Home at Last

Luke and I arrived home from vacation earlier this afternoon. It was a great week, but it feels good to be home, too!

Yesterday was another fun day at the beach. The waves were HUGE because of Hurricane Bill. They were fun to ride, but a little scary, too! In late afternoon, I built a sandcastle on the beach while Luke made his script Ohio in the sand (I think it's going to become a tradition every time we're at the beach). In the evening, Julie and I cooked dinner, and then Luke, Julie, and I went on one last souvenir run in town.

Oh yeah...Julie and I tried skim boarding one more time yesteday. We still didn't catch on!
Script Ohio
My sandcastle - moat and all!
Mom and I took a walk on the beach, and saw lots of birds and beautiful scenery

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Okay, so now that I'm home, I'm going to re-check my vacation to-do list, and see how many I accomplished:

1. Try skim boarding for the first time: CHECK. (Although I certainly have not mastered the skill!)
2. Take a walk on the beach at midnight: 1/2 check. we crammed so much activity into our days I just couldn't make myself stay up that late. Although I took a walk on the beach at 10:00, so I'm giving myself half a check for that :-)
3. Build a sandcastle: CHECK. And we also made a sand turtle earlier in the week :-)
4. Fly a kite: CHECK. It was a pretty cool kite, too.
5. Ride a bike on the boardwalk: Big, fat no for this one. I guess we just ran out of time.

6. Ride all the roller coasters and other fun rides at Busch Gardens: CHECK
7. Watch at least one show at Busch Gardens: CHECK, at Das Festhaus
8. Explore the nature preserve by our condo: 1/2 check. We went on a nature walk at the aquarium, and walked to the beach part of the preserve, but didn't actually explore the entire preserve.9. Prepare two meals for the family during the week: Check. A chicken casserole one night, and a spaghetti dinner another night.
10. Visit Jamestown: No check. We ran out of time for this, but would definitely like to check out Jamestown or Yorktown next time we're there.

11. Get up early one morning and watch the sunrise: No check again. I decided that sleep was too important to get up at 6 to watch the sunrise! I get grumpy if I don't get enough sleep, and like I said, we kept pretty busy. I did catch the sunrise in PA on the way there last Saturday, though. Does that count?? :-P

12. Work on my photography, and take hundreds of pictures: Check. My camera was attached to me all week. I took around 600 pictures in all.13. Try at least one new thing that I've never tried before (skim boarding doesn't count): Check. This is a little lame, but I tried boogie boarding. I'd never done that before! We usually use biggger blow-up rafts to ride the waves. Boogie boards were pretty fun, because you could stay lower in the water, and actually steer a little bit.14. Swim in the condo pool: Check. Sure, I was only in for about 2 minutes, but I did try it out! We decided that they kept the water too warm, and it just wasn't refreshing in the 90 + degree weather.15. Visit the nearby aquarium: Check. Although my pictures are all on my parents' computer, because we were having memory card problems that day.

So I finished 11/15. Not too bad! I think it was a good idea to make a list of goals for our trip. It became a challenge to see how many I could check off by the end of the week. I know I probably never would have tried skim boarding if I hadn't written it down as one of my goals. But don't worry, I took a lot of time to just relax, too!

Now I'm probably going to spend the rest of the evening recuperating, and catching up on all of your blogs! I know I've been pretty absent for the past week, but I'll be commenting like crazy tonight :-) I missed hearing about what's going on in your lives! :-)

Day 6 - Fish and Family

Unfortunately I have no pictures to share today. Luke and I bought a new memory card at Wal Mart right before vacation. It has been acting funny all week and giving us problems. Today we keep getting a message on the camera that says "File Error" and it's been locking up our camera screen and our computer whenever we try to do anything with the pictures! Has anyone else ever had this problem or know how to fix it? I know it's not Wal-Mart's fault, but I can't help but hate them a little more for it :-P

Anyway, today we visited the Virginia Aquarium. It was okay...Luke and I went to Ripley's Aquarium on our honeymoon, so it didn't quite live up to that. But still a nice little trip to see some fish :-)

Next we went out to lunch at Max and Erma's...love that place! And from there the girls spent the afternoon shopping while the guys went on a naval ship tour. Luke's really bummed that pretty much the only pictures he took this week (of the ship) seem to be the ones that messed up the camera...We can't seem to get them off of the memory card no matter what we do! Ugh, it's affecting my mood a little, if you can't tell :-P

We spent the evening at my aunt and uncle's house for dinner. They live in a beautiful neighborhood. After dinner, we all walked down to the pier on the bay where I took tons of pictures, and also walked around to look at the mansions on their street. Luckily, I took the pictures tonight with my mom's camera, so I do have access to them...I just don't feel like uploading them all now.

Tomorrow is our last day here before the drive home on Saturday. It's been so much fun, but I'm ready to head home. I miss Gabby! Plus I feel totally refreshed and ready to take on another school year, so I'm ready to get it started! I think we should try to go away a week before school starts every year! ha!

At the mall today, we visited a pet shop where we saw some kittens. I think that's what really made me miss Gabby! I am such a pathetic pet owner. She has somehow become like our child. I'm sure my mother-in-law is taking great care of her, though! But I thought I'd close today with a picture of her, just because I'm missing her so much :-PThis was taken the day before we left. Gabby followed me around all day as I was packing, and she kept trying to play with the sheets as I was putting the clean ones on our bed. I can't wait to see her cute little face on Saturday night!!

Day 5 - Beautiful Scenery

We spent today on the beach, and then came out to fly our kite after dinner (another item to be crossed off of my bucket list!) It was extremely hot today, and for some reason, the water was FREEZING! So it wasn't the most fun day at the beach we've had so far. But for some reason, everything just seemed extra beautiful today! I took over 100 pictures today alone. So for this post, I thought I'd just share a few. I'll post them all on flickr when I get home.

Our condo is just so much fun to take pictures of

Here I am flying the kite!
I really love this picture of Luke flying the kite:
After all of that, we went to the movies. The boys went to see District 9, and the girls went to see The Time Traveler's Wife. I cried through about half of the movie :-P But overall it was a fun night! Tomorrow we're going to the aquarium and then to dinner at my aunt and uncle's house. I can't wait to get caught up on all of your lives, because I haven't had much time to read blogs this week!! I feel totally out of the loop! ;-)

Day 4 - Busch Gardens: Europe

It was a hot day at Busch Gardens today...in the 90s and sunny! But we still managed to have a pretty good time :-)

I really loved the park because of all the beautiful scenery and theming. There were times when I really did feel like I was in Europe! ;-)
The rides were also pretty awesome. Lots of fun roller coasters! My favorite was Apollo's Chariot, but for everybody else, Griffon seemed to be the favorite. Luke took lots of pictures because he loved it!

Here's Loch Ness Monster...also one of the best rides of the day
And everybody's favorite, Griffon:
The car stops there at the top of the hill for about 5 seconds, and then drops you straight 90 degrees down. We sat in the front row. It was amazing!
We ate lunch at a cute buffet-style restaurant called Das Festhaus, where there was a live-music show.
The food was delicious! My cousin, who joined us for the day, got this HUGE slice of cake for us all to share. This picture doesn't even do it justice. Unfortunately, even between the 6 of us, we couldn't finish it!
I got this wrap, which definitely hit the spot. I like to try to avoid too many fried foods when I know my body's going to be shaken around like it's in a blender for the rest of the day! (I only ate 1 or 2 of the chips :-P)
Julie and I decided we wanted to go on a water ride to cool down. No one else felt like getting wet, so Luke took a picture of us on our way down the hill. I'm the one screaming, and Julie is leaning in toward me because she was nervous about the hill! It was fun :-) Can you find us??
Here's a picture before we went on a 3D ride...the joke was on me, because I thought Luke was also wearing his 3D glasses. Oh well, he tricked me. He's also not touching me because this was right after the water ride and I was soaked.
Here are Julie and my cousin Jake ready to go on the same ride.
So that was our day at Busch Gardens. I hope you're not getting too bored with my recaps and pictures! I feel like I haven't had time to read all of your blogs this week, but don't worry! I'll eventually get caught up :-) In the meantime, I hope everyone is having a super week!

Day 3 - The Beach and the Boardwalk

Most of today was spent on the beach.

Julie and I made a sand sculpture of a turtle because it was the easiest thing we could think of to make. His neck's a little long...
We (as in Julie and I) tried skim boarding, and realized that we are both horrible at it. We still need lots of practice, and have the bumps and bruises to prove it!

We ate a delicious dinner at the condo, and then headed out on the town. First we went jungle mini-golfing...

Then we went shopping and walked on the boardwalk...
And we ended the evening by eating delicious ice cream cones and watching the awesome street performers.
Tomorrow is Busch Gardens day! I'm very excited about that! So I better sign off and get to sleep, because we're leaving somewhat early. so have a great night!