Vacay in Virginia Beach!

My super awesome friend Christy has an aunt with a house in Virginia Beach, and she graciously offered to let Jackson & me join her for a trip!  We’ve been looking forward to it for some time, and finally nailed down a date to go in July for a long weekend.  Another friend, Carrie, came along as well (not sure if these girls knew what they were getting into re: “vacationing” with a 2 year old!).  So Jackson was quite the ladies-man being surrounded by women the whole time :)

We had a blast!  It can be exhausting doing the whole travel thing with an ittle-bittle one, but it was so nice to get a break from the monotony of daily life, and soak in the relaxation of the beach atmosphere (even if it was routinely interrupted with toddler-produced sand-storms, whining, time-outs, and toy-throwing).  Haha… it’s not as bad as it sounds, but usually by lunch time, he was bored with beach times, and we were both getting cranky and ready for naps.

This was Jackson’s first time really being able to experience the beach, and he did LOVE the sand.  Our first morning out, he quickly covered his entire body; a total Sand Monster.  I didn’t want to touch him, but realized rather soon that I needed to just get over the sand issues and be ok with bein’ a dirty beach mama.  Ick!  :)  He would dig in it, lay in it, throw it, build with, put it in trucks, and at times, even eat it. 

However, he wanted absolutely nothing to do with the ocean.  He seemed to be somewhat afraid of it.  I tried to get him to play in it, but the most I succeeded in was getting him to splash around with his feet in the very front edge of the waves.  If he was sitting on the sand and didn’t realize it was coming, he would jump up and yell “it got me… that water scare me!”  One good thing about this?  I realized just while dressing to go to the beach that I completely forgot to pack swim diapers.  So I made the game-time decision to just go with a regular one, but it wasn’t even an issue because he refused to get anything above his feet wet, so I didn’t even need to buy any!

Other highlights --- he LOVED seeing boats in the water, and there were tons everywhere.  He especially  loved the tow boat and police boat that we saw very closely from the restaurant on the bay. 

Here are some pics… I’m sure this will get long!

As soon as we arrived on Thursday afternoon, we ventured out to the beach… so excited to be there!

Yes, that is my child throwing sand.

Little boy, big ocean. 

 Waving at boats is a good trick for getting a picture with the boy ;)

He’s totally freaked out by the water

Christy & me 

Our first day out on the beach!

 
He refused to wear flip flops at White Lake.  So I totally bribed him with a candy bar, and he put them on with no issues!  Score. 

Digging in the sand with Christy

Getting close to nap time…and this boy has no issues with getting all up in the sand!!

Playing with his favorite toy, the big dump truck.

The transformation to Sand Monster has begun.

Second day on the beach:

Christy went on a crab-catching mission, and Jackson totally thought he had a crab in the bucket.  He was thrilled.  Me – not so much!

Destroying Carrie’s castles

Lovin’ on my boy… even if he did bring sand madness.

 
Where did the letters go????

Looking over the “cliff”

 

We had dinner at Bubba’s and Jackson loved watching all the boats pass by from our table on the upper deck over the bay.    

Super sweet tired sleepy boy :)        ps.  The Aerobed is awesome. 

 

Such fun times!  Special thanks to Christy for letting us tag along!