I must say the beaches of Long Island are very relaxing!

We are now home from an absolutely amazing vacation in the Hamptons (well we stayed on the edge in Riverhead). And no we didn't see any famous people. The second day we drove out to Montauk Point to see the light house. I had no idea it was commissioned by Pres. Washington. Jake climbed the light house not once, but twice.

We were then off to the beaches of Hither Hills for the afternoon. It was a very nice beach and there were some waves but not too big. Jake learned to love boogie boarding even when he got knocked over by the wave. He just got up with a smile on his face and said he loved boogie boarding! He basically spent the entire day in the water. Nellie was a little unsure of the waves, but enjoyed spending the day in the beach tent snacking her way through the day.

Those of you that know about my feet issues will be surprised to know I learned to almost like the sand on my feet. 

Erik had to calm me down when some people set up right in front of us. I really wanted to go say something to them but Erik held me back. The beach wasn't that crowed so there was plenty of room for them to set up elsewhere. (Ok, I will let it go already.)

Before Photo

Obstructed View Photo (Yes I did have to photograph it!)

We stopped in East Hampton for a nice dinner at Rowdy Hall. The food was great, very reasonable, had  a great selection of draft beers, and was very kid friendly. The fish and chips was the best I have ever had and Nellie ate almost as much of the fish as I did.

Our third day was spent at the best beach we visited. Pat, Maria, and Emily took us to their favorite beach, Cupsogue Beach. Wow, was it a nice beach. The waves were a little bigger than the day before but Jake was ready for them and spent most of the day in the water riding half the waves and getting knocked down by the other half. Nellie seemed to enjoy the ocean and waves a little more as well. However, she still managed to snack her way through the day. Our beach tent is now called "Nellie's Snack Shack".  To my happiness a group of four ladies almost set up in front of us but one of them said that it would be rude to do that when there was plenty of room on the beach. I got up and thanked her! An enormous amount of fun was had by all!

 Here it comes

 Getting ready

Ride 

 Keep your head above the water

Over taken by the wave

 Made it!

 Taking it all in for one last time.

 Sad to leave the beach!

 So tired!

Yeah! Vacation!

This year for vacation we decided to go to Long Island to hit the beaches and see family and friends. We started off the vacation spending an afternoon with Traverson’s in Queens. We were hoping to get there much sooner than we did but the traffic getting to the GW bridge was so bad! Those of you that know me know how well I deal with traffic (I don’t deal with it well!). Jake had a blast in the pool and he and Lou decided to see if Jake could jump through the hole in the float. He did well and may even have a future in the circus or something.

 Lauren took the trip out to Riverhead and spent the night with us and the day at Orient Point. The beach was pretty empty and everyone had a great time. We had to drag Jake out of the water and keep a constant eye on Nellie who kept trying to eat the sand and rocks. Having snacks in the beach tent was a big hit!

We met the Yannuzzi’s in Port Jefferson for dinner and Lauren took the ferry back to Ct. Jake and Nellie had a feast on crap legs (thank goodness it was buy one get one free or we would be broke). It took Erik, Lauren, and myself working together to get the crab meat out of legs fast enough to keep up with their eating. No good pictures of the feast were taken because that would have required a break in the action of eating and Nellie and Jake would not have dealt well with that. The Hehl kids can eat and enjoy a good meal!

Play Ball

Erik and I coached Jake’s T ball team (all 4 year olds). What did we get ourselves into??? It really was fun but a bit nutty and what I would imagine it is like herding cats. Good news is that everyone one of our players learned how to run the bases. Bad news is that many didn’t get the concept of dropping the bat and just ran with it. Fielding was an issue as half of the kids all ran to the ball at once and the other half had no clue the ball was even hit into the field. I do have to say by the last game great improvements were made and the kids did start to get the concept of fielding and playing a position. One poor kid even took a line drive to the face, but he cried for about two minutes and then was back on the field. We had a few kids that were wonder and at times with a bat in hand. Note to those who coach 4 year old T ball kids should wear a helmet at all times with a face mask….Wait maybe hockey gear. We also had the big head team, but I guess that was expected considering the Hehl family heads. We had to plan the batting order based on head size because we had so many kids who only fit into the large helmets. Yes Jake was one of those kids. The kids had a lot of fun and I think learned a little about baseball. I had so much fun I let my friend Claudia talk me in to coaching a fall soccer team with her.