his birthday party.  They have a pool, so Alice was thrilled, but unfortunately it ended up being a cool 80-degree day.  She was undeterred even when she was shivering and turning blue.  This girl loves the water.

The other kind of neat thing was that Alice demonstrated some signs of becoming a functional human being.  She sang along for the happy birthday song (whenever there is group singing when we've been at daycare she always sits there like she's never heard the song before).  After that, she wanted cake immediately, but I suggested we go back out on the deck and finish eating the snacks while we waited for the cake line to die down.  She agreed without a fuss (delayed gratification!).  Then, when she asked again, Zac and I were busy feeding Simon so I told her she could go up to the porch and asks Lukas's mom for some cake.  She did just that, (keep in mind this was a pretty big party with lots of non-daycare strangers) and managed to carry it back down all the steps and put it on the table without dropping it.  Then, she ate it with her fork and only made a slight mess.  It was amazing.  I mean, not really, but just that she was able to successfully navigate the physical and social requirements of the task with ease. Another example is that at the beginning of the party, she made some beads out of clay that was then baked, and the kids were supposed to string them onto necklaces later.  She remembered this at the end, when we were changing Simon out of his poopy swim diaper (definitely a two-person task) and so I just said she could go up and ask Lukas's mom about it.  A few minutes later when I went back in the house, I found her sitting on some random woman's (not a daycare mom) lap, stringing beads onto a necklace. I'm confident this girl's going to make it in the world.