Summer 2009 Staycation

Getting ready for bed...

Run for your life!!!

Or join them...

Water fun...

Abby... under water 99% of the time...

So much for one person at a time on the body slide...

Oh the looks!

I'm sure this is last time "I" am left with 5 kids and trusted with keeping them out of the water! It was cold (hence the jeans!), no towels, no extra dry clothes, longggggg walk, fireworks and traffic.

We returned the next day with towels, dry clothes, and sun!

Such a boy!

Surprise Visit

This past week we were treated by a visit from Yia Yia. Being so far away after the accident happened was really hard for her. Well, it was hard for all of us. She wasn't able to come for a visit then but suddenly it became a possibility in July. She wanted to come be with us and take care of us, even if she had to endure our July weather**. We of course said yes, come whenever you can! So before we knew it she was here, in person, at our house. The kids were in heaven!

While she was here she had some great quality time with each of the kids individually as well as all together. We also all managed to spend a bit of time at the zoo. We then had Carie's siblings and their families up for dinner, a bon fire, and s’mores one evening. The kids also got some fresh new sand in the sand box! Since Yia Yia always brings Grandpa's truck, I thought why not use it to load up some sand and freshen up the sand box. After nearly 3/4 ton of sand was moved, it is so much nicer. Sure beats paying the delivery fee for such little sand!

Carie and I also got some fantastic quality time together as adults. We got to go out on a date night and we chose to see the new Harry Potter movie. We saw it just days after it had been released and it was still in the big theater. We also managed to get some simple errands (simple without kids in tow, a process with kids in tow) accomplished, enjoyed some retail therapy - for both kids and adults - and got to benefit from some amazing discount coupons in addition to the incredible seasonal sales. We felt relaxed and accomplished!

Then VBS started on Sunday evening. In the past Carie and I've stuck around to help. Last year we even taught during VBS. But this year we just couldn't take on those commitments. We thought about attending the adult class, but couldn't commit to that either. Then with Yia Yia here we decided that the adults would spend some time together while the kids were otherwise occupied. I think that was good for all of us. The kids are having so much fun in VBS. Tonight is the family picnic then they sing in Church on Sunday.

Carie didn't take any vacation time and I only took one day of vacation while her mom was here. With other things going on it didn't seem right to do it any other way. Thankfully it worked out quite well!

Yia Yia packed up and headed out late Tuesday morning. Before she could leave, she and the girls had to finish up one of the many books they were reading. Her next destination is KS for a short visit with her sister. Then she'll head towards home (Oregon) with the plans of returning by Friday evening. It is quite a drive, one that would easily take 3 full days each way for us. Thankfully Yia Yia loves driving so much (and she doesn't have small children to consider) that she can make it in a long 2 days each way.

**The funny thing is... we experienced some incredibly cool weather while she was here. People keep talking about it being unseasonably cool, and it is. But in my opinion, that has been our entire spring and summer. So while we were experiencing wonderfully cool temps here, Grandpa was enduring 100 degree temps back home. I loved it!

Three Week Recap

A busy and fun summer... as usual.

The weekend of June 26th, 27th 28th...
Friday was the last day of the kids’ FUN summer school. I think they (and we) were all bummed when it came to an end. It was a 3 week mini-morning session and they got to do a lot of fun things! They are already talking about going again next year.

Friday night we got our babysitter and her best friend to come over and hang out with our kids and our friend’s kids. Our master plan was to take our friends out for an adult evening in appreciation for all that they have done for us. They truly made a difference while we were in the hospital. After a superb evening we returned to pick up the kids and headed up to our Church lawn to watch some incredible fireworks that were being set off at a nearby park. We arrived just in time, the weather was incredible, and the kids had a blast. We enjoyed the fireworks and continued to enjoy watching the kids run around and have fun. It was another late night!

Saturday we went to Spencer's t-ball game and then we spent the afternoon swimming at the Y. Sunday after Church and lunch the girls had a friend come over to hang out. That evening we had our neighbor friends over for dinner to thank them for all they've done over the past several weeks. More great company and another late night.

Independence Day Weekend...
We took a "mini vacation". We decided that instead of spending money on blowing up fireworks and hosting a BBQ as we have in the past, we would do something that we KNEW that Abby could fully participate in and enjoy. We haven't setup our swimming pool yet... and probably won't because we are concerned about sun exposure and burning.

So we went downtown (which feels like out of town to us) and stayed at a brand new hotel with a really cool indoor mini-water park. The rooms were really inexpensive, spacious (2 king beds with a lot of room!), clean, comfy, and a great location to all that we wanted to do. The water park was just the right size to enjoy swimming, hot tubing, and sliding on the huge body slide. We also got to spend some fun time at the Farmers Market, Heartland of America Park, Lewis and Clark Landing, the Pedestrian Bridge. We attempted to watch a huge firework show on Friday night but rain changed those plans. We did meet up with some friends on Saturday evening and enjoyed an awesome firework show. It was so much fun watching the fireworks and watching our kids enjoy it all.

After hearing how things went in our neighborhood this weekend, I think we'll be considering going this route in future years!

Last weekend... July 10th, 11th & 12th
All the kids finished up with swimming lessons on Friday. Spencer is now officially in Level 2. Long (but good) story there. The girls passed Level 4 and get to move onto Level 5. YAY! I decided to take Friday off due to a funeral that morning but at the last minute we all decided to go to memorial the night before. So I got to watch their last lesson and got to see first hand the huge progress they all had made from the week before. It is amazing seeing the girls stacked up against all these BIG kids. They were easily the youngest in their class... by a solid 2 years.

After a late lunch with some friends we decided on the spur of the moment that we would go to Lincoln to visit Great Grandma. While Spencer has been to her new place, the girls haven't. So we went home, got cleaned up, packed up, and headed to Lincoln. We managed to get in town in time for a quick trip (our first of the season) to the Children's Zoo! Then we visited with Great Grandma for a good couple of hours. Our visit was a total surprise to her and we had a good time visiting with her. We then headed back home. Another late night!

Saturday was another full day with yard work, birthday party, t-ball game, grocery shopping, carpet re-cleaning, a swim party, a play date. Then ultimately Carie and I ended up having the house to ourselves for nearly 3 hours in the evening, quite an unusual occurrence. Once the kids all returned home at about 8:30, we started a bon fire.

Sunday was our planned trip to CoCo Key Water Resort to make up for the trip we couldn't take on their birthday. As expected, we closed the place down.

More adventures this weekend... stay tuned.

Pacific Northwest 2009... In Text

Just the other night as I was working with the girls on their homework... trying to wrap up on the work that they missed. It was then that I realized that I needed to get the basics of the trip written down before I forget. I haven't even gotten to the pictures yet!

About the homework though... we had high hopes of getting it all done before we even left. Especially since they had a couple days off of school! We knew that we would all be tired and it would be hard to get back into routines upon our return. But it just didn't happen. Sure, we could have made it happen but it just didn't and it will all be good. Their teachers had absolutely no worries about them missing a few days of school! Thank goodness they had a great start on their homework (a great way to kill airport time!) but there were still several more pages to complete.

After book club we sat down with them and they knocked out their regular homework (to stay current) and several more pages from what they missed last week. It didn't take all that long and we called it quits come dinner time. They were able to turn in their entire folder by the end of the week. Unfortunately we didn't get to these pages before we left! We discovered that part of the material covered last week tied right into our vacation and the things we experienced. At least we were able to say "remember when we saw.... ". Made for great conversation!

So what did we see and do???

Saturday (Valentine's Day) was our day to fly out. Our tickets were booked for a late flight but we managed to fly standby and got in about 3 1/2 hours earlier. Thank goodness! The airplane flights and the train ride (Seattle airport) are tops on Spencer's list of favorite things we did. And the final hour-ish of the flight into Seattle would be the only time that the boy slept on any part of our travels. And slept he did! He was so passed out that I carried him through the airport, on the train ride, and all the way to baggage claim where he slept and slept and slept while we sorted out our luggage deal and van rental.

Sunday - Carie, Spencer & I took care of baggage stuff at the airport (giving the boy extra airport time) and exchanged our van rental while Grandpa, Yia Yia and the girls went to Tumwater Falls. After lunch we dropped off extra vehicles at Carie's Granddad's house and then we began our journey to the beach! That afternoon just before sunset we pulled off in Lincoln City to have our first of many beach experiences. We were all in heaven! We then stopped for dinner in Depoe Bay before heading onto the final destination... our beach/house rental in Newport.

Monday - The great thing about the time change was that sleeping in still meant a great start to the day! After breakfast Grandpa and I took the kids to the nearby beach while Carie and her mom made a quick trip to the store to beef up our food supplies. After spending the morning at the beach we had lunch and moved onto more adventures.

After lunch we visited the park with the Yaquina Head Lighthouse. With the nice weather we kept our adventures outdoors. We timed our arrival such that we could explore the natural tidepools. Walking on the lava rocks at Cobble Beach was also way cool. While it was hard work walking across the rocks, it was a really cool experience. As Yia Yia put it, the rocks talked to you as you walked on them. We opted to visit the lighthouse the next day when the weather was more questionable.

Next stop was "old town" Newport. I'd also refer to it as their Pier. I'm not sure what it is officially called. We were entertained by enormous sea lions yapping at each other and their onlookers, the masses of boats, shops, and a fish processing place. We watched guys bring in tons of fish, saw the fish go through some washing process (slimy!) and fly off this conveyer belt into huge bins, then saw forklifts moving those bins all around. Fascinating stuff... but the smell was overwhelming to say the least.

Carie and Spencer then went back to the house to rest. I offered to stay back with him but she insisted! This would be the only day of the entire trip that he would nap. The nap was a good thing! While they were resting we took the girls over to The Port of Newport Public Fishin Pier where people were crabbing. That was quite fascinating. They got to see folks loading up their baskets with bait, tossing them in, checking on them, etc... At the end of the dock there was a group of guys (likely drunk) sitting back, shooting the breeze, and waiting for their catch. In front of them they had several star fish that they had caught and didn't (but should have) release. The girls were of course instantly attracted! The guys quickly caught onto this and offered them up to the girls. Uh... no! After several more trips to check out these star fish they return with the littlest (and cutest) one in hand. It looks quite... well... not with us. Yia Yia agrees to hold onto it for now and the girls are over the moon excited. They also saw several other folks catch star fish in their baskets and throw them back in.

We then ended up at the Oregon State University Hatfield Marine Science Center. This was a pretty cool place! We happened to talk to one of the volunteers about this star fish and after a great Q&A dialogue we decided that it was still best to return it to its home. The girls were quite sad to say the least. Ellie (all teary eyed) asked the volunteer if we could give the star fish to her to take care of. Unfortunately they had plenty of star fish and didn't need any more. So we proceeded through the museum and enjoyed many of the exhibits. One of my favorite memories from this place will be Abby and the crabs. There was a huge tank with a few huge fish in it and at the bottom was a lone crab. Abby knelt down next to the tank and started talking to the crab. She was talking to it and doing some crazy hand motions. Next thing I know the crab is responding to her! The crab got up on its back claws and was totally interacting to Abby. After they had interacted with each other for a good long while Abby moved on to check out other things. Then Abby got Ellie's attention and they both went back to check out the crab. Abby showed Ellie how she talked to the crab the first time and the crab was quick to respond again. They both had so much fun!

After the marine center closed we took our star fish friend and returned him to the water. Then we headed back to the shop area to give Abby & Ellie a chance to spend their vacation and allowance money they had brought. Then it was time to call it a day! We returned to the house, vegged, played, grilled dinner, played some more and called it a night. The kids had so much fun playing hide and seek! It was so nice that they could run around and just be kids!

Tuesday - After breakfast we made our way back to the park where the Yaquina Head Lighthouse is located. We looked around the grounds a bit and spotted a Bald Eagle, one of many that we spotted throughout the trip. Then we headed inside the light house to catch the tour that was about to begin. It was quite a fascinating tour! As part of the tour we got to climb all the way to the top of the light house. The guide was really great with our kids (the only kids there). He engaged them and asked them questions, questions that they were able to answer. Surprised the pants off some of the other visitors. One thing he said that they thought was so exciting (and had nothing to do with the actual light house) was that "you are smarter than most 12 year olds". Man they thought that was funny and they didn't forget it for a good long while.

The day was a bit overcast (and we were looking for a little less walking than the day before) so we took a little trip up to Tillamook to visit the Tillamook Cheese Factory. We had been there before and while it doesn't sound all that thrilling, the kids have a fantastic time. They still talk about all the different parts of the cheese process. Even better, we get to enjoy the absolute best cheese and ice cream! Oh man that ice cream is the best! Too bad it doesn't travel well... but thank goodness cheese does! Oh man it is so good.

That afternoon we stopped at another beach on our way home. The kids collected some fantastic shells (nearly filling their buckets) and we thoroughly enjoyed watching the sun set while the waves crashed against the coastal line. It was here that Grandpa wrote the kids names in the sand (Spencer always had a stick!) and they watched the water come up and wash them away. Grandpa would tell the kids that the ocean was taking their name and would always remember them. Spencer especially thought this was way cool.

We picked up some pizza for dinner and headed back to the house for the night. The kids played another exciting round of hide and seek.

Wednesday - This is the morning I don't want to ever forget. After breakfast we loaded up the van to begin the next phase of our journey. I would have loved to have stayed longer, but 3 nights on the coast is all that we had time for. Before heading out we stopped at a beach we had been meaning to get to over the prior days. The sun was out and the sky was beautiful. This was our final ocean experience of the trip, a time to say goodbye for now. Abby had been begging to take her sandals off and if there was a time to do it, this was the time. She quickly learned that it was still too cold to walk barefoot! Seriously though, the Pacific Ocean - especially Pacific Northwest - is not a prime place to go wading... any time of year. But that didn't stop them from pushing the boundaries and going in farther and farther each time the waves came in. All was okay since we had clean and dry pants, socks and shoes at the ready. They were in the ocean and loving it! They didn't seem to mind the frigid temps! Their lips didn't seem to turn blue. Ellie wasn't so sure about getting in; after all it was cold, wet, and dirty. All things she cares about. Then Abby started dancing in the ocean because really she could care less about the wet and dirty part. I could have stood there and watched her for hours on end. She was having the time of her life!

Then at some point the tide started to turn and the water came up farther. We were all moving back up the beach... to stay on the dry side of the water’s edge. The kids knew the drill and they were paying attention. They were running to stay on top of the water. Then Spencer fell and Carie ran in and got him... one more person with wet shoes, socks and (slightly wet) pants. Carie was thrilled! Just as we were wrapping up and getting ready to go Abby fell (and recovered nicely) and ended up soaked herself. Neither one of them cared much that they got so soaked. Though the process of getting everyone into dry clothes is a time that I will very happily forget.

After saying goodbye to the ocean we were on our way. Next stop Grandpa & Yia Yia's house! But on the way we stopped at a park to see Multnomah Falls... the 2nd highest year-round waterfall in the United States. It was a beautiful park with an incredible waterfall. While the kids did super fantastic on every leg of our travels, that was a nice break in the drive.

Thursday - Grandpa & Yia Yia gave us a scenic tour where we got to see a portion of the Oregon Trail followed by a trip to the Columbia River and the McNary Dam. I also loved hearing Spencer talk about the Umatilla River. That afternoon the kids enjoyed vegging out, playing Webkinz hide and seek and reading. They also sorted through their sandy and smelly beach buckets. They set all their shells and drift wood out on benches to evaluate and select the precious few to take home. Yia Yia plans on packing up the rest to mail to us! That evening we had a great home cooked meal. Then we assisted the kids in glazing some special ceramic pieces that Yia Yia picked out for them from Carie's Granddad's place.

Friday - After sleeping in a bit and having a fantastic breakfast we loaded up to begin our journey back to Seattle. En route we stopped at the Bonneville Fish Hatchery. The kids had a fantastic time feeding the fish and ducks. There were tons of salmon and even more empty tanks. The weather was wonderful, the sun was shining, the grounds were green and beautiful. This was a really cool place to stop and stretch.

Saturday - We checked out of our hotel and headed to Pike Place Market and on the way we spotted the Space Needle (of particular interest to Abby). It was fun to walk through the market with the kids and they each collected new and very cool souvenirs.

That afternoon it was time to begin our journey home. By about 2 - 2:30 we made it to the airport to return the van. Our flight left at 5:00 Pacific Time. With a short layover in Denver our flight was scheduled to land in Omaha at 12:09 am Central Time. We were on time if not a bit early on all our flights that evening.

Sunday – A total lounge day! We all slept in. We vegged out and caught up on our favorite shows that we missed. The kids took marathon baths, played, read, and simply relaxed. We left the luggage alone... after all most everything was clean! I was happy to leave all the sand and smelly ocean water in Oregon. Or so we thought! We opened up the container with their selected shells and the odor was amazing.

Throughout the entire trip Spencer's favorite words were strange and gross. Try it; you can use them in almost any sentence!

Almost a week later and I just downloaded all the photos... all 651 of them! It didn't feel like I took that many. After looking through them pretty quickly I noticed quite a few pics taken from a small child perspective. I can't wait to go through them to make our selections for our album.

We Made It!

It is roughly 11:50 pm Saturday night. We are on our last leg of the trip home after a tiring week. The flight is very full! The kids insisted on sitting together... all 3 of them on one side of the aisle. Carie and I were just across the aisle and within reach after convincing the 6th passenger in our row that he really wouldn't want the aisle seat. :) They haven't slept a wink... not even a nod. But they all did fantastic, better than fantastic even. I cannot even believe how well they all traveled throughout the entire trip.

The boy asks continuously "are we landing?" I point out the noise/feeling of the landing gear emerging and told him that he would soon feel us landing. It wasn't long and we touched down.

As soon as we landed Spencer belted out "WE MADE IT!" He was excited but it could have easily been heard as relief. Yes indeed, we made it! We even landed on the early side. YAY! There were many highlights of our trip but flying was definitely a highlight for Spencer. I think he would have been excited to fly every day.

As a bonus, all of our checked luggage and car seats made it. Wish I could say that was the case on the way out. :) We collected our things, made our way to the van, loaded up and headed home arriving around 1:30 am. Spencer fell asleep on the way home. Ellie fell asleep shortly after climbing into bed. A bit later and Abby was out. Everyone slept in until about 11:00 which is unheard of... but we were operating on Pacific Time all week. Bedtime ought to prove interesting tonight!

The rest of the day was just lounging around the house relaxing and playing. Time to jump back into routine tomorrow! I wonder how long it will take us all to adjust.

Going On A Jet Plane

And the roof of this house is about to blow off with all of the excitement!

There are so many reasons we shouldn't be doing this... so so many. But after a couple of days of intense deliberation we concluded that it was an opportunity that we couldn't pass up. An opportunity to take this entire trip within the range of what regular priced airline tickets would cost. Not the most responsible decision but sometimes you've got to live outside the box.

It also feels like a higher power has led us down this path. There are so many things that have fallen into place and so many things that have happened recently for this to not be the case. The timing of it all has to be orchestrated! The timing of so many of the circumstances is huge! More importantly, we have to trust in that.

After getting our biggest responsibilities taken care of and securing the tickets we shared our exciting news with the kids. Perhaps we should have waited!?!? We had to tell them sometime since we leave in just a few short weeks! Since breaking the news to them they have been bouncing off the walls.

● They can hardly sit to eat.
● They can't stand still (within a 5' radius) to hold a conversation.
● Within 10 minutes of hearing the news they decided what they were going to pack.
● Spencer has decided that he is afraid of "being up high". I concur!
● Ellie came down (out of bed) to tell us she had "so many (exciting) dreams that she couldn't choose what to dream about". LOL
● There was a discussion between Spencer, Carie and I about airplanes having restrooms and how he could go potty and (emphasis) poopy on the airplane if needed. He then told us all about "potty parachutes". Ick!
● They were so excited they couldn't choose what to eat for breakfast.
● Every conversation and question is now about flying. It is rare to not have a conversation about flying every 3 minutes of every day.
● Spencer is convinced that the airplane is going to come down our street, pick us up, and fly us straight to Seattle. Wouldn't that be nice!
● They are locating all our toy planes in the house and wondering if "this" is the kind of plane we'll be flying on.
● Spencer: "Momma, where's Ellie? Maybe she's on an airplane?"
● Spencer: (Insert whine) "Momma, I really want to go on an airplane." Repeat every 30 seconds.
● Spencer: "What's that sound? Is that the airplane?"
● As we are driving in the newly fallen snow Spencer inquires about the runway. He's concerned that the plane won't be able to fly if there is snow on the runway. Carie tells him that the airport has big snow plows to keep the runway clear and safe. They have a lengthy conversation about this topic. Ultimately Spencer decided they must have a "gigantic hairdryer" and it will all be good.
● We've also discussed seating arrangements! It seemed important for them to know well in advance that they could not choose where they got to sit on the plane.
● Mom, can we sleep on the plane? Absof'nlutely! I won't believe it until it happens though!

Needless to say we are all quite excited about this opportunity. It is so fun to witness their excitement. It feels somewhat spontaneous and that is exciting for both Carie and I. It will all come together in short order... because it has to.

2008 Summer Vacation

We made it there... and back with a whole lot of fun in between.

While it was fun, I have officially dubbed it...

"The Vacation Of No Listening"

Then we hear... "I'm not trying to be naughty I'm just so excited!" For the record, we never ever said anything about being "naughty".

We did explain how their behavior was impacting our day(s) and what we all needed to do to improve things. It didn't seem to make a huge impact though as we seemed to be faced with "Do you want to stay here and play with the (insert whatever) or would you like to go to (wherever we were going)." Because really, I know that playing with the lid to the ice bucket does seem like fun. But trust us on this one!

Outside of the highly frustrating transition times, we had a really great time.

Saturday we hung around for Abby & Ellie's final softball game of the season. After their game the team met up at DQ for a little end of the season awards party. Then we headed out of town from there! Spencer was supposed to nap on the way. Carie finally won that battle after we were well into our drive. That night we went to a balloon festival where we saw over 80 hot air balloons setup and lift off. We've never seen that many hot air balloons all at once and it was quite fantastic. Of course they also had a play area for kids with tons of things for them to do. After playing for a bit (and losing and finding Abby) we got some tasty treats and listened to their live music while we waited for the fireworks finale. We had an incredible view! On our way back to the hotel we stopped to get the only thing that we seemed to forget to pack... nightlights.

Sunday was our day to swim at the hotel and check out the Science Center. We did get a lot of swimming in that morning and then again in the evening. Both Abby & Ellie have gotten quite independent in the pool and they had a really great time jumping in and practicing their swimming skills. Spencer kept us busy by getting out and jumping in over and over again. We asked the kids what their favorite parts of vacation were and they all listed swimming as a top contender. I think it was partly due to the fact that we went swimming several times. But the key factor was that it was an indoor and an outdoor pool all in one. We were able to swim through an opening and go inside and outside. That was a huge hit for them! I didn't find it as entertaining, but I was the one who got to escort them in and out and in and out. We then spent a great deal of time at the Science Center. We thought it would be fun but had no idea just how great it would be. At least I thought it was pretty cool. Carie seemed less impressed than I was, but still agreed it was a great place. But what really counted was that after 4 solid hours of playing, the kids did not want to leave! So we promised that we would go back again on Tuesday.

Monday was our full day with plans to go to Adventureland. We saved this for Monday hoping that we would benefit from lower weekday traffic. I don't really know if that made a difference or not, but it wasn't crazy busy and that was really nice. We arrived just after the park opened with no lines and no waiting to get in. The park itself was shaded quite nicely, a huge bonus on the hot hot day. We pretty much stuck to our plans and did the activities at the back of the park that morning / early afternoon. I was surprised and impressed that the kids wanted to ride a huge roller coaster (The Outlaw) so Carie agreed to go on it with them. They were so excited and seemed to have so much fun! We had all of our swim gear with us so we could do Kokomo Kove, which the kids had been eyeing and getting all excited about ever since they found out we were going. Abby & Ellie were ready to hit the big slides but Spencer really wanted them to hang out with him. Thankfully they agreed to take turns sliding with Spencer on the smaller slides. Then while he took a break they both got to do the big slides together. After the water slides we hit a few other key attractions before heading out of the park for an afternoon break. It was time to get out of the heat and have some rest time.

When we returned we found an even better parking spot right in front of the entrance. We rode ride after ride after ride until we closed the park down. Abby & Ellie surprised me again by some of their ride choices! Carie and I both rode a couple rides with them and couldn't do anymore. Our stomachs just couldn't take anymore rides that went in circles! Several of us (everyone but Carie!) left the park soaking wet from the log ride that we rode four times! We then stopped across the street from the park to pick up pizza to take back to the hotel. First priority was to get out of the cold wet clothes! We got the kids stripped and into their warm jammies so they could enjoy their pizza. Our meals (and snacks) were so out of routine that day... from start to finish. We ate at such crazy times but it seemed to work for everyone and the kids were champs.

Tuesday we all slept in, hurray! Thankfully we also got a late late checkout at the hotel. After breakfast we went swimming again before getting cleaned up, packed up, and loaded up. We even managed to get lunch in at the hotel before departing for our day! Our first stop was to the park with the Carousel in it. It looked like it could rain at any time so we wanted to get that in first. The Carousel was absolutely beautiful! The kids rode a few times then played on the playground before we headed back to the Science Center where we spent another 2-3 hours. Thankfully admission was "free" (reciprocal membership) and we could easily go as many times as we wanted. I think we managed to make it through all of the areas, with some getting more of our time than others. But still, we practically had to pull the kids out of there. But it was (past) time to hit the road to home. It was also way past Spencer's nap time, a nap we had hoped he would take in the van on the way home. No dice! Instead we heard him begging for his rock candy for at least 130 miles with small intermittent breaks (our successful distractions) now and again.

We pulled into our driveway at 9pm and played outside for a bit before heading in for the night. After riding their bikes the kids had a great idea to light off the rest of our smoke balls (or bombs as Ellie calls them). That seemed like a nice little treat at the end of our vacation. They got their suitcases with all of their important things unpacked and then headed to bed. It didn't take long and they were all asleep for a good long time. Even Spencer slept in this morning!

No rest for the weary! Thankfully we managed to have the house cleaned up before we left. Now to get everything unpacked and put away in short order! We’ve got a busy weekend ahead of us. Oh, and school starts in just 2 short weeks from today!

Totally Excited

This morning Carie went to check on the kiddo's who were supposed to be getting ready for swim lessons. She went upstairs to find Abby & Ellie in their room. While they were somewhere in the process of getting ready, they had also taken a break.

Carie found them dancing and singing. I got the pleasure of the instant replay via Carie. It seems that they were doing a variation of a Hula dance while chanting "We're going on vacation!" over and over again. Carie’s version was cute and silly; I can only imagine what their version looked like.

Ellie comes downstairs and I ask her: "Are you excited about going on vacation?"

Ellie: "Totally excited, mom"... adding the proper emphasis on "totally".

I tell ya, there is a huge change that takes place between ages 5 & 6. It is crazy!

I asked her if she would do their little dance for me. Unfortunately she was not at all interested. It seems that this was one of their private little moments. I love it!

We are going on a mini-vacation. For us, it isn’t anything big or incredibly exciting. The fact that we are leaving town is exciting enough for us. Though it seems at this age, it doesn’t matter what we do or where we go. The idea of a “vacation” is enough to send these little ones to the moon. Thankfully all the proper rsvp’s have been made and we are a go. Thankfully we don’t have too much longer to wait.

Purging

We've been purging and I'll be damn if we still have more to purge.

What surprises me is how much crap we hold onto. Especially since we aren't "pack rats" and aren't one's to get all wrapped up into sentimental value. With a lot of things we really don't know how long we've had them. I'm not very good at looking at an item and saying "Gosh, we've had that since "whenever"". I don't remember dates and things like that. That sorta stuff doesn't take up residence in my little brain.

But when something has a printed date on it, there is no denying just how long it has been taking up residence in the refrigerator. It is amazing, way freakin' amazing, how many outdated items we discovered. Too bad I just trashed it all and hauled it to the big ol garbage can.

See, part of preparing for our little weekend away I thought it would be a good idea to clean out the fridge. And like all things with me, it starts out small and ends up being this big massive project. Simply washing off this or that turns into fully dismantling the fridge and doing a thorough cleaning. Yeah, that is a "trait" that undeniably drives Carie nuts! :)

I mean, we have our little routines and whatnot. There may be things in there that we kinda know about, meaning that we know that maybe we should check the expiration date before serving such items to our children. We don't really need to discuss it amongst ourselves. You just know that maybe you haven't used that jar of Mayo in a long time and maybe you ought to check to see if it is still good. With someone else coming into our home how exactly would they know that maybe they shouldn't serve the cranberry Jell-O salad thing that is leftover from Christmas Eve? (Note to self: Remember to take that out of the garage fridge and dispose of it!)

Anyways, while cleaning and purging the fridge I discovered a number of outdated items. Like how in the heck is it possible that this jar of whatever has been in OUR REFRIGERATOR since well before 2005? With an expiration date of sometime in 2005 I’d imagine that it had a significant shelf life prior to that. We are talking condiments here people!

Prime example: Carie found a box of Velveeta cheese in our fridge that expired in 2005. What the hell! I argued that there is no way it could have expired in 2005 since we just bought it and made dip out of it a few months ago during football season. Yeah, football season in 2007. I described my memories to Carie, in full color, and she finally was like "oh yeah, I remember". Seriously, it was impossible. Except, the printing on the package doesn't lie. This is still a mystery to me!

Anyways... So while we didn't have to pack up the kids, all their stuff, and the kitchen sink to go on our little adult vacation, we did find ourselves preparing things around the house for someone else to come into our home to care for our kids. And man, that was a lot of work!

The great thing about it is that we do get to reap the benefits of that work. Heck, clearly our refrigerator won't need another purge like that for 3 years!

Back To Reality

We have returned from our lovely 4-day weekend adventure, Yia Yia has safely returned home, and we are back in the swing of everyday life.

Our weekend was awesome and relaxing. We enjoyed a live comedy show where we consumed more alcohol that evening than we had probably consumed in 2007. This just means is that we shared a few large drinks and felt it. The comics were hilarious and the last one was clearly high. Just after he started Carie and I discussed that he had to have been high and then it wasn't long before he commented on it. I think his show could have been better if he weren't high and drunk, but to each his own. The downside was that we smelled like a smoke stack when we left. They allowed smoking in the bar area where we all had to gather for the general admission seating but then they didn't allow smoking in the theatre. It was too late by then; we had already soaked in a fair amount of smoke.

We also enjoyed several movies over the course of the weekend. We actually went to the movies at the theatre and watched three great movies ranging from chick flicks (27 Dresses – awesome!) where you knew how it was all going to turn out to the more intense Drama/Suspense type (Michael Clayton – also awesome!) where I was lost for a good part of the movie. Those darn flashbacks! There was a fourth one (Great Debaters) we were going to see but the timing didn't work out. We enjoyed many awesome meals at restaurants that we don't tend to go to as a family; either because we don't have them locally or they just aren't part of our routine. We enjoyed sharing entrees and occasionally enjoying an appetizer. Mostly we enjoyed eating very tasty meals and having great adult dinner conversations.

The weekend was also filled with shopping, both window shopping and some serious shopping. We both managed to come home with a fair amount of new clothing and shoes. We knew before we left that we wanted to visit a particular shoe store since we had been there before and had great success and fun to boot. Carie scored a couple pair of boots, really cool sexy boots. I was able to find some much needed work shoes and casual shoes hoping to make my work shoes last a bit longer. We scored some amazing deals all around and it felt good to add some new items to our wardrobe. On our way home we also stopped and picked up some potentially cool fireworks. We've never been big into buying them and we didn't go crazy crazy on this trip, but I think we have some really cool and colorful fireworks for our 4th of July celebration. The deal is that Missouri sells fireworks that are “illegal” to us Nebraskan’s. :)

We checked in daily with home to see how things were going at home. Clearly they went well as not one of the kids really wanted to talk to us all weekend. If they did agree to talk to us it was very brief. They had better and more important things to do! It was really awesome to know that they were having such a great time. That made it easier for us to enjoy our time away.

They all were thrilled to see us return Monday evening. Abby (and potentially everyone) really wanted to go out to dinner Monday and so we agreed. They had such a great weekend and deserved that little treat. Of course Abby chose McD's and they enjoyed it greatly. But before we could leave for dinner they were highly anticipating PRESENTS. It didn't take Spencer 30 seconds within our arrival to ask if we brought him presents. Of course we did! It wasn't anything really exciting. Oddly throughout our shopping excursions we never really came across anything really cool and great for the kids. But they each enjoyed the couple of little things we got for them and the book that they get to share.

I ended up taking Tuesday off as well as we thought Spencer wouldn't be a happy camper if I left him yet another day. So I hung out at home with everyone. Carie and Yia Yia went up to school to have lunch with the girls and got to check out "indoor recess". The girls got to show Yia Yia their classrooms and their tables. It was a very special treat for them!

Tuesday evening we had Carie's family up for dinner to celebrate her brother's birthday (which was Sunday) while their mom was still in town. It was nice to get everyone together before her mom left.

Wednesday morning it was time to return to our routines. I took Carie's mom to the airport and then headed off to work while Carie got the 4 kids off to their respective schools. We are all tired and ready for some more down time.

Tonight marks the last of the swimming lessons for this session. The girls’ are signed up for the next session that begins next week. As of now Spencer isn’t enrolled because they don’t have enough kids to hold a class. I’m hoping that will change but it doesn’t look promising. I suppose if he passes this level we could more easily find a class for the next session, but I’m not thinking that will happen. Even if he does, I’d really prefer that he experience the preschool level again. I guess we’ll see!

Saw It Coming

We totally saw it coming and there wasn't a dang thing we could do about it.

The kids have been moody, moody, moody, and moody. Spencer was especially pleasant to be around on Tuesday. He's had goop in his eyes for days, but we just thought he had a cold in his eye. It was just a little bit of goopy stuff in the corner that he was easily able to remove periodically. We knew something was going on but we didn't yet know what it was.

Finally by Wednesday we had something to go on. They boy has pink eye even though we were certain that he didn't. As the hours progressed his eyes became horrific looking. He also has an ear infection in the ear that still has the tube in. Oh, and the ear tube is blocked. Oddly, but thankfully, the ear that is tube free is looking great. Ellie's deal is still a mystery and one that we all (teacher including) are trying to uncover. Abby is mostly just fine, well except the large goose egg on her head from landing head first into her footboard last night. Oddly the previous night she joined Spencer in the effort of keeping Mommy awake all night long.

I guess I can be grateful that all this came about when it did. Hopefully everyone will be on the mend and we can still leave tomorrow morning. Carie, in her extreme sleep deprivation state, was so bummed yesterday because she thought we wouldn't be able to go. I was a bit worried as well! But I really think it will all work out just fine.

Carie's mom is here! We all picked her up at the airport last night. The kids were beyond excited. It was so fun to see Spencer run down the ramp to her. The girls were acting shy like they were in disbelief that she was actually here. When we got home, at bedtime (!!!), they were all amped up and ready to show her everything they own. Finally we all got settled in for the night.

Honestly it really hasn't sunk in yet that we are leaving tomorrow. There is still so much to do between now and then!

Two Days & Counting

We are all excited and we are all counting down the days, though for very different reasons!

Yia Yia is scheduled to fly in on Wednesday. This is totally a last minute deal and thankfully we didn't have long to wait. The girls have been counting down since the moment the flight was booked just one short week ago. Saturday afternoon Ellie was convinced it was Sunday and thus one day closer to Yia Yia's arrival. No amount of convincing from any of us was able to change her mind. Sunday afternoon during Choir rehearsal and prayer time the girls shared a happy prayer with the group. They prayed about Yia Yia coming and Mommy & Momma leaving.

Carie and I decided that we need to get away, so we are doing it! We are going on a mini adult vacation and we are thrilled.

Should we? No.

Do we need it? Yes.

So we are throwing caution to the wind (no different than any other day) and going for it.

I think this idea came about just a week, maybe two, ago. Last week we firmed everything up and got a plane ticket for her mom to come stay with the kids. Carie and I are heading out of Dodge! I know how ridiculous this sounds to fly her mom in to stay with the kids. At first we all laughed at the idea! But the more we thought of that possibility the more perfect it became. Absolutely perfect! Aside from the fact that the kids will get to spend a few (highly anticipated) quality days with Yia Yia, it was the ideal option all around.

Carie has been a totally different person since we decided to do this. She is very much looking forward to her days off and our days away from home. She’ll also get to spend some good time with her Mom before and after our little trip.

We almost chose to go to Chicago and I even found the perfect series of flights (finally!), but ultimately we decided that we simply want to be free. We don't want to have to think about or worry about any schedules of any sort. When we are ready to leave we'll get in the car and go. We do (as of today) have hotel reservations, but we can get there whenever we want to get there via whatever route we choose to take. We can come and go as we please. We can go wherever the mood strikes us. We can go to sleep and wake up when we want to. We can eat when and where we want to. We can use the restroom in privacy when we want to, and no more than we need to. We can listen to or watch whatever we want and talk about anything we want to. We'll even be able to have complete conversations, beginning to end. Hopefully we are capable of this!

We should probably pay attention to when we need to come home but at that point I think we'll be very ready to come home. I'm positive that we'll have a great time. But I know that we'll miss our kids and we'll be just as ready to come home to them then as we are ready to get out of here today.

Missing the Vacation

Tonight Ellie informed us that...

1) She misses their "Lincoln Vacation"...
because... of the two beds.
2 "double" beds in the same room - woohoo!?!?

pause

2) She misses "Minneapolis"...
because of the bunk beds.
There were 2 sets of bunk beds in "their room".

Clearly the sleeping arrangements are as important to her as they are to us!

This is where I add that we will never arrange another room like the one we had in Lincoln. Clearly Ellie thought differently of that experience!

I will also add that the bunk bed room was pretty darn cool. I could do that again! I'm thankful that I found such a deal making this hotel stay possible.

In Minneapolis the girls' got to sleep on a top bunk for the very first time. It was also Spencer's very first attempt at sleeping (by himself) in a big bed. They all did so incredibly awesome! Oh, but the best part was that each bed had their very own nightlight! I don't know who was more excited about this, the kids or us.

The Vacation of 2007

We opted to go to Minneapolis. Why Minneapolis? It was within reasonable driving distance, we haven't been there in a long time, the kids have never been there, and it sounded like it could be fun. We would have loved to hop on a plane and go to the coast, but the hoping on a plane part alone was astronomically crazy expensive for a family of five.

So Minneapolis it was!

We left Saturday morning, July 21st. Carie and I were up till the wee hours of the morning loading up the van so we could leisurely go whenever we were ready the next morning. While it wasn't awesome to be up way too late, it was awesome that the nuts and bolts were packed and loaded. After all, we took everything including the kitchen sink. Only a small list of last minute necessities needed to be grabbed the next morning.

The drive went pretty well. We felt like we were pushing it a bit by going to Minneapolis. Mr. Spencer really doesn't care to be in his car seat for extended periods of time. Something more like a drive to KC would have been optimal, but we wanted to do something different. On the way out we stopped in Des Moines for lunch and play time. We found an awesome park and the kids had a blast. Much to our surprise, all three kids did unbelievably awesome with the drive.



Saturday evening, after arriving at our hotel, checking in, getting settled, and heating up dinner/eating, we ventured over to the Mall of America for a bit. The plan was to check out the Lego store! I have to say I was a bit disappointed. It was just so chaotic; Lego pieces everywhere, and kids everywhere. The kids appeared to have a decent time. They had fun building race cars with the pieces they could find and Spencer had a great time racing the wheels. We ended up moving on from the Lego store sooner than we thought. We then went and checked out the park area where we had planned on spending a whole day later in the week. While we were there the kids all chose a ride to go on to kinda get a taste of the fun we had ahead of us.

We then looked at the rest of the week and decided what activity we wanted to do when. We started out by going to the Minnesota Zoo on Sunday. We had so much fun and there were so many things to do and see that we decided we'd return on our "open" day later in the week. We were treated to a Dolphin Show on both visits. That was definitely a highlight of the Zoo trip! We rode the monorail, got to see the shark feedings, watched the bird show, but unfortunately we didn't make the the butterfly garden before it closed.



Monday was our big day at the Mall of America. While we hoped to do some browsing of the retail shops, our primary destination within the mall was "The Park". Boy did the kids ever have a blast! The girls' and I were at the mall from about 10am to 10pm and Carie and Spencer were there for all but the middle of the afternoon nap portion. They rode the rides over and over again. Carie or I stuffed ourselves into any necessary kid rides that needed a "chaperone".

In the middle of the afternoon the girls and I walked the mall. I bribed them with sugary goodness along with a double stroller rental and we cruised. I really enjoyed the browsing, but thank goodness wasn't really in the shopping mood! The stores we did check out in more detail were definitely geared towards the kids. When Carie & Spencer returned we went to the "Ridemakerz" store and the kids got to custom make remote control cars. Then since I got to have my fun in the toy car store, we went to "Friends 2B Made" and the girls had fun making new dolls. Spencer was just done by that point and showed no interest in making a doll or animal (in the adjacent Build-A-Bear store). Thankfully the only store we have near us is the Build-A-Bear store!!!

The kids then rode a few more rides and we took a family ride on the Ferris wheel before closing the park down.



Tuesday & Wednesday were our "down" days at the Water Park, which means that we got to stay at the hotel and go freely to and from water play. This water park was so cool, the best we've been to in terms of offerings for little kids. They had the typical fort with the large bucket o' water that dumped, but off of the large fort they had at least 4 kid slides. Then off to the side they had yet another kid slide for the littlest of the visitors. Carie and I joined the kids on the slides and we all had a blast! The lazy river was a big hit as was the big pool with the basketball hoops.

They then had slides for the older kids and adults. From the exterior of the hotel/park you could see these large tubes shooting from the building and every time we left and returned to the hotel the kids were amazed and talked constantly about the water slides. As part of the "big slides" (body slides & tube slides) they had a "family slide". The kids and I gave that a whirl once. That was enough for the girls! Then Spencer asked to go on it "again!!!" so he and Carie went. They climbed all the way to the top, Carie gets into the large raft, and Spencer suddenly changes his mind. Umm... no. So he and Carie went. They had fun, but he was definitely done after that. I sure would have gone again!

One evening, after much water play, we took a side trip over to IKEA. It was basically across the street from our hotel, we couldn't not go! We shopped for a bit and then had a nice and easy meal. The kids had a great time playing in their kid area!



Friday - time to pack it up! Thankfully we had already packed up quite a lot of stuff the night before. Friday morning we were able to take the remaining items in one trip and check out. We then headed to a park to check out Minnehaha Falls where the kids convinced us to ride the bikes. After leaving the falls we stopped for some quick lunch before heading to the Sculpture Garden.



Then it was time to make the trek home. The drive home went pretty well, it would have been even better if Spencer would have napped better and the girls' would have napped at all. But overall, our travels went way smoother than I had anticipated.

Speechless

"The entire span of the Interstate 35W bridge collapsed about 6:05 p.m. Wednesday where the freeway crosses the river near University Avenue."

"Emergency crews in Minneapolis are working on recovery and cleanup efforts at the scene of the Interstate 35W bridge that collapsed during rush hour Wednesday evening."

I am speechless. This could have easily been us. I know we took 35W and Carie thinks we crossed this bridge... just 5 days ago.

Souvenir?

As part of our travels we collected some souvenirs. The kids, of course, didn't really know what a souvenir was. To them, they were just getting cool new stuff. So it was fun to talk about vacations and souvenirs. Oddly though it was only the little people who ended up with souvenirs!

We arrived home to discover that Ellie had managed to collect another, unwanted, souvenir along the way. Spots! Many many spots that itch terribly so.

Bug bites? But there are so many of them and they are spreading!

Could it really be chickenpox? But she's had the vaccine and the booster. Though, it was still a possibility. If this is the case, it is possible that she had this in her system before we even left for vacation. Grandma checked them out last night and thought it could just be the chickenpox and she's heard that it is going around.

But then this morning we thought a few of the spots were fading.

Carie talked with the Peds office this morning and they don’t suspect chickenpox, especially with the potentially fading spots.

So we wait and see. Outside of the spots and the urge to itch, you wouldn't know that she was "sick". Spencer and Abby are the one's who've been sporting the high temps!

Whatever this is I hope it is settled down before school starts in just 2 short weeks. ACK – TWO WEEKS!

We Made It!

We've arrived home and all in one piece. I think the consensus is that we all had a great week, but we were also all ready to be home.

We've even managed to unload the van without the house looking like it! Wowza was that a lot of stuff. Let's just say we got some looks when loading and unloading our gear at the hotel. The funny thing is the gear that we loaded just before leaving the hotel was only a % of everything. We had packed up and loaded the bulk of it the night before.

More on the week in "Minneapples" (Spencer's variation) another day. For now it is time to focus on the busy weekend.

Vacation

Here we come!

We are so ready. I'm so excited to go I can hardly wait. The kids are quite excited as well. Ellie has decided that they get more new fish when we get home from this vacation. Hmm... I see a trend.

We took Carmen down to Lincoln last night so she could spend the week with Grandpa, Grandma & Jake. She'll have some good company and we won't feel quite as guilty leaving her. Carmen seemed pleased with that option as well!

I think we are feeling pretty on top of things, hopefully that trend will continue. We hope to be loaded up and on the road by mid morning tomorrow. We'll be gone a week, returning home sometime the following Friday only to have a very full weekend of activities and events ahead of us.

I'm sure I'll be ready to come back to work the following Monday!

Adios!

Family Weekend Getaway

We've been talking about getting away as a family this summer, but travel options and distances are limited. During our brainstorming of what to do, we decided that a weekend in Lincoln would be fun. There are so many awesome kid activities in Lincoln, and as a bonus we have memberships that give us "free" or reduced admissions. As a double bonus, it is really close and a routine drive for us. We also considered it a trial run for a potentially longer trip later in the summer. We may now be re-thinking that potentially longer trip!

Friday we arrived and after dinner and a bit of getting settled into our space we headed down to the pool. They were in heaven! Suddenly swimming pools, big big swimming pools, are a big deal for the girls'. They love jumping in the pool and swimming under water. Spencer was a bit apprehensive at first, but managed to get in and have a great time as well. After swimming it was time to head back to our room and call it a night. Unfortunately it turned out to be a long night for Carie & I. I'm sure the kids were low on sleep as well as we headed into Saturday.

Saturday morning I unfortunately woke up with the beginnings of a migraine that was making me ill. After getting some medicine in me (thanks to Carie stalking the gift shop lady!) I managed to doze for about an hour. Carie took the kids to get some breakfast and check out the nearby farmers market & play area at the train station. The kids met a clown and got some cool balloons! They also loved checking out all the flowers from the various vendors. Then Ellie caught a whiff of something. As she's sniffing the air she tells Carie "I smell something yummy" and of course they then returned with a bag of delicious kettle korn. Ellie has a good nose on her & I love how she phrases these things.

At about the time they were done with the farmers market I was getting ready to go myself. I probably would have slept longer, but that darn alarm was set for 8:30 - you know - just in case the kids slept as they normally would. HA! By then they had already had breakfast, they had played, and they were ready to join me for breakfast (for me) and 2nd breakfast/snack for them.

Then we headed to the Children's Museum for a morning of play, and play they did. The kids actually had a choice between the Children's Museum and Morrill Hall. Our sights were set high with hopes of getting them both in, but reality set in and we knew it would be one or the other. Unless of course they wanted to forego the swimming! They alternated a few times between the choices and they all agreed that the Children's Museum was the destination. As a bonus we arrived shortly after they opened and it was really quiet in there. They spent a lot of time in and around the prairie dog tunnels, the stage, and the water areas. The girls' of course scoped out the face painting as a priority. I love that they have the areas staffed and someone who is skilled (way more than I!) at face painting is able to wow the girls' with the results.

After the Children's Museum we walked by a sandwich shop for lunch en route to our hotel. One of the reasons we chose the hotel we did was so we'd be within walking distance to a lot of the activities that interested us. The kids were a little less impressed by all the walking, but in reality we didn't walk all that far. Once we got past all the complaining of all the walking, they did enjoy the walk and the hunt for exciting things. Why are kids so fascinated with ants?!?!?!

Finally back at the hotel it was time for some down time. Spencer was ready for his daily nap and both Carie & I could have easily joined him. Ellie ended up nodding off, and we totally encouraged that. Usually an afternoon nap for either of the girls' is not such a good thing when it comes to bed time, and this turned out to be no exception. But she was so tired and we knew we had a busy evening ahead of us. Carie then insisted that I join them for a snooze. Instead I insisted that she should join them, but somehow it didn't work out that way. She and Abby played some UNO and got ready to go to the pool. After Ellie had a good snooze in Carie woke her up so she could go to the pool with them. Then once Spencer woke up he and I joined them. This time though he didn't want to get in the pool. Instead he wanted to play around the outside of the pool. One of Spencer’s weekend highlights had to have been riding the elevator. I don’t know if it was good or bad (for us) that our room was directly across the hall from the elevator, but it was good for him. I know both Carie and I rode all the way to the top several times with him. Unfortunately for him our room was only on the 3rd floor of the 9 floor hotel.

After some good pool fun it was time to get cleaned up and ready to go to the baseball game. We made it to the game before it started and stayed until the 6th inning. We sat on a blanket out in the 1st base grass berm area and we were lucky to enjoy a cool (for summer) evening of weather. The kids were up and down, as we totally expected - hence sitting in the berm area next to the playground! When Spencer and I were standing out near the outfield watching the game he'd reach out through the fence and yell "guys hit the ball". As we were leaving they talked about how much fun it was. Spencer was especially thrilled with the baseball game and watching the players throw and hit the ball as he would fully demonstrate to us.

Thankfully Saturday night went better than Friday night in the sleep department, though still not as great as if we were at home. But that is to be expected.

Sunday morning we all enjoyed some breakfast before hitting the pool area. It was incredibly quiet in the pool, which was awesome. In addition, there were some really great families in the pool area. The kids had a great time playing and splashing in the pool and could have easily stayed there all day. Unfortunately we did come to a time where we needed to get out and get ready to go. It was time to check out and get to the Children's Zoo!

The whole getting ready to go, loading up, checking out process took a lot longer than we had anticipated and suddenly we were leaving nearly two full hours later than we had hoped. We knew we were delaying ourselves with the trip to the pool, but we didn't expect that long of a delay in the end. So we finally pull out of the hotel and decide that grabbing some lunch on the go would be a wise option before we arrived at the zoo.

As we are nearing the zoo Carie and I look at each other to confirm that we are in fact nuts for going through with this plan. We are all exhausted, we are quickly approaching naptime, and we are still in Lincoln. But we knew the kids were looking forward to it and would totally notice if we skipped it.

So we forge ahead and we had a nice time at the zoo! Everyone enjoyed feeding the goats, llamas, and donkey's! Abby & Ellie then chose to ride the ponies, no big surprise. Spencer said "no thank you" to a pony ride and instead took interest in talking with them and petting them. Then they got to check out several animals that the zoo crew had available to learn about. Then we washed our hands! The only disappointment of the trip was that the Butterfly Pavilion wasn't yet opened. With all the info we had, we were anticipating that it would be open and we didn't stop long enough to see if it said why it wasn't. What we did see was that it would be "opening soon". Near the end of the zoo we came across the ponds with turtles, fish, and alligators (in different ponds). The kids had a really great time checking out the turtles so we spent quite a bit of time there. Spencer kept asking for a towel for the turtles. He didn’t seem to care that these turtles live in the water. At the end of our day there we took a ride on the train, a huge hit for our three.

Then back to the coolness of the van. It didn't take long and Spencer was asleep. The girls' knew that as soon as he was asleep we'd turn on a movie for them, and that we did. While everyone was vegging out a bit we ran a couple of quick errands before heading out of town.

Our final stop being at The Fish Store! We are now owners of two new pet fish. We've had the tank setup for several days waiting for the day they could pick out their fish. The deal was that we would pick out our fish on Sunday, after our vacation. I don't know how many times they talked about Sunday over the weekend. They may have been totally happy with skipping the entire weekend to get to Sunday! We surprised them with a stop at a fish store in Lincoln that Carie and I were familiar with and they picked out two beautiful male guppies. I verified doubly so that we were getting male guppies!

Abby chose a "Fancy Male Sunrise Guppy" and promptly name her "Pepper Shell". Ellie chose a "Fancy Male Blue Guppy" and promptly named her "Rosa Beauty". Now I know I did say that we chose male guppies, and we did in theory. We've referred to them as he or him and have explicitly told the girls that they are boy fish. They disagree and from here forward the fish are girls! This is a battle I’m not going to entertain. As far as the names, I only hope they are heavily swayed by their partners when it comes time to name their children.

The fish immediately went into shock as soon as that fish net entered their tank and the van ride home from Lincoln to Omaha wasn't probably all that pleasant for them. The girls were thrilled though! But they made it and they are adjusting nicely in their new home that resides in Abby & Ellie's room.