Conversations With Emily

Em: "Mommy, can you snap your fingers?"

Me: "I can."

Em: "I can't."

Me: "You just have to practice and then you will be able to."

Em: "I practice every day.  Do you know what else I practice everyday?"  

Me: "What?" 

Em: "Flying"

Me: "Flying?"

Em: "Yep, when I jump up I practice flapping my arms."

Anniversary Trip to Hollywood, FL

Last week Shawn went to a work conference in Hollywood, FL.  This was his third time to go there and each year he has tried to convince me to meet him out there.  I decided to take him up on his offer this year and make it an anniversary trip for us.  I flew out Tuesday afternoon to meet him.  Since I didn't get there until late on Tuesday, it was a pretty low key night.  We just ate some sushi and had some drinks at the hotel.  I was super excited about the hotel and couldn't wait to see it and the beach in the daylight.  We had an awesome room at the Hilton Diplomat Resort.  We were on the 29th floor and had a corner balcony room with an ocean view.  It was such nice weather that we slept each night with the balcony doors open.   I slept great listening to the ocean each night.

Looking down at the pools and beach from our balcony.

The view from our balcony.

We were up bright and early on Wednesday morning.  I don't tend to sleep in on vacation because I'm so excited to start doing stuff.  I was most excited to just get out on the beach.  We ate breakfast in the hotel and then headed on down. We rented chairs and an umbrella and setup for the morning.  I could have laid there all day!  It was so relaxing.  The water was just as clear as it had been in Destin and it was so calm.  There was also a sandbar that went pretty far out, so you could swim and swim and it was still so shallow.

Our hotel in the background.

We stayed out on the beach until lunchtime and then ate some lunch at the restaurant by the pool before heading back upstairs to change for our airboat tour.

Another view from our balcony.

You can see the sandbar well in this picture.  Where it's the darker brown, was super shallow.  I'm talking you could stand up and only be knee deep in water.  It was neat being able to go so far out into the ocean and still stand.

After a quick shower, we headed out to Ft. Lauderdale.  We had plans to take a private airboat tour of the Everglades.  I was a little nervous to see alligators, but I was game.  I figured this was probably our only chance we'd get to do this.  We met our tour guide and headed out for a 2 hour tour.  It was really neat.  We saw a TON of alligators and all kinds of birds.  There were all these different paths and it was neat seeing how our tour guide knew exactly where he was going.  I'm so glad we did this tour.  It was a highlight of the trip.

All ready to go.  

We went through some areas where there was hardly any water.

Look over to the left.  It's an alligator.

See.  :)

 After the airboat tour, we headed down to the main strip by the beaches in Ft. Lauderdale.  I had found a restaurant right on the water, Coconuts, that I thought might be fun for dinner.  It was my favorite meal of the trip.

We headed back to our resort after dinner.   We woke up to a beautiful sunrise Thursday morning.  I couldn't wait to get back on the beach.

I had gotten just a little bit of sun by now.  :)

Eating lunch at the pool bar.

We had originally planned to go to Miami Thursday afternoon and go on the Duck Tour and have dinner, but once we were on the beach we decided we'd rather just stay there all day.  So that's what we did.  It was the best.  I read a book and Shawn listened to music and took a nap.  It was perfect weather and the water was really calm again.  I think we stayed on the beach until around 5:00 that night.  I was trying to soak up every last minute!

We walked around some that night trying to find somewhere to eat, but after not finding much we just ended up back at the resort.  They had a nice steakhouse, so we ended up there.  It ended up being a nice night!

The next morning we were up early and off to the airport.  I was so sad to leave, but ready to see my babies.  It was a quick trip, but I'm so glad we made it work.  It's nice having some kid free time every so often and who knows, maybe I'll join Shawn next year when he goes back.

American Girl Bistro

A couple of years ago, Em got a bitty baby for Christmas.  It's still one of her very favorite toys to play with.  I've never taken Em to the American Girl store before, so I thought it might be fun to make a girls day out of it and take her to the store and to the bistro for lunch.  I asked my friend, Courtney, if her and Grace would like to join us.

Em was super excited once she saw all the dolls and clothes in the store.  We looked around for a little bit and then headed upstairs to have lunch.  It was very girly!  The girl's bitty babies got to sit right at the table with us and they even got their own cup and saucer.  Em thought this was super fun. The restaurant is definitely geared towards little girls and not adults.   The food choices lean more towards a kid's palate, than an adults palate.  But luckily, we didn't really go for the food, but more the experience.  I think Em and Grace had lots of fun eating with their babies.

After lunch we headed back downstairs so the girls could pick out something for their baby.  Em picked out an outfit set and couldn't wait to get home so she could try out all the outfits on her baby.

Snow Day Round #3

Just when we thought the winter weather was gone, we got a surprise snow day.  They were predicting snow a few days out, but you never know if it's going to happen or not.  We went to bed Wednesday night and woke up to 4-5 inches of snow on the ground!  I definitely wasn't expecting that much.  The kids were super excited about another snow day.  We headed out pretty early in the morning to play in the snow.  It still wasn't perfect packing snow, but a bit better than what we had gotten the week before.  I attempted my best snowman, but Evan kept knocking it down.  Sigh.

We didn't stay outside too long as Evan doesn't have the right type of gloves and his were soaking wet soon after he picked up snow.  Next year I will be buying both kids waterproof gloves.  When we headed back in, I decided we should take advantage of all the snow outside and decided to try out an idea I saw on pinterest. . snow ice cream.  It's just snow, milk, sugar, vanilla extract and some sprinkles.  The kids loved helping me make it and they loved eating it.  Such a fun treat when you don't get snow very often.

My opinion of snow days is a bit different than when I was younger.  I used to love getting to stay home from school, but now snow days can be tough.  I'm still expected to work from home, but the kids don't understand that.  It can definitely be hard trying to balance the two.  But I won't complain because even if I have to work some from home, it's so fun seeing your kids eyes light up at the sight of snow on the ground and getting to have a day off from school.

I'm hoping this will be our last snow day of this winter.  I'm sure I'll be ready for a few after the summer heat wave, but for now, I'm craving that warm spring weather!

Conversations With Emily

Shawn: "Would you like to get a goldfish?"

Em: "Like as a pet?"

Shawn: "Yeah"

Em: "I'd rather have a horse, that's my favorite pet."

February I Phone Pics

We took the kids to see Paddington.  This was Evan's first time ever to go to the movie theater.  He did better than expected and we made it the whole movie.  He did tell us several times that he was ready to go, but luckily all the snacks we got him helped distract him.  I'm looking forward to going to movies as a family now!

One night after dinner.  Shawn thought it was so funny we were all playing on our electronic devices.

Shawn and I went out for PNO.  We just grabbed drinks and went to dinner.

While Em and Daddy were at the daddy/daughter dance, Evan and I went to the park.

We fed a ton of ducks.

Day 2 of being iced in.  By now, most of the ice had melted.

The kids went to the drive in movies - only the drive in was in the gameroom and the cars were laundry baskets.  Evan stayed in his basket for about 20 minutes before he was done, but Em loved it.

Our family portrait per Emily.  She even included Lily.

Dr. Suess day at school

Em's Pre-K 2 class with 1 of her teachers.