Tent, towels, toys, a TON of snacks & baby powder.
The list of necessities obviously decreases as your kiddos get older but we live less than a mile from the beach and when the kiddos were younger, I felt like we would pack enough for a weekend vacation. Needless to say, it was a process. The diapers, change of clothes, every type of sunscreen, some sort of shade coverage, towels, blankets, it was excessive.
If y’all are planning for long beach days, I would grab a tent. Pacific Breeze has one that is great, small, portable and an easy setup. The Pacific Breeze Easy Setup Beach Tent is great! Check it out here.
I find that the tent is easier than the umbrella. It’s long, you can never predict the wind, and I just can’t put it in the sand right. Who knows, maybe it’s just me.
So now for stuff, I’ve really gone down to the bare minimum. I’ll do one towel per kid at least & maybe one for me if I’m feeling ambitious. For the toy department, each kid can have a bucket and fill it with whatever. As long as they can carry it, I’m down. Baby powder is ALWAYS in my beach bag. Natalie has an issue with being sandy which poses a little bit of a problem because, well, we’re at the beach! It doesn’t matter how wet or sandy you are, baby powder on the hands and a quick rub and they’ll be ready for the 7th round of snacks.
My favorite beach snacks are pouches. They’re mess free and easy. The issue is that they can go through them in a minute. I bag or compartmentalize every snack because undoubtedly something spills or gets sandy and the next kid (minus Travis) won’t touch it. The sun makes my kids 10x hungrier than normal, so I end up packing tons of sandwiches, pretzels, cuties, grapes. I try and think of things that could potentially be rinsed off. Just in case, ya know?
Beach romps are becoming more frequent for us, I leave a suit in the car for each kid, jean shorts for me, hats & sunscreen. Sometimes the best beach days are the ones that aren’t planned.