Vacation Highlights: St. Auggie '08

Sorry this took me so long, guys & gals. We are still running on insane around here, but all that could give me about 4 other posts. Let's just say right now, I can't wait for morning so I can have big ol' steaming cup after cup of coffee!


Aaaaaah . . . vacation. I love it, treasure it, adore it, wouldn't miss it. And St. Augustine, FL is my favorite place to go (so far). But, of course, it wouldn't be a true Mama Said vacation if a few calamities didn't happen here and there. Mostly just minor stuff sprinkled with a few crazy things. So, I'll just give you a day-by-day blow-by-blow.

Saturday: We arrive after a long arduous 12 or so hour drive. I can't remember the drive being very eventful. Just the usual except that this is supposed to be a 10 hour drive. After we arrive, we hurriedly unload so we can make it to the Old City for the opening ceremony of the Nights of Lights (where they plug in the Christmas lights for the historic area). I don't really know what we were thinking. I guess we had some kind of fantasy that the city would hold this ceremony for just us or something. Of course, it was crazy, insane crowded. Now, Rhett and I both hate crowds. Why we went to this I'll never know. I would have hated this on a good day. Going after being in the car for 12 hours made it almost unbearable. And trying to leave was a nightmare! Rhett had the stroller and was just standing there as a thousand people rushed in front of him. I scream at him, "You just have to GO! You can't WAIT!" So, he did go. And rolled the stroller right over my foot. I screamed again about that and took over the stroller and proceeded to roll into two other people. Not fun.

After that lovely display of peace on earth and goodwill toward men (and let me tell ya,' the lights were NOT worth it!), we get back to the condo and realize it's freezing inside and turn on the heat. We do about and get BFG to bed. About an hour after turning on the heat, it smells like something is on fire. I mean really on fire. Now, I know what it smells like when you turn on the heat for the first time--kind of a burny smell that's gone after a few minutes. But this was an hour later and was a horrible, putrid smell. I am convinced the thing is on fire somewhere and turn it off. From this point, things got real ugly, real quick. I start screaming and moaning and groaning and complaining that we are either going to go up in flames or freeze during the night. Rhett was concerned, too but ol' boy just wanted to go to bed. I get the bright idea of calling the on-site maintenance man to come check it out or move us to another condo or something. Well, the phone in our condo doesn't work (Remember that for later). I have a prepaid cell phone and didn't have many minutes left. After more yelling and screaming, Rhett calls the maintenance guy and has to leave a voice mail. More yelling and screaming ensued. Mostly me, but Rhett was really mad which is highly unusual for him. We were trying to decide whether to go get a motel room somewhere or just freeze. Whenever one of us would pick, the other would start arguing the other option. We finally decided to stay and as soon as we get in the bed and Rhett falls asleep. Boom, boom, boom! The maintenance man is knocking on our door drunk. He says the smell was just from it being the first time turned on for the season and I guess he was right 'cause we didn't burn up. He was falling all over himself apologizing to Rhett. I thought he was going to hug him or something. Maybe he did. I was just listening from the bedroom. That whole deal was probably our second worst fight ever.

Sunday: I got stuck grocery shopping at Wal-Mart. Yuck! It's bad enough on a Sunday anyway but the one before Thanksgiving was terrible! We ate dinner out at a dive restaurant Sea Fair. It was really good. Of course, BFG refused to order anything because she wanted broccoli and they didn't have any. Are you kidding me? Since when does she want broccoli esp. over fries? Then we went to Winter Wonderland at the Amphitheatre. I had read about it online and was so excited. I knew there was a charge for the ice skating but that was okay 'cause I knew we wouldn't skate anyway. Oh my gosh! Rip off! We were so disappointed! There was a charge for almost everything. They had like school carnival type games for $2.00 a pop! They had a fire going and charged $4.00 for the supplies to make one s'more! I think Santa might have been free . . . if he'd been there! BFG was so bummed. She just kept walking around saying, "I hate Winter Wonderland!" And, now every Christmas song or commercial she hears with the words "winter wonderland" she says, "Why are they talking about Winter Wonderland? That place is awful!"


Monday: We went to the Fountain of Youth. That's were I took the peacock pic. Isn't he a beauty? The peacocks and squirrels ate peanuts right out of Rhett's and BFG's hands, too. We learned the hard way that those aren't the only animals living there though. We walk into the park and stop in the spring house on our way to the planetarium. The dude forces me to drink the water. I tried to get out of it. I have been drinking that water since I was a kid and it is yucky sulphur water. But he would not take no for an answer, shoved it in my hand and waited and watched while I drank it. I ended up having to drink mine and BFG's. I will say it was better than usual though since it was cooler weather.

Later, as we come out of the planetarium, we are looking around. BFG was enthralled with the goldfish pond and stuff. They start announcing on the loud speaker that the presentation in the spring house was going to start in a few minutes. Well, we weren't going. We just kept looking around. They kept coming on the loud speaker counting down the minutes and finally saying last chance to come. I notice we are the only people in the whole park that are not in the spring house. Whoops! But still, we didn't want to go. A final loud speaker message, "You need to go to the spring house now for the presentation!" We still didn't go. Ya'll, I kid you not, that same water guy comes out of the spring house and hollers at us to come in there. We went.

During the presentation, a woman notices . . . (Oh my gosh! This still makes me so sick!) . . . a RAT! Again, I am not kidding. I saw it. A freakin' rat right there living in the spring house hanging out by the mannequins and climbing on the rafters. I would say he was over 12 inches long NOT counting his tail. Well, just where do you suppose that rat goes to get a drink when he's thirsty?!?!?!?!?!? Uuuggghhh! And the water man knew it too. His little joke when the woman pointed it out was just too rehearsed. I cannot believe we drank that water! Rats carry diseases! Yuck!

Later, we went out to lunch. Yes, I was actually able to eat after that. Rhett had on our local hockey team's t-shirt and as we are leaving, this kind of rough guy stops us and says he's from the same area. We chit chat. His girlfriend comes up. He tells her and she asks us to take their picture. We do. Here is how the rest of the conversation went:
Rhett: Well, maybe we'll see you around.
Man: Oh, yeah, you'll see me. Just watch the news. I've been all over the news. I'm the guy who got attacked by elephants in China.
Me: Really?
Man: Yeah, the Discovery Channel is doing a special on me.
Me: Wow, that's cool. (as we are trying to get the heck out of dodge)
Is that crazy or what? How do we run into these people? Is his claim even true? Either way, the situation is just hilarious to me. How many people go on vacation and run into someone from home who claims to have been attacked by wild elephants in China?

Tuesday: Disney Day! We had a blast (mostly)! It was pretty crowded, but we stayed til almost 11:00 pm so BFG got in alot of stuff. She even rode Splash Mountain 3 times! I'm too scared to ride it 1 time! LOL! In this pic, Aladdin was asking her to pinkie swear and I guess I've never done it with her 'cause she didn't know what it was and she's trying to get her fingers out. It was so cute! I can't think of anything thing major happening just small stuff like buying her a chocolate covered Mickey ice cream and some chocolate falling in her stroller and melting making her look like she'd had a po*pie accident all day. And being on It's a Small World with the one person in the universe who knew what remote country each detail represented, which is funny since even the creators didn't. They just made a general representation or so I've read.

Anyway,BFG hung in there all the way through the 10:00 night parade. It was fabulous! And my favorite part was the show where they lit up Cinderella's castle with Christmas lights. It was seriously one of the prettiest man-made things I've ever seen. If you ever get the chance to go see this, GO!

Wednesday brought the realization the bank had cut off our debit card. Fabulous. And of course on the day I went shopping. And of course, I couldn't call them. Remember? The phone in the condo didn't work and I didn't have enough cell phone minutes to call and couldn't even buy cell phone minutes and put them on my phone 'cause the phone in the condo didn't work. Yeah, fun. Luckily, I had moved money for Disney over to our other account. That debit card did work. And praise the Lord, it got us home . . . right before they cut it off too. Yes, I am truly grateful we made it home. Turns out they saw the out of state purchases and couldn't get a hold of us so they froze the cards. Which is really good news if they are actually stolen. Only they weren't. And we were counting on the debit cards for our gas home.

Thursday: We spent Thanksgiving going fishing off the lighthouse pier and going to the beach and eating steak. It was an absolutely gorgeous day! Missed our family though . . . kinda.

Friday: Nothing big happened at all except for Rhett walking around all day in the Old City with his shirt inside out. Even after I told him. Many, many times. Oh, and BFG spilled a cup of hot chocolate on the nicest piece of furniture in the condo--a cream-colored chair with matching ottoman. That was fun to clean up. And we had to get the stain out. Somehow, when a little one is watching you and you are the example, flipping over the cushion just isn't an option like in the days of youthful irresponsibility. Oh, and did I tell you she broke a clock too on the first or second day? Yeah, we still haven't got the deposit check back yet, but we're really hoping a plastic clock wasn't worth $300.

Saturday: The Ride Home

Still glad to be home and still seriously contemplating never riding with Rhett again through Atlanta,

Mama Said

We're baaaack!

Well, we made it back late Saturday night from FL. We somehow turned a 10 hour drive into a 15.5 hour drive. How does that always happen to us? It's like some big marriage test or something dating all the way back to our honeymoon when we turned an 8-hour leg of our trip home into 20 hours. Yeah, that was fun. It was way back when the DC Sniper was terrorizing everyone. We were completely stopped on the interstate in that area for hours. We convinced ourselves that the DC Sniper had struck again and the FBI was holding up traffic. I kept searching the hillsides for signs of a white van. It was crazy. Oh, yeah. And it was raining something awful for part of the 20 hours and somehow Rhett got this really weird leak in his car that ran from his front windshield to the backseat floorboards, which proceeded to flood with about 2 inches of water. Good times. Good times.

Yes, folks, that's the kind of trips we have. This one wasn't as bad. We just elected to take the backroads around Atlanta instead of sitting in traffic. It turned into an 4+ hour nightmare through highways of mist and fog and mislabelled highway signs. Ah, well. Praise the Lord we made it home.

I'll give ya'll the highlights just as soon as I can walk through my house again. (I will have victory over the Laundry Monster!!!!)
Mama Said

It's Official . . .

It's official . . . my dear friend admitted to me yesterday that I'm mentally ill. Yes, finally someone besides me said it out loud!!! I'm glad too 'cause it's hard work trying to convince everyone that I have a problem. I think she meant emotionally disturbed. No, wait! Maybe just that I've got alot of emotional problems . . . I mean stuff going on. Whatever she meant, I got a big laugh off of it and it helped me get over my poor-pitiful-me-ness. And I don't blame her really. I was complaining about me complaining. That's how good I am at complaining! It's an art really. I should post a tutorial on it sometime.





I think we're actually gonna pull it off. I think we're gonna make it to Florida this time. My back is feeling better. Not completely healed but better. So, prayerfully the ride in the car won't send it into a relapse. But don't worry. I'm packing my pills. We are going to have fun on this vacation even if I'm drugged up and half-asleep the whole time. Gosh darn it! Actually, everyone would probably have a better time if I was so I wouldn't be complaining and terrified of everything. Ya'll know how paranoia goes along with my mental illness and all.

Like our turkey? Super simple. Used washable markers on a cone coffee filter (the natural brown ones) and doused it with water. I free-handed the turkey body, used a circle punch for the eyes, and a flower punch for the feet.

Tomorrow, I'm gonna post my muffin tin early. It's a super cute turkey food craft (meaning the food looks like a turkey; not using turkey). I think ya'll will like it. After that, I'll see ya'll in a week.

Happy Thanksgiving! God bless!

Mama Said

The Smokies In Review Part 2

After making everyone laugh so hard in Part 1, I'm afraid y'all will be disappointed with Part 2 especially since y'all apparently like to laugh at my misery and this was a great day! :)

Part 2 is our trip to Dollywood. I have to say Dollywood was really fun! I had not been since it was Silver Dollar City like, um . . . over twenty years ago. Check out this first picture! How sweet is that! And look how darn high we were! I was terrified. Rhett kept pointing out things for BFG to look at and she'd turn and make our little bucket-thing sway and my heart would come up my throat as I made everyone freeze. I'm not scared of heights really, more scared of malfunctioning rides.

But check out the view! Way, way better than Clingman's Dome and so much easier!

They have real-live coal-burning train at Dollywood. The same one I rode as a child when it was Silver Dollar City! This was one of BFG's faves! Knowing she was going to get to ride a real train is actually one of the things that helped her get over not getting to go to Disney World. It's so easy to forget that some of the simplest things are what mean the most to little kids.

Another totally awesome thing there is a bald eagle sanctuary! It was so cool! Rhett and I talk all the time about how we've never see a bald eagle. We're so weird, I know. And Rhett always asks elderly people if they've ever seen one. So, this was a big deal to us. Now, this eagle is not in the actual sanctuary. The sanctuary is a netted-off woodsy area and you just look up the hill and see all kinds of bald eagles hanging out. This eagle was in like a viewing display thing. He was a rescue and only has one wing. Isn't that wild? So, I don't know if he can be in the sanctuary or not.

So . . . This I have to address: Was Dollywood as good as Disney?

Rhett would say hands down "YES!" As we were leaving Dollywood, he asked BFG and she said yes. But, come on now, she's 3 and just had a day full of rides and fun. She's easily swayed. As for me, I would have to say that Dollywood did have some perks over Disney at least for us at the time of year we went.

1) 3 yr. olds are still free @ Dollywood!!!!! and mine & Rhett's was about $25 cheaper each. Plus, if you go after 3:00 pm, you get the next day free. This was our plan, but unfortunately our after 3:00 day was the day we had climbed Clingman's Dome so that took care of that. We couldn't walk.

2) BFG is so tall for her age that she was eligible to ride all but the fiercest roller coasters. There were some she qualified for that I just had to say no to. I just don't think a 50 ft. drop @ 60 mph on the log ride is appropriate for a 3 yr. old even if Rhett did think he could hold on to her to keep her from flying out of the no-seat belts log. She did get to ride some pretty scary stuff though. I guess I didn't know how tough my little darling is. There was one rocket booster swing type ride thing that I rode with her and I was the one scared. I was sitting there praying for Jesus to protect us and and she was patting my leg saying, "Don't be scared, Mama, don't be scared."

3) Dollywood has a color-coded armband system to signify what rides you can ride. We got her measured when we first got there, got her armband, and knew by the back of the park map everything she could ride. So, there was no getting to the front of the line to be measured only to be told that you couldn't ride.

4) It was the Bluegrass and Barbecue Fest so we had some gooood eatin'!

5) It was all elderly people working in the park. I'm talking like probably in their 70s, which did make me a little nervous. I could just see one of them having a heart attack or something while we were stuck at the top of a ride.But everyone seemed healthy enough and I much prefer elderly people to teenagers. They were all super sweet to BFG and treated her like she was one of their own grandchildren.

6) Absolutely no lines!!!! We didn't even have to get off the rides. We just kept on going over and over again! In fact, the elderly people preferred that we didn't get off because it was less work for them!

7) You are surrounded by patriotic and religious themes in the park (actually, in all of the Gatlinburg area) which I think is pretty darn cool. Disney supports and promotes values and beliefs that are contrary to the Bible.

So, I guess it was pretty darn close to being better. And it probably was a better experience overall. Just different. I don't know why seeing your child hug a big dumb mouse is so important. It just is.

Oh, this will give you a laugh. I got targeted on two water rides. 1) On the Smoky Mtn. River Rampage, there is this section were people can put in a quarter and when the raft comes by it shoots water right at a person (depends on which one you put money in I think). So, I got nailed right in the face. Then on their new River Battle ride, you ride in a boat with water guns and can shoot people on the sidewalk. And they have guns and can shoot water at you except they are up higher and it's easier for them to get you. So, we are riding and out of no where, some grown man we do not know was running from gun to gun shooting at us and getting us soaked. Rhett was mad! Of course, the crazy man ran off and hid before we could get off the ride. What an idiot! Who would pick a big 6'3" guy to shoot at and aim at his wife and little girl? He was a doofus! But at least he was smart enough to high-tail it out of there before Rhett could hurt him.

Mama Said

Muffin Tin Monday: Hello, Ocean! & Vacation Misc.

We did a thematic unit on Oceans/Beach because that's where I'm supposed to be right now. But God and Hurricane Ike had other plans. We based our unit on the book Hello, Ocean! because I found a cool lapbook on Homeschool Share. You can check out our lapbook below. We didn't quite finish it but that's okay. I'll keep it and pull it out to finish and review when we actually get to go to the beach.
Muffin Tin contents: Sand Dollar Sandwich (two tortillas with cheese melted between), Coral (Cheetos), Deep Divin' Desert (blue jello with gummy fish), Wet Sand (peanut butter with graham cracker crumbs mixed in), Shovels and Driftwood for the Sand (Keebler Cracker Sticks and pretzels) and Whales. Oh, and Ocean Water to drink (lemonade with blue food coloring). BFG had a blast with this muffin tin! I think it was her favorite one. She really pretended to be digging in the "sand" with her "shovels" and she kept having "beached whales" (Her Whales would be dipped in the peanut butter.). She would say, "Mom, have a piece of coral." and then whisper to me, "It's really Cheetos!" and giggle and giggle.

Isn't our lapbook precious? I think all this preparation and leading up to our trip is what made not being able to go so disappointing. Luckily, Rhett came up with the idea of going on BFG's birthday which is Thanksgiving week. He thinks he can take just a few days and put it with the Thanksgiving holiday. Shhhhh! We aren't telling the fam yet. So, for this week, I guess we are going to head to the Smokey Mountains. I think we'll have fun. There's a waterpark we can go to and of course Dollywood. And I think we might try one of those dinner show things. It's just not what we all were expecting. But down here in the South, going to the Smokies is like a rite of passage. So, might as well get'er done for BFG.
I found this idea on the Crafty Crow. I didn't make it exactly the way it's supposed to be 1) 'cause I don't roll like that when it comes to sewing (um, 'cause I can't sew) & 2) I was in a super hurry. I still like it though and BFG was mesmerized.
And it rolls up all cute and everything. I think the best part is if she drops her crayons in the car while coloring (which always happens) the crayons will stay all tidy in one place instead of flying all over the floorboard.

Well, chickadees, I'm off to the mountains! Holler at'cha when we get back!
Mama Said

Hannah & Ike & Josephine! Oh, My!

(Don't forget the survey!!! Look to your left right now!!!! See it!!!)

Aaaaagh! Thanks for ya'll's prayers! It looks like we will miss Hannah. Now, we have to worry about Ike and Josephine! Please pray again. Thank you so much!!!! We have even talked about not going. But I just know if we don't go, it will be beautiful weather down there. If we do go, we will be evacuated. No, we won't be evacuated 'cause then we'd get our money back. It will just be terrible winds and rain and we will be forced to leave because we are so miserable. Sigh.

I'm still planning though just in case. Although after a gazillion errands yesterday and more to do on Friday, I think I might opt for the swimsuit and white T-shirt plan. It's soundin' pretty darn good about now.

Anyone have any good car activities for almost 4 yr. olds? Or any tips on making a 10 or 11 hour drive any easier for BFG? I have to say this is one time that it is almost a relief to have an only child 'cause she doesn't have anyone to fight with in the backseat.

Mama Said