Fernandina Beach

My last vacation for the summer just ended.  It's always sad when you realize that you only have a few more days until your summer ends.  I go back to work this Friday, which for most, seems early for school to be starting back - but as a counselor I always go back one week before the teachers and two weeks before the kids.  Too soon if you ask me.

This past week we were at Fernandina Beach.  I have many really good memories of this particular beach.  I grew up going to here.  It is where my mom wanted her ashes scattered and so when I am there I always feel like she's around me.  And, she must have worked some miracles on this trip because everything went better than I anticipated.  

My Aunt Martha & Uncle George invited us to come stay at a house with them for the week.  It happened to be the very house I stayed at for many summers growing up.  A quaint yellow house on the beach.  I have a very vivid memory of eating taco salads on the porch when I was little.  We were there with my two cousins and their families.  Harper and Yukari flew into Jacksonville from San Francisco.  Hunter, Jessie, and their almost one year old, Addie drove from Atlanta.  Addie was quite the social butterfly.  She waved and blew kisses to anyone in her sight.  My boys on the other hand, watched her like a hawk, worried that she would somehow take their toys.  Glad I taught them to relax a little, right?  It was a good time, minus some missteps on our part :) I will get to those later.

I was fearful that Drew and Ollie wouldn't take to the beach / sand / water because Drew has always had a healthy fear of getting his feet dirty and actually dipping himself into water.  When we arrived around 5pm it was completely overcast and there were tidal pools on the beach.  Drew and Ollie slowly worked their way into the little pools.  Ollie did not mind getting himself fully soaked.  Drew was a bit cleaner and tossed his clothing off a little at a time until he was fully naked running around in the pools and sand and water.  I looked at Mike like, "are you seeing this??"

Drew when we first arrived at the beach.

Ollie's first ever view of the beach.  He couldn't get down there fast enough.

Looking at shells.  

Mike & Ollie.  Drew being silly in background.

Stripped down.  Who needs clothes?

I love this picture.  Ollie is oblivious to the butt in the background.

Ollie enjoying the tidal pools.

Jessie, Hunter, and Addie arrived!

Gotta have the shovel!

Addie thought she had a friend in Ollie....

Until he thought she might take his shovel.  Who is that back there?

Day after day we enjoyed the water and sand.  Daddy is an excellent sand castle and hole digger.  Ollie particularly enjoyed climbing in and out of the holes that were made.  He let them fill up with water and then would find his own way to get back in and out again.  The pictures really don't do it justice.

Aunt Martha & Uncle George blowing up the floats.

Drew with his feet in the water.

Favorite part....sitting in the waves!

Ollie & Addie sharing a hole. 

Ollie & Drew being silly with each other.

Martha, Harper, and George relaxing on the beach.  Martha trying desperately to keep her drip castle away from Drew.

Ollie napping on Mommy.  What a sweetheart.

Ollie & Drew enjoying some "fruit snacks." 

The Hole!

Ollie's favorite spot.

Harper trying to to help save the hole from a water breach.

We also had some fun days downtown seeing the boats, eating ice cream, going into shops and seeing the sights.  We went one day to Little Talbot Island State Park.  There are more birds, shells, and wildlife at this particular park.  We spent a morning over there.  Mike and I went on a sunset cruise one night while Martha & George watched the boys.  It was a pretty sunset cruise that went around the Cumberland Island area.  We then had dinner at the Crab Trap.  It was when we left the house in a hurry for the cruise that Mike couldn't remember where he'd last had his wallet.  Later we received a weird phone call which as it turns out had nothing to do with the wallet fiasco.  Then, our car was egged.  Yes.  We were egged while on vacation.  This was discovered while Mike was searching our car high and low for his wallet.  He didn't find it.  The next morning he went to retrace his steps at the State Park and I did some more searching.  I found his wallet buried in the back of a closet.  Yippee!  The other misstep was allowing Ollie to play with our car keys.  It always seems harmless, but it's not.  At 3:58am on Friday morning I kept hearing banging on the door to our house.  After verifying that it was the police, he said that the door to our van was wide open.  There had been some car burglaries and they wanted to make sure nothing was taken.  As it turns out, everything was fine.  No burglar is going to settle for a Jungle Book movie and Clifford reruns, right?    Well, it turns out that as Ollie was playing with the keys he managed to open the door to the car and it never got closed.  Ugh.  Barney Fife did tell me that they had caught the guys who were doing the egging the night before.  Yea for the Fernandina Beach Police.  What a night.  Again, a misstep on our part.

Ollie gives the best hugs.

Happy Boy.

Ready to go for a dip!

My growing boy.  Walking everywhere.

Sunset cruise!  

Even an IPad2 can come in handy with toddlers!

Dinner at Sliders.  Yummy.

Enjoying the view.

Drew discovered goggles and wanted to wear them everywhere.  

And, when Drew didn't have them, Bear was holding them.

Here are my little shrimp.

While at the beach we played lots of poker with my family.  We listened to good music. We enjoyed relaxing in the sand and surf.  And, we ate ourselves silly with seafood.  It was delicious and overall a very fun trip.