Beaches: The only place children actually entertain themselves.

I think we've found something to make Fridays better. (Waking the kids up 2 hours early to drag them to therapies all morning is not their idea of fun.)

So, there are tons of lakes here you know. (The state's nickname, The Land of 10000 Lakes, is no exaggeration.) And since it finally warmed up a bit, in the 70s now...wee, we have been trying to find "our" lake. With so many to choose from we knew there was one out there that would be just perfect for us. We found one 9 minutes away but it was dirty water, the in-laws have one but it's 35 minutes away and down a windy road so Alex and I got car sick, you get the idea. There was always something wrong with each one... until today!

We got home from therapies at 11am and the kids were GRUMPY. (I might have been a little bit too....) So Jason threw us all in the car with a picnic lunch and said we were heading to a beach he had seen recently!

It's only 15 minutes away and...it's PERFECT! We loved it to death and stayed all afternoon! We'll definitely be going there a few times a week from now on.The best thing here is that since there are so many lakes, they are never overcrowded! Most of the time we are the only ones there!

The beach was amazing, so sandy!

And the water was crystal clear!

And the water was not deep for a long time, I loved this as the kids had tons of room to play and I didn't have to worry about them getting in over their heads.

Jarod way out there, and the water is only up to his neck. lol

The sand was perfect for creating! (Jarod never left the water. lol)

I was stretched out on a blanket, reading a novel, while everyone else played; a great book, (best I've read in a while) fresh air, the kids entertained, and the sun shining down on me - bliss.

They had picnic tables!

And a playground!

And trails!

And a freaky bird dock... no seriously....a dock that the birds took over. I don't think it was built just for them...they just commandeered it, and now guard it. And hold secret meetings.

So, I saw all the birds just sitting on the dock, staring out at the lake. Contemplating world domination is my guess. Anyways, I decided to attempt to walk out on the dock to get a photo. It was so insane! As soon as I put one foot on the dock they all slowly turned around and stared at ME! I kept slowly walking down the ramp and they just stared me down.... I got really nervous. (If my sister had been with me she would have died. She is terrified of birds.) I got really close and then half of them started to dive bomb my head but didn't touch me and finally flew away. The others stayed until I got all the way to the end and they left too, except for one. Who stayed the whole time, glaring at me. And omg, the dock was so gross! Piles of bird poop and fish heads! Maybe the one bird stayed there to protect the half eaten fish I saw all over, I think I interrupted their meal. At least they didn't make me their meal. *shudders*

I did get an awesome photo though! The sky here is always so beautiful.(Click to enlarge.)

When I got back the kids pulled me into the water and I stayed for an hour and had so much fun! I took each kid out to "the deep deep", and did laps, and threw them in the water, and played "find the best rock with your feet" game, and dove, and laughed, and got water up my nose, and almost took Jarod's dare to jump off the end of the dock...but the birds scared me too much.

A perfect afternoon, and it was free entertainment!

Oh, this occurred to me today as I was snapping photos. I took over 200 photos today. Aren't digital cameras great? Remember when we had to use film? I sure do. When we had Rebecca I wanted to take tons of photos of her but of course the meant buying film AND paying to develop them. It was $5 for a 24 roll of film and $5 to process them, money I never had so I limited myself to at most...once a month. 24 photos a month! And they weren't always good one of course. lol Of course the downside to digital is I never get prints anymore so my photo albums stop in 2003, the year I got our first digital camera. I have them all on disks so I guess when my kids leave home they will get a box of photos on CDs instead of a box of photo albums. And perhaps a digital photo frame. :-)