Vacation - Part I

On Tuesday, April 6th, we packed ourselves up and headed to Pompano Beach, Florida, with Grandma and Grandpa W!! Our plane took off before 7:00am which meant an early morning, but the boys were still excited. Here they are anxiously awaiting boarding.

Finally, we're on the plane. Check out Tyler's "wings."

Overall both boys were good on the plane. Ryan had no idea what was happening, but as long as he had food he was ok. Tyler was an excellent traveler, but he's got to learn that some things aren't appropriate in some situations. Picture this... the plane is fairly quiet and the voice of a 5-year-old rang out saying "we're losing engine one... we're going down!" Oh, yes he did! I think he's seen enough of the military channel.

We had a couple of hours in between our arrival and that of Grandma and Grandpa so we located a park to begin our vacation. What a great way to start...

Ryan loved it.

There were things just for him.

And, Tyler loved it too!

Once we arrived at the condo it didn't take Ryan long to discover the balcony. Every time the door was open we knew it wouldn't take long for him to find it. I can't blame him. It was beautiful out there.

Tyler has never liked the water much, but Grandma got him out there.

The beach wasn't popular with either boy, but Tyler did enjoy digging holes. We took walks on the beach and saw the sand castles built by other children... but not my boy... he dug holes.

Really deep holes...

Dan and I were concerned about letting Tyler get in the hole, but he figured out a good way to get out and eliminate a safety risk at the same time... he scooped some sand in the hole, then stepped up on it, scooped some more and stepped, until he walked his way up and out! Smart boy! No rescue needed!

Ryan's favorite place was the condo itself. He enjoyed the doors immensely. There were lever handles that were just perfect for him. I will always remember this vacation whenever I see that type of handle. Open, close, open, close, open, close... and not one pinched finger!

Another great memory is the water wars. I picked up some water cannons to enhance Ty's pool experience and only had one rule... no aiming at people. Well, Grandma doesn't follow rules very well and the next thing I knew I was getting wet! Tyler was having a blast. Here we are shooting water in the air. We even got Dan in on the fun with water war II the next day.

No vacation is complete without some silliness on the bed.

Luckily this was Grandpa's bed...

Life at the pool and on the beach was getting a bit old for Tyler by Friday afternoon so we took him to the planetarium. Very cool stuff!! After taking a look at the constellations and planets inside, we had a chance to look through some powerful telescopes at the real thing!

Here he is checking out Mars. He also got to see Saturn plus lots of stars. I think we'll be looking to do something like this again locally. I was very proud of how well Tyler followed directions and how careful he was with the telescopes.

One last shot of the boys on the balcony.

More to come...