Beach Break

Our Beach Boys stake their claim on a warm tide pool


Everyone loves the beach, and the Little Nguyens are no exception. This week we decided to surprise them with a trip to the beach, a perfect Spring Break getaway. On Tuesday while the First Little Nguyen was at school, I was trying to be sneaky while packing up the car. But it was difficult to hide from the Second Little Nguyen, who was following my every move. I had no choice but to tell him!

After picking up the First Little Nguyen from school, we then drove over to meet Chi at work. The back of our car was loaded down with all of the necessities, which were "undercover" beneath a big beach blanket. The First Little Nguyen didn't even ask what was under it! When Chi got in the car, we asked the First Little Nguyen, "Did you bring your flip flops?" He looked at us like we had three heads, clearly confused. I said, "We're going to the beach!" His confusion slowly gave way to excitement, then cheering.

The weather at the beach was typical Spring, with temperatures rising from 40 to 70+ degrees in the course of one day. Wednesday morning, our 9th wedding anniversary, was really, really chilly.... 40 degrees, to be exact. Of course, that's to be expected when you're out on the beach at 7:30 in the morning...can you tell the Little Nguyens were just a little excited? Well, nothing was going to stop them from building a sandcastle, not even an icy wind. After about, oh, three minutes of standing out there watching them, Chi and I were nearly turning into popsicles. Thank goodness there was a Starbucks nearby! Hot coffee for us and cocoa for the boys warmed everyone up enough to finish the construction.

The afternoon was much better. We had lunch on the beach and let the boys play awhile in the sand. The First Little Nguyen and I flew a kite (well, mostly me, as he was more interested in building a sandcastle again). We spent some time swimming in the indoor pool and lazy river later that afternoon before heading out for a yummy pizza dinner. (Anniversary dinners become decidedly less umm...romantic...once you have kids, don't they?)

Our second day was much warmer, about 75 degrees. We spent most of the morning and afternoon on the beach. Chi took a run while I sat in my beach chair and just enjoyed the fresh air. The Little Nguyens were happy to pick up where the left off the previous day and continued building sandcastles. This time, it was really a sand fortress! The fact that the ocean water was a chilly 58 degrees didn't stop the Little Nguyens from playing around in it. It only took one big, cold wave knocking the Second Little Nguyen down to change his mind about being in the water! After that, he dried off in a warm towel and ate some lunch! The Little Nguyens played on the sprayground outside our condo later in the afternoon and swam again in the indoor pool. The water there was much warmer!

On Friday morning, we said goodbye to the sand and surf and headed back home by way of the Battleship North Carolina. But that is whole other post!