The Big Beach Trip

This was one of the biggest Kids' Day at the Beach trips ever, with 15 kids and 4 adults and 1 dog, for a total of 20 bodies. It included Ainsley, Emmy, Will, Tierney, Cale, Macee, Ty, Brock, James, Auna, Parker, Rielee, Jillian, Norma (the Gourde's foreign exhange student), Marta (Norma's sister), Papa, Grannie, Daddy, Mommy and Mocha. It was a challenge fitting everyone into the beach house, and especially interesting having to share only one bathroom. Jillian loved having all the company, though. Her favorite part, of course, was the fact the her Cousin Rielee made the trip for the first time with her, so they played together almost the entire time.

The first day was a cold, windy and rainy one, but we made the trip to the beach anyways. Jillian and Rielee went right for the water, and played in the waves. It didn't last long though, as Sweetie-Pie got cold pretty quickly. We put a big sweatshirt on her to keep her warm, but she wasn't too happy, so we headed back to the house. Even though it was cold, we still stopped for ice cream, which made Jillian a little more happy. We finished the day with a quick stop at the Ocean Park Elementary playground. In the beach house, Jillian's favorite things to play with were the little wood kid puzzle, and the big box of poker chips.

One other thing to note was that Jillian went no. 2 on the potty, for the second time ever. When she got done, she ran into the middle of all the kids and said "I went poop in the potty!" The kids cheered, and Jillian had a big smile on her face.

The second day, we went to the beach again and had better luck with the weather, as it was warmer, less windy and not raining. The older kids played wiffle ball and football while Jillian and Rielee played in the sand. Then, when the sun came out, we headed to the water to do some wave jumping. After a couple days of seeing the waves, Jillian got more comfortable, and didn't need to hold hands anymore when the waves came in. We went back to the beach house, stopping for (cotton candy-flavored) ice cream on the way. After lunch, we next went to Astoria to go swimming in the aquatic center. Jillian wore her Dora swimsuit, and enjoyed playing in the water for several hours. Thanks to all the activity, she and Rielee fell asleep in the car on the way home.

The third and final day was the nicest one, so we spent a lot of time at the beach. Jillian just ran and ran from sand to water. She liked to lay around in the "dry water" (the warm water on the upper part of the beach). Eventually, she got a little chilled and headed back for ice-cream early. The rest of kids followed later, and after another stop at the "park", we headed home.