Sun Protection Umbrella for the Beach

by Helen
(Santa Barbara, CA, USA)

I always thought that sun protection umbrella was a little bit silly to drag to the beach with you.

I mean, I understood that people want to protect themselves from harmful UV rays, and they probably didn't want to get sun burnt either.

But I always thought that the whole point of going to the beach was to enjoy the sun, not to hide from it!

I mean if you're just going to hide in a shadow of an umbrella, why even bother going to the beach in the first place?

But after I had my kids, I quickly realized this was an erroneous attitude to have.

I guess I don't get as worried about my own skin, but when it comes to my kids, well, I worry about everything.

So now I make sure that our family always brings an umbrella to the beach. When I was single, I noticed I carried around a lot less stuff to go to places, and that included the beach.

I only had a small bag with a towel, some sunscreen, and maybe a change of clothes. But with kids, you already have to carry around a whole bunch of extra supplies.

All of their clothes and swimwear, their toys, diaper bags, sunscreens, chairs so you can watch them and now, umbrellas too.

I figure if I'm already dragging around all this stuff, an extra Sun Protection Umbrella doesn't make that much of a difference.

But it does make a difference in protecting my kids. And that’s probably the most important difference something can make.