Visit Florida: Invest in Sunscreen

SVisit Florida: Invest in Sunscreen

Sunscreen is a major hassle. Unfortunately it's a must when you have fair skinned children who travel from a northern state to a southern one. Their skin is going to burn if you don't protect it.

So every day before we go outside we pull out the sunscreen and the children run away.

"No!!"
"I hate it."
"It hurts."
"I'll wipe it off."
"I''m not going to let you do it."
"Mommy doesn't make us wear it."
"Owie! Owie! Owie!" (sometimes with tears)

Every day this is the thanks we get for trying to keep their beautiful skin beautiful, for trying to protect them from skin cancer.

We chase them down. We make vile threats. "No sunscreen, no pool." "No sunscreen, no Legoland." I'm waiting for the time when they say "I don't care about Disney World. I'm staying here and not putting on sunscreen!"

As much as they hate the sunscreen, I hate it more. It takes Mark and I quite a while to cover three children and ourselves. I cannot get the sunscreen off my fingertips. The iPad screen is covered in it. Finger food tastes funny.

Kara sent along some spray on sunscreen. Spray on sounds easier than rub on when you're dealing with six kiddie legs and feet and six kiddie arms and three kiddie necks and backs. You can't spray their faces, of course. The problem with spray on is that it's really oily and doesn't dry fast. We have to go outside or in the bathtub to spray it on and then we must make sure the children don't sit on any nice furniture before we leave the house.

Two of the three children have sensitive face skin, so that means a special facial sunscreen. Viva's arms are also sensitive. Jake's ankles have sores from his sandals. If we spray sunscreen on these areas the children howl like wounded animals.

I purchased some high quality Neutrogena for face sunscreen. It has zinc oxide in it. That makes it thick and hard to spread. If the children looked white before the sunscreen, they look like Halloween ghosts after it. I complained about the job Mark did the first day because he left blotches all over their faces. I haven't done any better. They look terrible, but better terrible now, then burnt and peeling next week. (Their mother would never let us take them on vacation again if that happened. She is a fanatic about sunscreen--as well she should be.)

Despite our best efforts, Jake had a red ear after the first day. We had to put aloe on it. According to Jake the cure was worse than the disease. Ever since I've double coated all six ears which makes the daily process take that much longer. Which makes the children protest that much more.

We're not going to miss sunscreen when we return home to Alaska.