The beach: Tuesday

Ohhhh, Tuesday. Tuesday, you were kind of a drag.

Not that ANY day at the beach on vacation is really a DRAG, but there are certain circumstances that can take a little shine off the day. Such as an older brother giving his younger brother a black eye in the pool.

See also: Rain. Not that the rain was altogether a bad thing. Amelia certainly didn't mind the extra attention SHE got from all the beach-dwellers who were forced to come inside.

She was quite taken with her admirers, actually.

They were like moths drawn to a flame. A flame on a brightly colored activity mat.

Honestly, after two 10-hour days on the beach, I think at least SOME of the kids were already ready for a little break. Not that you could tell by their body language or anything.

I thought they might perk up if they had a few bites of my Chocolate Chip Dip ...

And it was a big hit.

Recipe coming soon, when I finally get all these beach posts finished.

Or maybe I'll just keep SAYING that in every post, but I'm so lazy I won't ever actually type the recipes out.

Also on tap for the Rain Delay were some word games. Will, 6 years old, challenged Adam to a game of Scrabble.

And while you might assume that Adam ran away with the win, the score actually ended up something like 211 to 283. Will held his own in a BIG way. Including playing "hin," a word that Adam officially challenged -- only to look it up and find that it was a Hebrew word meaning "a unit of liquid measure." IRONY MUCH?

At the other end of the table, Grayson's sister Debbie played Bananagrams with Nick. Nick had never played before, so I helped him out a little bit.

Not surprisingly, Nathaniel was over on the couch playing some games on his iPod. (Best money my parents ever spent on our kids was for those iPods. HUGE FANS OF THE iPODS.)

For the most part, we just enjoyed the indoor afternoon, and I particularly enjoyed not having to bathe two pounds of sand off of Amelia. I enjoyed my squeaky-clean baby.

Heather cooked that evening, and somehow I neglected to get a picture of my plate. But. Recipes coming soon. We hope.

And finally, sometime around 9:30, the adults got to sit down, exhale and relax.

For the record, I was not on my laptop, iPad or iPhone at this time. AHEM, PEOPLE ON THE OTHER COUCH.

Oh, wait! Look over there in that chair on the far left: it's like an elusive wildlife sighting! That's my brother-in-law Gerry, Debbie's husband, in the yellow shirt. I think I MIGHT have gotten one other picture of him during the week. Soak him in, Internet. This is about all you're gonna see of Gerry.

I think this was the night I stayed up until about 2:00 finishing a book on my Kindle. Did I mention that I only read two books while we were gone? That's low for me, for a week-long trip. All I know is, MORNING CAME EARLY ON WEDNESDAY.