Sunshine State

Nadia, Ian, and Paul's parents arrived in Florida on Wednesday and spent two days with Aunt Diane, Uncle Jim, and their one-year-old grandson. Their home is right on the beach. Paul, Oliver, and I left our home at 3:45 on Thursday. It had rained almost the whole day on Wednesday, but it was sunny on Thursday, and I was able to take some pics of Oliver in the apple tree and then mow the lawn during Oliver's nap. We hit a lot of traffic so we didn't arrive at my parents' house until about 8:15. Paul stayed up until 4:00 am grading the final exam, and then he got up about three hours later to finish the grading. He finished around 10:30, and then I helped tabulate each student's score. He hasn't calculated their course grades yet, but he needs to do that tomorrow as he has to submit the grades by Monday. We ate lunch and then my parents drove us to the airport in DC. There was an air show going on in DC as we drove to the airport. Paul recognized several of the WWII airplanes flying overhead. This airshow caused them to stop all use of the runways for 90 minutes at the airport, which delayed our flight. Then once we boarded the airplane, there was a minor mechanical issue they had to look into, so we sat in the plane for an hour before the plane actually took off. This is not a good thing when you have a two year old, especially considering he lost 2+ hours of sleep the previous night and also had a very short nap (taken in the vehicle as we drove to the airport). Paul and I were in different rows, and we took turns taking care of Oliver. The flight itself was only two hours long, but we were exhausted once the plane touched down in Orlando.

After Paul's dad picked us up at the airport, we drove directly to the resort, I checked in, and we unloaded all our luggage. The kids went to bed an hour later than usual, and then Paul's parents and I headed to Walmart to buy groceries for the vacation. We ate all three meals in our unit today. I was VERY glad to be reunited with Nadia and Ian. I handled their absence well on Monday and Tuesday, but on Wednesday it was much harder.

I always like to get in the pool once on the day we arrive at the resort. It makes me feel like their was some relaxation in the travel day, and if our plan had landed on time, that would have been very possible, but it didn't happen this time. Of course Paul's parents, Nadia, and Ian had already been in two different swimming pools and the ocean before they picked us up at the airport. We all arrived here safely, and that is a big answer to prayer. It's not a big deal to wait one more day to take a dip in the pool. Today we had plenty of time at the swimming pools! Oliver got up too early (6:15) so even with giving the kids baths this morning (mainly because I wanted to shampoo Nadia's hair), we were at the pool by 8:45am. Ian is finally tall enough to go down the biggest water slide here! You have to be 42 inches tall. Nadia had gone down it in May 2013 and July 2014, but today was Ian's first. He needed Paul to be there to catch him because he doesn't swim yet.

Nadia went down the slide MANY times today, and she doesn't need anyone to catch her. Oliver enjoyed some smaller water slides, he wasn't too sure at first mainly because he didn't like the cold water that sprays on you at various places on the pirate ship, but he fell in love with one of the slides and wanted to do it again and again. It was very hard to get him to leave the pool to come back for a nap, but he did sleep for almost two hours while Pop Pop was reading. We spent at least 6.5 hours at the pools today. Nadia also enjoyed playing tug of war and a relay race with a sponge. After dinner we did a little miniature golfing before the magic show. Nadia was hoping to be picked as a volunteer at some point in the show, but that didn't happen. Paul had no desire to be picked, but the magician used one of his shoes in a trick (it looked like he was pouring cranberry juice into Paul's shoe but it was going in a cup in the shoe). Hopefully all that time in the sun will help the kids not get up quite so early tomorrow.