Beach Games

Realizing that my time on the coast is limited, I decided to take the kids to the beach today. So, after surprising them with the news this morning, we headed off to Hilton Head (I wanted to stay as far away from this as possible.) We made a quick stop at Target for sand toys (because He-Who-Stuffs-Things-When-He-Cleans put ours in the attic where I can't reach them and then left town) and another stop at the brand new Crocs Outlet (I know! Cool!) to pick up our summer shoe staples. This took waaaayyyy longer than it should because of one little four year old who will be impossible to handle as a teenager. The girl broke down in tears because she couldn't find a Croc she liked. Mind you, this is the OUTLET. There is every color, every style, every size of every Croc ever made. Mary Janes, Sandles, Flip flop, Crocs with holes, Crocs without holes, in every shade of the rainbow lining the walls. We tried on pair after pair. She didn't like the feel, she said. She wasn't happy buying them and she wasn't happy knowing she wouldn't get any. In the end, I picked out a cheap pair and placed it on the counter. By this time, it didn't matter to Ella because she was in full can't stop the crying mode. We got to the car, she got a spanking and apologized to me, Sam, and Si, took a drink of water, and was good to go. The crocs were not expensive, but the cost me plenty of sanity!

By the time we made it to the beach, via the piggly wiggly for the easiest lunch i could think of-lunchables (I was wrong) we only had about an hour before exhaustion meltdowns occur. One hour of Si kicking sand and throwing sand and Addie eating sand. But it really wasn't too bad. And we'll do it again, with a little better planning.