This Is The Beach, Miley...

Hubby surprised us with a trip to the beach this weekend. Can you say, Adventure?

Hubby and I tend to joke that our life is like a Saturday Night Live skit. Like, there's potential for funny, but after the first 43 seconds, you feel sorry for them and are begging for a commercial. You just want the skit to end already. So feel free to change the channel.

So, back to the beach. Well, the car. We brought the dog, Miley. Lemme just back track a bit and tell you that we recently bought a new car. We downsized from a full-on SUV to a crossover. It's smaller, but we can still load it up. We packed "light". Shared suitcases and vetoed toys left and right. So we load up the car with kids, dog and beach supplies. And plastic bags and Clorox wipes (I'll explain later). So we're excited to take the car on it's first "big trip"--1 1/2 hours to the beach! We decide to take Miley, cuz she's new too...well, new to us. We adopted her 3 months ago, and she's a great dog, but we're still in that Getting To Know You phase. We want to be able to take her with us places...mainly camping and to the beach. So this is our first trip with the dog too. All is going well, despite the fact that apparently our Miley is not familiar with this thing called, The Car. She has no idea what is going on. She's fascinated with everything. And squished. She has no idea what to do with her body. But it's only an hour and a half. She can live. She can squish.

So we are rolling through the winding roads, through the pines on the way to the beach. It's pouring the whole way, but this is Oregon, this is how we roll. Despite the rain, it is a beautiful drive. So green, so lush. We're about 5 miles from the beach, from the hotel, when I all of a sudden smell Burger King. Why do I smell Burger King? Pretty odd, considering we're out in the middle of the forest. Two seconds later...No, oatmeal. I smell oatmeal. 1 second later a collective and terrifying, "Eeeeeeeeeew!!!" vibrates from the backseat. "Miley threw up!" She totally did. A lot. New Car Smell immediately history. So we roll down the windows and pull over. It takes a good 15 minutes to get all that frothy, chunk o-goodness out of the floor mats (thank goodness we upgraded and got those babies), off the cup holder, out of between Miley's toes and tail. Clorox wipes are a good thing. We used about 250. Thankfully Momma was thinking and had put down a ton of blankets and towels over the back seats for just this reason. So it could have been worse. But let me tell you it was bad. And very disappointing to break the car in so soon. But we managed to work it out (and hold our own frothy, chunk-o-goodness down) and made it the last 5 minutes to the hotel (yes...we were literally almost there!). Incredibly (incredibly) we are laughing about this before we even pull in to the parking lot. We have to laugh, cuz we're At The Beach and a little (a lotta) throw up isn't gonna get us down.

So we unload and within minutes we're at the beach. All of us. Amazingly (amazingly) it is not raining and not freezing. It's always freezing at the Oregon coast. You dress in layers, cuz you just never know what it's gonna do. But it's nice! It's not terribly crowded and the girls can just go! And be loud. And get dirty. And wet. It's bliss. Truly. Miley is happy. We realize she has never been to the beach either. She can't believe her luck. But she's scared of the water. No doubt due to the fact that she's never seen the ocean and my girls keep screaming their heads off (as you do) when the waves roll in and dare to get their feet wet. So Miley is not sure about the water. She runs away from the water. Aren't Retrievers water dogs? Oh, and there are dogs everywhere, running in the surf, up and down the beach. You know, being dogs. We have Miley on a leash, cuz we don't know what she's gonna do. We don't know how she'll react to other dogs, people. She can be unpredictable (bipolar). Within minutes she does her business though--which is very predictable--and we pull out the plastic bag to clean up. So now, we're carrying a poop bag. Not a trash can in sight, cuz were On The Beach. Well, we're still making the best of it (poop bag and all) and hubby gets it in his head that he wants to get Miley to like the water. So he puts the poop bag down momentarily and tries to drag her in the surf. He's jumping over the little waves, trying to show her that this is fun...yaaaay! She is not liking it. Like trying to keep all four paws out of the water. She's such a girl! Hubby's kind of forcing her to stay there and brave it out. But somehow she squirms out of her collar and leash, out of his hands and takes off out of the water, but keeps going, chasing after another dog that is running by. It takes a few minutes for hubby to realize what is happening (can you say slooooow motion?). But if you can picture--we're all yelling after her, "MILEY!!!" and chasing her, cuz we don't know what she's gonna do. I'm picturing a horrible dog fight. "Miley! Miley! MILEY!" She's forgotten her name. She's forgotten us. She's just running. I turn to tell hubby to hurry up (he's still in the flipping water) and notice that a wave has come in and now the poop bag is floating out to sea. "Get the poop bag!" I don't think hubby knows what to do first. No, I know he doesn't know what to do first. So the girls and I chase after the dog--"MiiiiiiiiLEY!" I can only imagine what this whole scene has looked like to the observer. We totally do not belong on the beach. We are so not cool enough for the beach. Look at us! Thankfully (thankfully), she likes the dog, he likes her. Their fast friends and she turns around and runs back to me.

I turn to see hubby (finally) catching up, dripping wet poop bag, dog collar and leash in hand.

Somehow (somehow) after that we manage to have a very enjoyable afternoon at the beach. Miley realizes the water is not going to eat her and takes the plunge. We're all doing what we're supposed to do at the beach (what the other people are doing at the beach). Our kids are covered in sand, clothes sopping wet. We're looking for sea shells and playing in the waves. Writing secret messages in the sand. It's all good. We're cool again.

But that was just yesterday. There's more. We're still here and I still have the night to talk about. But you need a break. Stay tuned...Next time on Saturday Night Live...