Seaside, OR

I have so many wonderful memories of visiting Seaside, OR as a child.  I have been waiting for the day when I got to share it with my own family.  Our friends agreed and we made it a dual family vacation.

While the rest of the adults unpacked I took the eager sand diggers to the beach for a quick adventure.

Nicholas jumped into the full experience and dumped handfuls of sand on his head within minutes of having his toes in the sand.

We stayed in 1/2 the house on the left.  The little ones had their own rooms and the toddlers shared.  Between the camera and monitor a highlight of many nights was listening to Cooper and his buddy chatting it up before they fell asleep.  One night Cooper was particularly tired and his friend was not.  He kept telling her to go to sleep and stop playing.  She really wanted him to come off the bed and play with her.  He said he couldn’t because then he couldn’t get back in the high bed. Finally she turned the light on and that really irked him so he jumped out of bed to turn it off.  Now he was stuck and couldn’t get back up.  They were trying to work together to get him back in bed.  At one point she grabbed his ankle and raised it up to his head (the height of the bed) which wasn’t quit the leverage point he needed 🙂  The adults were laughing hysterically watching them try to problem solve, but ultimately one of us went up there to lift Cooper back in bed.

Early risers meant 6am beach walks.  The wind was the calmest at this time making our sunshine walks very pleasant.

This was a childhood memory of mine I had to share with the group.  Skeet ball at the arcade, that hasn’t changed in 30 years, impressive!  Mini golf was the other activity I was hoping we could all do, but you had to be 6 to play.

Initially Cooper wanted to hold hands when we got to the water’s edge, but he soon warmed up.  Sprints from the sand castles to the water and back were a daily activity and helped keep us warm in the wind.

The Kochman boys taking on the next set of waves with their toes.

This was our first vacation with Nicholas fully walking and he loved the sand.

Nicholas also loved his friend’s toes.  It was a crazy obsession.  Every time the little guy started to crawl Nicholas would run after him, drop down and start nibbling on his toes.  They both seemed to enjoy the game so it continued all weekend long.

Are you kidding us, a bulldozer at the beach?  Yes!  This weekend was a big volleyball tournament where they made the bleachers out of sand.  We were lucky enough to capture them knocking them down at the end of the tournament.

Cooper experienced his first ice cream cone drop.  Unfortunately, Mama is the one who did it when trying to “help” take the paper off of the cone.  It probably shouldn’t count since he didn’t actually drop it, but the emotions were real and finally corrected when he got Mama’s ice cream instead.

After watching Cooper’s friend do the carousel, Nicholas decided he wanted to do it too.  Before the carousel started he began to get upset and move a bunch.  We were nervous he wanted off, but it turns out he just wanted the ride to start.  He loved it.

Seeing the others do it, Cooper then wanted a piece of the action.  He selected the sleigh for his carousel ride experience with Daddy.

We ended this amazing beach weekend with a birthday doughnut celebration.  It was the first time Cooper actually sang happy birthday, perhaps the excitement of donuts after fueled his voice.

All of the pictures from our adventure can be found in the August folder here.