Just Beachy

We have a beach trip coming up later this summer, plus the Hodgepodge questions this week have a beach theme, plus this month's Share Our Lives link up (which I missed) had everyone sharing their favorite vacation memories, and all this to say (finally!) I've been thinking beach-y thoughts. 

We live on a lake now which is beautiful, crystal clear, unsalted, and shark free. We don't do a lot of summer beach trips anymore because it takes a lot to peel us away from our happy place in peak season. 

Lake life is chill and there's no sand to sweep out of every nook and cranny at the end of the day. Our lake is big and there are quite a few islands scattered throughout that have small beaches which we occasionally pull our boat up to, and then haul chairs and snacks and sand toys over to spend a few hours beachin' it. 

Mostly though we swim off our dock, we jump off the back of the boat when we're out in the wide open water, and we motor over to friends docks for float parties and relaxation. 

Still I periodically need to see the ocean. 

I need to remember I'm small and the Creator of the universe knows precisely how many grains of sand lie beneath my feet. I need to feel the remnants of saltwater on my skin as I watch the sun sink into the water at the end of a glorious day. 

I've been to a lot of beaches on American soil and elsewhere but when someone says favorite I always return in my head to one place- Marco Island. 

When we started going to Marco, only people who lived in Florida seemed to know about it.  Marco was a sleepy town without much going on, and while it's not a crazy tourist trap today, it's not unknown either. 

The first year we went to Marco daughter2 was still sleeping in a crib so we're talking many many many moons ago. Hubs helped organize a meeting there and got to know the hotel manager, so when he brought us back later that summer the manager upgraded our room to one with a walk out which was perfect. We'd spend the morning at the beach then the girls would nap and we'd open the french doors and park ourselves in lounge chairs on our porch. It was perfect. 

This trip made it our place and we went back often as the years rolled by. 

Marco is covered in seashells and sorting through them to find ones that were special and unbroken was always a favorite activity. 

We spent our days sitting on the beach, reading books, talking, thinking, making plans, walking, exploring, eating at our favorite places and just soaking up all the family time our hearts could hold. 

I've read that while children may not remember every detail of a family vacation they do remember the overall sense of family closeness that develops when you travel together. Sounds and smells and tastes later in life can trigger memories from trips taken when they were young, and these trips become part of your family lore. 

It's been a number of years since we've been back to Marco. Life and all that jazz. But in my mind Marco Island will always be 'our place'. 

One that holds precious memories from the days when we were a family of four...

 When little girls waved goodnight to the sun as it sank into the sea...

of laughter shared...

and problems solved...

...a beautiful peaceful place where plans for the future that is now were born. 

This post is linked with Talking About It Tuesdays hosted by Joanne at Slices of Life

Hello Summer Hodgepodge

Welcome to the Wednesday Hodgepodge! Who's ready for summer?  If you've answered this week's questions add your link at the end of my post, and then go say hi to your neighbor on the list because that's the way we roll round here. Here we go -

1.The first day of summer lands on the Hodgepodge this week. What are ten things you'd put on your list of  quintessential summer activities? Will you try to manage all ten this summer?

Only ten? My list has at least twice that number, but I'll pick ten in an effort to be brief-ha! 

Roast marshmallows in the outdoor firepit, watch a baseball game, visit the farmer's market
stargaze, make a peach cobbler, dine al fresco (often!), watch the sunset from the back of the boat, have an ice cream cone, daydream, watch fireworks, see an outdoor concert, catch a fish, and make a summer playlist.  

I did not mention swimming because I live on a lake where swimming is a given. Cornhole, boat rides, and BBQ's are also standard summer fare here. And there will be a homemade strawberry shortcake on the menu sometime before the leaves declare it autumn. 

Also, I'm not good at keeping things brief. 

2. Do you collect seashells when you're at the beach? What do you do with them once you get them home? What's your favorite place to comb for seashells? How many of these 'world's best beaches for hunting seashells' have you visited? Which one would you most like to visit?

Calvert Cliffs State Park (Maryland), Jeffrey's Bay (South Africa), Sanibel Island (Florida), Shipwreck Beach (Lanai Hawaii), Ocracoke Island (North Carolina), Galveston Island (Texas) and The Bahamas

It depends on the beach, but if it's one known for shelling then yes we collect seashells. I have some from my favorite 'shelly' beach sitting in a tall jar in my bathroom. I've been to three spots listed, and in fact we used to like to camp near Calvert Cliffs. You can find shark's teeth on the beach there, which is kind of cool. 

My favorite place in all the world to hunt for seashells though is Marco Island Florida. 

3. At a snail's pace, shell out money, come out of your shell, go back into your shell, drop a bombshell, happy as a clam, clam up...which 'shell' phrase most recently could be applied to some event or circumstance in your life?  Explain.

None of these are an exact fit at the moment. I'm waiting on my grandson's arrival later this summer, so perhaps 'at a snail's pace' works? 

4. What summer activity do you dislike? Why?

Hmmm...what's not to like about summer? How about applying mosquito repellent? Other than that I can't think of a thing I dislike about the season. 

5. What's something you see as quickly becoming obsolete? Does that bother you?

Small town bookstores, small town florists, small town stationery shops.  Does it bother me? A little. I enjoy shopping in all these sorts of small town places. I do use Amazon for a number of things, and I get it, but I think when small businesses go under a town loses a little piece of it's heart. 

6. Insert your own random thought here.

I'm going to see my mom for a few days and while I'm in town I'll be attending a little reunion of 'kids' from my high school church youth group. Many of these 'kids' I haven't seen in decades, so I'm looking forward to catching up, and seeing all the ways we haven't changed. We reconnected and organized ourselves on Facebook so yay for social media. 

Hubs will be at home keeping Daughter2's pup company while Daughter2 is on holiday. Hubs likes to make Daughter2 nervous by telling her he's going to teach the dog to swim while she's at the lake. She's a greyhound and they're not known for being big water dogs, but....

https://www.facebook.com/viralthread/videos/811236792382339/

#goals

Gifts from the Sea

My little family of four spent just a few days at the beach right after daughter 2's graduation. I haven't posted any pictures or written any words about those few days because to be honest it was a confusing and difficult time and I wasn't sure I wanted to write anything at all.

As I've thought about that week I recognize in the midst of life's greatest sorrow, we were given a gift. A reminder that in our darkest moments God cares for us.

We were together. All of us in the same place at the same time. I don't believe it was happenstance.

In my family we all love the sea.

Its the place we go to reconnect with ourselves and with each other.

Salt water rolls in with the tide and the tears.

When I am face to face with the sea I remember that God is big.

He knows the end from the beginning.

I stand atop a thousand million tiny seashells resting in the sand and am in awe of a Creator who knows precisely how many lie under my feet.

The birds of the air...

...the fish of the sea...

His eye is on the sparrow and I know it watches me.

On May 8th, 2012 this was our sky-

We sat together and watched as it was painted a thousand shades of pinky golden orange.

Life changed that day in ways we haven't even begun to realize, but this one thing remains constant. God loves us with a love that is wider than the widest sea, deeper than the deepest ocean and more beautiful than the most vivid sunset.

For a moment peace was not elusive, it was there for the claiming.

The sunset felt like it was made just for us.

Perhaps it was.

"How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! I can't even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand..." Psalm 139:17-18 (NLT)

Catch a tiger by the tail

My husband is in London today. It's his first trip back since we moved. Tonite he's going to see his buds at the Indian restaurant we loved in the little village where we lived. I'm only
extremelyslightly jealous. Yesterday I got an email from someone new to England. A friend there suggested she visit my blog and she did and I wrote her back and spent some time thinking about how it felt to be new and all that was in front of us that we had no clue was in front of us. The combination of these two things has left me feeling a little bit homesick.

Hubs phoned yesterday after he got checked into his hotel and he did have a small rant about the iron being bungeed to the ironing board in his room and the outlet being in an inconvenient spot which is always the case with outlets in the UK. I used to have a six foot extension chord plugged into my bedroom wall so I could dry my hair in front of the bathroom mirror because there were no outlets in the bathroom itself. Gotta be careful with 220 volts and water in close proximity I guess.

Thinking about those little annoyances should help but for some reason the quirkiness is something that makes me miss it more. Its a funny thing because when you leave you imagine all the things you will not miss and for sure using an extension chord to dry my hair ranked right up there. Yet, I think about that and I smile. Go figure.

So how about I talk some more about my vacation? Aren't you so glad you stopped by here today? Really there is not too much more to tell because other than the wave runner outing we spent most of the week sitting in beach chairs, swimming in the ocean and then maybe mixing it up with a swim in the pool, reading stacks of books, and walking for miles. Oh, and eating a lot of seafood.

If you've never been to a beach in this area you might have a hard time imagining the shells. The beach is just a mass of shells and of course alot of them are broken but there is also no shortage of beautiful whole shells of every size shape and color. No we did not bring home any live starfish...that's a big no no.

My daughter said it felt like cheating because you could literally just look down at your feet and pick up something pretty all along the beach. You didn't really have to work too hard.

Luckily.

We were on vacation after all.

There is a public beach in Marco called Tigertail and we like to go there to collect shells and also because you can walk to the far end and its likely you will not see another soul. Its pretty amazing to think there are beaches that are not wall to wall people and noise but there are and this is one of those beaches.

Apparently you can walk around from the car park but we always take the 'short cut' which involves crossing some water along with several school of assorted fish. This little bit is also the teensiest bit squishy which I do not care for. At all. I try not to think about the critters under my feet. Shudder.

We saw this guy just as we were taking our first steps. I started referring to him as a squidray because he looked like a cross between a squid and a stingray. My girls are petite so coordination was required.

As soon as we got to the path we saw millions of little bitty crabs. eww. I love crabs but they must be cooked. And these little guys scattered as soon as we stepped onto the path but they made so much racket. I couldn't even get a picture because I was too busy trying not to step on one in my bare feet. ick.

When you get out to the beach it is worth all the trouble. It is one of the most peaceful places I've been...so quiet and beautiful.

We did have a little bit of company...

I love to watch the pelicans...such funny creatures.

I started this post last night and things always look a little better in the light of day. The sun is shining, my pup was supposed to have a little surgical procedure today which was cancelled because the mysterious 'bump' is no longer a mysterious bump, hubs will enjoy seeing friends in our old stomping grounds...

and will especially enjoy his very spicy curry with a side of diced chilies because they will remember that's how he likes it...and as for me?

I think I have a few shells to clean and sort.

I feel the need...the need for speed

One of the fun things we did last week was a wave runner tour of the 10,000 islands. No we did not go to all 10,000. Technically Marco is considered the biggest and northernmost island in the chain which touches on the Everglades.

Let me back up and just say that on occasion I have to be talked into doing things like riding a wave runner. I am not like the rest of my family who asks the cute cabana boy things like, 'How fast are we allowed to go?' My family knows this about me so by the time I arrived at the rental center the cute cabana boy let me know that my family was not going to allow me to drive. Apparently they did not want me slowing them down. My daughter1 would drive and I would be her passenger. Which was fine with me because I have been on the back of a wave runner with my hubs before and told the cute cabana boy that he was the one they should be worried about. I think cute cabana boy had already figured this out.

This is cute cabana boy. He looked a lot like Chris O'Donnell...

I was distracted by our upcoming adventure so I neglected to hit the zoom. Plus my girls would have found that embarrassing and I'm pretty sure mom on the wave runner was embarrassment enough for one day.

We all put on the very attractive life jackets and I'd been wearing a baseball cap all morning on the beach but had to stow it because apparently we were going to go fast...nothing like some lovely hat hair to complete my look. Why don't I look adorable in my life jacket like daughter2?

Cute cabana boy gave us the basic operating instructions but the only thing I really heard was to leave a lot of space between the wave runners in case someone stops suddenly and also the part about if you go flying off to move away from the wave runner so your hair and/or life jacket are not sucked up underneath the machine. Won't this be fun?

In fact it was lots of fun. Lots and lots of fun. Actually, while I generally have to be pep talked into stuff I do love to go fast. Daughter1 was an excellent driver and hubs only scared daughter2 once or twice. He liked to drop way way behind us so he could then zoom up at supersonic speed. Cute cabana boy pretended he didn't notice.

In all our trips to Marco we'd never been out to the islands. Technically you don't go to the islands, you ride around them. There are mangroves on these islands and they are interesting trees. They grow in salt water and the roots go as deep as the trees are tall. They are able to filter the salt water themselves and the mangrove forests along the coastline here help protect Marco from storm surges and hurricanes.

We didn't see any manatees but we did see lots of beautiful birds and some crazy jumping fish and we got up close and personal with some dolphins...he's right beside us here-

It's not easy to take a picture of a moving animal while sitting on a bobbing wave runner in the Gulf but we tried...

We rode for about an hour and a half and only saw a handful of boats in all that time. It felt like we were the only people on the water and it was a gorgeous day.

I may have needed a little coaxing to get started but by the time we returned to the beach I was thinking maybe we needed to buy a wave runner once we got back home. And I guess a house on the Gulf to go with it...I mean we'd have to park it somewhere right?

By the Sea By the Sea By the Beautiful Sea

Whew. Where to begin? I'm back home after a week of vacation and am drowning in photos....graduation photos and beach photos both. Wait, don't go...I'm not going to post them all. I can't promise you I won't post any but I for sure will not post all. That's mostly because I have a lot of pics of my girls on the beach in their oh so cute bikinis but it doesn't feel right to me to put those out in the blogosphere. There are also a few of me in my swim suit which I guarantee you will not be going on the world wide web for altogether other reasons, so you can relax now.

We wrapped up the graduation celebrations late Saturday night and flew to Florida Sunday morning. Marco Island is just south of Naples and is one of our favorite family vacation spots. We've been there many times and its a special place for us...we all have lots of happy memories from holidays in Marco. Here is the view from our balcony-

I tried to talk my hubs into retiring straight away but then he reminded me that we still have one in university and we have a house we're still settling into in a state far far far away from this little slice of heaven and btw, he's not quite old enough or even ready to retire just yet. We both love the water though so someday. Do you see how easily sidetracked I am?

With another school year winding down and hubs travel schedule getting ready to go into overdrive we all wanted a vacation somewhere we could put our toes in the sand...

read lots of books...

talk for hours

eat fantastic seafood

wonder at the beauty of a sunset on the Gulf

and reconnect as a family.

Marco is just such a place. Most mornings hubs and I would walk to the point and look for shells. The beach is literally covered in shells but there are a couple of places where piles are dumped by the sea and we especially like to hunt in those spots.

Of course hubs is not content to pick up some of the billions of shells sitting in plain sight...he must climb out and over the rocks to get what? Better shells?

Dolphins love to play at this end of the island and early morning is a good time to see them.

We did a fun wave runner tour one day which I think I'll save for part 2. Yes patient readers...there's more. I'm sure you can hardly wait because we all know how much fun it is to see other people's vacation photos. I've been working away at my scrapbooking backlog but that is s-l-o-w going and I've got a ways to go before I catch up to present day. In the meantime my blog has become a good place to record
every random thought I havewhat is happening in my life as I live it. Blogging helps me hit the pause button for a minute...to see the specialness not only in life's big moments like a university graduation, but also in life's little moments. Like a walk on the beach.

One day you are walking on the beach with your little chicks...

and before you know it...

you are walking on the beach with your little chicks.

Sometimes the little moments are the big moments.