Summer Fun

I blogged about R for the better part of two years, but now that our family is growing, R will have to learn to share the blogging time just like she is going to have to learn to share everything else. (And the poor girl has no idea how much "sharing" is in her future!)

Our summer was split into two parts. The first part was devoted to vacation. We traveled to Athens (Ohio, not Greece, as a friend likes to say) and to New Jersey to visit family and friends. Then vacation came to us when my family rented a condo on Wrightsville Beach and we got to live like spoiled tourists for a week. The second part of the summer has been about our family and just enjoying time together during our first summer on the coast. We have averaged a trip a week to the beach, and only a tropical storm has kept us away for more than 10 days straight.

R has taken to the beach. She loves the beach. She is a little fishy. In fact, one of her favorite activities is laying in the sand on her belly facing the shore, letting the waves crash over her. For several weeks she did this, and we could not figure out why. Finally, we asked (duh!) and she replied by making her fish noise. (Only R could make a noise for a fish. It sounds like gurgling water.) So I asked if she was pretending to be a fish. She casually said, "yeah" as though everyone pretends to be a fish at the beach.


Each time we go to the beach, R generally comes up with a new activity, although some are frequently repeated, like pretending to be a fish. Some days she likes to sit near the water and cover herself with the wet, muddy sand, although she gets even more pleasure covering me with sand. One day she threw a ball into the water over and over again and gleefully chased it when it washed back up on shore. Two weeks ago another mom let her play in an inflatable pool while her boys ran in circles. (I'm not joking. It was like watching two dogs chase their tails.) R sat in their little pool and played with the boys' toy boats for the longest time. She was a happy girl. She even looked for the pool on the next trip to the beach. Last weekend she took her cups down to the water and "washed" the hair of a very patient Jeff over and over. (She didn't ask to wash my hair, and I thought it best not to offer. Jeff could be the hero of the day.)

However, there is nothing Ree loves more than to be in the water. She is brave, perhaps a little too brave, and happily runs straight out to the water. With each passing wave, she grows a little braver and heads a little further out. She is happiest when she is standing in water that is at least waist high and she gets pummeled by waves. She tries to venture into chest deep water. After getting blasted in the face two or three times, she is ready for us to hold her and let her play "up down up down" and jump over the waves. The catch is she wants to do it in water that is at least waist deep for us. This is normally not a problem, but a few weeks ago while we were doing this, she and I got hit by a monster wave. I had to hold her over my head superman-style as we rode the wave for 10 - 15 feet. She screamed "Wheeeee!" the whole time and thought it was the greatest thing ever. When we got done, she was so excited, she forgot her words and just started frantically signing "More!" I wanted to go collapse on the beach!

Early in the summer, Jeff made the mistake of stopping at Wendy's on the way home from the beach after two consecutive trips. A ritual was born. As soon as she sees the Wendy's sign, R now starts chanting, "Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat! Pleeeeeease!" We don't always stop, but the ritual is there. (There are actually commercial developments from the beach all the way to our house, and this ritual is also repeated at an ice cream shop, Chick-Fil-A, and On the Border.) Last week as we were leaving the beach, Jeff and I decided it was a good day to stop at Wendy's, and we asked Ree if she wanted to go there. We were expecting an enthusiastic, "Yeah," but instead she started babbling in crazy toddler-speak. I finally realized she was saying "bok bok" (chicken) and "oranges." She knew what she usually ate at Wendy's and was placing her order!

Our lives this summer have not been fancy or crazy. Our vacations were spent with family and friends. Our weekends involve cheap trips to the beach and fast food when we splurge. And ya know what? It's been wonderful.