Sunsets on the Beach

We experienced some amazing sunsets on the beach on this trip. They were incredible and I had to take a lot of pictures. So sorry for all the picture overload, but this is where I put everything for myself to look back on later. I just couldn't decided which to leave out so there are a lot here.

Feeding Seagulls

Beach seagulls can see food from miles away and we had some fun feeding them a loaf of bread one day. The kids got brave and would put a piece on top of their heads. Some of the birds would actually come down and snatch it away too.

If you zoom in on this picture Ethen is making the funniest face! There were so many birds

Thankfully, the only shark we saw. A little playground by the pier

One of the beautiful sunsets we enjoyed. If you look really close you can see a sliver of a moon in the middle of this pic and one shinning star.

Digging a Sand Pit

Ethen was on a mission to dig a sand pit that was deep. At first he thought going up to his waist would be good, but as he kept digging down he wanted it to be over his head. After a lot of hours digging and playing he did manage to dig deep enough to cover his head. He had to even put a step in the side wall so that he could get out. Each of the kids had fun taking turns getting in and being stranded for a bit. I just love how the simplest things at the beach bring so much joy.

Digging Deeper

Sand Sculptures and a Day with Wild Dolphins

We had a lot of fun digging in the sand in Fort Walton, Florida for Thanksgiving break. Here are some of the masterpieces we created.

Luke is a crab and thought it was funny to be in sand up to his neck

Paisley is our little mermaid. She liked it so much she stayed there for a really long time and kept smoothing out her tail fin.

We started to just bury Ethen deep and then decided he would look so funny as a mermaid as well. The sun was right in his eyes

so Dad's shades completed the look.

Phoebe formed a starfish and dolphin, but I didn't get a picture of the dolphin.

This turtle was made by someone else and was what got our creative juices flowing. Eventually the turtle became a cake after a few days.

We were pleasantly surprised, on our first day at the beach, to have a pod of dolphins hang out with us for most of the day. My battery died on the camera so I didn't get any pictures except for this one. There were probably a total of about 12-14 swimming right off shore from us. They were having a good time playing in the water and Ethen and Phoebe even got to swim right by them. They were floating out on the boogie boards and came within 3 to 5 yards of them. It was so amazing and cool to watch. After that day we didn't see them the rest of the week, so we felt pretty lucky to have had such a great day with them.