Margopalooza

Yesterday at our beach, Margo (our summer local and party planner) hosted the annual "Margo-palooza" beach party! What a fun time was had by all!
Every one of the 150 or so attendees brought food and drink and celebrated the reason we love Ocean City-good friends and nice families who appreciate the beach and all its wonder.
The evening is really meant to instill fun and comradery among the children but the adults enjoy it as much as it reminds us to slow down and enjoy the quickly fleeting summer.
The kids loved the egg toss and tug'o war (boys against the girls with the girls kicking butt!) Then they especially liked challenging the moms for a match of tug'o war in which they pulled heartily then promptly dropped the rope and watched Moms fall all over each other! Luckily for us it was before too many mojitos. My favorite game was the watermelon race. A large watermelon was greased with crisco and dropped in the ocean out in the breakers. First kid to bring it in wins - what a slimy whoot!
The acoustic guitar player/ singer was awesome playing every great sing-along song you can imagine (American Girl, Brown-eyed Girl).
It was a perfect evening brightened by a near full moon, tiki lights surrounding the guitarist and 500 or more glow necklaces dancing about the beach.
Our beach is so unique in that most of the people are regular summer residents that we have come to know and love. We are very fortunate that we, and our children, have such great "summer" friends!

Thank You Day!

Today needs to be a Thank You Day! Little E recently celebrated her 2nd birthday and I need to finish and mail the thank you cards. She received so many nice things and we need to let everyone know how much we appreciate them. I must set a more timely example here for the kids.
Also, we have wonderful neighbors who just returned from a week in New England bearing all kinds of goodies for the entire family - including the dog!
Hopefully we can think of some other nice things to do to say thanks for our blessings.

Do we have to leave the beach?

Oh the freckles that arrived today- each a kiss from God. It is an absolutely stunning day, just a mild breeze to offset the bright sun, crisp surf perfect for cooling the sun's rays and just wonderful waves for surfing and swimming. There is no strong under toe or rip tides and waves are full surfers. I don't think my kids or husband walked on dry land much of the day- they are going to be shriveled like prunes! As for me and little E, we're just thankfully soaking it all in.
There are a ton of boys ready for a good game of wiffle ball today. It is so cool how a section of our beach seems permanently reserved as a baseball diamond. They play a few innings then race to the ocean to ride a few waves. The last I heard, the score was tied.
You know its a good beach day when it's still packed at 5:15. Now the dilemma is what to do for dinner. I think that today will just be hot dogs on the grille and baked beans but I sure am hungry for some of my summer favorites like homemade salsa with mango and corn, crab salad with mixed greens, green beans with walnuts and chocolate meringue with raspberries. YUM. I think I'll write a summer living cookbook! Though that will have to wait for a day when the sun is not so brilliant and the water less glistening. TTFN

Windy days and Rip tides

What a blustery summers day.

The ocean is wild with white waves and there is an awesome rip tide but the sun is bright and warm. A perfect day for laying in the hot sand and for digging holes to play in. It's a tough task to convince our 2 year old not to stomp on the sand castles or to fill in the holes but everyone is content nonetheless. The wind surfers must really be enjoying the north wind though I imagine they'll need a ride back down south today.
Swimming in the ocean on a day like today is a dangerous sport but oh so much fun. Our oldest daughter is a good swimmer and well aware of the risks of rip tides (fast moving streams of water that travel off shore) but our 4 year old took quite a few wipe outs as she is a daredevil in the ocean. We're really working with her on some tips for getting out of a rip tide. I'll post them with the prayer that none of you will ever need them:
1. Never try to fight a rip current by swimming straight into shore.
2. Swim parallel to the shore until you get out of the rip current. (They are usually less than 100 feet wide)
3. If you cannot swim out of it, stay calm and float on your back until you drift out of the current.
4. Once you are out of the current, swim towards shore. A full description of rip tides and how to handle them can be found at http://www.ripcurrents.noaa.gov/overview.shtml.

Enjoy the ocean but be safe and swim near a lifeguard!

Beach Checklist

Wiffle ball and bat •
Surfboard •
Paddle ball set •
Tennis ball •
Book •
Bucket and shovel •
Television - Not
WII - Not
Don't get me wrong, I love a good TV show (Americas Funniest Videos, Cash Cab) or a race on Mario cart but my favorite thing about the beach is the freedom to make your own fun with the most basic of toys.
Things to do at the beach without the technology that bombards our world
Give my boy a ball at the beach and he can play catch, run the bases, wiffle ball, the list goes on and on.... Kids just seem to gather at the beach and make up all sorts of games.
Drips castles require nothing but a good seat near the water, a few thoughts to get lost in and a steady hand to drip droplets of mud into delicate towers, like steeples on a church. I can drip soft sand into castles all day long, inching my chair up or back every so often as the tide dictates to stay with a steady pool of water.
Oh the surfboard. What a wonderful way to spend the day. I've always admired the ease at which surfers glide into the ocean and seem to leave the cares of the world behind. Now, as the mother of 2 young surfers, I am even more amazed at the persistence required to paddle out beyond the breakers and the patience involved in the search for the next great wave. What a wonderful, solitary sport that appears ever so graceful and peaceful. Think a 40 something can learn to hang ten? (Though I use the term solitary, NEVER surf alone)
Body surfing - just you and the waves, baby!
Nothing beats a good book on the beach. Check out what we're reading this summer and please let us know what we should add to our list
Who could forget shell collecting. I think our family is just naturally drawn to piles of washed up shells and debris, even my 2 year old gets in on the act when we walk to look for shells and sea glass. The joy in finding an intact shell or pretty little pebble is God smiling upon our days. We have a 2009 Shell Jar to collect the smiles!
When all else fails, eat! The amount of food we consume on the beach is amazing but the amount of energy consumed requires a lot of nourishment!

Just don't feed the sea gulls

Life at the Beach

It's a beautiful summers Monday and our 4 children have spent the entire 4th of July weekend in the surf and sand, leaving the waves to lap away the marks of their days. What an amazing way to spend the summer. Our 12 year old beauty has become a little surfer girl beyond my wildest dreams and her younger brother learned this weekend to boogie board on his back!
What a carefree existence and yet, they, along with their 2 little sisters (ages 2 and 4) are amazingly aware of the environment and its wildlife by living in Ocean City.
As a child we used to drive 45 minutes from home, leaving by 8:30 am, to spend long days at the beach. Lathered in Coppertone and sandy with salt and sweat by time we piled back in the Buick for the drive home before Dad got done work, I never even considered it an option to be able to live in the same town that I used to spend vacation days, as Shoobies!
I sure hope our children appreciate this idyllic existence!