Waits Family Annals

And we return to Busch Gardens. I know Liz explained it to me several times, but I still don’t understand how we got a second day free. Regardless, we did. Huzzah!

The second day was more about the adults. Busch Gardens has an awesome, I don’t know what to call it… a feature– “Child Swap”. They let one parent wait in line, while the other stays out with the kid(s). Once the one parent rides the ride, they get a card that let’s the other parent skip the queue and ride the ride. Awesome! Take note other parks– this is a must. We took advantage of this several times throughout the day.

We found these airplanes for kids. The attendant let Connor and his friend fly unattended. She loved it. Smiling. Posing. Charming. Connor, on the other hand, hated every second of it. He gave everyone stink eye. Whined. Disinterested. At one point it looked as though he was trying to gag himself in an effort to get out of the plane. Hilarious.

The man who drew Connor’s portrait happened to have a connection to us. He was from Pittsburgh! He graduated from the Art Institute here. He did his first caricatures here in Kennywood. Now he’s the art director for Busch Gardens there.

The park was a little slow, bad for them good for us. Lines were under 15 minutes. Then there was the rain storm in the afternoon. It’s as if Mr. Weather knew Connor needed a nap. So for the duration of his nap, the park shut down due to weather. When he woke up, the park resumed, but with even less people. Lines were so short we could essentially stay on the coasters and ride multiple times in a row. We rode so many rides! By the end of the day, I couldn’t even look at a coaster. That’s when you know you’ve spent a great day at the park.

The Machins took us to Ybor city in Tampa. The old-school trolley was pretty cool. The driver even hollered “All Aboard” for the benefit of the kids. Soon after, the kids fell asleep. During the naps we visited some really fun stores (there were a few that weren’t tattoo parlors or bars ).

That night, the Machins got a baby sitter so we could go on a double date. It was a blast. We went to this small Japanese restaurant and ordered a Sushi boat. In most Sushi restaurants we’ve been to, the “Boat” is a pre-defined list of sushi rolls. Here, we were able to pick our own rolls! Again, fantastic sushi. Afterward, we went to the theater and saw Drive with about four other people (two left in the middle). The movie was fantastic as well.

Rain in Florida is different than rain in Pittsburgh. If it’s raining in Pittsburgh, it’s gross for hours before, during and after. It’s saturating and everywhere. In Florida, it could rain for ten minutes and be done. On one side of street, it’s pouring; the other is dry as a bone. We experienced some of that while driving to and from Sarasota.

On our way to the beach, we stopped off at a Cuban market for lunch. Delicious! While ordering, one of the guys wasn’t gelling with my English, so I switched to Spanish. It felt good to speak Spanish again, but I felt so out of practice. And, man, people talk fast!

While at Siesta Key beach, Connor loved running and chasing the gulls. He would get really far from the tent just chasing bird after and bird, arms stretched in attempted flight. It was fun to chase him and bring him back only to start the process again.

The other thing he would do was hilarious and gross. While we would hold him in the ocean, he would lean in and lick our shoulders or cheeks or whatever he could because of the salt. So gross! And hilarious!

The sun provided quite the show. While it was high in the sky, I couldn’t get passed how hot and bright it was. The sand is white and reflecting everything back in my eyes. You would think with the sun pounding this super-fine white sand, it would burn your feet, but the sand was cool and comfortable. Amazing! Then, as the sun lowered, it revealed a beautiful beach sunset. I took SO many pictures. I left a lot of them out… but I can’t bring myself to delete them (I’m sure one with the initials V.R. can relate to that quandary).

Sarasota was beautiful! An amazing beach, and so much fun to spend time there with such good friends.

Coming home from Busch Gardens, we got Chinese take-out. Aside from the order getting messed up, it really hit the spot! Nothing picks me up from utter exhaustion than nice, greasy Chinese food. Yum!

In my dish of orange chicken lay a hot pepper. Our friend’s son commented that he thought the pepper would be super spicy. As any good friend would do, I bet him five dollars he couldn’t finish the whole chili. His father approved the bet, and his mother was not in the house at the time. So he agreed to the bet.

He took one bite, and spit the whole thing back onto his plate. He exclaimed that it was very difficult to chew. He cut it into smaller pieces and ate the whole thing bit by bit. I was surprised and happy to fork over his five dollars. He was very proud of his accomplishment; and he may have his first hair on his chest now.

The Machins took us to Busch Gardens on Friday. It was a lot of fun. We haven’t been to an amusement park in years! Of course, this was Connor’s first trip to a park. There were parts he liked… and parts he did not.

When we first arrived, we wanted to ride the Cheetah Hunt (0 to Cheetah!). Unfortunately, due “inclimate weather”, it was shut down. We waited for a while, but then the message switched to “technical difficulties.” We ate lunch and continued through the park.

We rode some wooden roller coasters, and smaller kid rides. When Connor went to sleep, Liz and I ran to Shiekra and Kumba. The freefall nature of Shiekra was a hoot. It takes you up 200 feet, holds you over the drop… then down you go. Lots of fun. Kumba was full of twists and turns; good coaster.

Coming back to Connor, he was in better spirits. We introduced him to some characters from Sesame Street; they were fast friends, exchanging kisses and hugs and what not.

At the end of the day, we took Connor and one of the Machin boys on the log ride. If you check out the picture, I think it’s pretty clear how much he liked it.

And it’s 80-something in Tampa! At the beach we were reminded why the Gulf of Mexico is so nice. The water felt like warm bath water. We could swim and play without going into hypothermia (thanks, Lake Eerie!). It was wonderful. Liz and I both had creative ways of putting on sun screen, so we both ended up with creative sun burn patterns on our backs. A lot of hand prints.

The beach was relaxing and beautiful, but we were unable to stay forever because the Machin’s sons were being babysat at home. On the road home, the car gave a slight shutter, and Richard murmured, “Uh-oh!” Everyone looked at him and asked what was wrong.

“Um… we’re out of gas.” The car immediately started to slow down. Always thinking on his feet (just not enough to keep the tank full ), Richard did not put his foot on the brakes. Instead, the hazard lights went on, and we costed two blocks. The car lost enough momentum, I jumped out and pushed… about ten feet to the gas pump! What fortune! What could have turned into an arduous and terrible experience is very much a fun and enjoyable story!

Enjoy the rest of the pictures of the beach:

We left Wednesday morning to fly to Tampa, FL to visit the Machins. We were nervous about the flight because of the nearly two-year old bundle of raw emotions we were travelling with. When we fly to Vegas or Salt Lake, it is a longer flight and Connor usually decides to freak out for a period of time. We scheduled our flights so he would be flying during nap time. Then we figured we could distract him with Curious George on the iPad and what not. It worked! We made the trip without incident, and Liz and I were able to spend a lot of time playing Mario Kart on the DS.

I have given the flight more space on this blog than it deserves. So, on to the festivities!

We snapped a picture of where we parked. Last time we took a trip, I ended up running back and forth clicking the panic button on the keys. In the rain. In order to avoid that, we made sure to tag the picture with GPS coordinates so we could easily find it when we got back. Ha! It worked flawlessly. (Is this a good time to tell you how much I love my iPhone?) I guess that’s not really a festivity.

First things first. When we landed, Liz made the important  trip to go and get the necessary ingredient for a great week. Ice cream! But not just any Ice Cream, Blue Bell Ice Cream. Liz’s favorite Ice Cream on the planet! I’m not going to tell you how much Ice Cream we ate that week, suffice to say, we are all lactose intolerant now. We did have other meals that were not solely Ice Cream, but every meal had some kind of Ice Cream side. And so the feast began!

And of course, the kids had to bathe together.

That, my friends, was day one.

Really quick, I meant to write this blog right after my birthday, but I didn’t get around to it.  We had a super awesome picnic in Frick Park.  Our favorite place to be.  Connor LOVES dogs.  The bigger the better.  This is place to go for that.  Here are just a few pictures from that evening.

Okay, surprise surprise, you guessed it right: Cowboy Boots! I love love love them. I made it through work, and a steampunk wedding. The awesome thing about charlie horse boots, is that they are wider than most boots, so really my feet didn’t hurt anymore than normal. They are slowly becoming easier to put on though, the left one gives me problems…. but I have a major bruise on that foot. Anyways, here they are:

These suckers are beautiful! Its is almost a shame they are on my feet.  They are lasered with black tulle, and of course nice and leathery!

Now, I have to add just two more top gifts of my 28th birthday.  I have to be honest, I have great family and friends.  All my gifts were awesome, but I just want to add two more goodies to this blog.

My mothers gift.  This thing is awesome and beautiful.  My moms best friends daughter makes these and sells them in a boutique in Arizona.  When my mom was visiting us this summer, she brought all of the fabric options and let me pick which one I liked. Even though Connor is almost sorta kinda 2, a lot of this gift will be saved for the next baby.  But I still need a big bag to fit all his food he requires when we are out and about, so here is the awesome handmade diaper bag set:

So that awesome flower thing, is not a clutch like I thought it was.  It is actually to hold your baby wipes! I am considering using it as a clutch though…..

Angry Baker and Marijuana Boy gave me the third gift I would like to share.

Here is some of what Angry Baker wrote to me in my birthday card:, “… you should know – the book is for real- she’s not joking around.” and my favorite line, ” I figure if you ever get around to reading, this would be a good one for you – maybe even work it into your sabbath scripture study!”

She knows me very well, I am a wannabe at many things, reading is one of them.  But I have already read the special bonus interview with Eliza Dushku, and I’m feeling a blog post coming on about that one! So more to come about this book. Angry Baker, yes you are right, she is a bigger fan than me.  I have read the intro, and I’m already wanting to put my dvd’s back on to re watch the clips she is talking about, I’m falling in love with this show all over again! I love this gift!

This is really ambitious, but I need to figure out how to get two adult size wonder pet character costumes, and a 2t costume for Halloween this year. If anybody has some great ideas, pass them our way please!….. THIS IS SEWIOUS!