June 21st through June 25th

June 21 through 25

Click Here for photographs (Several different "albums")

Okay, my days are running together. I have no idea what we did Wednesday of last week. I thought that was the day we went to Battleship Cove but according to the blog it was Tuesday so here we go, as best as I can remember. I do remember we went with Mitchel to the chiropractor again and then we stopped at a little mom and pop joint for pizza… we did this for you Erin! Erin now lives in California and asked me to eat some decent pizza for her. Apparently you can get a good pizza in California. I was recounting this story the other night and someone from California just happened to be walking through and told me that wasn’t true… it depended on where you went. Well, we didn’t get Chicago deep dish style, but it was good… not all that, but not bad, either.

June 22, 2006

I decided to take a break Thursday and relax around the room, swim, clean up, watch TV, etc. We heated up our leftovers and took them out for a picnic. It was so pretty out we decided to go to the Zoo. We actually saw a couple of things we hadn’t seen before. There was one exhibit that had little domes you could crawl in, stick your head out and your head was in the “cage” of the animal. We never did see that animal but it was pretty cool. Also, we went on a walk through the marsh and saw a mama duck with her ducklings.

June 23, 2006

Friday we did take a break. We stayed around the hotel room for a little while. We ran to Wal-Mart to get cheap inner tubes to play with in the pool as well as rain ponchos we knew we’d need for the coming weekend. When we got back I decided we had watched enough TV. so we went down to the lobby and played Uno for a little while. There’s a basket in the lobby with dominoes, cribbage, and other games. Anna and Stephen got the dominoes out, split them up, and began creating domino effects. As we were sitting there, a man walks in with a bird on his gloved hand… We got to me Cody, the Prairie Falcon… aka one of the United States Air Force Academy’s mascots. He was here for the air show that was happening Saturday and Sunday. We got to pet him and the kids got their pictures taken with him (see photos). We soon got a call from Mitchel asking us if we wanted to meet him for dinner… well duh! Needless to say, we met him for dinner.

We had a late night pillow fight and this time I got pictures. Pretty good ones, if I do say so myself. There were several pillows flying through mid air. Some of the kids’ pictures have red eye… It kind of makes the kids look evil. I was in bed trying to read with pillows flying all around me... then I decided to get in on the action. I didn't get on anyone's team. Up to this point it was Mitchel against Stephen and Anna. Now I was just taking opportunity shots, not matter who it was.

June 24, 2006

Saturday we woke up and it was rainy. It rained all weekend. Rained out some of the air show’s flying activity although we got to see some stunt planes and we saw a jet truck race a plane flying upside down. I believe this was the highlight of Mitchel’s trip to the air show. The kids got to sit in a several cockpits, push buttons, pull levers and pretend to be fighter pilots. Oh, I did meet someone famous… sort of. There is a famous picture of a, I believe a World War II sailor who has just gotten off of ship, grabbing a lady and kissing her. For those of you in Sarasota, it’s the huge sculpture that we went down to the bay front to see when we were there in December. I met that sailor. He was selling pictures of himself with his autograph. We declined the autograph but spoke with him for a few minutes.

We left the air show when it became obvious the rain was not going to let up. They announced over the intercom that there wouldn’t be anymore flying that day. We have to drive right by a movie theater on our way home. We stopped and saw the movie Cars. It was cute, I don’t usually enjoy cartoons but this was a good one. I think next we’ll go see Over the Hedge. Hopefully we haven’t waited too long to see it. I’m not sure when it will be leaving theaters.

June 25, 2006

Today, Sunday, we just got in the car and drove. We drove down to Point Judith and back, stopping wherever we decided to. The first stopping point we hit was Gilbert Stuart’s birth place. For those of you who don’t know, and I didn’t know, he is a very famous painter. He is the man who painted the portrait of George Washington that is on the $1 bill. One of the things that stuck out to me was a portrait that was commissioned to be done in 9 days. Because he was not very happy about being rushed he took the head of George Washington off one of his other paintings and put it on this one and painted George Washington’s horse backwards so you see this big old horse bottom. And George Washington’s head is not proportional to his body.

http://www.gilbertstuartmuseum.com/

We then drove to Point Judith which looks out on Rhode Island Sound and Block Island Sound. It is located in Narragansett, RI. (narra – gan – set) Every time I hear about Block Island Sound I think of a Billy Joel song… something about cruising through Block Island Sound, but I digress. We got out of the car, donned our rain ponchos and walked down a rocky cliff, well Stephen and I did. There was a definite line where the rocks were much darker and they were slimier. I’m assuming the tide was out and this is how far it would come up the shore. Stephen came running up to me with something in his hand and said, “This looks just like a starfish.” He had found a starfish in a tidal pool. He put it back in the sea and I never did see it again. I looked and looked for another one, but, alas, there were none to be found. Neat area, though. I’d like to go back again on a sunny day. Maybe this is a place the kids and I can go when Mitchel is at work. There were lots of interesting rocks. I wish I had a penny for every rock that Stephen and Anna want to keep. I actually kept one from this area. http://www.lighthouse.cc/pointjudith/

We headed back up to where we started, stopped at Wal-Mart to get a few things. As always, when Mitchel is with us, we buy more than we had planned. This time it was Nerf guns. They shoot little Nerf darts. We got four of them and had a war. I’m sure there will be many more wars to come… we also bought extra darts. The extra darts whistle as they sail through the air. No one has gotten hurt… yet.

After the war we went down to the pool, Mitchel worked out for a little while then we all went swimming. We came back, all showered and ate and it’s 8:23 and the kids are going to bed as soon as they’re TV. show and macaroni and cheese is over. I got some microwaveable mac and cheese at Sam’s before we left, I may have mentioned this earlier, and that has been the big thing. We’re almost out. I’ll have to wait to get some more so we can eat up some of this soup and ravioli!

I’ve got some great things planned next week. Thanks to John and Kelly Barton for sending me fresh ideas this weekend. Stay posted to find out what we’ll do next!