Family Visitors

My brother in law, a police officer, was attending a conference in town, and my sister seized the opportunity for a mini vacay and tagged along. So last night the kids and I headed over to their resort for dinner and some good times. Being a good conference goer, my brother in law missed out on the fun (dinner with a 3 and 6 year old count as fun, right?) as he had some nighttime activities to attend. The oldest of my sister's three children, my niece, just graduated college in Orlando and is still living here with my mom and other sister, so she joined us.

First off was a trip to the pool bar to say hello to the police officer. After just a few minutes, he's promising the little ones ice cream after dinner and talking about little toy cars he has for them. To be honest, he's pretty much a sucker for kids in general, and mine are pretty stinkin' cute, so they get him wrapped around their fingers pretty quick. On the walk back to the room, we passed a beautifully landscaped little planter thing, so I made everyone stop for pictures. Here's my beautiful sister, her beautiful daughter and my stinkin' cute kiddos.

My neice lived with me for a brief period of time during her college years and was there for a lot of the little man's first months. In fact, her name was part of the little man's beginning vocabulary. I'm sure she's happy his version of it, Caca, didn't stick, but maybe we could bring it back for the sake of this blog. Maybe not. I'm sure I will need her to babysit for me again sometime, so I had better be a little nice. But only a little. And in case she is reading this, I would like to take this opportunity to go ahead and say "You're welcome for getting you over your whole 'baby puke makes me puke' thing (poor girl was yakked on more than anyone else in the family, I think) Anyway, both my girl and the little man have a definite love for their Kissy (Hey, it's better than Caca). How sweet are they?


Of course, my normally extremely well behaved and calm children cannot pass a planter like this without feeling the need to run around the ledge like animals, so that's what happened next.


And if, by chance, anyone who works at said resort happens to see the post, I would like to apologize for this:

In case you can't quite place it, that is a little man butt shaped crushing of the beautiful flowers in the planter. Because, in addition to feeling compelled to run around every plant ledge we pass, and having inherited my sense of grace and coordination, the kiddos also must ineveitably fall while running on said ledge. Someone really should be watching them.

After scoring toy police cars from their Uncle, and lots of this:

(I seriously think she's addicted to tying her shoes), we headed off to dinner. The kids were angels and didn't cause an ounce of trouble throughout their entire dinner (and I can remember and write whatever I want cause it's my blog), we headed back to the resort for the aforementioned ice cream and some time on the playground. A good time was had by all, and I would like to apologize again to anyone who may be reading from the resort for the ice cream covered bench we left behind. It finally started getting dark, and we headed back to the room. The kids were again angels (my blog, remember) and my big sis and I got to have some good conversation. As much as we give her crap for being a wimp, she really is a warrior and I learn alot from her strength. Thank you, sister, for loving and supporting me, and for reminding me that it's way past time to toughen up and find that joy I'm looking for.