Trip to Pennsylvania

In March, we took a road trip to attend Jimmy's grandfather's funeral. Overall, it was a good trip to see family and honor the life of Jimmy's grandfather Walter Fetterly. Below is a picture of Jewel and Jane with Grandma Fetterly.

We stopped in Raleigh, NC both going to and returning from Pennsylvania. In the hotel one night we had a play dough party! :)

They each did a Bible story and we tried to guess which story it was...Jane did the story of Jesus dying on the cross with Mary next to the cross. Jewel did the tower of Babel. Both were pretty easy to guess...they are pretty good with play dough! :)

We actually left our camera at the funeral (it was mailed to us a couple of weeks later). We forgot to take any pictures there and we also didn't have the camera for a little trip to Philadelphia where we visited Independence Hall, the Liberty Bell, Benjamin Franklin's "printing press," and more! I am really sad we didn't get pictures at those historical sites because it will probably be a loooong time before we make it back there.

Conference in Orlando

In November the girls and I tagged along with Jimmy while he was presenting several papers at a conference in Orlando (Disney World). During this trip my pregnancy queasiness kicked in so it wasn't the most pleasant time, but the pictures show us having a great time! :)
We didn't go to a theme park because we were somewhat limited on time, but the girls had fun riding on the carousel that was in downtown Disney.

The girls had fun putting together a Mr. (or rather a Mrs.) Potato head in one of the stores. (Of course, we didn't buy them, but it was a fun activity!)

Jeneva found a stuffed Pooh bear that she thought was pretty fun. Pooh bear is her favorite. She really isn't interested in watching anything except Winnie the Pooh. And, really, she only likes the classic ones (The Honey Tree and the Blustery Day).

The "princesses" enjoying an activity with their Daddy (building lightsabers).

The girls and I found these little cinderella costumes at Target after Halloween for like $5 or so! Sooooo much cheaper than the $60 Cinderella dresses in the Downtown Disney store (and they were just as happy with them...or at least pretty close to being just as happy)!

Cape Coral Trip

In October, we took a trip to Cape Coral to attend Jimmy's great aunt's memorial service and to visit with Jimmy's parents.
We enjoyed a pretty sunset on the water.

The girls had a lot of fun feeding the fish, turtles, and birds at the Shell Factory.

Here we are inside the Shell Factory. There were lots of different rooms that featured different things. (Notice Jane's Raggedy Ann? We found it at a flea market in the parking lot right before going inside. It is almost exactly like Jewel's. She was...and still is...SOOO excited to have her own Raggedy!)

Daddy out with the girls on Pap and Nana's kayak.

Pap made a fortress around Jeneva. She loved it!

Lambert's Cafe

I took a whole week to plan for this New Orleans trip, and we were able to everything except one attraction in New Orleans. We were really hoppin' the whole time. On our way home, we took a slight detour that added probably a total of 45 minutes to our trip to eat lunch at Lambert's Cafe (the home of the throwed rolls). I had been to one of these restaurants when I was a little girl, and it was very memorable! Overall it was a great lunch and experience.

The weather was nice and the girls enjoyed playing on the train out front.
I couldn't get the camera ready fast enough to get one of us "catching" the rolls that were thrown to us, so Jewel posed for me! She is so precious... I just love her so much!

Jane was in heaven...as our little "bread-eater."

The food was really pretty good....very southern. Not only did they come around with rolls to toss to you, but with your meal you also can enjoy any of the sides they come around dishing out of big pots from the kitchen! It was really a fun time!

Jeneva had a fun time climbing with her sisters!

Audubon Insectium

After we left the Aquarium, we took in an IMAX 3D movie about the sea. Jeneva was REALLY bad so I spent most of the time out in the hallway, but Jimmy and the girls really enjoyed it.

Then we took a walk a few blocks over to the Insectarium. It had some fun stuff. The girls are sitting on a giant worm in this room that was made to look like we were shrunk down and underground.

Being the salsa loving guy that he is, Jimmy had to test the special of the day in the bug kitchen: six legged salsa!

Jewel and Jane enjoyed some yummy cricket chip cookies.

The girls were trying to "pretend" that the alligator was coming out of the case!

Two little sailor girls...

The next day, we went to the Zoo, and it was probably the best of the three...although they were all done really well. We forgot the camera in the car, so there are no pictures to post. One of the memorable moments was feeding the giraffes. The girls would put a treat in their hands, and the giraffes would lick them out of their hands with their LOOOONNGG tongues! They were able to feed them several times! There were really a lot of fun and entertaining things at that zoo. It was probably the best zoo we have ever been to!

Audubon Aquarium

Once we checked into the hotel we walked right to the Aquarium. It was really a great place!

Here is the little fish that I watched most of the time!

Pretty seahorses!

There were several of these little tanks where kids could go inside a tube to be surrounded by all the sea-life.

In the kids' area, there was a fun whale that they could climb on...and there was even an occasional fun "poof of water!" (in the pic, the girls are waiting for it to blow)

The girls were trying to touch a stingray...but they really couldn't (or wouldn't) reach deep enough!

There were several very entertaining tanks. This one was fun...the penguins were really friendly and would swim right up to us.

New Orleans

Jimmy recently presented a couple papers at a conference in New Orleans. We really enjoyed tagging along for a mini-vacation!

Here is Jewel in front of a building Jimmy liked in the French Quarter. (It is kind of hard to see the character of it in the picture.)
The girls really enjoyed our room at the Riverside Hilton where the conference was held. The view of the Mississippi River was great. The girls sat at this window quite a bit just watching the boats go back and forth. In the picture below I think they were watching Dora on the laptop! :)

One day we walked to Saint Louis Cathedral.

While Jimmy was at the conference one day, I took the girls to the mall and also on a FREE ferry ride across the river. It was all in short walking distance from the hotel.

From my research of New Orleans, I knew that one thing to do while there was to get a beignet at the Cafe du Monde. The orders come in groups of three so one order was all we needed! :) They were pretty much like a doughnut with powdered sugar, but they had a heavier consistency...probably due the amount of eggs made to make them. They were pretty yummy!

I did quite a bit of planning and prep work before we took this trip. One thing I did was to print some Restaurant.com coupons to use at some of the restaurants within walking distance from our hotel and one near where we went to church Sunday.

Jeneva really enjoyed the New Orleans sampler platter with jambalaya, gumbo, and one other dish that I can't remember the name of. Overall, Jeneva was horrible during every meal. She was squirmy and fussy....but that is probably to be expected when she is hungry and sleepy from sightseeing.

This was probably our favorite restaurant. The service was great, the food was good, and there were horse and carts that passed by the window every few minutes. (That street must have been on a touring route.)

Back in the hotel we had a fun time. I packed plenty of food along, so here we were all enjoying some trailmix before bedtime. Jenevea was enjoying mine instead of hers since she figured out that MINE had a few dark chocolate chips mixed in! :)

Like I stated before, the girls really loved sitting at this window watching the riverboats and drawing pictures.

Behind the girls you will notice our hotel on the right (the tall building). The shorter building is a mall that is actually sort of adjacent to our hotel. The river is to the far left, and the

fountain is surrounded by a big plaza area with the Audubon Aquarium (pictures coming soon) just beyond the plaza opposite our hotel. With the French Quarter just beyond that. So as you can see, there was plenty to do within walking distance of our hotel.