Ella’s Birthday at the Beach

by Rachel McCarthy
morkie-at-the-beach
Happy Monday, friends! I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! You may remember a few weeks ago when we celebrated Ella’s birthday, I mentioned we had a trip to the beach planned, and this was the weekend! Ella is definitely a beach girl. She was only a couple months old when we discovered her love for the sand {not the ocean, she won’t go near it!} Although, one of her favorite activities at the beach happens to be eating the sand, which never ends well, we try to keep her focused on playing in the sand, instead of eating it. 

As I mentioned, we have been taking Ella to the Rehoboth Beach area of the Delaware coast for a few years now. Last year, Ella’s birthday fell on a Friday so we made a weekend out of it at the beach. The only problem is that her birthday is the end of March and it actually SNOWED that day. We said that this year, we would push it back a few weekends, because it could never snow in April. Well, it didn’t snow, but it was a pretty cold rain Saturday. We did have a few hours of sunlight on Friday afternoon when we arrived and Ella took full advantage. And not even the wind could stop her {see picture below} 🙂

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morkie-at-beach
It’s very rare for us to ever leave Ella to go away for a long weekend. Typically she likes to come with us! Ella is super set in her routine, so it has been difficult staying in a hotel with her in the past. But, this past weekend was a success! Even the constantly slamming of doors throughout the hotel didn’t bother her. We can blame that on exhaustion from the beach I think!

I wanted to share a few of our favorites on the Delaware coast — everything from the dog friendly hotel to the best food to a newly discovered juice bar!

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hyatt-place-dewey-beach

Since we first starting coming for Ella’s birthday weekend, we have been staying at the pet friendly Hyatt Place Dewey Beach. It is a pretty new hotel and super clean — something that is hard to find when it comes to beach hotels. And, it’s only a block from the beach so it doesn’t get much better when it comes to location.
dogfish-head-rehoboth-beach
Dogfish Head is always a must when we head to Delaware. Although Dogfish Head is more known as a microbrewery based in Milton, Delaware, this brewpub based in Rehoboth Beach has been around for over 20 years! But, what I love most about Dogfish Head is their food! They do have a patio that is connected to the restaurant where we usually eat when Ella is with us, but it is unfortunately under construction, so we just took our lunch on Friday to go {which honestly was fine because the wind was really starting to pick up by Friday afternoon!}. I recommend the crab cakes and the fried pickle appetizer 😉

greenman-juice-bar-rehoboth-beach

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It was rainy, cold and windy for most of the day on Saturday, but in between the rain showers we hit the beach with Ella again and found the most amazing juice bar and healthy eating restaurant in Rehoboth, GreenMan Juice Bar & Bistro. If you follow me on Snapchat {rach.mccarthy7} you may have caught my obsession with this “Healthy Elvis Smoothie”. And obsession is probably an understatement. The ingredients are listed as bananas, raspberries and organic peanut butter, which seem to be pretty healthy. Right?! In all honestly, it tasted like an unhealthy peanut butter milkshake! We actually had to stop one more time yesterday before leaving because I had to have it one more time! 
lupo-italian-restaurant-rehoboth-beach
Saturday evening, we got take out {we don’t like to leave Ella in the room!} at our favorite Italian restaurant at the beach, Lupo Italian Kitchen. For an appetizer, my husband and I split the meatball flatbread — you know our love for meatball pizza — with whipped ricotta. I loved that they added the ricotta instead of the usual mozzarella cheese. I will definitely have to try the ricotta cheese next time I make meatball pizza! For dinner, I went with the Eggplant Parmesan and my husband decided on the Chicken Parmesan. The chicken was served with pasta and the eggplant was served with sautéed broccoli rabe…it was such a delicious twist on the usual eggplant and pasta combination! 
dolles-rehoboth-beach

And, of course we couldn’t leave the beach without picking up a container of Dolles caramel popcorn! It’s one of my favorite sweet treats and a must if you are visiting the Delaware or Maryland coast. 

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Overall, it was a great weekend celebrating Ella’s fourth birthday at the beach! Looking forward to our next trip back to the beach with our little beach girl!

P.S. Here is a short video of Ella from the weekend. We like to call these her “figure eights” 😉

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Have a great start to the week, friends!

25 thoughts on “Ella’s Birthday at the Beach”

  2. Yay, Beach day with sweet Ella!! LOVE that pic of the wind in her hair!! The photos look like a gorgeous area and fabulous caramel corn, I'm in!!

  9. This is the absolute sweetest! I adore when other people treat their fur-babies SO well, we do the same thing. Anything for our fur-babies. Happy birthday to sweet Ella! She is so cute! Glad y'all had a great weekend!
    xo, Lily
    Beauty With Lily

  11. Rachel, this is such a sweet post! Happy Birthday to Ella! She is a cutie! We travel with our dogs too! It's so nice to have them with us, and I totally need to check out your pet friendly hotel! Sounds amazing, and the beach looks great! Wish I was there too, and so happy to hear that in the afternoon the weather was great! 🙂
    Happy Monday, love!
    xoxo, Vanessa
    http://www.WhatWouldVWear.com

  18. I seriously loved watching Ella on the beach on your Snapchat! She was the cutest running around in the sand! That's great that she had such a good time and was so good at the hotel. Even as humans, it can be hard to be somewhere no and unfamiliar.

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