Florida Beaches

(these photos have not been through photoshop, but I wanted to get them up)

I love the beach. Love it. I've always lived not far from the coast (I mean 20 minutes) and I didn't realize how much I missed it these past 4 years. Florida has some kick-ass beaches with velvety white sand. Oh, but there's what I dislike about the beach. Sand. When you have kids, it's sand everywhere. Hair, fingernails, toes, armpits... everywhere. All over them, and mostly on you. My mom's friend didn't quite understand my hate of the sand, but he doesn't have kids and therefor never will. Nathan took to the water right away and wanted to dive in, but he's not that good of a swimmer and we told him not to go past his knees. Especially in the ocean, it only takes one strong currant Drew was not a fan of ocean water at all, and stayed as far from it as possible. By our second trip down, we convinced him to get his feet wet, but that was about it. Matt, being our water baby, we thought would love it. We couldn't have been more wrong. If his pinky toe brushed against the water, he'd scream like a banshee for 10 minutes. He stayed with Grandma under the tent. My mom had bought the boys some sand toys, and they had a great time making sand castles and sand pancakes, which Drew learned by trial and error aren't really edible. New Year's Eve we went to Naples Beach and had a picnic and watched the fireworks. Every time went in the air Drew would yell, "ka-boom, pa, pow! Ka bow!" It was hilarious. I do have one suggestion Naples Beach if you're listening: turn on the lights when a thousand people (literally) are trying to exit a beach at night. It was impossible to see and no one (including us) thought to bring a flashlight. Instead, there was a sea of open phones lighting our path to the stairs.

Joe and I were going to go out after, but the hour drive home (due to traffic) did me in. I was way too tired. Even with the sand, sand and more sand, the boys had so much fun it was worth it. I wouldn't go every day but if we lived close enough. maybe twice a month. Maybe.