If you can't get to the tide pools, build your own!

 I wanted to take the boys to a new beach in Carlsbad that has great tide pools. But we didn't time it right.

We walked down a bunch of stairs to a small cove and noticed that the tide was coming in already. We tried to walk past this reinforcement of the bluffs which was a concrete wall, so the waves were hitting us hard and the kids were nervous.

New plan!

Backtracking, we set up camp on the tiny beach. It was gorge blue skies and we knew we'd found a piece of heaven based on the number of surfers we were sharing the waves with!

The Littles quickly forgot their worries when I dumped out the digging hear and they made their own tide pool with a waterfall! They also put in a little work reinforcing the bluffs and getting as much sand as possible into Chris's shoes.

Liam didn't like the seaweed, so we had some struggles there. (Next time I'll bring donuts.) But even he agreed that the ocean was vast and sparkling. and that a family outing always gives us a chance to see new things and scheme new schemes. Newest scheme, move to Carlsbad and go to that beach all of the time!