Afternoon at the Beach

This is the view down Clearwater Beach this afternoon.
(Sheri please note nobody here is wearing a burly winter coat! LOL It was 86 degrees - a whole 82 degrees warmer than your beach trip. Kinda crazy!)

We tried to go to the beach yesterday. That really didn't go well. Raleigh was whining in the car, aiden was screaming and Chris had JUST said "In two minutes I am going to turn this van around because everyone is miserable!" Does that sound like a 'DAD' thing to say or what? He was of course kidding. I was chatting about how we needed to look into getting AAA since our other car just went out of warranty and therefore no roadside assistance for free anymore. Chris agreed. We got on the expressway to head to the beach. The warning light for the tires dinged a couple times. We don't really think much of this since the sensor goes off if one tire gets even a tiny bit less air than the others. Suddenly I hear this loud repetetive noise. At the same time Raleigh, who was wearing her big girl panties, says "Mommy I have to go potty!"Chris thinks it is a truck passing us but I knew it was a flat tire. I told him to pull over. Sure enough he came back to report that the rear passenger tire was completely flat.

Now, at this point I am thinking "Thank goodness it happened in the van!" This car is still only a year old and has the roadside assistance that Chrysler promised was included when we leased this van from them. Chris calls the roadside assistance number. They don't cover flat tires, only mechanical problems. FANTASTIC (note sarcasm here). We then discovered that the spare tire was very complicated to get out from under the front end of the van. And, it could only be pulled out on the side with all the traffic whizzing by. Inside the car, Aiden was screaming and fussing and Raleigh is crying because she has to go potty and won't go in her pants because we told her if she went in her pants we wouldn't go to the beach. In the end, Chris got the spare put on and we took the van to get the tire fixed.

Raleigh had a great day using the potty yesterday. She didn't have any accidents despite the obvious trauma of the whole van break down. We promised her we would go to the beach today.

When we arrived at the beach, since it is Spring Break, there was no parking! We wound up paying $10 to park a zillion miles from the beach and walked the whole way with all our stuff. We had originally intended on having a picnic on the beach, but we had to eat our lunch in the back of the van before we headed off to the beach. Raleigh thought this was hilarious of course.

Eventually we did make it to the beach...

Raleigh looking for seashells (for our sandbox at home)

Bringing the seashells back in her pail and then surveying her finds with Daddy!Aiden at his lunch on the beach! Nothing like beachfront dining!

Raleigh absolutely hated the showers, but we had to rinse the sand off. She was screaming and throwing a huge fit the entire time. I swear, I used to be on the other side of this whole parent thing thinking "Oh my what is wrong with that kid? Why don't their parents do something?" I now realize there is absolutely nothing you can do. When your two and a half year old wants to scream about the shower - just keep pouring water on her until she's clean and worry about it later.

Despite the fact that it was pretty hot, Aiden was so good. I carried him back to the car in the front carrier so that Raleigh could ride in the stroller. He was asleep before we got to the car! He slept the whole way home.

We quickly did baths and both kiddos are napping now. I think Raleigh had a lot of fun (despite one gross potty accident and a big tantrum at the showers!) but Chris probably won't be agreeing to the beach for a while. Guess it is a good thing we have a sandbox in the backyard now!