Brianna & Marc
Marc bowling/totally beating us.
I look like such a graceful bowler in my skirt. :)
Brianna's turn!
I can't help it. I pose when there are cameras. And I kind of felt like I was living in the 50's with the combination of the skirt and the shoes.
Group shot.
I love arcade games!Day 5: The day started off somewhere in the 3 o'clock hour when Marc woke me up to tell me the shuttle launch had been canceled. :( There was a leak in one of the fuel pipes and the launch was postponed. Good decision, but disappointing nonetheless. It's looking like the launch might be rescheduled for Wednesday and there is still a chance we'll get to go. I hope so!!!
I felt horrible calling Jared and Kim to tell them the launch had been delayed, since they left their home in Alabama at about midnight to make it to the launch. They were very nice and didn't complain at all. I'm pretty sure they were just happy that they had some extra time and could stop to take a nap. :) They got in just in time for breakfast and our day began. It was so great to see them after three years. Their daughter Hailey is also adorable! We played in the pool for awhile and then headed over to Kissimmee to their hotel. Shortly after getting in the sweet pool with slide, lazy river, etc, it began to storm. The pool area cleared out and while everyone went inside, we decided to get in the hot tub. :) It never actually stormed, though winds picked up quite a bit and it did rain a little. I tried to get a picture of it, but of course couldn't capture much of anything. Instead, Marc just looked like a dork pointing a to a water feature. It really was windy though with trees bent way to the side and water shooting off of the feature. Sorry I couldn't get a better picture, Marc! We had take out and drinks back in the hotel room and hung out for the rest of the night. We left just after midnight and even though we had a whole day together, I was really very sad to leave. It was so great to spend time with Jared, Kim, and Hailey and it was truly the case of friendships being able to pick up right where they left off no matter how long it has been.
Froggy Potty or Port-a-potty? Either way, Hailey is really cute!
Marc in the storm looking like a dork thanks to my poor photography timing, which I have not heard the end of on this vacation. :)
Friends!
Hailey LOVED Marc. Is anyone surprised?
Group Photo! We took about 83 pictures before leaving to get food. The guys were ready to kill me!!
She's a sneaky one!Day 6: Sunday was a pretty typical Sunday. We went to Mass in the morning with Marc's family and then came home to a nice relaxing day. I took a nap in the afternoon while Marc did some gardening with his mom and played in the pool with his sisters. When I woke up I was pretty tired and unmotivated, but decided I'd better do something before I shrivelled up from laziness. We played some board games with Faith and Brianna, spent some time reading together, and then went for a run at about 9:00 PM. It was 84 degrees out!! We ran about 2 1/2 miles. It was so great! ...my first run since I tore my medial meniscus and all is still well. :) It hurt a bit at one point and it's still not 100%, but it I'm happy to report recovery is well underway. Marc and I both have sore legs today thanks to some lunges we did in the middle of our run. Love it!! We jumped in the pool when we got back and man it felt so nice! Great Sunday!
Marc & Sisters :)Day 7: Beach day! Marc and I went to New Smyrna Beach today with the girls. It's basically an extension of Daytona Beach, but a little further south - so closer to Titusville. I was excited to get back in the sun after a few days break, but it didn't last very long. Another little storm started brewing, with lightning and all. (Oh yeah, lots of lighting last night during our run...awesome! and then it down poured like crazy last night.) I figured it would blow over sooner than later and didn't really want to cut our beach day so short, so I convinced the others that we should just find something to do in town. Thanks to GPS, it's a lot easier to find things as you can search by categories like entertainment, recreation, etc. Unfortunately New Smyrna doesn't seem to be too exciting, but by amazing luck, I found an absolutely, unbelievably incredible place...the Bob Ross Art Workshop and Gallery!! Can anyone say, "...and a happy little tree right here" or how about "...you decide, you decide." Apparently our luck wasn't all that amazing, perhaps because luck isn't really all that real. The Bob Ross place was closed. That sure wasn't enough to stop me from having a great time and taking lots of pictures though! We also encountered a gigantic grasshopper. That's not it's official name, but that's pretty much what it looks like. Marc though it might be a cicada, but after looking at Wikipedia, he doesn't think so anymore. Any ideas? Locusts? We think so! Oh my, I just had a brush with the Old Testament. No thank you. What was Pharaoh thinking!? I would have caved pretty quickly after a bunch of those things everywhere. Yuck! See below for pictures.
Marc & me at New Smyrna Beach
Brianna & Faith
Not so happy to get out of the water when it started storming.
Pure awesomeness!
Closed! Boo!
But do please note the "Happy Painting" on the closed sign! HAHA!
Which one do you think was the "happy little tree"?
Ah! So cool!
Marc having his own fun at the Bob Ross place. His fun came in the form of showering to wash off the ocean...in the water coming off the roof of the building.
Locust Thing! Marc found a cigarette in a nearby ashtray (only object we could find) to roll by the big grasshopper thing so you could see how huge it was!
Then we took turns posing with it.
Marc held it first. I'm not entirely sure why I felt the need to do the same. So scary!!
One more Bob Ross picture! You may notice that Marc's sisters did not quite appreciate this place the same way that we did. :)
I chased that butterfly for so long trying to get a picture!!After Bob Ross, the weather was looking great, so we headed back to the beach. Marc decided that we would not be allowed to leave the beach with out building a sandcastle. That rule didn't really last very long, but it did get us going on quite the project. I really wanted to build a sand turtle...so we did. Again, see pictures below. We got some pretty great compliments. Apparently people must be sick of seeing the same old sand castles! After two plus hours of building our turtle, it was time to jump in the ocean and catch some waves of the boogie boards. :) And oh yeah, Marc also tried out a skim board when we first got there...he did very well, but of course pictures of him falling are way more fun to share. Am I mean girlfriend?
Sand Turtle! And since it's nesting season, we even made a few eggs in the back. :)
All of us with the turtle!
Faith, Turtle, Brianna
Marc, Turtle, Me
A girl and her turtle. :)
Marc skimboarding! (I figured I should put up at least one good shot before I let you laugh at Marc. Good thing he's such a good sport!)
Marc trying to skimboard.
..and not so much skimboarding here. :)Marc Skimfalling. Sorry it's sideways.
We are back at home now, relaxing some more. Julianna asked me earlier today via g-chat what our plans for the week were and I had no idea. It's so nice! I feel like I'm in high school again on summer vacation. I can stay up late, although I'm too much of an old lady to do too much of that, but I could if I wanted to. I can sleep in if I wanted, but again, I'm too much of an old lady for that. I can take naps though and old ladies definitely do that!
I haven't really said too much about Marc's family yet though, so for those of you wondering (if you've made it this far into my super long post), here we go! Poppy is hilarious! Grandma is trying to fatten me up! She is very nice and clearly likes to take care of people. I appreciate that. :) She is really nice and kind of funny. She just seems to pop in with food or drink or to make sure we have something fun to do. I like it. The other night at dinner, her and Poppy were telling us about when they met back in college at WSU. He was in a frat, she was in a sorority (the good 'ol days when they were not quite like they are now I'm sure...), and he was dating her and one of her friends!! I don't exactly remember the details now, but one of them introduced the friend to a frat brother and that seemed to work out for everyone as both couples are still happily married and friends. They were really cute and funny though. It's great being around old couples. :) Marc's mom is really nice and sweet. I don't know how else to describe her. She is just really nice and sweet. I enjoy talking with her. I feel a little bad for her though because she has had a few incidents in the car where she wasn't quite paying attention as much as she should have been and she was clearly embarrassed. We all have those moments and I'm sure she has them only every now and then like most of us, but she has had three while I've been here...one bigger than the others...which was on the way back from the airport when I met her for the very first time. The other two were really not big deals at all, but she finally said something about it, so I knew for sure she was embarrassed. Poor Marc's mom. :( I really like her! Faith and Brianna are both a lot of fun. They are only two years a part and I don't think I've seen them fight at all. They did have some fun little bantering going over who had to sit in the middle backseat, but that's about it. They seem to get along very well and are both really nice. Faith will be a sophomore next year and Brianna will be an eighth grader. They both play the flute, a bit of piano, and really enjoy acting. I guess they have been in a few plays at school and also in the city. Fun!
I'm really enjoying being on vacation with Marc and glad we still have this whole week left!
1 comment:
I LOVE all your pictures and it looks like you're having so much fun! Boo about the launch. Yay for seeing Jared, Kim and Haley (and her froggy potty), and yay for the sand turtle. You might recall that we (and by we, I mean Perry)made one at dash point last year, but yours is much bigger. LOVE the picture of you and Marc together sitting on it :)
Glad you are having fun with Marc's family!
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