Sea World!

A miracle has happened - I finally got motivated to put up our pictures from Sea World. Because of the passes we bought, we ended up going to Sea World 4 times, so we ended up with a couple hundred pictures! So you can imagine why I've been overwhelmed at the thought of trying to post some pictures. I'm just warning you, there are probably a couple dozen pictures here, so if you don't give a hoot what we did at Sea World, you'd better exit now! :)

All of us at Sea World - well, before Matt and Aline got there.

The girls with Elmo after the Elmo show.

This was at the dolphin nursery, where pregnant moms up to 1 year old dolphins are kept on display in their own little pool. This little guy kept showing off for us. It was so much fun watching these little ones!

I think this is the same dolphin as above - he actually flung himself up on this rock and posed for us!

This is a new mom with her 4 day old baby dolphin. So adorable!!

The Shamu show, which was so incredible! We saw it twice, and got some great pictures.

Kylee was so excited when we got splashed by Shamu!

Makayla sitting on Grandpa's lap during the show.

Everyone waiting for the show to start. I'm pretty sure they only look miserable because it was hotter than the blazing depths of heck.

Us learning how to feed the sting rays. Sounds kind of freaky, but it was SO FUN! I liked it even more than feeding the dolphins. You stick the fish between your 2 fingers, hold your hand under the water, then a sting ray comes by and sucks the fish right out of your hand. It feels so funny you can't help but laugh!

I love this picture, it looks like this sting ray's gonna eat Makayla's arm!

Kylee trying to get brave enough to touch one of the sting rays

Me and Makayla feeding the dolphins. You would think this would be funner than feeding sting rays, but the dolphins don't really like to be touched, and the Sea World employees yell at you for every little thing, so it wasn't as fun as I thought it would be.

This funny little sea lion was waiting for us to feed it something. Sorry buddy, we spent all our money on the sting rays.

A mom and baby mantee.

These silly little birds were all over the place trying to beg food from people.

Jenicca, Jason, Logan and Kylee in this cave thing where they had all sorts of aquariums.

This is one of the aquariums in the cave where the kids can pop their heads up and view the fish from "inside" the aquarium.

Beach Bums (and Aquatica)

Of course, you can't go to Florida without going to the beach, so we had one really fun beach day. The water was soooo warm!! We had an awesome experience while we were swimming. We noticed some large shadows moving towards us in the water, and at first my mom thought they were sting rays, but then somebody else shouted that they were manatees. We moved closer to them, and sure enough, there were 2 manatees swimming right by us. You're not supposed to touch them because they're protected, but we saw their heads come up for air. Talk about awesome! We ended up also seeing several large sting rays in the water that day, but they just fly right by you, so you can't really get a good look at them. It was probably the funnest time I've ever had at a beach (and that's really saying something!) Also, I'm throwing in the only 2 pictures we took at Aquatica (the Sea World water park). We went to the water park twice, but for some reason we only took 2 pictures - maybe because water and cameras don't mix.

Aline with Kylee and Makayla - just look at that cute pregnant belly!

Grandpa going down the waterslide with Makayla

The girls going down the waterslide by themselves - they LOVED it!!

Downtown Disney Date

Brian and I took the opportunity to have a date night while we were in Florida, so we headed over to one of our favorite spots, Downtown Disney/Pleasure Island. We ate at the Rainforest Cafe, had dessert at Ghiradelli, and just enjoyed the fun atmosphere of Downtown Disney at night.

On the boat between Downtown and Pleasure Island

Checking out the new T-Rex Restaurant (soooo awesome!)

Florida Family Fun!

Well, we just got back from another fun Florida vacation at my parent's house. Have I mentioned how much fun it is having them live in Florida? Loads! Anyway, for the first time in 6 years, all of us were able to get together for a family reunion, even Nancy and Bruno (Aline's mom and brother from Brazil). Talk about total chaos, but we had a rockin' good time! I have to give a big shout out to my mom for the months of hard work she put into getting ready to host all ELEVEN of us at their house. Between making sure she had enough beds, bedding, food, towels, chairs, toys for the kids, etc..... All I can say is, THANKS MOM!! It's probably gonna take me awhile to get all the pictures up that I want, since we did a lot of stuff. But for now, I'm gonna put up some pictures of the family just hanging out and having fun.

The whole family

The girls having a blast in Nana's blow-up pool in the backyard.

Makayla all ready to swim at the big pool

Kylee giving Jason some pointers on the right way to swim.

Jenicca and Brian playing "catch" with Kylee

Brian trying to get the girls to hold still while I take a picture

Aline opening presents at the "surprise" shower we threw for her

Aline with her mom Nancy, and Kylee (Baby Alex arriving this fall)

Jenicca and Nana with the grandkids

Dad trying on his Father's Day gift - now he can get serious about finding shells at Santa Bell!

New Kitty....Again

I didn't really want to do a post about our new kitty, for fear we would jinx ourselves, but my sister insisted, and since I'm very afraid of her, I decided to give in. We got this little girl almost 2 weeks ago, and while some people might think we're crazy for getting one so soon after Tigger died, it's helped with our sadness, especially for the kids. Kylee and Makayla decided to name her Tinkerbell....apparently we can't get away from Disney names. Here's our little (s)Tinker....

She loves to sleep on Brian's laptop - probably cuz it gets so warm. So cute!