A little rain on our parade...

There's nothing like the sound of pouring rain to put a damper on your 4th of July festivities...and it was POURING when we woke up this morning! The entire radar was a lovely shade of green, and things did not look promising for the annual community parade. If my kid weren't marching in it, I would have rolled over and gone back to bed. Believe me, I thought about it. But I do love a parade...and my kid...and I love watching the band perform, so we packed up and headed out to claim our spot on the parade route. Oh, it was crowded...you bet! I'm not sure how we found a spot. We hauled our chairs out and set them up under our umbrellas, strategically placed so as not to drip on the chair next to us. Yep, we are PROfessionals. My parents were ever so kind as to join us...and whacked in the head. Last year, we were dripping sweat. This year, the drips were from a cold, steady rain, and I would gladly have donned a parka.

We sat for a while in a steady rain, praying that the straggling cars passing us by would avoid the puddles in front of us. Miraculously, just as the parade came into sight, the rain stopped! We dumped the blankets and umbrellas and took up our post on the curb. We had no problem spotting the band well in advance. They were wearing their new show shirts, and...well...they were hard to miss, even with the rain ponchos over them. Last year's show shirts were so sharp and classy that we were naively excited about this year's shirts. Until we saw the bags full of highlighter yellow t-shirts being passed out the night before. "OH...WHOA...WOW," was, I believe, the most common of responses among the teens. They had a few other comments I will refrain from sharing. My neighbor and I decided Mindy's new nickname should be "Sharpie". My neighbor's daughter quipped that at least Mindy won't get run over, wearing that shirt. But my favorite response was from Abby. All she could do was roll on the floor and laugh and sputter words like "neon" and "banana". She was REALLY glad she wasn't in the parade this year.

You can definitely see them coming...

The kids played "In the Stone", by Earth, Wind and Fire...I would have preferred "Boogie Wonderland", but nobody asked me. Seriously, they were awesome! They always are! Afterward, Mindy told us that the pouring rain kept them from playing the show tune until they got to our location at the end of the parade route...had to keep those woodwinds and brass covered...which left the percussion section playing the street beat until then...which left Mindy with very little feeling in her arms without a break from the cymbals. We were so proud of her, though. There's just something about your kid marching in a parade that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy...which is a good thing, considering the weather.

Many of the kids who come to this parade every year call it the "Candy Parade"...it's like Halloween with the candy-givers doing the walking. They collected scads of suckers and bubble gum, and Mickey made quite a haul. It took Caroline a few minutes to figure out what was going on and understand that it was okay to run out into the street to get the candy, but, oh, was she happy when she did!

We headed back to the house after that to have a cookout with my parents. Jon's mom was in Kentucky, visiting his sister, so it was a quiet afternoon. We took advantage of having time to spend with Mom and Dad. Caroline had "Pop" color with her and read books. After lunch, Mindy played a bit on the xylophone she brought home to practice for her marimba part. Caroline was all about that, and Mindy let her try it out. You can just barely see the motion of the mallets in the photo. This girl is meant to be a drummer!

Those mallets are flying! I think we have

another future percussionist...

Later in the evening, we grabbed milkshakes from "Steak 'n Shake" and headed back over to the park to see the fireworks. Abby complained the entire way...she really does not like fireworks...HATES loud noises. Poor Abby...and I forgot the earplugs. It was like a war zone where we were, with people setting off some fairly good-sized fireworks of their own!

Here's a slide show of our day...click on the slide show to view photos individually.

I am falling asleep, but I am almost finished with a little something to add to this day's post, so check back later today...

New post from Florida trip...

Just posted another day's worth of photos from our trip to Florida...trying to keep the days in order, so click on the link to view them. Working on 4th of July...

Whew!

We just rolled in last night at 12:05 am from our road trip to Washington, D.C., and our first (hopefully, annual) Guangdong Girls Reunion. After well over 1000 miles, we're tired...but it's a happy tired from a trip full of memories and adventure. As we finished unloading the van, I looked over and saw Caroline sprawled on the sofa. I had to laugh...she looked like I felt. I am bound and determined to get caught up on blogging, but those of you who follow our blog know that I haven't even finished blogging our Florida trip! I'll try to post tonight, and I'll link new Florida posts as I get them done. I've taken a bazillion photos in the past week and drained my camera battery more times than I can count. I know a few people who will be after me to see those pictures ASAP! So stay tuned...

Mellow Monday...

Monday morning we were still waiting for our Disney tickets to arrive by FedEx, so we begrudgingly decided to take advantage of an RCI presentation. We were treated to breakfast at the Columbia Restaurant in the nearby Walt Disney community of Celebration. The Columbia offers a quaint Cuban cuisine, and we thoroughly enjoyed traditional breakfast favorites, along with Cuban varieties of potatoes and peppers and french toast. I forgot to take my camera (yes, it does happen), but I found this photo on a great little blog about Orlando. The catch was a one-hour pitch that, not surprisingly, turned into over two hours. We finally extricated ourselves without buying anything and decided to spend the afternoon at the pool.

Okay, maybe I went a little overboard in prepping the princess,

but I've been waiting to take this trip for a LONG while!

And, from experience, I know she's only little for such a short time...

We properly prepped our littlest princess before our trip to the land of Disney, and Caroline was one stylin' gal in her Princess bathing suit, sunglasses and "fee-foppies". Mickey was all about trying out that new boogie board from Ron Jon's, and Mindy was anxious to get some sun. Unfortunately, Abby came down with a fever and spent most of the day feeling puny. A little ibuprofen perked her up enough that she was able to enjoy a little fun in the sun, but she spent a lot of the evening curled up under a blanket. She hadn't felt well a few days before we left, but she seemed to recover. I think she was continuing to fight off whatever that was. The tonsils continue to plague us, and I'll be glad when they're gone!

I know she was in kindergarten just yesterday...

Poor Abby...

Caroline tried out her new floatie suit. It's the same kind we used with all three of our older kids, and I'm convinced it helped them learn how to swim. Although it's age-appropriate, Caroline didn't seem quite ready for it. We'll go back to the Speedo suit and try it again later. She had the most fun pouring water over Daddy's head and taking a spin on the boogie board.

Daddy was a good sport, to say the least!

I did finally put the camera down and got in the pool for a bit. There is truly nothing like the pool water in Florida...it just feels great! I played with Caroline and dodged the squirt gun bullet from a couple of cuties we met that were adopted from China and Korea. I judged a couple of handstand contests for the girls and had a ball watching Mickey thoroughly enjoy himself. At one point, he was practicing the "dead man's float", fairly convincingly. I started to get concerned when Mindy asked him if that's what he was doing. His stillness in the water was abrubptly interrupted by his head popping up with a "Yup!" and followed by his head going right back down in the water. You just had to be there...it was hilarious!

Mickey's version of the "dead man's float"...

Just add water...

It was a beautiful afternoon, but true to Florida form, an afternoon thunderstorm blew up a couple of hours into our afternoon, and we tried valiantly to ride it out under an umbrella. We finally gave in when the wind whipped up and the lightning got a little too close for comfort. We made a run for the van and, if possible, got more wet than we were in the pool! Oh, well...it made for a good laugh. The rain actually never let up the rest of the day. Combined with the fact that Abby didn't feel well, we were actually glad we weren't at Disney World. We took turns warming up in the wonderful jacuzzi tub back in our condo. Then Jon and I went in search of Wal-Mart to stock up on some drinks, fruit and late night snacks. We turned in early in preparation for our first day at Disney.

Time to call it a day...

Here's a slide show of our day with a few more shots...click on it to view the photos individually...

Hang in there...

The next post is on its way...

Sea World

You know that phrase, "the best laid plans"? Yeah. Well, we have been wanting to take the kids to Disney for years. It's been a ten-year stretch since our last visit. A while back, we purchased a no-expiration 4-day pass with our credit card points, worth more than $250. And, to borrow from another expression, we left home without it.

The kids at Sea World...three out of four smiles...

Here's my confession of the day...I am an organized "wanna-be". I love containers. I love labels. I love organized files and baskets. I love lists. And that's where the problems begin. I make these lists, in various notebooks...another of my loves, notebooks...and forget where my current notebook is. Another dilemma...I can remember scads of things I need to do or buy while I am drving in the car, taking a shower or lying in bed. And I know, I've read the organization books, too. Keep a notebook and pen handy so that you can jot down those thoughts. That's a great idea, in theory. But if I could remember to keep a notebook and pen in those handy dandy places, I could probably also remember all the things I need to do.

The difference between boys and girls...

Check out the look on Mickey's face...

So back to lists...I learned early on, when traveling with children, that I needed to make a list and include everything. And I mean everything. I have it broken into headings and sub-headings. As it's packed, it's highlighted in yellow. I even have a pink highlighter code for "can't find the darn thing and somebody better get on it". Back in the day, we traveled to the beach every year, and I had that packing thing down to a science. I had the vacation packing list saved on the computer. Each year, I made changes, printed it out and knocked it out. Once we started the adoption process, our vacation budget took a hit and we stayed close to home for a few years, and I lost my edge. Then we traveled to China last year, and I had the opportunity to take up my art, once again. Lots of factors in this latest list-making...first international trip...first plane trip with kids...two weeks in a foreign country...adoption paperwork...new baby. Oh, I was in my glory. I researched packing lists and refined them carefully into what became the mother of all lists. If you've read the story about our luggage, then you know that I didn't forget a thing. I can honestly say I can't remember one thing that we didn't have when needed.



Somehow, on this trip, I got cocky. I scribbled a few half-hearted lists here and there, but the busyness of my life got the best of me, and I ended up winging it. Oh, yes, those of you who know me well know that this is exactly how I ended up in Florida without that Disney ticket. And that wasn't all...I had a post-it note of "wanted" items that I couldn't find before we left. I had purchased a pair of sunglasses for Mickey at Wal-Mart, and I searched this house high and low and never found them...until we got back, of course. So back to the original story...there we were in Florida, without our ticket. We called Jon's Mom, and she overnighted the ticket to us, but we had to wait until Monday to get the ticket...no Sunday delivery. Our original plan was to start at Disney and take a mid-week break to lounge by the pool. Without our Disney ticket, we had no choice but to go ahead and use our Sea World tickets and take our day off at the beginning of the week. The revised plans had its ups and downs, but that story will come later.

So off we went to Sea World. We were dripping sweat inside of seven minutes, and a dip in the sea lion tank looked mighty inviting. The kids wanted to sit in the splash zone, which also happened to be in the blazing sun, but we obliged...and didn't get a drop splashed on us, by the way. We didn't have much trouble enticing them into the shaded parts of the stadiums the rest of the day, though. The kids were itching to ride their first ride, so I took them on "Journey to Atlantis", a themed log-flume ride. This was really Mickey's first big ride ever, and he was a little nervous. When I was his age, I was scared of everything, so I was fairly impressed that he was so willing to go. Mindy's not afraid of anything, and Abby, fear or no, doesn't want to miss out. Jon does NOT like water flume rides (or most coasters) and was more than happy to wait with Caroline. I wish I would have purchased the photo. It was hilarious. But at $17 a pop, I had a hard time buying the first photo of the week. Turns out, it was one of the best. Oh, well. I have a great memory, for sure. The best part of the ride is after the plunge...it starts up another incline, and you have no idea what's going on. At the top, it shoots you through the dark onto a coaster track, and that's how you arrive back at the rider station. Very fun!

Journey to Atlantis

The plunge begins a lot higher than is visible...believe me!

As we walked through the park, Jon and I frequently did a head count. Invariably, one of us would say, "Hey, where's Mickey?" A quick glance in the direction of the closest landscaping would usually reveal his location. That boy was LIZARD CRAZY! He spent the better part of his day chasing lizards through the park. It was fairly entertaining, to a point. By the end of the day, we were all done with keeping track of him, though.

Another attraction at the park was my daughter's first temper tantrum of the trip. I mean, we could have sold tickets. We got hungry late in the afternoon, and I think the heat and lack of food got to us. We ended up walking back and forth in one area of the park a few times before deciding on a location and menu. On our route was a little dancing area with party music blaring. Caroline wanted to dance SO bad. She kept asking to stop, but, of course, we were in a hurry. Then we passed a dance CONTEST. In front of mermaid-type divers who were dancing in the water, along with the contestants. And Caroline was entranced. She did NOT want to leave. Well, Jon decided it was time to move on, and it was all I could do to drag her away. I fought her for a few minutes and then let Abby have a go of it, chasing her down, while I recorded the moment for posterity. She fought like a tiger when we put her in the stroller. In fact, she ripped the sun visor off our brand new stroller and pitched it on the ground. Total China syndrome. Oy. Caroline is usually very pleasant...loving and charming. But when she's mad, she's MAD. And in those moments I am usually praying that her behavior will NOT be witnessed by someone considering international adoption.

We loved the Shamu show the best...the sheer size of that animal is incredible. My favorite part is watching the trainer shoot up through the water while standing on the tip of Shamu's nose and then dive into the water below. Can you imagine that being your JOB? We went to both the day and night shows. The night show is set to rock music and very cool. We took another shot at the splash zone, and I was just barely high enough to escape Shamu's wave. Jon, Mickey and Caroline took a good hit, though. As you can see from the photos, when it comes to making a splash, the killer whale takes no prisoners. Why is it so amusing to watch others be completely soaked in fishy water?

This one cracks me up...take a closer look at the people reacting to the oncoming wave...

I really love the guy a few rows up,

having a good laugh at their expense...

Here's a slide show with a few more photos of our day:

Place the cursor on photos to view captions.

Click on the slide show to view photos individually.

Check out the videos in the post below...

A few videos...a few laughs...

Here are a few video clips from our day at Sea World...they all make me laugh...

Don't forget to pause the music player before watching them...
Just a sample of the sight we saw about a bazillion times today...




Here are a couple of Caroline...she REALLY wanted to dance!





And, finally, the "Oh, Brother!" saga...Caroline gets her chance to dance, and Mickey can't pass up the chance to mess with her a little bit...

It was hot, you say?

"What sign?"

Believe it or not, I'm almost done with my next vacation post, but I am way too tired to finish tonight. Here are a couple of photos to tide you over...and, hopefully, make you chuckle.

Yeah, like he would NEVER splash HER...

Let the vacation begin...

The breakfast of champions...

Our first full day in Florida dawned bright and beautiful! We were so relieved to hear that ... amidst several flooded basements in our neighborhood, twelve hours without power, and NO back-up sump pump...our basement was still dry. Everything in our yard and on our porch remained untouched, except for the welcome sign, found unscathed in the yard. We enjoyed a wonderful breakfast, including a yummy made-to-order omelette, before taking off on our day's adventure. Miss Caroline went to breakfast in her jammies...a little beachy terrycloth sweatsuit...cute and casual. And ever so easy to strip off after you have poured your Froot Loops into your sister's soda pop and dribbled it all down your clothing as you thoroughly enjoyed scarfing it down. Okay, I know it's disgusting and a fine example of terrible parenting, but it was HILARIOUS! She actually ate it! It was vacation, after all. Jon was appalled, especially when she stripped down to her diaper. I cackled all the way back to the room.

After breakfast, Jon headed out to pick up our mini-van rental while the kids and I packed up our overnight stuff. Then we headed out to find the condo we were renting for the week. There was some confusion as to the unit we were renting...they wanted to put the kids in a separate unit, instead of having us in adjoining units. After a little "Good Cop-Bad Cop" routine, we convinced them to give us an adjoining set-up and ended up in a brand new building with beautiful accommodations. We dumped off our suitcases and hit the road. The kids were fairly excited when we finally told them about the space shuttle launch. We were planning to zip over to the coast...barely an hour away...and enjoy the afternoon, grab a bite to eat and scope out a spot to watch the launch. Now you know that all sounds too good to be true, right? Yep. We quickly found ourselves deep in traffic...the "Beeline" slowed to a caterpillar crawl. Turns out there were another 150,000 people who wanted to see that shuttle go up! We finally made it to I-95 and headed north. It was right about the time that my research and directions clashed with Jon's opinions and GPS information that I remembered why we will NEVER do the "Amazing Race" together. We would be "that couple". And one of us might not make it. And I'd miss him. Really.

So NOT making a beeline...

Back to the shuttle launch. My research results prevailed, and we arrived at the Titusville Spaceview Park about 20 minutes before the scheduled launch time. It was PACKED! Haven't these silly Floridians already seen this a bazillion times? We had a heck of a time finding a spot to even stand, let alone SEE anything. We knew the general direction of the launch, but we couldn't really see anything over the crowd in front of us. The park is actually right on the intracoastal waterway, and a river inlet runs adjacent to it. There were tons of people standing in the water to get a better view. It was plenty hot, and Mickey decided that looked pretty fun. So Jon agreed to wade out there with him. Mickey made his way through the crowd and ended up with a "front row seat".

Mickey is the little guy in bright orange, just right of center.

Jon is behind him and to the left, in sunglasses.

Right on schedule, the countdown began. It was pretty cool to be in the crowd as they chanted that countdown. As the cheer went up, though, we couldn't see a thing. We finally got our first glimpse of the shuttle about 10-15 seconds later, when it cleared the treeline. Even with my 300 mm zoom, I got an unimpressive shot of the shuttle itself. I did, however, get a fabulous picture of the rocket trail!

As the crowd cheered, Caroline yelled out, "Bye, Daddy!" and pointed to the sky.

Two ladies whipped their heads around immediately.

"Your Daddy's on the SPACE SHUTTLE?!"

Wouldn't you think we'd get better seats?

Taken about two minutes before the wet shorts whining began...

The boys waded back out of the water, smelling a lot like salty, fishy river water. Mickey immediately started complaining that his shorts were wet. Did I bring a change of clothes for him? Of course, not. So I promised him that if his shorts weren't dry by the time we got to our next stop in Cocoa Beach (and he hadn't stopped whining), I would buy him something to wear. Lightweight midwesterners that we are, we were melting in the Florida heat and humidity, so we crawled into a little grocery store on our way back to the car and snatched up the last two bottles of ice cold water. Then we were off to Cocoa Beach. Oh, yeah, we just zipped right down A1A. It took us more than 90 minutes to drive about 25 miles. Sheesh. The good thing is that the kids got a little snooze, so it was a quiet drive. We easily found our destination, Ron Jon's Surf Shop, and drove to the roof of a nearby parking garage for a glorious view.

Cocoa Beach is special to us, and Ron Jon's is a Florida tourist's rite of passage. I first visited Cocoa Beach when I was in the Army. My position as a Public Affairs Officer also came with the additional duty of Equal Opportunity Officer. Bummer...I had to attend the school, which just happened to be at Patrick Air Force Base, just south of Cocoa Beach, Florida. Oh, and because I was a National Guard officer, I had to make three trips to complete the course. Yes, yes, it was a real drag as a young 20-something college girl...but somebody had to do it. It was actually a really educational course, and I learned a lot. Just before my second trip to Cocoa Beach, Jon and I had our first date. A year and a half later we were married and headed south for our honeymoon. We got a late start and made it to Louisville, Kentucky, just a few hours down the road, before we crashed. To make up some time, we vowed to drive all day and night and have breakfast on the beach the next morning. Well, we were young and dumb...what can I say? We did make it to Cocoa Beach and ate breakfast at a McDonald's right across the street from the ocean. We also learned that we are not good at the driving through the night thing and that we are neither one very friendly at 3 am. It makes for a good story, though. We did make it all the way to Fort Lauderdale after a nap in our car and left for a cruise to the Bahamas the next day. I'll save the rest of that story for our 20th anniversary post in October. I do have one more Cocoa Beach anecdote, however.

Three years into our marriage, we had weathered the experiences of Desert Shield and Desert Storm. Jon was deployed for 357 days...a very long time for a very lonely young Army wife, stationed far from home, with only two small dogs for company. We got through that time by looking forward to a trip home to visit our families and a vacation to celebrate our third anniversary. Again, one of our stops was Cocoa Beach and Ron Jon's Surf Shop. Long story short, we lost our rental car keys on the beach about 30 seconds before getting in the car to head to Orlando. I must have dropped them when we stopped to take some photos, but we never found them. So we called a locksmith to pop the lock...yes, we are that old. Because the car was brand new, and we were the first to rent it, the owner's manual was still in a plastic bag in the trunk. I remembered picking it up when we loaded our luggage and noting that it had the spare key in the bag, as well. We knew that if we could get into the trunk, we could get to the spare key. The details are fuzzy, and Jon's memory is worse than mine, but I believe the locksmith was able to pop the lock, but we couldn't get into the trunk. He then made us some sort of key that worked the ignition, but not the locks. I am NOT kidding. We ended up having to take out the backseat of the car to get to the trunk, which entailed buying a screwdriver and climbing through the back seat into the trunk. We still have that screwdriver and the key the locksmith made for us. We went to a lot of trouble for those cute little souvenirs.

So now you know why we just had to visit Cocoa Beach again. We rambled through the enormous store and bought a couple of t-shirts and boogie boards. It ended up a late night, and Jon and I were ready to head back to Orlando to collapse, but the kids begged us to at least get their feet in the sand. It was already dark, so we didn't venture far...just over to the boardwalk. We ceremoniously plopped Caroline's bare toes in the sand for the first time, and she stopped dead in her tracks and refused to move. She did NOT like the sand on her feet! Generally speaking, she does not like to have her hands or feet dirty. I laughed because when Mickey was a baby, he grinned ear to ear as he shoved handfuls of sand into his mouth. He still loves the beach, as you will see in later pictures, and he could roll in the sand and still not get enough. I guess we'll have to work on Caroline's romance with the beach.

I believe her exact words were, "EEEWWWWW!"

I just about burst out laughing when I turned around and saw this...

I think maybe she was a bit hungry and tired, eh?

We grabbed dinner for the car and, thankfully, enjoyed a speedy traffic-free return to Orlando. A quick stop at a local grocery store where we paid $4.19 a gallon for MILK drove home the need to find a Wal-Mart soon. The next morning we were up and out the door for a day at Sea World.

One last story from today...frogs, turtles and lizards are among my son's greatest passions. You might recall our recent visit with "Snappy". He was absolutely beside himself with joy at his first glimpse of a little anole running across the sidewalk this morning. The lizard chase would ensue throughout the week, but it took Mickey all of 30 seconds to catch this little toad outside our condo. It took major persuasion to get him to set the little guy free.