More Beach Pics

Beachy Keen

Bethany Beach Vacation 2010 did not really start off as planned. For days before hand I excitedly told anyone within hearing distance about how excited I was to really organize, plan and pack for the trip this year. It was perfect because I was off from work on Friday and the kids were scheduled to go to daycare that day. So, I'd take them in, then go home and have all day to calmly and leisurely do laundry, make lists, pack bags, put things in an orderly fashion and even go ahead and pack up the car. Which would mean a smooth, peaceful and leisurely Saturday morning to get on the road and head to the beach. Dreamy! Especially since our packing usually consists of super late night laundry, throwing items in random bags, rushing around like crazy people all Saturday morning and then asking each other if we remembered to pack certain things for the first 30 minutes of the car ride. No, this year was going to be different.

But on Thursday when I picked the kids up from school, Lucas felt fairly warm and was acting a bit off. I couldn't really tell if he was just hot and exhausted from the obnoxiously hot weather (he'd been playing outside and it was in the upper 90s and super humid) or if he was getting sick. After a while, nothing really changed so I decided to take his temperature - which was 103. Poor thing had a rough night and a somewhat milder, but still present fever the next morning. No school for Luke, which meant no lovely day of organizing and packing for Mom. The best laid plans are always spoiled! But luckily, my little guy was not in terrible spirits so we actually were able to have a fun day together, just the two of us. Which is more exciting than laundry and packing anyway!

So Marty and I still did the late night scramble and last minute pack, but for whatever reason it went more smoothly than most years and we actually left the house in an orderly and un-crazed fashion TWO MINUTES BEFORE our target departure time, which is practically unheard of in this family. Lucas seemed to be completely better and we were ready to enjoy our fun-filled family vacation. But when we stopped at Marty's parents house on the way, we noticed Elise acting whinier than usual and then it became clear that it was her turn to get sick. I took her temperature and discovered she had apparently caught whatever Luke had because her body was also running at a blazing 103. By the time we arrived at the beach Elise was officially feeling horribly. Our first night was not the fun exciting celebration it usually is, but spent worrying over Ellie (and worrying that the illness was going to make its rounds in the house of 12 people during the week). After a rough night, Elise woke up with a mild fever in much better spirits, and by Sunday night she was as good as new.

The rest of the vacation was wonderful! It was incredibly hot and crazy humid all week, but we spent lots of time enjoying being in cool water in lots of forms. In past years we have gone to the beach, Elise has been so terrified of the ocean (it's too loud!) and Lucas enjoyed eating the sand so much that we've spent very little time at the actual beach. This year, it was a whole new experience. Both children LOVED playing in the ocean and abstained from eating sand. Elise had one little sand-in-the-eye issue that was a bit stressful for a while, but other than that we had excellent beach experiences. We even took her out into the water to jump the deep waves (before the lifeguard told us we couldn't do that if she can't swim) so she got a real ocean
experience. The kids (particularly Elise) also loved the pool. She was like a little fish all week, using her noodle to motor around the pool having an absolute blast. There was a strip mall very near our beach house that had a fountain that would shoot up water for kids to play in. This was Luke's favorite part of the vacation - he went into the fountain (both in his bathing suit and with all of his clothes on) nearly every day.

We took two trips down to Ocean City so the kids could experience the excitement of the boardwalk and go on some rides. Elise went on everything from kiddie rides to big kid rides she was tall enough to go on and loved every one. Lucas, on the other hand, is obviously way less of a rides person. He sort of enjoyed the Ferry Whip until he decided he was done (while it was still moving) and tried to stand up, coming so terrifyingly close to falling out that they had to stop the ride and take him off. He also went on the motorcycles for a few rotations before deciding he hated that and wanted off. The only thing he really enjoyed was the carousel - and by enjoyed I mean that he did not cry and beg to get off. I think Elise may be the only thrill seeker child in the family!

Lucas also played his first round of miniature golf, but I use the term "played" very loosely. He didn't really get it, but was a great sport about staying off the green and not picking up other people's balls. Elise and a great time playing golf with her cousin Abby, but I think she enjoyed the ice cream cone she got afterwards even more!

We had a really fun time hanging out with family and enjoying all that the beach had to offer. We're already excited about taking another beach trip next summer!

So Similar, So Different

For children who look so much alike, Elise and Lucas sure are different. But make no mistake people think they look alike. Many people have even asked me if they are twins (which is actually a little wacky considering that they're more than two years apart)! I don't think they look at that alike, but I can see why people say that. They have the exact same shade of red hair (though Lucas has waaaay more of it than Elise did at this age), the same adorable curls when they have wet hair or in humidity, the same big blue-gray eyes, the same slight upper body. They even have the same mannerisms - wrinkle their noses the same way when they don't like the taste of something and both get the same pout when they're about to cry.

Where they are not the same is..well..everything else. Elise is very cautious around people she doesn't know well, sometimes even around people she sees a lot. For example, we went to the doctor's for her 4 year check up last week and the doctor (who she has been seeing regularly since she was one day old) asked me if Elise actually spoke - because she's never heard her utter a word before! Not one in four years! On the other hand, we have dubbed Lucas "The Mayor" because he takes it upon himself to greet and welcome everyone - at the store, walking along the sidewalk, at restaurants, where ever. He waves and says hi to everyone he passes and takes it personally when they don't respond. Often he will repeat himself until he gets some sort of acknowledgment of his greeting. Similarly, Lucas loves all animals and runs to greet and touch them with absolutely no fear or idea of how potentially dangerous this is, while Elise enjoys looking at animals in books or from afar but doesn't really want them to come near her - and certainly not touch her.

Elise was always a very active child - always busy and moving - but she tended to keep her activity to running and jumping and flipping and things like that. Lucas, on the other hand, is slightly more subdued than she is but he uses all of his energy to get into stuff. He (still) eats things he's not supposed to (ie rocks, napkins, coins), and can make something into a complete mess when left alone for 10 seconds (throws everything on the table onto the floor, pulls soil out of potted plants, dumps the contents of your purse onto the couch). He is also a climber - something that Elise was never really into at this age, but also she was a lot more coordinated than Lucas is so even if she had climbed things it would have been less terrifying.

Elise has never been very good at entertaining herself - she wants people to be playing with her or at the very least, very attentively and actively watching. Lucas can entertain himself for really long stretches at a time and while he enjoys playing with others when he's doing it, he rarely seeks it out.

Another difference of note - when she was about a year old, Elise developed an attachment to "Greenie", her flat elephant lovie. When I say attachment, I mean ATTACHMENT. To this day, the child cannot sleep unless she is cuddling with Greenie (and yes we have a back up!!). Lucas never developed an attachment for anything like that, although lately he has been taking two stuffed animals (any ones) into bed with him and holding their hands while he falls asleep. (Precious!)

Yes our little ones are different alright. But they are both equally as sweet and as much fun.

Jumping the Gun

Ok, I may be premature in blogging about it, but from the way last week went I don't really think I am. The decision has been made (mostly). We are going to start potty training Lucas. This seems particularly crazy to us because we seriously did not even consider that it was a possibility for us to start potty training this summer. From everything we've heard about potty training boys, we just assumed it was something we'd try to tackle next summer. Any other option had never even crossed my mind. But in Luke's class, they are potty training a few of the older kids and Lucas is completely obsessed with it.

A few weeks ago, he started telling us that he had to go pee pee and asked to sit on the potty. Even though we hadn't considered potty training, we certainly weren't going to say "no kid, pee in your pants" if he was specifically asking to go on the potty. So we indulged him. And the crazy thing is, he actually went. On the potty. Every time he said he had to. Then he was waking up with a dry diaper in the morning and telling us first thing that he had to go potty. Again, we took him straight to the potty, where he proceeded to take care of all of his business.

We mentioned all this to the head teacher at his school, and she enthusiastically told us that he is ready and we should go ahead and go for it while we have momentum on our side. We continued to hem and haw, remembering the exhausting process that was potty training Elise - and she was older, a better communicator and was more coordinated when we went through this with her. This could potentially be a disaster and it would all be our fault, because everything is completely fine the way it is.

So Luke's teacher talked us in to having a "Practice Week" this week. We're going to take note of the times that Lucas regularly does his business and work on getting him on the potty right before/around those times. We're going to track when he goes and how often we don't catch him before using the potty. We bought some underwear, but we're not going to officially start using them until after the practice week, if practice week goes well and it seems like he's really ready. Once you start, it's almost impossible to go back. (He is very excited about the big boy underwear though!)

So it's possible that we're diving into the insane process that is potty training - way, way, way sooner than we anticipated. Wish us luck on Practice Week!

Thrill Seeker

Elise is fairly cautious child. She enters into a lot of things, particularly social situations, with hesitation, thought and care. It usually takes her a while to warm up to people she doesn't know well, or an environment that she's not familiar with. Socially, she's just not much of a risk taker. But where she is not cautious, apparently, is in the physical and the fun. She has always been a bit of a dare devil when it comes to things like climbing and jumping, probably because she is extremely coordinated therefore hasn't learned the hard lesson of needing to be cautious quite yet. But we recently discovered that she is a dare devil about lots of other things too.

This past weekend, Elise and I traveled Virginia to visit with my friend Heidi and her 5 year old daughter Riley. The car ride down was shockingly great (she has come so far!) and the girls immediately picked up where they left off last time we hung out with them (when they came to visit in February). On Friday evening, the girls had a blast playing in the sprinkler and then on the Slip N Slide. Once they got the hang of it, they were trying out all sorts of ways to get down the Slip n Slide - sliding down head first, backwards, upside down. Elise had no fear about the new experience - she just had fun.

Then the four of us went to Kings Dominion on Saturday; Elise's first ever amusement park experience. From the moment we arrived, it was like a dream come true for her. So many rides! And she could go on them as many times as she wanted! She has been on lots of rides in her life - like a ferris wheel and spinning tea cups - some of which were high and fast. Still, carnival rides are a little different - a little more tame than amusement parks - but Elise showed no sings of being intimidated.

From the minute we pulled up she was asking to go on the most terrifying looking roller coasters in the park (rides that you could not pay her father enough money in the world to ride!), but she sadly was too little for those. There were a few roller coasters and adult rides that she was tall enough to go on though, and the kid was eager to get on all of them. She loved her first real roller coaster (formerly called the Scooby Doo, now called something I can't remember) so much she kept trying to put her hands up in the air and was giggling with glee the whole time. On the Avalanche, a super fast roller coast type ride (minus the steep hills) she declared it the most fun ride of the day. She went on several super fast spinney-turny rides that were so fast and spinning they made me sick (and a few that I didn't even think I could ride - Heidi went on in my place!) As much as she enjoyed the fast and scary rides, she also still loved the slow and rather dull kiddie rides that chug along in excruciatingly slow circles. She just seems to love rides in general, no matter how fast or slow they're going. The whole day was so much fun.

Our little girl is a thrill seeker, that's for sure. I guess in a few more years (or 6 inches) she'll get to see if those huge roller coasters are all that she thinks they're going to be.