Beach in October

We're at Myrtle Beach this weekend with my in-laws.  They have a time share here and they've invited us to visit them during their week's stay about this time of year for the past several years, but this is the first year we've been able to join them.  

This isn't the time of year I think of as ideal beach visiting time.   School has started, the temperature has dropped by ten or more degrees and the water is likely much chillier to swim in.   And while that may be true some years (I don't know from experience) it's not so this year.   The water is I think the warmest it's been all summer.   Both this weekend and last weekend the ocean was very warm.  

The temperature hasn't been that hot, but it's been nicely warm and sunny.  The pools at the resort here are a nice temperature so we got in and out without noticing it was October and we should be cold.

My children are adjusting to a new situation here at the condo: they are sleeping in the same bed.   They've never done this before and they're not one bit upset by it, but it is an adjustment—especially when it comes to calming down and going to sleep.   Nana brought her bed rails and that's been helpful.   As I write this, my husband is in the room with them, making sure they aren't having fun giggling and kicking each other and going to sleep.   He may be in there a while...

We went out for lunch today and decided to try the Hard Rock Cafe for lunch.   We hoped to get there a bit early to beat the crowds.   When we arrived, following directions on the map, we encountered two things: first, there was a huge Mustang car show in the surrounding parking lot and second, the Hard Rock Cafe was for some reason in a pyramid.  

I don't know about you, but I have this thing for all things ancient Egyptian.  I always assume everyone else does too.   So piles of people hot from looking at Mustangs and a pyramid in which you can eat and I figured we'd be in a line for forty-five minutes to get seated.    But off season and we walked in to an almost empty restaurant shortly before noon.   I'm not sure why the building was a pyramid or why the theme was Egyptian throughout the building with splashes of Rock and Roll memorabilia here and there, but we had a good lunch.

For dinner tonight we went to a "mega buffet".   I'm not sure what you'd call one of these places, but that name seems to fit.   I've been to buffets in Las Vegas casinos and this one not only rivaled it, it surpassed it.   The building was massive, the decorations were nautical in nature and there were an astounding number of miniature ships and boats.   We could have stayed there for hours looking at the displays alone.  There was a children's play area that I would have gladly paid to have my kids come and spend time in on a rainy day.   Getting them to the table was a trick in and of itself.  When I asked, I was told the restaurant had seating for 1004 diners at the same time.   It was a delicious dinner experience all around.

After dinner we drove to downtown Myrtle Beach so my husband could see some of the more prominent sights as he'd never been here before.  As we drove past hotel after hotel on the beach-front road, my husband said, "that one has a sign that says, 'Color Television', do they even make black-and-white televisions any more?"   I'm not sure he was as impressed with Myrtle Beach as we'd hoped he'd be after that.

The Big Boy Update:  My son started talking about ghosts tonight in the car on the way home from dinner.   He told us about how ghosts were bad and that they killed people and they have spooky eyes.  When we asked him where he heard this (because, we told him, we didn't think ghosts were bad or did those things), he told us his teacher from last year had told him.   We're pretty darned sure Elim didn't tell him frightening things about ghosts.  My bet is some of the older children in his class that are four or five-years-old passed on their thoughts on ghosts.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter is getting interested in letters.   She wants you to draw her name or her brother's name.   Today at the beach she spent a long time drawing squiggles and lines in the sand.   Some of her squiggles looked like writing while some of her lines were as long as a grocery store aisle, although not nearly so straight.