dragonfly days

monday

No this pic is not from today. It has been cold and overcast. I miss the sun.

So today's post is brought to you by phone calls you don't want to get:

"Hello, Steve has had an accident  during class. We filled out an accident report."  Umm...hello.

Everything is fine now. I had just realized that I had missed a call from Steve when his teacher called and started out like that.  Wish he would have start out with, "Everything is fine."

Today was filled with meltdowns- mine and his, missed classes, library fines- ouch, cold weather, and more meltdowns. Not sure if someone is getting sick, going through a growth spurt, or just being plain ol' ornery. I think we have all the different members of the household in one of those three states.  Whatever it is I hope Tuesday brings better weather, physically and emotionally.

And now on to the positives:

• we did get school done, even Spanish. Bonus points for two science experiments and making a science notebook.
• we made the p.e. class that we've missed for many weeks.
• laundry- done, folded and put away
• dresser- handles off and primer coat started.
• new library books-- someday I will tell you about trying to convince Jack that we weren't buying the Garfield book at the library, but paying fines. It involved me saying, "this isn't a bookstore, they don't' sell books" while handing my debit card to the librarian.
• Everyone else got where they needed to go. It felt like an accomplishment today.
• And we made it through another day and will try again tomorrow.

 

 

scenes from the weekend 2/26

Two posts in one day! Yay me!

A friend of ours who was doing some heavy work down by the river found this guy and brought him to us. He knew we would want to see him and get to know him a little better.  It is a red eared slider.  Not native to our area.

We were able to watch the boy play lacrosse. He did AWESOME!  We weren't able to make it to Talisa's games, hers were out of town but they played awesome too! So proud of these kids.

 

We have been getting the gardens ready and collecting supplies. Hopefully the gardens will be planted soon!

Had a bit of a scare Friday. Alex was injured during rugby practice. It looked broken, luckily it wasn't. But she did break a fair amount of blood vessels in her foot.  So a couple of days of icing, elevating and salves seems to have done the trick. It's looking much better now.

On the list for this week:

• french cooking class
• tap class
• hip hop
• lacrosse in Vegas
• play at the high school
• lacrosse in Vegas again, yes again. Two different days. Sigh.
• birthday parties
• yard work
• oh fixing and painting my dresser- it's on the back porch I don't have a dresser until it's done.
• But even when it's done I need to paint the wall where it goes-- see forcing myself to do it.
• I'm itching to sew something out of felt
• the post office. Ahem. Someone I know still hasn't sent those Christmas boxes. Sigh.
• Clean to the boys room. Ugh. Prepping for operation paint kids room over Spring break.

That's all. Writing it out doesn't seem too bad. Thinking about Vegas twice in one week, seems bad. I'm sure we'll enjoy it. :)

 

Vacation day 6 + 7

 

This was our last official vacation day.  We decided to spend the day at Sea World again. They have a deal right now that gives you a pass for the year for the same price as a day pass.  So it was kind of an easy decision to go there again. :)

First though, a picture from our the beach in front of our hotel that morning. We were right down from the naval training base and if you were there at the right time each day you could see something like this.

First stop was the animal adventure area. Jack was able to pet the alligator and learn a bit about them.

Then to a mini pool to touch star fish, anenomes, and horseshoe crabs. Jack flipped the horseshoe crab over to show everyone how they can flip themselves back over. There was also someone there teaching about the animals.

There was a sloth nearby. Points for references here. :)

 

Back through some of our favorite areas. Like the shark exhibit.

A couple of rides. And then it was time for our Dolphin Encounter.

Meet Razzle.

We were able to feed Razzle.

Touch him and learn a little about dolphin anatomy.

We also gave him a few commands and he did a few tricks for us.

After the dolphins...

We met the eels. I've never been a huge fan of eels. Can't say it's changed either. ;) We talked with the person in charge of them and then had the chance to feed them some squid. I passed. Jack did though and he was one of the only ones who got a bite.

That's him with the squid in the tube. Yuck.

We visited this sick sea turtle again. Then it was our to turtle reef to feed the sea turtles.

We were able to hold a sea turtles shell and learn a bit more about their anatomy. We also learned about ways to help save the sea turtles.

After that we went to the Shamu show again. This time sitting dead center in the splash zone.

Luckily we only got a few drops. Disappointing for Jack, but it is February and I didn't want to freeze.  We had a great view. After that we hit some more rides.  Then he wanted to watch the Sea Lion show again. 

That evening we headed over to Seaport Village for dinner and a walk.

We ate at one of the restaurants right on the water. After we bought some hot sauce for our hot sauce lovers here and some cupcakes for ourselves.  Then back to the hotel to pack up and get ready for our return trip.

The last morning we ate breakfast out on the patio. We had a sea gull stalking our french toast.  Then it was time to head home. The normal 8 hour drive took us 10 hours because traffic was so bad. We didn't get home until almost 9. And it was oh so good to see everyone else again. We had a wonderful time, amazing really.  We also missed everyone soooo much.

 

 

 

 

Day 5

Oops. I forgot one little detail yesterday and edited the last post. I forgot to add that we were able to touch and hold an already hatched shark egg. It was very cool.

Day 5 or Wednesday, we decided to head to the zoo.  

Jack was a bit burned out by this day. He was starting to miss the rest of the family and his routines.

I love gorillas. Once upon a time I wanted to visit the Congo and observe them.

The bus tour was a big hit, especially since we sat on the top of the double decker bus. Luckily it didn't start raining until we were done.

Going on the tour gave us a better idea of where we wanted to spend more time.  Watching the baby giraffes for instance.

And the rhinos.

The last time we visited this zoo they were just finishing up the panda exhibit.

The aviary's were a big hit with Jack.

Who am I kidding? I enjoyed them too. 

Things I don't like- sky rides. Things I like even less- sky rides when it is windy. By the time we reached the other side I was about to loose my lunch.

And right after this is when it started to pour. We stopped for a quick souvenir and then headed back to the hotel to warm up and dry out.

That evening, we headed to the Hard Rock cafe for dinner.

He really enjoyed looking at all the memorabilia.  Afterwards, we headed to the mall next door for dessert.

 

Happily we found it. :)

 

 

Day 4

On Tuesday,  we checked out of our hotel, grabbed one last Starbucks and headed south. 

First stop Sea World. Luckily it was a beautiful day.

We decided to sign up for the Up-Close Tour.  It was one of our favorite parts. First we went behind the scenes and talked about the dolphins and got a glimpse of the mama and baby dolphin in the back, along with some other species. 

Then we saw a sea turtle that was being treated. Next up we were able to see the labs where they test the water and  the operating room.

After that we headed over to the shark lab.

Where we saw the egg incubator.

I don't know if you can make out the shark in the egg, but it was very cool to see in swimming around in the egg. We also were able to hold an already hatched egg, very cool.

Then we were able to touch the sharks in this tank.

Someone was really thrilled about the whole thing.

I think I want a display of shark jaws in my house. Seriously. I should live in a museum.

I would highly recommend the tours. We both learned a lot and enjoyed seeing some of the inner workings. The tour guides are more than willing to answer questions. 

After the tour we had some lunch and walked around some more. It was getting hot out and we were feeling the it, so we bought some hats. Jack picked a fedora, of course. I took whatever hat would fit my big head. They only had one.

We took in the dolphin show. It wasn't like the one I remembered from years past. A lot less dolphin and a lot more human acting. It was neat, but I really enjoyed the dolphin shows. Right after the dolphin show we headed over to the Shamu show.  We really enjoyed that.

Jack was praying to get wet. I was glad we didn't. :)

We stopped by the tide pool after the show to see some starfish. Those have always been a favorite. Then we walked through all of the aquariums.  It was getting late, but we had time to make it to the sea lion show. That was definitely Jack's favorite.  He loved that you could dance and work with sea animals. :)

Then it was time to go. We checked in to our new hotel, down in the bay.  After that we headed out to find some dinner. That turned out to be a lot harder than planned. It was Valentine's day so everything was packed. The only resturants near by were expensive bars, no thanks.  After trying to find another place, we finally settled on Subway. Gotta love it. 

 

 

Vacation day 3

After getting a glimpse of the ocean the night before, Jack was determined that we spend the next day at the ocean. It worked for me. The weather was iffy at best and I didn't really want to pay a fortune to get rained out of an attraction. We headed to Torry Pines beach, which was very close to our hotel.  He was mesmerized.

It was a perfect day for picking up some shells and playing in the sand.

But someone couldn't stay out of the water.

And it was windy and overcast.

And once he got his shorts wet in the freezing cold water, he was pretty much over the ocean. :(  We decided to leave and get something for lunch. I was hoping to persuade him to go back to the beach, but it wasn't happening.   We also walked aorund a few shops in Del Mar. After that we decided to head for the Children's Pool in La Jolla.

It's a wonderful place to observe harbor seals up close.

It's also a pupping ground.

Although one of us enjoyed the spray from the ocean. :) I asked if he wanted to go back to the beach and play and he said no. I told him he didn't have to get wet, we would just play on the beach. He said, "I'll get wet, no matter what. I just can't help myself."

After that it was back to the hotel for a warm shower and some faetime with the siblings.  Then we ate at a pizza joint down the street. He watched a movie while I packed up our things, it was our last night in this hotel.

I'll continue the rest tomorrow, this post got a little long. :)  Tomorrow will  be all about Sea World.

 

vacation days 1-2

I'm trying to split the trip up into managable pieces. :)

Here we are getting ready to leave.  It's a rule to have a pic at the start of a road trip.  Eight hours in the car. That was a long drive. By the time we got there, I questioned my sanity in ever planning the trip.

As soon as we got to the hotel, Jack facetimed home.   That night all we did was get dinner and shower.  I unfortunately ate something that didn't sit well with me and I was up all night long. I repeat ALL NIGHT LONG.  By the time Jack woke up I was a wreck. Luckily there was Starbucks at the hotel. I pulled it together, well with the help of a phone call from hubby and we set out to have a good day anyways.  We decided to do Legoland that day since the weather was in our favor.  Originally we were planning on going on Monday and getting the homeschool discount, but it was supposed to rain on Monday.

He was so excited.  Everything was so thrilling to him. I think I have a rollercoaster junkie on my hands.

This was our first ride.

Of course we had to get a shot with Lego Harry Potter. I didn't even think to get a pic of myself.

This was his first real experience at an amusement park.

He loved the brick wall at the cafe.

Learning how to make apple fries is my new personal quest in life. Those were yummy. And look who actually tried them.

I burned out real quick and by 4 o'clock was trying not to fall asleep on the benches. So we reluctantly called it a day.

We went back to the hotel for a bit so I could rest while he played with his souvenir lego set.  

On the way to dinner, we stopped by one of the beaches right by our hotel for his first glimpse at the ocean.

He decided it was pretty cool.

And by the time we ordered dinner he was looking pretty tired too.

 

I'm happy to say that thankfully we both slept well the second night.

 

 

scenes from the weekend 2/19

Jack and I are back from our vacation. I will be posting about that over the next few days.  We got back in late Friday night.  Saturday we spent the day running from a rugby tounrament to lacrosse and back again.  Today, we've just been trying to recover from it all.  Jack even took a nap.  It's been a long, fun week. So glad to be home, but still trying to get the ground under our feet.

 

Her first rugby game. They made her team captain. One of the other teams named her Woman of the Match. She did awesome! And we actually understood someof the game! :)

It was fun to be back at the lacrosse sidelines. Talisa was on a scoring streak.

Then she took a turn playing goalie. Looks like there may be a new position in her future.

On the list this week:

• the dentist...again. Hopefully this will be the last for a while.
• dance classes...someone really missed these last week.
• a day off for the big kiddos... of course they still have practices.
• library...yikes we have some books that REALLY need to get back
• homeschool...hoping to get into a light schedule post vacation. Maybe delve deeper into some of the things we learned on vacation.
• project life-- need to catch up on this and really want to get last week done while it is fresh in my memory.
• catch up on the laundry- leaving three sporty teens at home in charge of their laundry for the week is not a good idea. It's a  stinky one. :P 
• Park day. Looking forward to chillin with the homies. :)

 

What's on your list?

 

 

scenes from the weekend 2/5

 

On the list for this week:

• dentist- me
• doctor- Steve for the foot
• dance- tap and hip-hop
• rugby
• lacrosse
• lacrosse games
• roller skating Valentine party- looking forward to that.
• Doing Valentine's for the party

What is on your list?

 

silly

Today we had an poetry/art festival with one of our homeschool groups. Jack made this silly alien painting. The alien was trying to decide which planet to go to, he was headed for planet x.  Love that he was so excited for it.

We're thankful for the many different opportunities that this other group provides.