The Time I Almost Didn’t Bring An Umbrella

We got back from sometimes-sunny Siesta Key yesterday. What a fun trip to the beach, capped off with the most rain we (and several long-time residents of Siesta Key) have ever seen due to Tropical Storm Debbie. Luckily, Nathan put the umbrella in the suitcase before we left.

Before we forget, one of the most highly anticipated parts of Jack’s vacation was flying in an airplane.  We had to have answered “how much longer until we get on the airplane?” one hundred times Monday between 5 and 7:40am.  Once we were off the ground, he quickly shifted gears from the wonder of flight to the snacks mommy had packed in his Lightning McQueen backpack. Henry did great on the plane, and was entertained by massive amounts of snacks and stickers.

The week in Florida started out with blue skies and sunshine. We enjoyed the beach and the pool, right in our front yard. We stayed in a little Florida-style house that was about a 5 minute walk from the beach. Grandpa Bill and Grandma Sue stayed in the attached (but separate – luckily for them) bungalow for the first 5 days of the trip.

Here’s Jack and Grandpa Bill enjoying the sunset over the Gulf the first night of the trip.

Jack loved the beach right away, but Henry had a little trouble at first. He did not care for the feel of the sand on his feet and whined whenever it got on top of his toes or a wave touched him. But he got used to it and eventually was digging in the sand and running and stomping in the water. Jack loved the waves and trying to jump over them, as well as building sand castles and digging holes to China. He also made up a game called hopstone that he thought was pretty cool. To play, you started on the beach and ran into the water leaping over the waves. But if you ask Jack to explain it, you’ll get many more details. We went to Siesta Key Beach three times and once to Turtle Beach. The sand at Siesta was white and fine, and not hot at all. At Turtle Beach the sand was so different; it was just shells crushed up so it didn’t work for sandcastles.

We buried both boys in the sand, something they both liked for just a little bit and then they were done.

After the beach in the morning, we would come home and do naps and then swim in our pool. Jack loved swimming around with his water wings and Henry’s favorite thing was Nathan throwing him in his floatie. He also liked being able to kick himself around the pool in the floatie.

Another morning we went to nearby Myakka state park and went on an airboat tour around the lake to look for alligators. We saw several. The captain told us there are 600-700 alligators in the state park! On Sunday morning it was raining so we went to an aquarium and saw sharks, dolphins and sea turtles. Other favorites things were getting mini-donuts in Siesta Key Village and getting ice cream at the ice cream store down the road from the house.

We were able to go to the beach Saturday morning. It was overcast but it was probably the boys’ favorite morning at the beach. The storm started getting worse Saturday afternoon and by Sunday afternoon it was raining like crazy. There were lots and lots of tornadoes all around us and the weather people were on TV all afternoon and evening with the latest on the storm. We never had a tornado warning for our county, but that did not help calm me down. I was a little freaked out by the storm and not at all happy when Nathan decided he would go down to the beach to check out the storm. I might have even suggested we pack up all of our stuff and “head for higher ground.” And I might have gotten up in the middle of the night Sunday to make sure our house wasn’t flooded and Henry wasn’t floating away since he was in his pack and play and closer to the floor than the rest of us. We had a little canal behind our house and by Monday morning it had flooded and there was lots of standing water around the house. Thankfully, the weather cleared Monday afternoon and we were able to fly home on time. And I almost forgot another highlight of the trip for the boys – Jack would be sad if I didn’t mention his new toy dolphin named Stickers and Henry’s shark, Pancake.