Tampa visit with boys

blk and the boys keep cool

The jboys and I headed down to Tampa for a visit to the King grandparents for them, and a convention for me.

Tuesday morning, we piled into the back of the King CRV and headed out. Sunglasses, hats, and sunscreen were the order of the day. Or at least for the first 5 minutes.

swimming in the Gulf

Clearwater beach is lots of clean sand and warm, calm water. David was able to stand and walk out a good distance, and got encouragement from his Mama to try floating on his back. Justin, of course, is still a total fish.

feeding the gulls

By noon, the three adults had had enough sun, so we ate lunch at Frenchy's, and then took our leftover french fries out to the sand to the gulls.

I threw out a small bit of fry. Seconds later, we were swarmed in seagulls. Having gotten multiple meals a day, every day, fed to them from people dropping or throwing out food, these gulls were ruthless and daring. I showed the boys how to take a fry and hold it up over their head for a gull to take. It worked well, perhaps a little too well, as it was very challenging to get a picture in the 0.62 seconds it took for a gull to snatch it up.

We left shortly afterwards to escape the midday sun. I had gotten quite sunburned and quite worn out. The kids got mildly worn out. We all had a good time.

swimming at the hotel pool

I was staying at the Hyatt in downtown Tampa, which had a shallow pool on the roof of the 5th story. The kids came up one morning to swim. We outfitted David with some swimmies water fins, and he discovered that they made him float! He finally gained confidence enough to be in the water without holding onto something. He can put his head under water with goggles on, and he can swim by himself with the floats. It won't be long until he's swimming up a storm!