Go Fly A Kite (at the beach)!

Grandma lives a good 1.5 hours away and travels a lot, so it's hard to schedule a time to come and visit her, especially when Mika's in school. But, now that it's summer vacation, the girls and I headed off to visit Grandma a couple of days ago. The girls were tremendously excited and so was Grandma!


What is she doing, you wonder? Marika appeared to enjoy "sand swimming". She did a half-breast stroke about 20-30 feet across the beach. There's Miss Mika down at the water's edge! Marika was traumatized early on, getting knocked over by a wave and losing her shovel (but not her pail). She screamed hysterically for about 5-7 minutes, especially after being told that the ocean apparently wanted her shovel more than she did and oh, well... some kid in Hawaii was going to end up enjoying it. BUT - lo and behold, a very kind gentleman saw her antics and quietly kept observing the waves - a few minutes later, he trotted up to Marika and returned her shovel, saying that it had washed up down the beach. What a sweet guy!!! It's so wonderful when people express kindness towards somebody else, especially a distraught child.

My college friend Michelle came to visit us and take a nice break away from her studies. I like to think that when she hangs around us, she can hopefully forget about her stressful life and just relax and - enjoy being a kid again. Apparently, she has not lost the knack for flying a kite!

There's Grandma! The girls absolutely adore her - Grandma is a truly awesome grandmother. She gives so much of herself to the girls (her full attention and total love), it makes me happy that they have somebody like her in their lives. They'll miss her while she's visiting the other grandkids...

And here's Grandma flying the Spiderman kite. Beaches are a great place to fly kites - and it was an especially windy day. Grandma got the kite started and then handed it to Marika, who was either very tired or rather lazy and ended up lying on her back on the beach, holding onto the kite.

I leaned over and casually remarked to Michelle, "Gee... I wonder what would happen if she let go...?" And a few minutes later - you guessed it - Marika began screaming hysterically (again), "MOMMY! THE KITE! I LET GO OF THE KITE!"

I was already sprinting down the beach after the kite (good thing I run 3 miles every morning!) - realizing I was probably not going to make it (I can run fast, but I am vertically-challenged), leaping up on the slope with no shoes (who knew ice plants were so soft? and that gophers liked to live by the beach, too?). Luckily for all of us, the kite string handle got stuck on the fence and the kite went down under a parked car (no innocent bystanders were hurt!). Michelle untangled the kite and released the string so I could wind it all back up. Whew! And interestingly enough, I also scored a Top Flite golf ball at the top of the beach slope fence. Why it was there, I have no idea...

In a nutshell - it was a good (and sometimes exciting) day at the beach - good company and good food. Thanks for lunch and the delicious dinner spread, Mom!