Friday night at Seven Presidents in Long Branch, photos.



The playground is gone. I was shocked, mostly because I didn't know. Meaning, we haven't been to this beach all summer. Certainly true. Just had other things going on on Friday night: the Fourth, Jeff's parents, rain, Ella's ER visit, VBS, car in body shop. That accounts for every Friday. But I hope to go again.

And the playground needed repair/improvement so I'm glad it's gone. The sign said there would be something in place in September.

The beach was the busiest I've seen it but we were earlier than usual. And it cleared out rather quickly as most had been there all day. The water was warm and gentle the entire time.

Timmy would not stay close which bothered me. He seems to think that the entire beach is his to roam. I think the Hershey Boardwalk experience emboldened the two little ones to not sweat the waves. I wish they would have been a little more intimidated, actually. But towards the end of the evening, Ella caught a wave in the face, so that might set her back next time.

She and Chris made sand angels, an idea she must get - like so many others - from Max & Ruby. She kept saying, "Snowman" as she was moving her arms and legs. "Snowman" usually means "It's snowing." She doesn't seem able to distinguish between those sounds. Chris was crawling around like a crab but also joined in to create a couple of sand angels. Then the two of them simultaneously turned over to their stomachs and belly-crawled down to the water. Sometimes they are like twins, the way they don't mind copying each other.

And their attitude was as if they were getting away with something. Crawling below my radar. As if I was going to yell at them for heading down to the water. Usually it's their own reluctance that keeps them back. But the way the water was behaving itself, they were quite fine in getting wet.

We rinsed off and changed clothes. Chris thought he had left his yellow security blanket on the grass by our car but turns out it was at home the whole time. He fell asleep in the car on the ride home but I gave the blanket to him before putting him to bed. He roused long enough to acknowledge it and Jeff told me he had a big grin.

I took a wrong turn on the way home, exiting 537W at 18N instead of Kozloski Road. It wasn't a big deal, adding probably ten minutes on, as I exited at 79S in Marlboro. But I can't explain it because I almost never take 18N from 537; I have little reason to ever go north on 18.