Magical Monday - Hooray for the World!

This Monday was pure Magic. After enduring freezing weather for days and days we got a blessed little break.....45 degrees! Unless you've had to endure the dark frigid seemingly never ending winter days you can't know how glorious 45 degrees feels. You're whole body seems to release and relax and you can breath again. To celebrate we decided to go to the beach. Seriously, there is nothing greater than the beach on a crazy mid-winter thaw day. We went prepared to be pretty cold and to wear mittens and hats and gloves and run around for a little while before we lost feeling in our limbs....but it was even warmer than we expected. The kids ended up using all the winter hats I packed as 'buckets' to collect sea shells.

They went hunting and collecting for a few hours! All the while I was able to soak in the fresh air, the sun, the smells of the ocean an the company of my dear friend Eva. It was heavenly. In the middle of winter it's easy to forget about the beauty of nature.....the incredible world we live in. (The inside of my house isn't too breathtaking.) A day like this helps you remember how glorious the world is.

Oh, my, I love these two little best friends. I wish I could capture all of their sweet conversations. They play for hours together, having the best of times. They really fight with each other quite rarely. I love it.

And probably the most amazing part is that we got to see a baby seal. A real baby seal RIGHT BY US!!! She came up at high tide and stayed to enjoy the warm day with us. Apparently a vet had been there before we got there to check her out to make sure she wasn't sick. She was just relaxing, drinking it all in.

Charlie named her Badonna.

Look how close we were to her! It was so fun to see a wild animal like that......to observe her scooting up and down the beach and basking in the winter sun.

Eventually she got a little nervous about us and wriggled her way back into the sea. We watched her go.

I think Emmeline fully enjoyed her first trip to the beach. She spent most of her time in the bjorn...going between sleeping all cuddled up with her little hands covering her eyes and waking to gasp contently at all the fresh air blowing in her face.

We even let her lay in the sand for a while. She seemed to like it.

This is charlie's monster face. He does it a lot and reassures us that he is a nice monster.

Look at the snow on the beach.

Charlie thinks most things are about how dirty he can get his hands.

It was warm enough that they even ditched their coats after a while so that they could "hunt" some more.

It was great to have Eva there to snap some pictures of me with the kids. It's crazy seeming me there with three kids. I have three kids. Weird.

It's so rare that I get my life as a mom captured. I want to remember how much I enjoyed this time with them.

The whole day made me want to appreciate little moments more with my kids. It's only going to be like this for a little while. Before I know it they will be gone. They really will. It made me think back to one of my favorite quotes on motherhood by Anna Quindlen.

"The biggest mistake I made is the one that most of us make while doing this (mothering). I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs. There is one picture of the three of them sitting in the grass on a quilt in the shadow of the swing set on a summer day, ages 6, 4 and 1. And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked when they slept that night. I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less."

What we ate: Some oranges and a loaf of my first attempt at home made wheat bread that I grabbed on the way out the door. I think it tasted yummier than it would have cause we were at the beach and we were ripping off whole chunks of it and stuffing it in our mouths with our sandy hands.
What we talked about:

• Badonna the seal. How she fanned out her tail and arched her back and purred (or was it more of a snarl, you're scaring me kind of sound?).
• The clouds. Charlie was amazed at how they moved across the sky.
  
• The endless treasures that they collected in winter hats and spread all over our kitchen to 'clean' once we got home. Our sink drain is now clogged with sand and shell bits. I think it was worth it, jeff might not.
  
• the seasons. the kids are really into understanding seasons right now
• A song that they've been listening to called "Hooray for the world." The lyrics say: Hooray for the world, I'm glad to be on it." Charlie thinks they say: "hooray for the world, i'm glad to be honest." Both good messages I guess."

How they sounded: Thrilled. Filled with delight for life.
How they looked when they slept that night: exhausted and happy.

Oh. Life is good.

And in case you didn't get enough....here are all the pictures from our magical day.