Half Moon Bay Adventures & the Things That Follow You Home

Last Sunday we went for a hike in Half Moon Bay with some friends. We had found the hike on J's new favorite site Weekend Sherpa, and we're excited to try other suggested hikes. However, as so often happens on trips to the beach, by the time we were homeward bound we had started to regret our outing. One thing we learned on our hike, is that B is not a "nature girl" in the sense that she can not just pee any place. This is a bit of a problem when we are mid-hike with no idea where the nearest bathroom or outhouse is and she waits to tell us her bladder is full until the last possible second. And when you're carrying her on your back, you don't really want to take any chances with an accident.

The hike itself was nice, if a bit of an amble, on the top of some bluffs overlooking the ocean. We meandered around for an hour or more until it was time for our friends to part ways. Then we headed down to our usual beach spot (poplar beach) because B has been asking to go to the beach for weeks now.

sad that the birds won't let her get closealligator!

She didn't want any part of the water as she informed us that it was "too cold." She happily set herself up finding and burying kelp. Rhys found this a wonderful pastime as well and ran around the beach trying to find the biggest kelp fronds possible. The problem was that the tide was coming in and once he found a big prize he just didn't want to let it go. He got completely slammed by a wave, much to the delight of everyone on the beach, and still went back to try to find it! T had to chase him down and bring him back to the leash because we were sure he was going to drown or get pulled out by the waves. Then a big wave took B by surprise and knocked right on her tuckus! She said she was fine to keep playing even though she was completely soaked from the waist down, but T decided she'd had enough excitement for one day and made the call to pack it in.

The upside to B soaking her clothes, is that T got to pick up a couple new things at the cute little children's boutique. She found a new brand, Shiva, that she's very excited about.

The next day, as T is recovering from the forever long dental appointment, she notices a weird black spot on the back of C's head. At first she thought it was a scab and that he had hit his head in one of his climbing adventures. Upon closer investigation, she realized it was a bug and when she couldn't brush or flick it off she deduced that it was a tick. She tried to keep calm long enough to talk to one of the nurses from our pediatrician's office about how to remove the tick. Fortunately, by the time she got back to C to attempt the "procedure" the tick had already filled up and was loose in his hair. She brushed it out with B's hair brush and threw the whole thing off the deck when she discovered the tick stuck down in the bristles. She still gets the heebie-jeebies when she thinks about it.