About Taking Baby To The Beach

I read a lot of blog posts about what to take to the beach with baby. We bought an umbrella and a clamshell tent. We even bought this bath chair on Amazon because a blogger recommended it and a couple of the reviews even said that people bought it specifically to take their baby to the beach. They said it worked great, so I thought it would be a better alternative to taking Jacob to the beach in his car seat or his papasan chair.

Side note - why are all car seats like black or dark gray? I feel like whenever Jacob is in there, he gets all hot and sweaty. I'm sure they're dark colors to help keep them from looking dirty, but wouldn't something lighter be cooler?

Anyway...

The bath/beach chair didn't work for us. Jacob just slouched down to the bottom of the chair. It wasn't very hammock-y and it didn't recline all that far. Plus, the sides weren't very high so I felt like Jacob could topple over at any minute. We ended up just bringing his papasan down to the beach anyway, and he did okay.

At Jacob's 2 month checkup, I asked the doctor about using sunscreen. I know you're not supposed to use it on little babies, but I was worried about him being at the beach. The doctor said she'd rather have me use it than not. So I bought and used Babyganics mineral sunscreen on Jacob. It was white and creamy and kind of hard to rub in. I made sure to slick some over any exposed body parts and even slathered some on Jacob's Buddha belly because his shirt always rides up over it. I put some on Jacob's head, too, even though he had a hat - better to be safe than sorry! But holy cow - did it leave his scalp a mess. I had to rub and rub in the bath tub to get his head clean. It looks like it might have dried his scalp out because he got pretty flaky, too. I ended up just leaving his hat on and didn't do sunscreen on his head again after that.

Jacob seemed to like the beach. He hung out in his tent, played with toys, and took naps in the shade. We took him down to the water's edge and he got to stick his toes in the sand and water. He seemed to like the beach way more than the pool! I think the pool was a little too cold for him. We'll see what happens next summer!