Beach Packing List

Highly recommend Tesalate towels. The sand never sticks to the towel, and the colors/patterns and quality are outstanding! They’re also nice, large towels.

I always take a small blow-up pool with. Great for toddlers to cool down and relax next to you, and super handy to sit in and have lunch in. Wet hands are better than sand covered ones!

Rockaway is great but so is Jacob Reiss Park and Coney Island and Brighton Beach. Brooklyn has everything

Food, drinks and shade are the key to being able to stay from late morning to late afternoon. Besides an insulated bag with ice, drinks, snacks, and an umbrella and two chairs, we also bring a thin colorful Mexican blanket For stretching out on, two towels (we share), sunscreen, a few digging toys, and stuff to read. It’s a cinch once you get your routine down and it’s the most relaxing, fun, free, day by far. Glad you guys have found your groove too!

I was at the beach last week and saw one family bring their beach toys in a collapsible mesh hamper. I thought that was a great idea, since everything can drain before you leave the beach.

As for swimsuits, I love my suits from JCrew and Athleta. My friend also has a beautiful suit from Anthropologie.

We are lucky enough to have a beach house which we go to every weekend. Even though we thought we were beach people, having a little one had us reconfigure our whole packing system. Yours is a pro list, especially compared to ours! We put him a beach stroller (so he can nap and it’s easier to drag down the beach), and have wagon FULL of stuff. A tapestry to set down on our area, an umbrella, towels, toys, sunscreen, diaper bag (which is really a large designated so we don’t get anything sandy), change of clothes and a sweater for little guy, cooler with beverages for adults and little guy… and probably other stuff I’m missing. The wagon also has a license plate with his name on it, and a little American flag hanging off the back. That said, you can’t miss us walking down the block to the beach!

I’d swap out that BKR bottle for a S’well! They are my new obsession – they’re double walled so they keep water cold for up to a day. I took mine to the beach last week, and it still had ice in it that night.

I actually found a great beach bag on amazon.com. It’s super cheap but does the trick and it has plenty of pockets. I also always bring snacks with me to the beach and of course, I also always wear a hat. I particularly love this one because it has SPF protection in it (http://www.yaelsteren.com/work-wardrobe-no-38/). xoxo yael

http://www.yaelsteren.com/blog/

We live in Australia and spend a lot of time at the beach in summer. The best beach bag of all is the IKEA blue shopper bag, it fits everything (although I swear half of all beach goers are onto this and spotting your IKEA bag in the crowd is a skill!)

What a fabulous idea about digging a huge hole upon arrival!! That pic just says it all and they look so entertained (and refreshed!).

One thing I ALWAYS pack with us when we head to the beach is FOOD! We usually camp out for the day, so I like to pack tons of food and liquids to keep our energy up so we can keep swimming with the waves and sun bathe :)

xo, Bev

Esther Williams vintage swimsuits! I googled through the entire internet to find an online shop that delivered to my country without paying crazy customs fees, and boy was it worth it! I bought 2 straight away and it was a gamble as I didnt know about the size, plus I have a pretty long torso apparently. Both fit and I have never felt so confident! They are a bit ruffly on the belly and it keeps in all the wobbly, there booby area is slightly padded and keeps even breastfeeding boobs in place. And you can wear it with or without the strap that goes behind the neck. I have it in green and blue, and when I wear the green one random people stop me and compliment it. YEY!

We’re currently living at the beach (well, not technically, but we can hear the ocean from the house, so pretty close). We swear by those puddle jumpers. Also, rash guards. Lands’ End is our go-to for those. They’re good quality and limit the amount of sunscreen we go through. We stock up at the end of summer for bigger sizes for the kids. With slightly bigger kids, we also found these chairs: http://www.amazon.com/Kelsyus-80316-Kids-Canopy-Chair/dp/B006DEH0KA/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1439878215&sr=8-2&keywords=kids+beach+chair
which fold into a backpack that they can carry themselves.

Hey, thanks for the shoutout!

I’m glad so many of your readers will know the baby powder trick now. I grew up spending the whole summer at the beach with my mom and two brothers. Fond memories! :)

I swear by Esther williams! The bathing suits are so vintage and adorable. I have the high-waisted cherry print bikini version of this one piece ( http://www.modcloth.com/shop/onepiece-swimwear/fruity-suity-one-piece-swimsuit-in-black ) and I love it :)

I always freeze juice boxes the night before. Helps keep our cooler food cold and acts as a slushy for the kids. I also freeze bottles of water for the grown-ups.
We carry sand toys in a mesh bag so the sand (most of it anyway) falls out between our spot on the beach and the car.
Grocery bag to carry out our trash.
Baby wipes for sand (and cookie) covered faces.
Large Ziploc bag for each kid to bring home his and her seashells and two sandwich size to keep our cell phones safe.

this is the second post that you’ve referred to those beach tents as “dorky.” While they’re not as sexy as a private cabana, you should give them some cred for the shade they give you and how awesomely portable they are! They’re also great for shade-less parks.

Love this! We have totally clicked with the beach this year, too. Last summer was a disaster. Our kids are 4 and almost 2. We live just north of Chicago and since I’m a SAHM I take the kids a few times a week. Then, if weather permits, we go on the weekends when daddy is not working.

We take: tent or umbrellas, bag of towels and sheet (to lay in the tent) bag of toys (including that exact same kite. I mean $9?! :) and diaper bag with the usual essentials as well as snacks (fruit, nuts, pretzels, Larabars, cheese, etc.). I try to give the kids a good breakfast before we go and then have them snack/lunch before we leave. We shower when we get home and then everyone usually takes a nice nap :).

Did not know about the baby powder trick! Our car and condo are both FULL of sand. Will have to try.

I love J. Crew bandeau one-pieces. No shoulder tan lines. I put the suit strap on when I get in the water. Once I forgot and my daughter helped me flash the whole beach. I’m not crazy about sunscreen so I love, love, love these shirts from Old Navy: http://oldnavy.gap.com/browse/product.do?vid=1&pid=978511002 I bought 3 earlier in the summer for like $10 (they’ve since raised the price). When I feel like I’m getting too much sun, I throw one on. This is my sunhat: http://www.ebay.com/itm/like/321003413894?lpid=82&chn=ps

LOVE THE BEACH!

When my kids were younger, we used to bring a really small inflatable pool – like table-top size. We’d blow it up, fill with water and our toddlers would stay occupied for hours!

Out of curiosity, how do you get there? I’ve been wanting to try the beach bus but it always sells out!

We have the same beach tent as above, and we love it! It pops open in 2 seconds and gives great shade – we bought it when our son was a baby and we just had to have somewhere cool and out of the sun (and SPF’d) for him. It’s also great to take camping, when you want a 2nd shady spot to play and don’t want to get in and out of your actual (sleeping) tent. We take it everywhere!

my boyfriend and I live in Brooklyn and just discovered rockaway yesterday! it was glorious and we plan to go back a few more times before the fall arrives (but after our vacation next week to his hometown of Portland, Oregon, no less!).
I love the baby powder tip – it’s awful finding sand all over our apartment for days after the beach (although it is a sweet reminder of the easy, lazy weekend). and eres has the most amazing one piece swimsuits: http://www.boutique.eresparis.com/fr/home.aspx
xo