Little Miss Penelope's First Play At The Beach

 

 

 Summer is definitely here in Western Australia! Yesterday it was a balmy 38 degrees which is about 102 for all you Fahrenheit people. It's a bit early for this kind of heat here, but it's not overly unusual to have temperatures like this.  It was the perfect morning to take the Little Miss to the beach for her first proper play there. There was almost no wind yet, and because we were there around 9am the heat wasn't too bad yet. The water was on the warmer side as well (as it generally is come this time of year), and because of the no wind factor it was pretty still.

So we slathered her in baby sunscreen, stuck a hat on that pretty little head and jumped in the car. Now yes....we could have walked. After all, it is only about 500 meters away. But my ankle is still not getting any better and I didn't really want to try and push the pram down the sand dunes (and then back up again more importantly!). So we drove a couple of minutes down the road and played on the sand further down the beach than normal.

She didn't seem overly sure of the water, but she wasn't fussed by it either! Curiosity was the overriding reaction, she just wanted to see and touch it.

 

 Yes, it does look like she's saying "what the?!" in the photo above, but I swear there were no tears, no squawks of fright, just a general curiosity.

 She once again tried to eat her Daddy's hair; I don't know what it is about it that makes it taste yummy, but apparently Penelope thinks it's delicious!

 So then after a little bit of playing in the water (as much as a 5 month old can anyway!), we went and sat down on the sand. This she loved! She immediately wanted to dig her hands in and scoop up handfuls to eat. So of course that meant she had sand everywhere! That's ok though, that's what going to the beach does to you! (I have discovered a great tip though, and that's that baby powder gets sand off sticky skin very easily! Sprinkle some on and the sand wipes away, easy peasy!)

When I put her on her tummy she was concentrating so hard on the ground that it really was quite comical.

After she got tired of studying the sand and trying to eat it, we were getting ready to leave when we saw a couple of dolphins right up close to shore. Clearly chasing some fish, they proved wonderful entertainment for us. It would have looked amusing though I think, to see me trying to get the camera out to take photos, only to have it turn off and take forever to turn back on. So by the time I got it figured out, they were too far away to get any good shots. But it made the day even lovelier for us, so that's ok.

 

We got packed up walked back to the car and this is what we saw when we arrived home and went to take her out of her car seat approximately 2 minutes later. Fast asleep, seems playing at the beach is very hard work when you're this little. 

You might like to read:

Embrace Your Inner Hippie and Go For Cloth: Nappies That Is!