Grannie Camp: the Beach!

(Yes, I am still catching up on our blog posts from November- the rest of our trip to my grandparents' house, Thanksgiving, and two birthdays!)

The weather was just warm enough to enjoy walks on the beach during the day and after dark! That's another big plus about grandparents- parents are encouraged to take romantic walks on the beach while the kiddo sleeps! Leaving through the back gate:
Grannie was so sweet to rent a really nice jogging stroller while we were there and this is how it got used most:
It was beautiful, sunny beach weather! We enjoyed the sand even though the water was freezing. Kenna loves the beach and we had so much fun taking some really sweet pictures of our family, and some of my all-time favorites of Kenna!

We loved seeing Kenna play on the beach, and especially chasing the seagulls. She kept saying "hug bird" over and over- she is such an animal lover already. She was so sad when she couldn't catch one!

"Bird" was a new word for her, as was "shell" which she discovered plenty of to explore in behind Pop Pop's big chair.

Later in the day we went for lunch at a restaurant called the Palm Pavilion which is right on the beach with a big porch overlooking the water! When I was little, it was a place that you would walk in right off the beach, still in your bathing suit, and sit at the "bar" and have a coke and a burger. Over the years it has become much fancier with nice seafood and very few people wearing bathing suits. But the burgers were still delicious!

One afternoon we drove out across the bridge to the town of Dunedin, which is kind of like a little mountain town right beside an ocean. Matt and I both thought it reminded us of Boone. The whole main street was closed off for the weekend for a craft show and street festival which we walked through and did a little early Christmas shopping. Matt took this completely precious picture of Kenna that shows not only her little stage of learning by imitation, but how immediately she took to Grannie and just loves being around her:

Our fearless one had to stop and meet every dog she saw.
We walked around and bought a few early Christmas presents. And of course, an ice cream stop was necessary!
We had to laugh when we saw this booth at the very end. Grannie didn't know she was active on the craft show circuit! The fine print says "for the discriminating Grannie- too funny!
Ready for more adventures!

Grannie Camp: Family Legacies

We were really proud of Kenna's adventurous spirit during the whole trip, and especially how it didn't take her a second to warm up to Grannie and Pop Pop right away even though we don't get to see them nearly as often as we want! It's so precious to me to see my grandparents become great-grandparents and share in my children's lives. I'm so thankful the Lord has kept them healthy and strong, and blessed them with long years!

Sometime during this trip, I especially wanted to take Kenna to a smaller park closer to Grannie and Pop Pop's house, called McKay park. It is named after Grannie's father/my Mom's grandfather/my great-grandfather/Kenna's great-great-grandfather! He was instrumental in developing many of the family-centered (non-commercial or touristy) things to enjoy on Clearwater Beach, and Grannie has been instrumental in keeping them from being cut out of the city budget in favor of motels and parking garages over the many years. My Mom's side of the family is where Kenna gets her middle name McKay.

This park, and the pram sailboats available to sail in the bay (a small child-sized sailboat that I grew up learning to sail in) are his legacy... I'm sure he would be very pleased to know his great-great-granddaughter enjoyed them so much!

Kenna in a pram at the Sailing Center (they are so small, my cousins and brother and I literally grew out of them by the age of 13 or 14!):

And exploring the bigger Hobie Cat sailboats (the kind Papa likes to sail when he is in Clearwater!)

The same evening that all these photos were taken, we went back to Pier 60 for the craft show/festival (and playground!) since it had been chilly and not fully open the night before. I wanted to see a friend of mine named Suzanne who has been selling beautiful handmade jewelry on the beach for many years now. I helped her "man her booth" one summer for about two weeks, and credit her with much of my interest in doing craft shows and having a creative business! And it was fun to introduce her to Matt and Kenna!

And what is a night at the pier without a little ice cream to end the day? Kenna decided she needed to eat hers and mine too!

Grannie Camp: The Florida Aquarium

I can't imagine anything being more perfect for Kenna at this stage than a big huge aquarium. You could practically chronicle the trip according to the new words she learned: beach, fish, shell, boat, and bird! The pictures all pretty much speak for themselves: we had such a good time!

The fearless troops waiting for their leader (in the backyard at Grannie's):

Grannie, Matt and I had so much fun watching her enjoy everything the aquarium had to offer (and enjoying it ourselves!) and Matt and I also fell in love with our camera again, with so many fun things to take pictures of!

The Florida Aquarium in Tampa

...leaning over the sting ray touch tank! Kenna couldn't quite lean far enough to touch them without feeling like she was falling in, but she wanted to.

Lots of really, really big fish!

She was not so crazy about the fish tanks you can walk across (neither was Mommy!). She was making these hilarious freaked-out faces and scootching as closely to the wall as she could possibly get, so what did I do instead of comforting my child? Whip out the camera quickly, of course!

Resting a minute in the big chairs with Grannie.

I love Matt and Grannie's matching faces:

And my absolute favorite was when she saw the ducks. These ducks were the most calm, tame, friendly animals you can imagine, even though we were only about a foot away from them! Kenna kept shouting "hi duck!" and "bath!" and loved watching them dip and swim in the water.

We even met a little penguin on the way out the door!

We stayed all morning until after lunchtime. You know it's a fun time when this happens on the way home:

What a good time seeing all the "psssssh!" (fish!)