May Vacation

The three of us were in Florida visiting my parents for Mother's Day. Eva is always so excited to see her Poppi & Gaia. We flew down there a few days before Mother's Day. 



The day after we arrived we went to the mall where there was a carousel.....just one of Eva's favorite things to do. That.......

and swimming!

On Mother's Day we all went into Orlando and had Ethiopian food.....Yum Yum! The next day, John flew back home and Eva and I stayed in Florida for the rest of the month. 

We were truly on vacation. Eva had so much fun! She swam everyday, sometimes two times a day with me, her Poppi or her Gaia. The best part was after a week of being there, my brother (Uncle Scott) came to visit. He had been on a month-long, coast-to-coast visit with family and friends. We were the first stop in the beginning of the month and our parents was his last stop. Eva was so excited.....especially when she realized that he was one more person who could go swimming with her.

A week after Scott arrived, John drove down to be with us. Yup, that's right...16 hour drive. Thank God he made it safely. We were ALL under the same roof again.....something that hadn't happened since before Eva, Christmas 2006. 

A couple of days later was my brother's birthday. We all went out to lunch and then we hit Sea World! We went to see some really cool shows. Eva got to see stingrays, dolphins and Shamu all up close.

Afterwards to all of our surprise, Eva saw the carousel before us and could hardly contain herself with excitement about getting to ride it. How could we resist?!?

After the ride, we finally headed home where we sang Happy Birthday (Eva's favorite song) and had some cake. Happy Birthday Big Brother :-)

The next day was Memorial Day and my parents' community had a celebration that we attended. The singing group that my mom is in sang a couple of songs to celebrate the different branches of military service. Eva had a good time....see?

A few days later it was time for all the visitors to head back home. Scott was flying and we were making the 16 hour (2-day) journey home. Eva's flown numerous times, but we had never done a serious road trip like this before. We were already preparing ourselves to having to make several stops along the way to keep her satiated. After lots of tears (from me) and hugs and kisses we parted ways.

We all made it home safely and Eva did very well on her first road trip. John and I were both quite surprised at how much Eva occupied herself. We showed her a couple of movies. She also watched some Baby Einstein shows and read all of her books!