Who's Coming? Where Are We Going?

Friday, March 16, 2012

Vacation – part 9

Last one! I think. . .

On our way home from the beach we went to the estuarium on Dauphin Island. We heard it was a neat place to go, it could be done in a short time, and it would be a nice field trip addition to our school year. They even had field trip activity pages that helped us get more out of our walk through. Perfect!

So, what is the estuarium? They say “The Estuarium is an exciting educational facility highlighting the four key habitats ... River Delta, Mobile Bay, the Barrier Islands and the Northern Gulf of Mexico.” Basically, they had displays set up for each habitat with museum/aquarium types of info about history of the area and types of plant life and animal life that live there. They had aquariums with the different types of fish and other creatures there. They even had a display with skeletons and shark teeth and starfish kinds of items the kids could touch and feel. The activity pages definitely helped the kids look more at the displays. I didn’t too many inside picks of the exhibits.

“Miss May May”

Working on the ship

Watch out for Leighton

Leighton working the oyster tongs

Jaylyn’s turn

Another fun fishing boat to explore inside.

It showed the types of fish that could be caught there and they could throw them out and catch them with a fishing pole.

Leighton is driving again.

Flannel board! :-)

Half a dolphin!

Horseshoe crabs

Adley’s turn

jaylyn the aquanaut

Checking out the flowers on the boardwalk

Jaylyn is doing a creature “rubbing”. They had different plant life or creatures on stands along the boardwalk. They just put their paper on top and drew over it with a pencil and had a picture of the creature on their paper.

What do you see, Adley?

Checking out the boardwalk

What a view

Looking for dolphins

Looking for birds

Vacation – part 8

Videos! Aren’t you excited? :-)

Testing out the waves

Nice hammering at the pool

Jaylyn swimming

Adley’s shell

Just hanging out

Waterfall get me! (Leighton will say it again down at the water)

The videos really just make me want to go back. Oh well. :-)

Vacation – part 7

How many parts can I make out of these vacation photos?? :-)

Pool Fun!

The pool part was actually not as fun as we had hoped. Everyone told me how the pool water would still be fine to swim in at the time we went, but it was Sooooo cold!!! The pool set in a shady spot and it was kind of windy several of the days we were there. I did not get in until the last two days! An older lady made fun of me for being a wimp, so I caved. The kids didn’t want to swim too long either. Then, there was construction going on right next to the pool underneath the complex beside the pool and they didn’t care whether we were there or not. One day we got there and they were using some crazy jackhammer thing that was hurting our ears. We were getting ready to pack the kids up because our ears were seriously aching! They were upset and we were mad, so TJ just asked them if they could knock it off for a while so we could swim and that we did NOT have any nice earplugs to protect our ears like they did. They were nice and let us be. :-) So, pool time was not our favorite on this vacation unfortunately.

I don’t have many shots. . . :-)

not sure why they are scowling. . . maybe it is the freezing cold water. . . or the jackhammer guy??

This shot was before she bent over and then knocked her head on the concrete. She got a nice bump. Still not sure how she did that exactly. She also fell and scratched up her leg one day. And knocked her head into the wall at the hotel on our way home. :-)

Jaylyn enjoys being a fish now

Fish out of water!

Adley is getting around better in the water too!

Friday, March 9, 2012

Vacation – part 6

Beach fun. Beware, grandparents may be the only ones excited enough to view all of these beach pictures. . . :-)

Ready to get started!

Woohoo!

Sandcastle extraordinaires

Water!

It’s coming!

Ahhhh!

Hard at work

Time to rest

This is really the first time we have been to the beach since Adley was under 1. Neither enjoyed going near the water at that point. This time, they were all about riding the waves! (at least until we started seeing more jellyfish)