The DuMontiers took their first family vacation to Seaside, FL this past week. And our last as a family of three!
We picked Alden up from Mother's Day Out on Thursday afternoon and headed straight for the coast. Alden did great on the almost five hour trip. He occupied his time by watching for moo-moo's and "Lucy's," a.k.a dogs, along the way, and taking off the mysterious socks his mother had put on him this morning. He obviously did not remember wearing them last fall. 
Mid-trip snooze. This only lasted for about thirty minutes. His Dad had planned on this lasting for about two hours. This is the law of averages: you don't want him to sleep, he sleeps. You want him to sleep, he refuses. Here is another law everyone should pay attention to: A mid-trip diaper change. We were standing in the parking lot of All Saint's when one of our friends told us about the trip she and her husband took with their daughter when she was Alden's age. She said they thought they could make it without stopping and just refilled her juice cup in the car. When they arrived, the seat was soaking wet. You would think we would listen, we laughed at this story, but as usual, thought these things would not happen to us. Alden snacked on graham cracker bunnies and apple juice (a rare treat that was a last resort due to the lack of soy milk options at the local CVS) the entire way down. 
Needless to say, this is how happy Alden was to pull up in Quincy Circle at our destination. Yep, wet pants, wet car seat, wet shirt, wet diaper. Huge mess! We listened on the way home to the advice.
Another lesson this first time mom learned is not to just throw the child who is scared to take a bath in the "big" bathtub at home without his baby tub onto a seemingly gargantuan beach in front of an endless tub of water and say,"Here's the beach!" This is the reaction you get followed by said toddler crawling up your legs with fear.
A much better approach.
Getting his sea legs on the sand.
Checking it out from all angles. 
And off we go! After about five minutes, or less, we could not keep a hold on him. He could have cared less if we were there or not. He picked up all kinds of sticks and trash, chased birds, and in general ran as fast as he could all over the beach.
We could not get him to smile for pictures! He would smile and laugh and say "happy, happy" as much as you wanted until you pointed the camera. It took another lady deciding to say hello for us to finally capture the shot. Notice, he is not looking at his parents behind the camera!
Here is Alden running over on one of his random trips to visit people. These ladies made the mistake of winking at him playing in the water and saying hello. With Alden, this is an open invitation for complete attention. No matter how many times we directed him back to the water, he kept wanting to take these ladies his toy fish. Finally, we just let him. 
On Friday, our friends Elizabeth, Matt, and Ben joined us in our house. Alden was beside himself with excitement. He and Ben dug into the Busy Bee book which became a hit of the weekend. Everybody wanted to read it all time, especially when the other one was reading it. 
Now, we do have one problem with our son. Alden is not a fighter or a bully or a hiter or even a biter. Nope, Alden is a hugger. We kept having to intervene because he loved Ben so much. He literally had him in the hug death grip at times. He completely did not understand that Ben was not standing up at good as he was yet, and after a few innocent hug tackles which Ben did not care for, we learned to watch out for the hugger. 
Our pale, blond, blue eyed babies could only take the beach for short periods of time, but we all had a blast. We all put on the swim suits and hats our first official day, or hour, at the beach. I was very jealous of Matt and Elizabeth's mimosas from Modica Market. Ahh, if this were only Mad Men and 1960, I could have joined them. I have been watching pregnant Betty Draper drink red wine for weeks on that show!
Alden, actually sitting still, and Ben digging in the sand. 
I could not believe that Alden actually wore his hat on the beach! This child never wears a hat, but was such a good sport.
Alden's newest trick is that he has learned to climb. He climbs on the sofa and chairs, the table in the beach house we were staying, and is especially fond of locating baskets or boxes to climb on to reach higher surfaces. The beach is a great place for an active toddler. Alden even found a way to put his climbing techniques to good use. I think it will be years before Mommy gets to sit like this and enjoy the view. Another lesson: vacationing with children is a very different thing. I am not sure it is an actual vaction, just different scenery.
Alden had his first time in the ocean. This is not the best picture of Alden and Mom, but it shows how amazingly calm the ocean was on Friday. Yes, this is the ocean! It looked like a swimming pool. In fact, while Ben was practicing his swim lesson skills, Alden pretty much curled up on Mom's shoulder and fell asleep! Daddy made us get out of the water then because he was scared that we would miss a nap opportunity.
I am glad we took advantage of the day. The next day or so was not so pretty.
Our next little beach bum is getting bigger. The count down to finding out whether we are buying swimsuits or swim trunks for our next Seaside adventure is really close! Every time I go to Seaside I am pregnant. I guess I crave pickles, ice cream, and Seaside.
Speaking of sleep, we were shocked and amazed and you have no idea how happy that Alden slept through the night in his pack and play! When we have gone out of town before, nighttime has been from bad to dreadful. But, I guess we wore him out with fun in the sun. Every night, we would swing on the front porch swing to go to sleep. It stormed on Sunday night and you could even hear the ocean behind the rain. Alden also became obsessed with a stuffed animal dog that he has named, what else?, "Lucy." He absolutely had to have Lucy to go to sleep which is a very new thing. The first thing he would say when you went to get him in the morning was "Lucy" and remind you of his toy. Of course, the second thing was "Mamma" which was great. Even if Daddy goes to get him, he would point to our bedroom and call out "Mamma." Will someone please remind him when he is 16 that I was his favorite and he actually wanted to be with me?!
Alden was not so good at meals. He pitched and pitched a fit on a regular basis at dinner which is highly uncommon. He would suck the batter off of the calamari and then throw the rings, he would stick his hands in the soup, he would refuse to eat, you name it. He was particularly good on Monday when we took him to eat at Wild Olives in Rosemary beach. He had an entire cheese pizza all by himself and even got to taste sugar cookie (hey, it's vacation). Loved it!
Our little water baby. After the storm, the waves got bigger. Alden loved to get in the water with Daddy. Daddy would give him seaweed to throw. I have always thought it was diguesting myself, but this provided Alden and Daddy hours of entertainment. He would constantly pillage through the beach bag to find his toys. Our new favorite word is "truck" and our first two word combo came from our beach toys, "dump truck." I never called it this, but I am thinking it comes from a book on trucks he likes to read. He also surprised us by pointing to the Seaside church, which was right beside the house, and saying "church." We also passed a statue of a dragon fly which Alden proceeded, without prompting, to call a "firefly." I have no idea where he picked up these two words because they haven't specifically been taught. Kids are amazing.
Alden loves the word "giraffe" although he pronounces it "giratte." He knows exactly what they are...almost. An art gallery on the way back to the house had a painting of giraffes that he pointed and announced every time we passed. Even at night when the painting had been taken back inside. They also had one that was "quack, quack." I assume that one needs no explanation. However, one day, we were passing Great Southern restaurant when a patron had his great Dane outside. Now, usually dogs are Lucy, but the dog might have been a little bit bigger than Alden was used to seeing. He pointed and told us it was a giratte! Clearly, he needs a little more study on giraffe habitat. Although, he did point out every "kitty," his absolute favorite word, that we saw around Seaside.
You have got to give Alden good timing. On the morning we were supposed to leave, Alden woke up sick. Croup and runny nose. We called the doctor and got an appointment. Okay, so we also were semi-bad/semi-helpful parents and went to the beach one last time after that. On the one hand, do you take the child with the croup to the beach? On the other hand, the salty air did seem to clear him up, he was already sick anyway, and he did have to be still for a long car ride. He was wonderful on the way back and we drove straight to the doctor. Even with the diaper change stop in Prattville, he was soakin again. Good thing Mom had done a lot of shopping because Alden got a new outfit to visit the doctor. A hour and half later, after turning the light switch on and off about forty times for entertainment in the room, we got medicine for a double ear infection and the croup. Way to come home!
Only Alden would be having too much fun to let you know he had a double ear infection! What a wonderful trip for all of us! Can't wait to go back...okay, really, none of us wanted to leave.
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