Catching up on Pictures (Part 1)

The last couple of weeks feel like a blur, and I just realized the other day that it's been a while since I've shared pictures of the kids. Not a lot has been going on, but there have been some fun things worth taking a picture of and worth sharing. =) I will have to split them up into different posts, because (well, I'll just be honest) I take a lot of pictures and don't have the time to weed through all of them and work up one post all in one sitting. I want to feel like I've accomplished something, you know? So, here goes...

As you know, we visited my parents about 2 1/2 weeks ago for Jason's 4-day weekend. It was a nice relaxing time, and, of course, we didn't want to leave. =) We sat around and played games a lot. This picture was not intentional, but right as I picked up my camera to take a picture, Richard brought a handful of M&M's to his mouth...Busted!! Love you, Richard! =)


The kids even enjoyed playing games together...


The kids always enjoy seeing their cousins and look forward to pestering their "Uncle Retardo." Okay, I must explain...My brother-in-law's name is Richard, and as a joke we started calling him "Ricardo." At the time, Sydney was struggling with saying any "c" or "k" sounds and would pronounce them as a "t." As a result, when she said "Uncle Ricardo," it came out as "Uncle Retardo." Well, Richard loved that! He's a good sport, you know. Here are some shots of the kids with Richard. He was growing some facial hair, so Larissa was rubbing on his chin in the last picture.



My camera has a night vision setting, and Richard wanted to see how it worked. We turned off the lights, and here is his best "Deer in the Headlights" pose.


The girls (and Jason) love to go swimming in the cousins' pool. Sydney is a little timid when it comes to the water, so she sticks to the steps or occasionally floats on a raft. She also enjoyed "shooting" everyone with the water gun from the outside of the pool. Everyone enjoyed throwing (or pegging, if you're Jason) the balls and having a water gun war. The girls also enjoyed piggy-back rides on Jason.









My niece, Sarah, cracked me up when she came up out of the water one time and started quoting (in her most noble voice), "Fourscore and seven years ago..."


And what would a day in the pool be without a good cannonball? This one was thanks to my nephew, Tavish. He was trying to peg his twin sister, Sarah, who is on the right side of the picture.


Here's the whole group. Aren't they cute? =) They all had lots of fun.


The day was quite overcast, so after a couple of hours in the pool, Larissa and Sydney were so cold that their lips began to turn bluish purple. Poor things!



We also had fun in Granny's yard. The girls love to pick flowers (usually of the weed variety) and collect pine cones, and Jason (of course) had to try to peg the girls with the pine cones. He's so nice! (Still a boy at heart!) =)



I had to snap some more pictures of some flowers and critters that I didn't get the last time we were there. Mom has some very interesting things growing in her yard. The most interesting of all, though, has to be the starfish flower. Notice on the picture with the bird that there is also a dragonfly on the top of the branch. Enjoy!

It's that time again

These 4-day weekends are coming faster than I would have expected them to. Mind you, I am not complaining, and even though we haven't been able to take very many "Getaway Trips," we are still enjoying them. This weekend, we have decided to go back up to my parents' house. I know, I know...we were just up there, but before this last trip, it had been a while since we had been up there. Plus, this last trip was not very relaxing, since Mom and I were busy helping the girls with the sewing project and Jason was commuting to work each day. This time we would like a more "vacation-style" trip. You know...sitting around playing games with the family, working crossword puzzles, eating =), etc...

So, that's our plans. What's yours? I hope you all have a great weekend, and we'll see you when we get back.

Just to let you know...

We will be heading out of town to visit my parents for this holiday week and will not be returning until next Monday. Jason has not decided if he will be commuting to work or just staying at home. Please pray that we will have a safe trip and an enjoyable visit with my family.

I'm bringing my computer, but my parents do not have internet access, so I will have to see if I can find someone who does and is willing to let me use it. Otherwise, I will be M.I.A. for a little over a week.

We are bringing school stuff to work on while we are there, and I have some special extra-curricular things planned for my girls that my mom will be helping with. I'm very excited about it and can't wait to share it with you (along with lots of pictures, of course.) =)

I hope that everyone has a safe holiday and a great week! We'll see you when we get back!

Books, Books and MORE Books!!

Check out all of these books we got on our 2nd trip to the bookstore in Orlando earlier this week.



Kids Books:
Lewis and Papa
Pooh's Heffalump Movie (Book)
Beetles and Bugs (Shhh...this one is going to be a gift)
The Scrambled States of America
Joy to the World
Bill Grogan's Goat
Nana's Birthday Party
Ballparks: A Panoramic History (Shhh...this one's a gift also)
Nascar Now! (Shhh...this one is also a gift. Sorry, not for you Richard. =) No book for you! Try back one year!)

Teaching Aids - Flashcards:
Beginning Sight Words
Time & Money
Phonics Made Easy
Five-State Rummy
Numbers 0-25
Animals of All Kinds

Our Books:
2 Christian Fiction Novels
-Chasing Fireflies (Charles Martin)
-Abomination (Colleen Coble)
Job: Interactive Study Guide (Charles R. Swindoll)
Joseph: A Man of Integrity and Forgiveness (Charles R. Swindoll)
4 Ted Dekker Novels (Christian Suspense)
-Blink
-Obsessed
-Showdown
-Saint
Facing the Giants (Still haven't seen the movie! I hear it's good, so I'm going to read the book first.)
The Simple Faith of Mister Rogers (We love the show, so I thought I would enjoy getting to know more about him.)

25 books/flashcards
Actual Retail Value: $323.56
Our Price: $123.49!! That's a savings of a little over $200.00!!

My kids LOVE books, so this was definitely a worthwhile investment! I'm telling you, they love books so much that while we were on vacation this past weekend, we passed a library, and they begged to go inside. =) How sweet is that? I love their simplicity! They don't need all the "bells and whistles." As long as they have a good book, they're happy. ("Aunt Kiwi" knows how they feel, don't you?) =)

Quick Update

We're baaaaack! =)

We got our truck this afternoon and got back home around 5 tonight. It was a long day, and we're pretty tired. We enjoyed the vacation a lot, but we are glad to be back in familiar surroundings.

I'll post more tomorrow. Yes, I bought more books! =)

I LOVE Vacations!!!

This is just a little check-in to let you know that we're having a great time! We are very happy with the condo we are staying in. We got a great bargain!!! I'll give you all the details when we get back, but for now, I'll post some pictures. Check it out...

This is the "Family Room"

This is the kitchen

This is the dining room (Yes, Larissa wanted to pose in every picture.)

This is the "Living Room"

This is the bedroom Alyx and Sydney chose to sleep in the first night

This is the bedroom Larissa chose to stay in for the first night. She was living in comfort and style in that spacious queen-sized bed! =)

Here is the view of the back porch and back yard from the family room

Here we are chillin' out and enjoying our mini vacation!

Our plans were to go to Sea World today, and it wasn't until we were about to leave the condo this morning that I realized I had forgotten our passes. My heart sank, and I nervously told Jason. He immediately got on the phone with Sea World customer service and got our card numbers, so that when we got to the park all we had to do was go to the passport membership office and get some temporary passes. Whew! I was so scared that I had ruined the day. =}

I'll post more pictures later. I'm tired after today, so I'm going to go to bed.

4-Day Weekend!! Yay!!

We will be heading out of town tomorrow for our 4-day weekend trip! We're going to Orlando and are looking forward to going to Sea World again. I can't believe it, but it has actually been over a year since we've been. AND we have passes!!

We're staying at a 3 bedroom condo-type place that we've never stayed at before. That's always scary, but hotels.com rated it 3 stars and showed pictures of the place that are pretty nice. We got a great deal on the entire stay since we're staying 3 nights, so if it's nice, then I'll share more details later. Normally, we probably would have just stayed in a hotel/suite-type room, but we wanted to have kitchen facilities a little greater than a microwave and refrigerator. =)

We are planning on eating our own food the whole time we're there. That will save us lots of money and sugar! =) Tomorrow morning we will make up two different batches of muffins to have for breakfast on our trip - Raspberry poppy seed muffins and Orange muffins. We will also bring cereal and oatmeal as another option. I've been baking my own bread this past week, so we'll have that for sandwiches. (Post on bread is coming soon.) I'll be making (chicken) sausage spaghetti for dinner one night and we're bringing some various leftovers from the last couple of days to warm up. Extras and snack-y kind of stuff include salad stuff, apples, grapes, bananas, peaches, Lundberg Rice Chips (our favorites are BBQ, Honey Dijon, Wasabi and Pico de Gallo - check the ingredients of the others - some have dairy and maybe even sugar - I can't remember for sure. Oh, and they are definitely cheaper on Amazon. We've only bought them at Whole Foods, but we plan on ordering them online soon.) and Fruitabu swirls (these are like fruit roll-ups but so much better for you - and better tasting, too!).

I'm taking my computer, but I'm not sure if I'll post updates while we're there or not. For now, I'll just say, "See you when we get back!"

P.S. I'm hitting CVS tomorrow for the first time in quite a while. I have some ECB's about to expire on Saturday, and I just got a $5/$30 coupon from CVS in my email today!! Yay!

Great deal for a family-sized hotel room!!

For a couple of weeks now, we have been "shopping" for the best deal on a 2-night hotel stay in Columbia for our family vacation later this year. We always check out hotels.com and sometimes expedia.com. Once we find a hotel we're interested in, we go to the actual "hotel company" website to see if there are any more pictures or information to help us with our decision.

While on hotels.com we found a Country Inn & Suites that had a 1 bedroom hotel room, which means there is a separate bedroom with a king-sized bed and living area with a sofa bed - Perfect for us! The cost on hotels.com was $115.00 per night. When we checked it out on Country Inn & Suites website, the cost was $135.00 per night. As we moved around some of the pages on their website, we saw a note off to the side that said, "The best online rates...guaranteed," so we checked it out. The deal is...if you find a better rate somewhere else online, they will match that rate AND give you another 25% off!

After you make the reservation on their site, you "make a claim" for them to check out the other deal you found online, and then after they approve it, they will send you a confirmation email letting you know what your new rate is. If the claim is not approved, you can cancel your reservation without penalty.

We just got our confirmation email today, and for the 1 bedroom hotel room, we will only be paying $86.25 per night! How sweet is that?!?

Recommendation for Vacation Stopover Attraction

With Summer here, I'm sure that everyone is planning or looking forward to their "family vacations." We are always looking for some new, fun and even educational places to take the kids, and we would always welcome any suggestions. I'm figuring that most of you feel the same way, so I'm going to share one of our favorite "stopover attractions" with you. When we plan a trip up to Tennessee, we always stop in Columbia, SC, to spend a couple of nights. One day is spent at our favorite museum: EdVenture Children's Museum or as the kids call it "Eddie Adventure." It is the largest children's museum in the south, and it is really incredible! Check out the site for all the details. Here are a few pictures from one of our visits just to give you an idea of what's there.

The "main" attraction is Eddie - a 2-story tall boy that you and your children can explore. You can actually hear him breathe, hear his heartbeat, hear his stomach noises, hear the nerve impulses being transmitted in his brain...etc. The back side is all open, so you can see the insides and actually climb and slide all through it to discover things. It's really cool!

As you move through the museum, you'll find an area where kids can dress up in head-to-toe firemen uniforms and explore a firetruck and even slide down a fire pole.

There's also an area that deals with farming where you can sit in a big tractor, "plant/pick" vegetables and fruit, "milk" a cow...etc. There's also a mock grocery store where the child can take their cart up and down the aisles and pick out their groceries. When they are done shopping, they can go through the check out line and pretend to pay for it all. The kids really love that! Oh, and I threw in the picture of the "marsupials" just for fun. =)

When we last visited, there was a section outside with really big bubble activities for the kids. (I think that may have been one of their traveling exhibits.) There's also a water exhibit and a net "spider web" for them to climb on.

Has anyone ever heard of or been to this museum? Just curious. We love it and are looking forward to our trip there this year! The traveling exhibit that will be there when we visit is entitled "Air Play" and will teach the kids how air moves and how it affects the environment. They will get to learn about turbulence and air streams. Sounds cool! I'll let you know if I learn anything. =)