The Beach

We went to the beach, Myrtle Beach to be precise, for a late summer vacation.  When you say you are going to "Myrtle," South Carolina natives have interesting reactions ranging from surprise to pity to excitement.  Everyone has an opinion about this vacation destination.  And I will be the first to admit that it does not make my Top 10 Beaches list.  BUT, it is close and it is fun so down the interstate we went.  Our hotel had a beautiful view of the ocean and we were so excited to get out there and enjoy the surf, sand and sun.     

We managed to do a little shopping starting with the Disney Store.  Tessa had been saving her piggy bank money plus G&G had given her a wad of ones to spend on anything she wanted.  We spent a long time debating what to get.  I'm pretty sure she picked up every single thing in the store at least once including a gift card for a park season pass.  Piggy bank money wasn't going to cover the cost of that!  She made her final selections and handed over her money, not at all grasping the life lesson I was trying to teach.  All she processed was that she was surrounded by all of her favorite stuff, a little piece of Disney right at the beach.  As we left the store with our new precious toys, Tessa said "NOW we can go see Mickey!"  Slight miscommunication here, she thought we were at Disney World again.  How sad to explain that her favorite mouse was not there and that we wouldn't be seeing him anytime soon.  She thought about this and said "OK, we'll just see Goofy then."  We went for a ride on the carousel and she didn't mention it again but next time I will be sure to differentiate Disney Store from Disney World.  

One morning we got up early for a photo shoot on the beach.  I probably should have planned to do this about two hours earlier before the sun was shining so brightly.  But, let's face it, we were on vacation and not in the mood to move too fast in the morning.  I captured a few shots of my darling in the beautiful morning sunshine.     

One thing that I do like about East Coast beaches, are the dunes and sea oats. 

We drove down to Murrell's Inlet to sample the famous seafood.  It's ironic that for a girl who dreams of retiring to the beach, I'm not that fond of seafood.  We only eat shellfish, and even then I'm pretty picky.  However, the food here was delicious.  We shared crabcakes and then I had fried scallops and some cocktail that went down way too easy.  We sat on the deck under palm trees and live oaks watching the beautiful sunset.  Then we went for a stroll on the docks because Tessa wanted to look for crocodiles.  She is fascinated with pirates and we even saw a touristy pirate ship.  Seeing Ryan really relax and slow down was wonderful.     

These two silly monkeys are hammin' it up, our very own Muscle Beach!  Myrtle Beach is a great place for people watching, and I don't just mean people like us being funny.  The Yankees (I married one so I can talk about them) around the pool were the most fun to listen to because they were so loud!  And Tessa noticed interesting things too.  Like the big guy with a huge tattoo on his back, she announced that he got a stamp!  I guess she thought he was a good listener at gymnastics or something.  Then there was the biker sporting a half naked girl with long black hair on his t-shirt, Tessa pointed out his Pocahontas shirt.  Sure Honey, that's a princess.        

Our friends made an impromptu trip to the beach and we were able to hang out with them on our last day.  The girls played together in the surf, made sand castles and helped the daddies dig a huge hole.  They made me laugh when they made sand angels.  For most of the trip the surf was too rough to actually swim in the ocean.  In fact, we felt the earthquake that shook the East Coast and I'm sure that didn't help the riptides.       

While we spent more time in the pool than the ocean, we did have plenty of relaxing beach time.  We came home rested, refreshed and reconnected.