The fun I remember from my childhood revolved around the beach. My mother had great love for the beach and every opportunity she got, she would take us to the beach. I remember playing with sand, staying at the chalets by the beach, the extremely gross, sand caked toilets that smelt of sea water and the beds that had sand in it. Sand did get every where. Despite all that, I remember those times fondly.
Our lives as parents often revolve around doing things we wished we did more, what we had most greatest memories of and avoiding like plague what we still have nightmares about. So, for me, the beach falls into the greatest memories category that I want to share with JED.
Thankfully, we have like-minded friends who live near the beach and were happy to make it a happy crowd.
Firsts for JED, the hammock. Army style. Two 3 year olds could sit in it and 'row, row, row your boat' to their hearts' content. The ex army boys however realised that they were too heavy for it when lying in it, their bums were touching the ground.
Another first, setting up tent outside of the house. They discovered that camping at home was way more fun because it wasn't hot and stuffy in the tent. Gone are all their illusions of wanting to camp outdoors. When they are older, I would like to let them set up tent in their grandparents' garden though and attempt to sleep in it. I am certain they will migrate into the comfort of their air-conditioned rooms after a while but that's part of the fun.
The only problem is that our local beaches are a bit of a hazard. We were warned by some fisher folk to not let our kids run barefoot on the sand because there were glass shards around. The edge of the water was rimmed with thick green algae and I wasn't going to let JED go anywhere near the water for the fear that they glowed toxic in the dark.
At the end of it, they were sun-charred (Mommy forgot sun block), sticky and stinky. All very familiar senses from my childhood. Now, to convince the westie husband of mine to rent us a chalet and the experience will be complete!
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