Hawaii Part II: Quinn Met the Ocean

Quinn is our adventurous child.  He's had a wild side from very early on, and Pat and I knew he'd love the rolling waves of the Pacific.  After all, he's gone full body into Lake Washington and Lake Sammamish around here.  Warm ocean water would undoubtedly be quite the treat.

It didn't go quite this way, though.  At least not at first.  Here is a ridiculously long series of photos that tells the story of how Quinn came to love the ocean.  

Walking out the first day.  I'm sure he's in awe of how fine the sand is here.  Certainly not like the rocky stuff he's used to at home.

 Feeling brave.

 But nope, got scared and needed Daddy to carry him, or, "Up me" as he puts it.

 He was mesmerized by the sand, but was careful to stay at the shore line so the water couldn't get him.

 He held his shorts up like this the whole first day.

 Exploring the beautiful white sand.

 Oh, and he decided that he should do a little drawing in the hotel room while we were getting dressed for the beach.  On his tummy, of course.  Why use paper when you have skin?

And this photo epitomizes his first day.  Intrigued but cautious.  There's no way he was letting that water touch his shorts.  

 Second day, sand castles!

Seeing Pat and the kids building sand castles makes me all kinds of happy.  I've fantasized about these moments.

 Playing nice and safely in the sand.

Shadows!

  Totally relaxing.

 And then just as quickly as the vision of relaxing on the beach and building sand castles for the next week entered my mind, I was brought back to reality.  Quinn had decided the ocean was now worth exploring.

And he discovered that waiting for the waves to come up and slowly bury his feet in the sand was pretty entertaining.

But letting the water bury just his feet got boring, apparently.

Because he needed to let his hands get buried as well.

And sometimes the waves were strong enough to knock him down.  That was fun too.

But Pat taught him to have a "wide stance" to help him keep his balance.

We enjoyed sitting as the waves rolled up to shore.

In fact, Kira clapped and cheered right alongside Quinn for this.  We were all in heaven.

And before we knew it, Quinn was laying in the ocean, having the time of his life.

In summary, we've still got ourselves a beach babe!  And boy am I grateful for that.