• Left Tuesday morning, stopped at a rest area and realized: my period had started with a vengance. It’s the sort of period that screams to you, “Don’t worry! You’re SO not pregnant! Would I be like this if you were? Hell no! You’re TOTALLY not knocked up!” which is reassuring when you’re worried that you are pregnant. However, I was not at all concerned about being pregnant. Not one jot or tittle of worry about that. So a period that enthusiastic was just a horrendous pain–particularly because I had brought NOTHING with which to deal with my enthusiastic monthly visitor. My brother’s girlfriend said, “Oh, don’t worry! I’ve got a tampon!” and pulled something out of her purse that I mistook initially for a little pink pencil. I handed it back, “Sweetie. I’ve had two babies. This ain’t doing shit for what I’ve got going on.”
• After lunch, we pawned Nea off on brother and his girlfriend, who thought it would be fun to roadtrip with a tired and cranky four-year-old. I couldn’t get her little booster seat out of the van fast enough. I’m pretty sure I left skid marks in the parking lot as I peeled out of there before they could change their minds and give her back. The little chit was an angel for them. Girlfriend shared, “She was so quiet the whole time that I actually fell asleep!” Nea added, ‘Yeah, Mama! I was sooooooo quiet! I was like a little mouse!” Great. How nice for Girlfriend.
• Found a Target. Got Flo taken care of.
• Got to the beach house. Ahhhhhhhhhhh….bliss! This is the third year we’ve gone to the same house, so it’s a little like coming home. Every bedroom has a beach view (in theory. Our bedroom beach view is blocked by the deck stairs and the hottub.). Girls went apeshit crazy to go out on the beach. Because M had to stay home for a couple of days, brother and girlfriend went out on the beach with the girls and I.
• And am I ever glad they did, because the Boogster? NO FEAR. She ran into the ocean as fast as her 12-inch thighs could carry her. Wave hit her in the face? No problem! She just laughs it off, and meets the next one with a roar of challenge.  Wave knock her down? She gets back up again. I had to beg my brother to keep an eye on my wee daredevil, so I could search the sand to find the heart that had exploded out of my chest in fear the first time she went down.
• Finally coaxed Sarah away from the water, and watched them play in the sand. Much fun was had by both the girls–when we went back to the beach house, they looked like walking churros.
• There is a spigot and hose on the deck for hosing off sand post-beach walk. Sarah stripped down and let herself be hosed off. She totally dug it. The water was cold, but she’d stand there and roar and laugh as the water hit her chest, legs, and bahookie. We’d stop hosing her off to hose Nea off, and she’d push Linnea out of the way in order to do it again. My little Viking girl, with her yawp of joy in life and all it has to offer. Even, it would appear, possible death.
• That night, coming home from a grocery run, Mom put a dent in the side panel of our rental van. The story I got was she was driving along, and asked Dad, “What’s that sound? It sounds like something scraping against metal.” And Dad replied, “It’s the retaining wall you’re scraping against.” Mom didn’t get to drive the rental van anymore that trip. She was 100% OK with that.
• Wednesday, we went shopping at some factory outlets. We were in a Christian outlet (they sell Christians for cheap–granted, they’re irregular, but with some of them you can’t even tell), and I was buying Linnea a Larry Boy cup and Sarah a Larry Boy toy. The woman behind me asked the woman working there if they had any plastic St. Joseph statues. The clerk replied that no they did not, and asked if she could ask the customer a question. The customer said, “Of course.” The clerk proceeded to tear into this woman, accusing her of worshipping false idols, breaking scripture, not trusting God, etc. The woman was completely taken aback, and stammered that she just wanted a St. Joseph statue to bury in her  yard to sell her house, and that she of COURSE loved God very much. The clerk started to lambast her about how Christians don’t need insurance, that they should trust in God to take care of them and fulfill their every need, and that she’d been in real estate for 20 years and never resorted to idolitry to sell a house, etc, etc, etc. Dude. NOT cool. Women like that give Christians a bad name. And if I hadn’t had both girls with me, I totally would have waded into the fray. Because I’d like to know how she justifies her homeowner’s insurance, or her health insurance? Her car insurance? If God will take care of everything, and Christians don’t need to worry or plan for the future, why is she even working? Doesn’t God say to consider the lilies of the field? They neither toil nor spin, but God cares for them. Why the hell isn’t this clerk sitting on the beach, waiting for God to drop heaven in her most-deserving lap? I was furious. Linnea’s eyes were the size of beachballs, and she pressed close against me and murmured, “Mama? Why did that woman go crazy?” I said, “She thinks it’s her job to hold onto Jesus–not the other way around, Baby. Let’s go.” I refused to go back into the store, I was so put off by that woman, and if the girls hadn’t been so in love with their respective Larry Boy items, I’d have returned them and gotten my money back.
• Wednesday night/Thursday morning, M arrived at the beach house, and there was much collective rejoicing from his girl gang.
• Thursday, Familia Beege went and spent some serious time on the beach. We played in the surf, the sand, made sand castles, went beachcombing, etc.
• Friday we drove down to Florence, Oregon for the best freaking chowder ever. We discovered, after sitting down and ordering, that the ownership had changed hands since the last time we’d eaten there (I suspected so. The decor had changed a bit–lots of animal prints, which is a little weird for a beach town restaurant). We also discovered that they had changed the chowder recipe. I didn’t think it was too bad–it was more of a seafood chowder, with clams, fish, shrimp, and salmon in it, and some sort of tang in the cream–but I was the only one who felt that way about it. It was generally decided that we wouldn’t be returning to Florence. Everyone but I felt deeply betrayed at the chowder switch.
• We take our chowder seriously. You might be picking up on that.
• Friday night was the 4th of July, so we spent the evening out on our deck, watching people all up and down the beach set off fireworks. It was GORGEOUS. As far as the eye could see, there were campfires dotting the beach, with people setting off their individual fireworks displays. Fantastic. I’ll post pictures, later.
• I honestly can’t remember what we did Saturday and Sunday…it involved walking on the beach, getting sandy, drinking wine, soaking in a hottub, and having fun. Oh! One of those nights the girls went skinny dipping in the hottub. Linnea was quite impressed with herself, doing a little “I’m going on the hottub nekkid” dance–to the great amusement of our neighbors.
• Monday we went to another little town to do some shopping. I bought Linnea a little ring that had a mermaid on it. EVERYONE thought that she’d lifted it. I kept saying, “No, it’s OK. I bought it for her. It’s fine. She didn’t steal it.” At that point, M motioned me over, and opened the front pocket of his windbreaker and asked, “Did you know anything about this?” (Yeah, I went naughty for a moment, too, but it was just a pocket). Inside his coat was this…thing. Some sort of squishy toy with googly eyes and other little rubber animals floating around inside it. It was disgusting. “Where in the hell did you get that?” I asked. He said, “Sarah had it.” (He was carrying Sarah on his back in a baby backpack.) I said, “Well, she didn’t get it from me.” Turns out, our fearless Ocean Viking Baby? Yeah, she’s also a klepto. We had NO idea what store she’d grabbed it from, so my brother took it. I don’t know if he knew where it was from, or if he just wanted to take the evidence in case the local police force suddenly surrounded us and demanded an end to the Familia Beege crime spree.
• We tried a new restaurant that day. Now this little town has, what I consider, the best chowder. But the best chowder is NOT at the restaurant we ate lunch at. In order to be a good sport, I went into the new restaurant, and ordered the chowder. I swear to God: it was some of the worst chowder I’d ever had. Progresso Chowder in a can is better than this stuff was. And it was our last day on vacation! We were leaving the next morning! And our two chowder experiences had been distinctly lackluster and unstatisfying! I was so disappointed!
• We’re serious about our chowder. If you couldn’t tell.
• That afternoon, M and I managed to finagle some alone time, and we went to some shops that we first discovered on our honeymoon. They’re trendy and expensive, and we can afford almost nothing in them, but they a lot of fun to poke around in, so: that’s what we did. And when we were done, I drove us back to that little town, and I bought seven bowls of the good chowder, and brought it back to the beach house, because I refused to let the lunch chowder be the final word on chowder for this vacation. It was generally agreed that my chowder was the best chowder, and that next year we wouldn’t think of missing it.
• We take our chowder pretty seriously, if you couldn’t tell.
• Tuesday, it was time to come home again. Nea and I went out for one last beach walk…found a jellyfish. Found some agates, sprinkled like pearls all in a row (I told Linnea that was the beach’s goodbye gift to us. You almost never find agates all lined up in a row). Linnea cried a little bit, because she didn’t want to go, and I cried a little bit, because I didn’t want to go either. Then we hopped in the van and began the long, long drive back up the Columbia Gorge, home.
• We went out for Mexican food. Because really, the best way to deal with the “I don’t wanna go home” blues is a margarita and spicey salsa. Linnea nursed her wounds with strawberry lemonade. Whatever gets you through the night.