Ward Beach Day

Every year our ward goes to the beach for a ward activity. This year, the primary volunteered to head this activity up once again.

We picked Wingaersheek beach, as it is (in my humble opinion) the BEST beach for children. We'd just come home from our camping trip, washed all of our sandy laundry, and set off for a great day at the beach.

Lachlan is bringing home a baby bumble bee. This is his favorite song. He wants us to sing it to him every night when he goes to sleep. Now he has a life connection to make to the song.

The morning was overcast and foggy, which mostly meant that we were able to stay the whole day without worrying that we'd gotten too much sun.

See how misty it is? You can't even see the water line!

Linda, Janessa and Nadia. Linda and Janessa got SOOOO badly sunburned. Janessa's shoulders are blistered, and Linda couldn't even come to church the next day because she was in so much pain.

We found TONS of sea life. At this rock we found a lobster, which Logan is trying to lure out with some mussels that he's found and broken. We also found tiny shrimps, star fish, sand dollars, and other things you'll see pictured below.

Lachlan LOVES letters. Here, he shows William and Mia each of the letters on his Sverige shirt from Sweeden.

Janessa and Nadia found some pretty decent sized crabs. They had a whole bucket full. Again, we used mussels and clams as bait, broke them up, and these crabs just came out of rock shelter in the tide pools like crazy. Janessa and Nadia scooped them up and only suffered a few pinched fingers.

Low tide was at 2:00 which meant that a huge sandbar was exposed and that we could literally walk 1/2 mile out into the ocean. This was the most magical thing ever!

James and Lachlan walk out to the sandbar.

The waves lured Lachlan right to sleep.

Jansen and Linda found these big sea snails with the slimy slug body, fully out. They were disgusting--completely covered in mucousy slime. But Jansen and Linda just kept picking them up and holding them.

They found many!

Jansen out on the sandbar.

Are you noticing that I didn't get any pictures of J.B. and Soren? Yeah, me too! They were there. I did get lots of pictures of other ward members, but somehow neglected my own two boys.

Would a New England Beach be a New England beach without a lighthouse? No! We got to hear plenty of foghorns in the morning when it was so foggy, and bit by bit as the sun burned the fog off, shoreline and landmarks would pop up!

The sun ended up coming out and it was a gorgeous day! We stayed all day and then ate at our favorite seafood place on the way home--Woodman's Grill.

Funniest beach moment: I wish so badly that I'd had my camera on hand for this part. The thieving gulls would climb into our tents, open our lunch bags and take off with sandwiches, chips, etc. All the men in the ward were busy playing Bocce balls. This is a popular game in France although they call it Boules there. You throw a small wooden ball down, and then the players throw larger metal balls after it to try to come as close to the wooden ball as possible. One of the thieving gulls took off with the little wooden ball. All of a sudden I saw all of the men and teenage boys in the ward running at breakneck speed down the beach and chasing the flock of seagulls. The owner of the game, Steve Boyer was outraged. He wanted to throw his metal balls at the gull to try to get him to drop it. The gull was frightened, but wouldn't drop the wooden ball. He finally realized that it wasn't food and let it go, but it took a good while. We all thought the ball was a goner. How would they ever find it? They did! And the game continued, but that moment of all of the men in the ward chasing a seagull was priceless.