This morning the girls and I went to see a movie for $1.00 each. It was called Alpha and Omega. It was a story about two wolves from the opposite ends of the social pack structure that fall in love...and all the obstacles they have to overcome. It was cute.
After lunch we went to the library for a program put on by the Virginia Aquarium. All the kids go to listen to a story, play a few games including charades (although when Sophia was selected to act out an animal, she got up there and then decided she didn't want to play). She was all about touching the HUGE hissing cockroach and the enormous African beetle though! GROSS! She thought it was cool. Lilly opted not to touch.
Sophia wants to be vet when she's older. Well she used to want to be a vet. Now she wants to be the professor who trains vets to be vets!
The girls absolutely loved playing with and taking care of Baby Jonas (or BJ as Big Daddy calls him) while we were in Florida. Lilly especially.
Lilly has always loved playing with baby dolls. She gives them bottles, pushes them in the stroller, carries them around, puts them to bed, etc... (all the normal baby doll activities)...
Well, now that she had a chance to help take care of a real baby, she calls every baby doll Baby Jonas. She told me that she misses Baby Jonas and that he's so pretty.
Rob & Christina, Mike & Misty and Will & I went out to dinner one night...it was so much fun.
I think we would all agree that the food was just so-so, but the company was fantastic!
I wish we all lived closer and could do it more often. By the way, all the cousins got along great too. The youngest is 10 months old and the oldest just turned 13.
Rob & Christina, getting married on Sept 3rd
Mike & Misty, preparing to celebrate 5 years of marriage
Will and Shirley, 1 month shy of our 8th anniversary
Big Daddy took the whole family out to Midieval Times while we were in Florida. The girls really got into it...and we bought them the $1.00 flags to wave in support of our knight....and the flags both broke before the end of the show. I guess we should have gone with the $5 flags. Either way, our knight won the battle! We sat in the black and white section. We ate chicken, garlic bread, ribs, and potatoes with our hands. We drank our soup and "gulped" our wine. The girls really thought the horses were beautiful.
Sophia picked out a stuffed cat in a carry tote. Lilly choose a purple jewel necklace. Both were big hits!
The first time we went to Animal Kingdom we were with Grancy, Big Daddy, Rob, Christina and Baby Jonas. We actually got rained out that day. Since we really only experienced a quarter of the park that day so we decided to return. Afterall, we had to take the safari ride. It was really cool. There were so many animals for the girls to see close up.
Some funny moments from the day(s)...
1) We parked at Magic Kingdom, unloaded the stroller and almost started the long process into the park when we realized we were at the wrong park. Oops...(easy fix)
2) Lilly and Sophia spent their souvenir money. Sophia picked out a stuffed cat from the Aristocats named Marie and Lilly picked out the Princess music box that Sophia still regrets not choosing.
We just spent the last two weeks either vacationing in Florida, traveling to/from Florida or recovering from our trip (by far the most taxing part)! We're finally unpacked and caught up on our sleep, but tomorrow morning our next vacation begins -- Vacation Bible School that is! It's called "Shake It Up Cafe" and the theme is cooking. I'm teaching the preschool class (3s and 4s). Twenty of them actually! Lilly will be in the class with me and he rest of the Mini Muffins. Sophia's in the rising K class this year (I still can't believe she's going to be in Kindergarten!). Her class is the Banana Splits. She's going to have so much fun.
But...I have so much to write about Florida.
We had an uneventful drive to Kissimmee, Florida. It took us 14 hours, but we stopped quite a few times and let the girls get out an roam around a bit. We left at 5 AM on Saturday (July 2). We arrived that night around 8 PM. We spent our first full day (Sunday) at the rental house just relaxing by the pool. Sophia spent the entire day in the pool. In fact, she spent almost every waking moment in the pool if we weren't at one of the Disney World parks.
We went to Magic Kingdom three times and spent two days at Animal Kingdom. We definitely could have gone back to Magic Kingdom a few more times...if nothing else but to enjoy the fireworks another time. What a spectacular show! At one point, Tinkerbell flies out of the castle on a zipline rope and glides through the night sky...granting wishes I presume.
Another one of our favorite parts was the castle show and the parades. We times it perfect on our first day at Magic Kingdom. We arrived just five minutes before the castle show was about to begin. It was a fantastic way to be welcomed into the park. Some of the Princesses made an appearance and Sophia's eyes couldn't have gotten any bigger! During the afternoon parade on the first day there a super Giant Woody (from Toy Story) stuck his finger into Sophia's ear. She grinned so big.
We also met Rapunzel on the first day. The girls danced with her and then Sophia talked to her, hugged her and had her sign her autograph book. We forgot to ask her to sign Lilly's book. Lilly was too shy to give anyone a hug or to request an autograph, but I jumped right in and asked for her in every case except Rapunzel.
Lilly's favorite things about Magic Kingdom:
The rides (literally, all of them)!
The popsicles (they're GIANT sized)!
Sophia's favorite things:
Tinkerbell flying out of the castle AND the fireworks!
Driving her first car (I pressed the gas and she steered us back and forth slamming into the middle rail with every turn. I had to smile.)
The Carousel of Progress ride (she liked the mechanical dog)
My favorites:
It's a Small World ride
Watching Sophia's face light up over and over again.
Listening to Lilly experience an amazing fireworks show! She said WOW with amazement with every burst of light in the sky. It was adorable. You can kind of hear it in this movie. You have to listen for it, but you'll hear it really loud toward the end.
In addition to Rapunzel, Sophia also got to meet the following:
Buzz Lightyear (Toy Story)
Aurora, Sleeping Beauty
Belle, Beauty and the Beast
Cinderella
Pocahontas
Jiminy Cricket
Rafiki
Pooh
Eyeore
Tigger
And Pluto and Goofy, but I can't find that picture. I think it might have gotten deleted. Boo hoo.
Magic Kingdom was awesome. I already told the girls that we would go back every 5 years. I can't wait! Here are some images from the parade and the rides that we went on...
Since Lilly and I were technically both registered in the Mommy & Me class, I was able to take lots of pictures of her in dance class. Here's a bunch I just downloaded from my phone. She got really comfortable and did a great job participating on her own. It was so fun to just sit back and watch her do her thing. I was so proud.
Here's a short video:
Here's a longer video of her doing part of her dance class:
Here's a video of part of the song they warm up to called Miss Puffy:
I had no idea that Sophia's second loose tooth would come out so soon, but it fell out while we were in the car today. Incredible. I think Tina Toothfairy is going to bring a pack of sugarfree strawberry shortcake chewing gum tonight. Sophia's going to love it.
Unbeknownst to me, Will put Lilly to bed without a pull up on last night. She was bone dry this morning. She's been waking up dry for about 2 weeks, but it never even crossed my mind to put her to bed in undies.
She's been completely potty trained during the waking hours for months now, but we're clearly in the home stretch for the night time as well.
Way to go Lilly! This is much earlier than Sophia was potty trained. I can see $$ now. No more pull ups!
It was literally hanging on by a few threads. She could push it with her tongue and point it completely upside down.
We were at Target - in the dressing room. I asked her if I could just pull it out because I was afraid she was going to lose it and flick it with her tongue and not even realize it. She was crying. She was scared. And then it just fell right out onto her tongue.
We ran to the $1.00 section and found a Hello Kitty round, pink "Tupperware" container and put it in there for safe keeping until we got home.
That was on Wednesday night. Sophia has a decision to make. She could either put the tooth under her pillow that night and have the tooth fairy visit without ever seeing her tooth - or she could wait until Sunday night. Will had left on Tuesday night for CA and wasn't getting back until Saturday morning, at which point he was planning to join us at Haley and Carlie's family's beach house in Duck, NC. The girls and I left for Duck on Thursday morning after swimming class. We were planning on coming back on Sunday afternoon, but like I already mentioned, Will was going to arrive by noon on Saturday.
Sophia decided she would wait until Sunday night to put the tooth under her pillow. So, last night, the tooth fairy came to our house. She left a red envelope under Sophia's pillow. Inside it was $1.00 and a miniature booklet of cupcake tattoos.
All day Sophia carried her loot around in the pink Hello Kitty "tooth" container.
We're half way through swimming lessons. The girls have each had 45 minute lessons on Tuesdays and Thursdays for the last two weeks. We've got 2 lessons left. Sophia is really improving over last year. Lilly has yet to put her face in the water and cries if she gets splashed. She will put each of her ears in the water, but she prefers to play with toys on the safety of the steps.
I'm finally back online. My new battery and power cord arrived so my computer is like new again! I love it. I've got a lot of pictures to go through and share.
We've been so busy since the beginning of June.
School is out for summer.
Sophia had a church choir banquet for the "end of the year".
Swimming lessons have started.
Sophia had her dance recital last weekend.
We joined the YMCA so we could use the outdoor pool.
Sophia lost her first tooth this past week while Will was in CA for work. I took the girls down to Duck, NC with Haley and Carlie on Thursday and we arrived home this afternoon. Will was supposed to join us, but he was a victim of the United computer glitch on Friday night and got stuck in San Fransisco and then Chicago and didn't arrive home until late last night.
By the way, it's Sophia in the picture - and it was only just a few weeks ago. Doesn't she look almost exactly like Lilly? I did a double-take when I saw it.
