Vacation Post #2

OK, so I made it through Wednesday's activities last night before I crashed and enjoyed my 5 or so hours of sleep...so here's the rest of the week summed up, plus I added a picture of the house we were in so we can remember it...it was a great vacation house, it had everything we needed.

I forgot on Wednesday we also went on a dolphin sighting cruise. Just the girls and Mr. Cliff and the kids went while the guys played golf, but it was so much fun! We saw at least 6 dolphins and one of them was a baby, it was really cute. I didn't get any pictures though, so if anyone got a picture of Timothy in his life jacket, please send it to me, he looked so cute!

For some reason, I can't remember much of what we did on Thursday...I think we drove back up to Foley and did some more shopping, but I'm drawing a blank. I know on Thursday night we all went out to the beach and took family pictures so here are some of the better ones from my camera. Mr. Cliff took some really nice ones with his fancy camera so as soon as I get those I'll post them too.

Friday we spent cleaning up our mess and hanging out for one last day. We ate lunch at Doc's (thus the pictures of the kids with messy pudding faces) and then we spent the afternoon at Adventure Island playing putt putt and go karts and arcade games. It was a fun end to the week.

Saturday morning we pretty much just cleaned out the house and said our good-byes. Hopefully we'll get to see Meme and Papa in a few months and we'll see everyone else at Christmas (unless anyone else feels the urge to fly to Seattle...?). Aunt Larena and Uncle Brandon drove us back to Pensacola and we ate lunch at Cracker Barrell (yum!) and then hung out at the airport until it was time to come home.

The flight back was pretty un-eventful. Timothy fell asleep in the airport in Pensacola and woke up in time to get on the airplane. We barely had enough time to change his diaper and use the restroom in Houston before we had to board our next plane for the four hour trip home. Timothy was incredibly awake and wired for that plane ride, but we had a whole row to ourselves so we ended up strapping him into his own seat and setting up the DVD player in front of him so he ate snacks and watched Baby Einstein for probably close to an hour. He finally crashed with about an hour left and really didn't wake up much until the next morning. We got him off the plane, into the stroller, got our bags and got on the shuttle to go pick up our car, waited at the hotel for the car, got it loaded up, drove home, changed his diaper and laid him down and he woke up for probably 10 minutes through all of it. That was really nice!

Anyway, it was a great week, we really had a lot of fun and enjoyed getting to see friends and family that we hadn't seen in a while. Hopefully we can do it again soon, even if there are more little ones in the picture by that time (for all of you wondering, no I'm not pregnant, but hopefully will be soon!). Anyway, I wanted to let everyone know what a wonderful week we had and thank everyone there for making it so memorable. We love you all and can't wait to see you again soon...and now we're looking forward to the Leupold family vacation in August!!!

Vacation Post #1

It was a long and busy week, so there's no way I could write about it all in one sitting...I'm still pretty tired! So I'm hoping to get it done in two posts! We had a great week in AL with the York and Thompson families, it really was a good vacation. Here are some of the highlights and pictures...

We left out on a red eye Thursday night/Friday morning and got into Pensacola around noon on Friday. Aunt Larena was there to pick us up and we spent the night at their house in FL. Timothy had a great time climbing up their stairs and chasing Penny the cat.

We got to the beach house on Saturday and met up with Aunt Christi, Uncle Trey and Emma and Elyssa and it wasn't long before everyone else got there too. We had a good time catching up with everyone and especially enjoyed seeing how much cousin Easton had grown since we saw him last.

Timothy kissing cousin Easton

Sunday morning we did a short church service at the house and spent the rest of the day playing on the beach and in the house. I think we went to the pool that night too...can't remember too well, some of the days run together!

Timothy braving the water with Meme and Papa

Blowing Bubbles

Monday the guys went to play golf and the girls went shopping at the outlet mall in Foley. I really wanted to get Timothy some new shoes, but they didn't have his size (which, by the way, is a 6 1/2 extra wide...he has the biggest feet ever!).

Timothy and Easton looking cool in the stroller

Tuesday morning we went to the zoo. It was actually a really nice zoo, it's pretty small, but they had a lot of cool animals. Timothy really liked it. We had a bit of a scare Tuesday night, we thought Timothy had gotten an ear infection so we rushed over to the urgent care center and spent three hours there waiting to see a doctor, but thankfully, it ended up to be nothing but a fussy spell and a new tooth! Uncle Dustin came on Tuesday too so we got to spend time with him.

Timothy and Elyssa chilling in the stroller at the zoo

Feeding the swans

Family picture at the zoo

Wednesday the guys played golf again and the girls hung out at the house. Christi and I tried to take the kids to the beach but that didn't work out so we walked over to the pool carrying two one year olds, a double stroller and a three year old. The walk over wasn't so bad, but the little ones fell asleep while we were there so one the walk back we had to carry the double stroller with probably 50 pounds of babies in it across 50 feet of sand...needless to say, we were a little sore after that one! Wednesday night the grandparents put the kids to bed so the parents and aunts and uncles could go out for a little bit and we had a lot of fun that night hanging out in the hot tub.

Brandon building sand castles with Timothy and Emma

Uncle Trey and Elyssa...such a cute picture!

Emma digging a hole with Uncle Brandon

Throwing sand at the waves...Timothy was a little scared of the ocean, so Papa made a pile of sand for him and he threw handfuls of sand in the water when the waves got close to his feet...it was really funny...he kept yelling at the water like he was really mad at it!

That's as far as I can get for tonight...4:45 is going to come really early tomorrow morning and I still have to add all the pictures! Timothy did pick up some new tricks while we were away. He's now eating really well with a fork, he is signing "please" consistently and he's finally started waving "hi" and "bye". He is just not a baby anymore...he's a little boy now...I think it's time for another one :)

And We All Survived!

Sunday was the grand opening of the new Tacoma Narrows Bridge!! For anyone that lives here or has visited here you know that the only way to get to Gig Harbor is to drive over the Narrows bridge (there are other ways, but not as quick and easy) and for the past few years they've been building a new bridge to help with the horrible traffic that used to back up from people that have to slow down to 5 miles an hour to drive over the bridge. For those of you that have never been out here...this is the bridge that replaced the old one that you probably saw in physics class on a video, the bridge that collapsed...here's a picture of that old one. It doesn't look like it's very high, but it's something like 400 feet from the bridge deck to the water and the water below is Puget Sound and it's 800 feet deep and freezing cold.

So anyway, Sunday was the grand opening of the new bridge, so my family and the Brazile's were out there to celebrate and walk across the new bridge. The weather was perfect, we all got some sun, and it was so much fun! Some of us were a little scared to walk across it, but we all made it and had a great time. I'm at work so I can't write much on here, but here are some of the pictures that Heather sent me since I forgot to bring my own camera! My mom got a great picture of Timothy when Brandon held the stroller up so that Timothy could look over the edge. Timothy looks very concerned in it, it's really cute. As soon as she sends those out I'll put it on here, but I think that will probably have to wait until we get back from vacation.

This is the group at the mid span point on the new bridge

This is our whole group getting ready to walk back across to the Tacoma side...I like this one because you can see both bridges

Spoons

So Timothy has been feeding himself with a spoon at daycare and at home for a while now, but tonight he was so fussy and he wouldn't eat any of his dinner so finally I gave him his spoon to hold and put his yogurt on the table for him to feed himself...well...he learned that it's much more fun to dip your spoon in the yogurt and then pull it out really fast and watch the yogurt fly all over the place. Since he was fussy and tired and it helped him actually eat some, I let him have at it. I thought I'd share the pictures of the mess that he made...it was also funny because when I went to take the pictures, I told him to say, "cheese" and he just opened his mouth really big and yelled, "ahhh". It was cute, guess you had to be there...anyway, enjoy the pictures!

Beach Time!

We decided yesterday, since it was seriously 100 degrees up here, that we would go to the beach. It's way too hot to stay inside with no air conditioning, and we had maintenance guys coming over to our house to fix some stuff before the one year warranty runs out soooo...Timothy and I went over to my mom's that morning and hung out until it got too hot and then we picked Tyler up from soccer camp and headed for the beach. I absolutely love living up here this time of year. The weather is beautiful, and the beach we were at yesterday was so pretty! Yes, there was some sea weed and a lot of rocks since, hey, it is the West Coast and Puget Sound, but the sand was nice and hot and the water was really cold and it was clear and sunny and you could see the mountains in the background and it was just beautiful.

Timothy wasn't too sure about the sand at first, but once he saw Tyler playing in it and I put his sandals on so his feet wouldn't hurt he got the hang of it pretty quickly! We brought a big bucket and some little watering cans and he could have played all day with that bucket. Tyler kept filling it up for him and then Timothy would just fill up the watering cans in the bucket and sprinkle water all over his legs and laugh. The funniest part of the day was when Tyler decided to go swim (I still think he's crazy for swimming in that freezing cold water!) and Timothy wanted to watch him so we walked down to the edge of the beach and stood there so he could see Tyler. So here's Timothy...this little blinding white skinned kid with his SPF 50 swim suit, swim shirt, and big floppy hat...surrounded by these three little hispanic kids and they just stood there staring at him for the longest time. It was so funny, it was like they had never seen anything like him. And of course, they're all in their little bikinis and incredibly tanned and brown...it was hilarious. We couldn't get the camera to work to take a picture of it, but it was pretty cute.

And Tyler was amazing with Timothy, he's so good to him. He played the whole time at the beach with him, entertained him in the car, played with him at the house so mom and I could get ready for church, crawled all over the playground at Burger King with him and then follows him all around the church building making sure Timothy stays inside and doesn't go where he's not supposed to be. The little kids at church just love Tyler...and he loves playing with them. He's going to be a great baby sitter in a few years!!

Timothy's not doing too much new stuff except for getting into a lot of trouble. He's definitely testing his limits. He's starting throwing his toys when he gets mad and then he either hits his head with his hand or bangs it on whatever's closest to him. It's really annoying. He has also learned how to say (scream?), "no" and he uses it quite often now. And today at day care they said he tried to bite another kid. Please pray for us! He's also become incredibly affectionate when he wants to be...he will grab on and wrap his arms around my neck and hug so tight and then he'll give a big sloppy open mouth kiss. It's so sweet, I just love it. He loves to give high fives now and he's started "reading"...he'll open a book and turn to the first page and just start babbling and then turn the page and start over again. It's so cute.

We're definitely getting excited for vacation, we leave one week from tonight!!! I'm already packed and Timothy's packed and I think Brandon got most of his stuff packed tonight. I can't wait, I'm so ready to be at the beach for a whole week!! I don't plan on doing anything except enjoying time with family, watching the kids play, and reading my new book. I'll try to get back on and get some more pictures up before we leave, but I'm sure I'll have a ton of pictures to post when we get back...until then, enjoy the sun!!

Happy (late) 4th of July!

We had a great week, hope everyone else had a good holiday...the best part was our neighbors shooting off fireworks from 11am Wednesday morning until midnight that night (and they've been shooting them off every night since then too) so that was just so much fun. Timothy had to sleep in our bed because he was terrified of them and I think we all got about three hours of sleep...but anyway, other than that, it was a good day. It's late and I'm really tired (and I have to get up at 4:45!) so I'm just going to put some pictures on here and I'll update on Timothy later!