Vacation: Planet Hollywood.

Exchanging some love at Planet Hollywood.

Me with "Jenny", the boat from my favorite movie!

This was the last day before the endless drive home, so we were pretty wiped out by this time. I'm still wiped out, which is why these last posts are so short!

Vacation: Beach Day!





We all had loads of fun, but the sand got a little ridiculous. It was a fairly miserable ride home because we couldn't thoroughly rid ourselves of the sand until we were back at the condo. And, even under the umbrella, wearing a T-shirt, and donning SPF 70 sunscreen, I got a sunburn.

Vacation Day 4: Downtown Disney and Sea World take 2

These lego sculptures were impressive. And the girls liked the puppies.
Anna and I with Pooh and friends. Ella refused to come sit with us.
Ella likes the RED present.
Ella's incredibly fake smile at TREX.
I touched a sting ray! Lots of them, actually. You see, they sell food for $5 a tray; however, you can just stick your hand in the water and pretend you have food and they come right to you. Silly sting rays.
A manatee eating lettuce, or maybe cabbage...
A really great picture of the girls watching the manatees.

I had to get this hat for Anna. It fits her personality perfectly. And, they were selling the swords at the same vendor, so I got those, too. Sucker.We shopped quite a bit today: Jasmine, Squirt, Woolly Mammoth, 8 little dinosaurs, 2 bigger dinosaurs, 2 swords, 3 lolly pops (one eaten), a Shamu flag, a Minnie Mouse cap, a silly hat, and the girls names painted as art. This doesn't count the spoils from day 1 at Sea World: a dolphin and a penguin for Ella and Anna, respectively. Think what you want, they need every bit of this stuff.

Vacation Day 3: Aquatica! These two pictures sum up the day.



We arrived at the park around 10am, and left around 4. The girls absolutely LOVED the park. They have a couple of great places just for little ones, and they swam, slid down water slides, and floated on the lazy river until they were exhausted. They were asleep almost before we pulled out of our parking space, and slept for about 3-4 hours. Sorry for the lack of pictures, but camera's just don't go well with water parks.

Here is an unexpected show from yesterday at Sea World, the "Stilt Drummers". These guys are living out the dream of many marching band drum-line veterans...

Vacation Day 2: Sea World!

Anna loves whales!
I'll admit, they are magnificent!
She also loves to smile for the camera. She was excited to see Elmo and Abby!
Penguins are cool, too.
So is Daddy and blue whales.
We had a caricature drawn of the girls. It is really cute!
The dolphin show, "Blue Horizons", was one of Ella's favorites.
"Clyde and Semore Take Pirate Island" was cute and funny.
Anna and the seals - harbor and leapord.
Two sleeping girls at the end of the day.
Good thing they woke up in time to see "Shamu Rocks!"

Florida Vacation! Day One...

After 16 long hours of travel...We're Here!!! Woo Hoo!
Burning off a little pent up energy on the playground. Can you spot Anna?

After our Downtown Disney plans were rained out, we decided to come back to the condo to try out our awesome jacuzzi tub.

At first it was all fun and games. I added a little shampoo to make some bubbles for the girls.
Then, we turned on the jacuzzi and the bubbles quickly found a mind of their own. Notice the depth of the water in the previous picture compared to the depth of the bubbles. We quickly realized there was a big problem and started draining the water. We ended up with no water and about 2.5 feet of pure bubbles. The final result was four people covered head to toe in bubbles, two screaming girls who didn't want to rinse off in the shower, and a 30 minute job trying to rinse out the tub...

Word to the wise: DO NOT PUT ANY SORT OF BUBBLY SUBSTANCE IN A JACUZZI!!!!

Oh, and Anna broke some drawers...

Anna playing with Snap-N-Pops on the 4th of July.


Anna hiding.

Project 1: Check!
Project 2: Check! New kitchen, dining room, living room, and hall floors! Pictured below: the kitchen.
Project 3: Check! New floors and new bookshelves, guest starring Rivers and the magnificent CLOCK!Project 4: Check!
Project 5: On book number 6 of 7. Need to think of something else to read after these...
Project 6: Hanging with the girls almost nonstop. Fun times!

Ella reading Russian short fiction, and Anna reading Ariel by Sylvia Plath. A foreshadowing into future personalities perhaps?

Anna, being a Bobo in the middle of O'Charley's while eating with Mamaw Minnie.
The Bobo Brothers - This pair of wild, mischievous spider monkeys are always causing trouble, setting traps, upsetting nests, breaking dams, or bringing down mudslides. To stop them, Animal Rescuers need to say, "Freeze Bobos!"

Anna hiding under some shelves.