Nothing Says Christmas Like Castles In The Sand

Early in December my dad told us about a sand castle contest that was going on, so we headed to the beach to check out the fun along with my parents and my sister and nephew.  Some of the sculptures were creative, some were fun, some were silly, some were a little confusing, and some were nothing short of amazing!  I'm not sure if Luke really noticed the creations, but Jack thought they were pretty cool!  Their favorite part, though, had to be when the judging was all over and it was time to destroy the creations!  Smashing the snowsandmen sculptures was so much fun, as was playing in the pit at the skatesandboard park sculpture, and walking on the Gingerbreadsand man!  Jack even became a sculpture, with grandpa's help!

(This one is for Keisha)

This one was amazing, and I'm pretty sure that it won first place.  Even after the whole thing was over and we were smashing all the "castles" it was still standing... no one could bring themselves to ruin it!

Then Jack found some seaweed (ew) and couldn't resist examining it...

And then we played in the sand while we waited for smashing time!  Jack informed me that he was a "snow-plow train and the sand is the snow and these [hands] are the plow".  And Luke ate sand.

Amy happened to bring a football, and so my dad decided to try to teach Jack how to throw it...

But Jack's humongous hands (the kid seriously has quite a set of paws!) weren't big enough!

So he came up with his own way to throw it.

And then... look who showed up!  There is a sight you don't see every day, huh?

And then, it was smashing time!!!  The boys had so much fun smashing and climbing on, playing in and sliding down the sand!





Of course, put Jack on any uneven surface and you know you're just asking for him to fall down (oh, who am I kidding? You don't even need an uneven surface... he falls down when he's standing still on flat land!)


Big piles of sand tend to turn even grown men into little boys... my dad was definitely having just as much fun as Jack and Luke!  He didn't surprise any of us when he took a flying leap over Jack's head.  And when he did a headstand on the top of the sand mountain?  Well, the only thing we were surprised about was that he hadn't done it sooner!

By the way, just in case you were thinking about wearing corduroy on your next trip to the beach... well, as you can see, that's not really a great idea.

His messy clothes (and messy face!) certainly reflected what a great time he had!

Then Jack called me over to look at him, teasing me by saying "Oh no mom!  My feet are missing!  Where
did they go?!"

And of course that brought forth more not-surprising behavior for my dad... who turned Jack into a mermaid fish! 

And the two of them stayed in that pit, burying and un-burying Jack's legs until Sam finally woke up from his nap (did you notice he was missing from this post?  He was snug as a bug in a rug, strapped to me in the Moby Wrap.  Love the Moby Wrap, and love that Sam!!!)

After we finished playing in the sand, we had a little bit of time before our parking meters ran out, so we decided to go for a walk on the pier.  Jack,of course, couldn't resist walking on the Sandy Gingerbread dude on our way back to the strand!


Right at the foot of the pier was a huge Christmas tree, that Jack loved!


Here are two pics from my mom's camera, cause they're great pics that I didn't get!  These pics also show you exactly how overcast it was that day!



And since it's late and I'm tired... here are a smattering of photos that I took on our walk on the pier, with no commentary ;)

(okay, with one comment... isn't this cool?!  okay, no more comments!)