SV 15: Improvise, Be Spontaneous, & Get Ready for Fun!

Today we tried to go to the library. No such luck - it was closed. Perhaps if I ever watched the news I would have known that travelling to downtown Racine today would be difficult. I don't watch the news so I didn't know that President Obama was coming for a visit. When we got downtown and the roads were all blocked off, and there were people standing around everywhere and police officers at every intersection I still didn't catch on. Someone told me, I felt dumb for not knowing and then the kids and I walked off. Crying. The kids were crying, not me. Because when the president comes to town and the library is closed the disappointment of no story time outweighs any interest in seeing someone important. Quick Mom, think of something fun to do to make up for missing story time. Quick! "Beach!" I blurted out.
The tears quickly dried at the mention of a trip to the beach and the rest of the morning was focused on nothing but the beach. Beach, beach beach... "Can we go to the beach yet? Is it time to go yet? Are we being good? Can we go?" After a small detour to see if we could catch a glimpse of the president's entourage (no luck) we finally arrived at The Beach. The Sand. The Water. The Sunshine. The Fun!

I'm so glad I didn't take a book to read, I would have missed out on the fun. We built towers and dug holes, buried our feet and then our hands and then a bunch of rocks. Raced each other, built paths and roads and walls. Then we played in the water and I was really surprised that Shelly had as much fun as she did, I kept waiting for her to cry when the waves splashed in her face but she and Archer both just squealed and screamed and laughed. I was cold with the water up to my knees and then I realized that my knees equal Archer's thighs and Shelly's waist. My hips equal his shoulders and her chin. They were in quite deep and still having fun in the chilly water. We got out for a little break to warm up and then they wanted to go back in but I said we couldn't because Shelly was still shivering. "No I not shivering!" she exclaimed and then stood as perfectly still as she could. Archer claimed "we never get cold, remember?" I admired the sheer effort required to willfully stop shivering so we tried the water again but it was just too icy. Time to get dried off, warmed up and head home. And once we were in the car he said, "we're always hungry, remember Mom?" That means snack time, of course!

I was surprised at how upset the kids were about missing story time but we sure made up for it with the fun later on. The weather was nice and the kids played so well that I didn't have to referee any disputes the entire time we were there.  Thanks kids, you guys sure know how to have a great time and I love getting to tag along with you!