Blurring The Lines Of Our Routine - Part III
08.1.2010 A Trip To The Beach. Sort Of.
Mateo thinks this is the ocean:
Granted, it’s a huge pool, but he literally calls it “the ocean”. Every time we go. And while that’s super cute, we do live only an hour from the Gulf of Mexico. So you can guess where our next blurring the lines adventure was going to take us.
You are probably getting familiar with the drill: if I’m going to step outside our routine, I’m going to be prepared because with twin toddlers, spontaneity is not all it’s cracked up to be. So I did some research, this time, by polling my mother’s of multiples group and neighborhood parent’s group and asked for recommendations for a “public area on Galveston beach with decent bathroom facilities and preferably a playground within walking distance and some shade”. Much of Galveston beach’s kid-friendly facilities were leveled by Hurricane Ike and are not yet operable, so I wasn’t sure what kind of ideas I would receive, if any.
Turns out, though, that one of those recommendations was just slightly better than awesome: Palm Beach at Moody Gardens. Had the suggestion not come from someone I knew, and further suggested by several mom’s I’ve met, I would have never chosen this place – the pictures from the website don’t do it justice (and neither may mine).
We arrived at 9:30 a.m. (it opened at 9:00) and Harper staked out a spot for us with an umbrella. And don’t you dare try to take it from her.
So it wasn’t the actual beach that we went to.
Obviously. There were clean restrooms, a zero-entrance pool, a splash pad, and a huge playground, all enclosed by fencing, and with a view of the bay. So for $24.00 for what could have been all day ($11.95 per adult, kids 2-and-under were free), it was actually better than the beach.
And even when it got more crowded by mid-day, it never felt overcrowded.
I had packed a watering can, pail, small shovel, a little sifter, and a funnel for the kids to play with. They were marginally interested.
You are not supposed to bring food in, but they generally do not crack down on that rule for toddlers. Plus, I wasn’t going to feed them soda, hot dogs, pizza, and ice cream dots all morning long. Not unless we were going to strap the kids to the top of the car on the way home. And I hadn’t packed our bungee cords.
I had packed a snack of grapes and cheese and crackers, a snack of fresh cut fruit, and a lunch of turkey and cheese sandwich and goldfish crackers for each child, and after some playing in the water, they were ready for a little something. That’s three meals per kid, people.
Little did I know that coastal breezes mixed with a little sun and sand play accelerate a toddler’s food consumption by HALF A DAY. Around noon, out of food, and a huge storm brewing just off the shore, we decided to pack up and go and stop for a fast food lunch on the road. Which resulted in just enough time for Harper to fall asleep- before we ever got to the highway.
But only for twenty minutes.
When we got home around 2:00, we tried to get them to take a nap. Mateo went down more easily and slept a good two hours. Harper only slept one hour and that sucked for me, mostly because I was tired and hoping to take a nap, too. Unlike times past, though, a short nap did not for her result in a hormonal hurricane the rest of the afternoon. So, progress!
Later that night, after putting the kids down just a little earlier than the new normal, Jennifer and I were talking about the day and how much fun we had. I think the words “low-stress” and “relaxing” actually entered the conversation. It was really the first time we had been somewhere with the kids in public, in a crowd, where they were not running off, and in opposite directions. It was one of the only times we’ve been anywhere with the kids that we could actually sit down for just five minutes please.
We are so going back.
Reader Comments (3)
Sounds perfect! Love the photos too!
From our experience, that playing in water = insane hunger thing never stops. I always pack a huge dinner for our nights at the pool and I am always hungry because the boys eat it all. I can never pack enough.
We took a 3 day trip to the beach for the boys' fourth birthday. Jon and I sat for THREE HOURS drinking by the side of the pool, stopping only for potty breaks and more food. This happened three days in a row.
And so it was that our return trip home included a call for a vasectomy.
@LauraC - I now know that water+wind=famish. There was a turkey sandwich in there for Jen and I that we didn't get to eat.