Beach x 2

Daycare was closed yesterday but Ryan had to work, so Sam and I made plans to meet up with Amy and Will in the morning and go to the beach. We headed down to Kettle Cove, and got there early enough that the parking lot was almost empty. It was warm and muggy, but a low fog had settled over the cove, so it was totally manageable to be out on the beach for 3 hours. Otherwise, I'm not sure how long I would have lasted! Sam and Will had a lot of fun digging in the sand and playing at the edge of the water. Amy and I searched the tide pools for periwinkles, hermit crabs and little crabs. We probably could have wandered around the rocks and pools all day except that, well, you know, we had the kids with us ;) Ha! A fun way to spend the morning, and good to catch up a bit with Amy, even if it was the sort of rather disjointed catch-up that happens when you are trying to wrangle the kids at the same time :)

Digging

The kids

Hermit crab!

Strong girl!

Always running :-)

After lunch, Sam and I headed to Freeport to do a bit of shopping. It actually wasn't as crazy in town as I would have thought, and Carter's and LL Bean kept us occupied for the afternoon before we picked up Ryan and drove down to MA for a visit with Irene and Dana.

Although the hurricane was headed up the coast, I really wanted us to get out of the house this morning. When we got up, it was sunny and bright, but by the time we finally got into the car around 9:00 am, it had started to rain. Oh well, we were prepared with extra clothes and shoes and raincoats. A little rain wasn't going to stop us :-) We went to Plum Island and out into the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge, a really neat 6-mile peninsula of land extending out into the salt marshes and along the ocean. The vast majority of the beach was closed for plover nesting, but the one parking lot available was almost empty when we got out and headed up over the dunes. The heavy rain had stopped, and after a bit of digging in the sand, Sam wanted to go into the water. She and I spent a good long time running in and out of the waves before it started pouring in earnest and we ran back to the car. Sam and I were already soaked, but the rest of the crew didn't have change of clothes, so off we went. It was a lot of fun!

Raincoat on, digging in the sand

Wave running

Fun in the water

Soaked!

This is fun!

After changing, we drove down the 6-mile road to the end of the Refuge, stopping at a few of the roadside areas to get out and walk around. It was really neat. We saw a ton of birds - a number of Great Egrets and Snowy Egrets, Great Blue Heron, two Yellow Warblers, five swans, catbirds, a few Brown Thrashers, swallows, two turkeys out in the marsh grasses, terns, a lot of Red-Winged Blackbirds, and a tree full of Cedar Waxwing, along with a lot of ducks and Canada Geese - and I would love to go back in the spring or fall when more birds are migrating through and explore a bit more. The marshes were really beautiful too. It was a wonderful place to spend an on-and-off rainy morning exploring.

Great Egret

Walking along the road at Hellcat Observation Area

Observation tower

Marsh vista

Family Selfie :-)

Swans

Greens and blues

Aside from all the birds, this was only other creature we saw - a little snake sitting at the edge of the trail