Sea World

We went to Sea World on Friday. It was stinking awesome! It was actually super hot and really humid and muggy, but we had a great time anyhow. The first thing we did was see the sting rays. Stephen is obsessed with them. We bought a tray of food and fed them, getting them to come over and touching their weird skin.

Dolphins had a HUGE line, so we didn't go up to where we could touch them on Friday. Brian and the boys went back on Saturday though, while I was at a stamp convention, and they bought fish and fed the fish to the dolphins.

We saw everything. They loved everything. It was so fun to see all those animals through the eyes of our children.

Ethan is terrified of sea lions! I think it's because they were constantly barking at us, they are loud ya know. Here's pics of that:

I loved this bird, there were lots like him, but he was the fluffiest one.
I was worried he was gonna fall out! I guess he knows what he's doing.

We saw sharks and that was great. Ethan said the sharks were "friendly, happy" I think because from under them in that shark tube you can go in it sorta looks like they are smiling. In any event I found it funny that he was afraid of sea lions but friendly about sharks. In with the sharks they have tons of fish too. Also it's cool in there. One thing about Sea World is it's cool in most of the exhibits so that is nice.

We saw penguins and puffins. Stephen calls puffins, "puffy penguins". It's really cold in there with those.

Then we looked at the killer whale. There was a show, but this is us at the little side viewing thing where you can go up to the glass. The boys were AMAZED with the whale. This particular whale is Tilly.

There is a section called Shamu's Happy Harbor. We spent a lot of time there. It's a lot of kiddy rides. Here is Ethan on the Merry-Go-Round.
And here are the guys on a spinning type ride.
Stephen on the Shamu rollercoaster. Super fun! Ethan wasn't tall enough for it though.
Here we are on some tilting back and forth boat type ride.
After we were leaving that area this girl came up. She was about 12. She had won in the carnival area two killer whales. She gave one to Stephen. He almost cried he was so happy. Ethan fell in love with it and Stephen gave it to Ethan. He does still refer to it as "My Killer Whale" but he lets Ethan hold it all the time.

At the Shamu show shortly after Ethan used his new killer whale to act out the tricks the big whales did.

We had some excitement in our show. A whale would not do it's tricks. It also would not leave the main tank! So they paused for a few minutes, but still no luck getting that whale out. So they said, "listen, this animal weighs 9,000 lbs. We can't make her do anything she doesn't want to do, show's over, come back later to the next show" And so we had to leave! haha.

Me and the kids did go back to the night show. Brian took that time to ride lots of rides while the lines were short. EVERYONE goes to the night Shamu show. I got totally lost getting back to where Brian was because it was almost time for fireworks and they close some of the paths off. It took me an hour to get to him! SHEESH.

So like I mentioned they went again on Saturday. Apparently they had an awesome time. I was at a rubber stamp convention meeting friends and stamping celebrities. After my stamp show Brian and the boys picked me up. We went to dinner with a friend of Brian's. After dinner the friend brought the boys this:

Can you see how big that killer whale is? It's HUGE. They love it to bits. Every morning Stephen gets up and goes potty in our bathroom. He brings his puppies *you know puppies right, go everywhere with us two of them, one pink one blue*. Well Sunday morning I wake up to him grunting. I look up and he's dragging this HUGE killer whale into the bathroom! HAHA.

One bad thing though. I left Ethan's blankie in the hotel! We actually really liked our hotel. It was nice and clean and in a good area and quiet and that's all we really ask of a hotel. So we were very pleased. Not so much anymore. It's TOTALLY my fault I left the blankie. They are not helping me get it back at all though. They won't ship it and charge us, they won't fill out UPS or FEDEX forms for me if I arrange to have UPS or FEDEX come to pick it up. Oh and UPS and FEDEX were total butts about that, apparently "go get my blanket and bring it to me, charge me whatever you want" is a service they only offer business customers. Sigh. SO I'm mailing an empty priority mail box to the hotel. Inside the box is a return label I printed off paypal that has our stuff to ship it back. I talked to the post office and this should work. The hotel "guesses" they can be bothered to tape the box back for me, as I can't mail an open box. SHEESH. I'll let you all know if/when we get blankie back. Meanwhile Ethan is crying himself to sleep for almost an hour a night. It is very sad.

Flat Rate Priority mailing.

Today at the post office:

Me: Hold this, *hand Stephen a flate rate envelope*
Stephen: Ok, what we can mail in this?
Me: whatever fits in it. Do you have something you want to mail?
Stephen: Yes, a duck!
Me: Oh ok, a picture of a duck? Who will you mail that to?
Stephen: No mommy a REAL duck, for my Gramma Sue
Me: I don't think you can mail a real duck baby.
Stephen: NO, I'm a kid! I'll ask the lady.
Me: Ok

At the counter

Me: Can Stephen ask you a question?
Lady: Of course he can.
*pick Stephen up so he can see her*
Stephen: I can mail a real duck in this ok?
Me: *shaking head no*
Lady: No hun, we don't ship live animals
Stephen: But I need to send a real duck to my Gramma Sue
Lady: How about a painting?
Stephen: No, she needs a real duck
Me: What about a clay duck?
Stephen: Ok


So Gramma Sue, expect a clay duck, we haven't made it yet. Whatever you do DON'T ask where your real duck is!

Just a teaser.

We had an awesome day. Full write up later. I'm zombie tired.

Bubble Machine

got a little bubble machine yesterday. MAN it runs through bubbles. I gotta go back and get another gallon of bubble "juice". Turns out my kids LOVE a bubbl machine.
I figure later I can just mop with water, there must be half a gallon of soap dried on my floor already right?

Trip to the Zoo.

This trip was actually last Wednesday. I have a TON of photos, so it's taken me a while to get around to getting them to you.

They have a "dinosaur dig" now at our zoo. It's a sandbox with dinosaur bones in it.
We almost always ride the carousal. I really think our zoo has the prettiest one I've ever seen. Ethan was NOT sad, I know he looks sad, but this was his "silly" face.

And this is a "smile" face.
Stephen's smile face.
All three of us in this shot.
Ok, they both love the birds and fish more than anything else at the zoo. Go figure. This is in a bird house thingie. See that thing in Stephen's hand? It's a bird guide. Every time we saw a bird he VERY seriously looked at the guide then proudly proclaimed that the bird is a "Mango Mango".

Taking a break.
A Mango Mango.
Another Mango Mango. This one would NOT move out of our way, we had to sneak past it. It's my experience (white peacocks) that birds at zoos that are NOT afraid of you want to steal your popcorn and peck your eyes out. Give them their space.
Mango Mango again. (This was the first one actually and I thought he was refering to the color)
You can't see them, but there are otters in there.
See this cool animal? My kids didn't. There are tiny little fish in that water and that's all they look at here.

Tiny fish in this one too.

We stayed in this "temple" for a while. It's air conditioned and there are lots of tiny fish. (and bats and sloths and poision dart frogs, and a GIANT snake, and two kinds of tiny friendly monkeys, but all my kids remember is that there are fish in there. )
"Mommy, Fishes!"
"Just frogs, no fish"

And YES, we are getting annual passes to Sea World. I mean we HAVE to, with boys who love fish THIS much.

Visiting Papa

Yesterday we took the boys down to St. Augustine to visit Marcia, Gram and Papa. Papa is in a home so we visited him there. The boys were really great. You might expect them to be shy or even nervous, but they climbed right up on that bed. At first Ethan laid right beside Papa on his pillow and cuddled up. Of course as soon as we got the camera ready they had to act like nuts and ham it up!

Then we went shopping at the Outlet mall. I got some new shoes. I KNOW I totally have said a million times, "I don't care WHAT they feel like I'm NOT buying those horrible ugly Crocs!" Um... Call me a liar! These are a little cuter than the originals, but still odd looking. I got them in red because if you are gonna get plastic shoes you might as well get a great color. haha! They are REALLY comfy. I can't believe I held out for this long. Oh and try them on! I'm a size 8 in them, they don't have half sized. Usually that would put me at a 9 but I needed 8.

Stephen also got a Higgly Town Heros toy because guess what? He has not only been doing the potty all the time while he's awake, but he's been waking up DRY every night for over a week! We have a handful left of the pull up diapers then we will just do underwear all night too! I have to tell you, waiting until HE was ready worked GREAT. Better than I imagined. He just doesn't want to pee or poo unless it's on the potty.

Speaking of that! So in our church on the first Sunday of the month, instead of normal speakers who prepare a talk for us we have time where the memebers can get up and share their testimonies. Last month Stephen wanted to do it and he did a cute job. This month he said he wanted to do it again. I said, "What will you say?" he replied, "Heavenly Father is good, Jesus is good" I gave him the OK and with Brian by his side he marched up to the front of the congregation to share this wisdom with us all. He went off script however:

"I'm so happy seeing everyone here today, I'm so grateful seeing everyone here. I'm so proud of me peeing and pooping in the potty *pause for laughter to die down* Jesus Good, Jesus Christ Amen"

I kid you not, those are his exact words. CLASSIC!

Ethan is talking more and more. He's a super copycat. He likes what his brother tells him to like. It's hard to get him to disagree with Stephen.

Me: Ethan do you want chicken or hot dot?

Stephen: Ethie wants chicken

Me: *Knowing that hot dog is Ethan's favorite food* Ethie do you want hot dog?

Ethan: *looks at Stephen* CHICKEN!!!

Stuff like that. Stephen insists that "Ethie loves green" so green is what Ethan loves, although I secretly think he prefers blue. Stephen still definately loves yellow. And I mean LOVES yellow.

We went to the zoo this week too. I just realized I've not shared those with you. I will do it very soon. CUTE pics there.

Happy Birthday Ethan

Rain Boots!

You may remember the boys got rain boots from their Grammy back at Stephen's birthday? Well it hasn't rained much sense they got them. So being the fun mommy that I am I decided to make our own mud/rain puddles for them to stomp.

I'd like to also add that I see adorable photos like this only with kids wearing cute clothes and looking all groomed and smashing. What's up? Am I the only mom who lets her kids hang out in PJ tops and underwear/diapers half the day? I could hardly make them go get dressed just to do this photo shoot, and I'd have hated to miss the opportunity ya know. So anyhow this is how we roll at The Kellogg Show.



*note to self, right by the brick wall is not the very best place to build a mud puddle for stomping*

In other news both boys have the cold or whatever it is, but no one is super sick. Last night they seemed sicker, I think it's one of those ones where it's worse when you are trying to sleep.

Ethan peed in the potty yesterday. Just a tiny tinkle, more of just a "tink" really, but he did it and he was proud. I don't really think he knows yet when he's gonna pee though, he was totally shocked that pee came out of his little business. Stephen is doing great, he had one accident a few days ago, but it was while RUNNING for the potty. He got caught off gaurd, during dinner. All the sudden, "Mommy I gotta go potty RIGHT NOW!" And he ran. But then I hear, "Mommy I peed in the potty and all over around it." He wasn't kidding either, it was all over. But one accident in more than a week is wonderful and we are very happy.

Brian is well on his way to fixing the pool pump! He researched online and stuff and took photos of it before taking it apart and found a part that needs replacing and we ordered it from our local Pinch-A-Penny.

I think that's all my new news. Did I tell yall I was published in another magazine? It's the current issue of Stamp and Scrap Arts. I'm actually RIGHT next to my super stamping idol Kim Hughes. I might put a pic of that later.

Too much America's Next Top Model

Stephen has been watching too much America's Next Top Model. He was posing for me when I did pics of him with his friend Xander.

This is the last play date with Xander too. :( They are moving to Idaho.

check out the toe action on this one!
Ethan is still snotty, but the fever is gone.
Oh and this morning I woke up to another suprise! But a good one! HAHAHA. I woke up and they were totally quite. That's usually bad so I flew out of bed and raced over to their rooms. They were shut in Ethan's room. I wondered what horror awaited me behind that door. It was... Two boys sitting on Ethan's bed reading books. Stephen was leaning over to Ethan's book saying, "This one is the..." When he saw me. I was so proud! Everyone was dressed, there wasn't any ointment anywhere, they were being peaceful and happy and quite. GREAT way to start the day.