Spring Break 2011: South Texas!

We headed down to South Texas for Spring Break this year. We're so lucky that we have great-grandma Pauline and great-grandpa Bob down in Harlingen! It was a lovely getaway from the city and the perfect 5-day adventure to a warm-weather destination with the kids. So, we left the 50-degree rainy NYC weather and headed for the 90+ degree South Texas weather and loved every minute of it (well, maybe excluding the 3-LEG! airplane trip down there with delays on every flight!)

Jon's grandma and her husband live in an awesome retirement community in Harlingen that's literally built on a golf course. I really didn't understand this until we looked out their back window and saw hole #8 staring us in the face. They own a golf cart that they drive around the neighborhood and do their weekly golfing with. They also have a lovely pool and 2 friendly cats that made the trip even more appealing! So, yes... that's pretty much what we did: a daily drive around the neighborhood to the pool and torturing (I mean PLAYING) with the cats. A little boy's vacation dream! No toys needed!

The boys loved our little getaway. They're always up for an adventure and this one was no different. We had a slight snafu when I forgot my cell phone at home and Jon and I were travelling separately with the boys (gotta love those frequent flyer mile cash-ins!). Our flights were both delayed (unbeknownst to both of us) and several pay-phone messages later, we finally found each other in Houston! (I even bummed a phone call off an Army soldier (the most trustworthy looking person I could find) during our layover in Charlotte). We flew to Harlingen together (18-hours later!) and finally arrived at the Harlingen airport and were greeted by our lovely great-grandparent hosts.

We had 3 good days there and filled them with some serious kid-friendly fun. Day 1: ZOO, playing with cats, golf-cart ride to pool. Day 2: BEACH trip to South Padre Island, playing with cats, golf-cart ride to pool. Day 3: CHILDREN'S MUSEUM, playing with cats, golf-cart ride to pool, and dinner with the fam at the local BBQ joint. The Mr. and I also enjoyed early morning jogs, long chats with ggma and ggpa, a Friday Night Lights Netflix marathon, and a little pinochle (the Horey family card game of which ggma is reigning champion!).

We had a hard time saying goodbye and will definitely return as soon as we can!

admiring the flamingos

looking for 'baby Jaguar'

(have I mentioned the Diego phase???)

this way to the Iguanas!

super fun water playground right at the zoo

(every zoo should have one of these!)

petting zoo

super sweet golf cart!

these poor cats survived the boys (almost!)

the beach!

the water was SO warm!

loved this little Children's Museum

weatherman Noah!

road-tripping!

playing restaurant

fixing stuff with dad

dance party outside the BBQ joint

(i.e. must get children out of restaurant before we get kicked out!)

the fam

ggma and her grandson!

Easter

It's SO on... I'm catching this thing up and I don't care if it kills me! (which it might because blogger is being ridiculous right now!) I'm totally motivated by a friend of mine who just printed her blog. My kids will have nothing if they don't have this... must blog NOW!

We had a lovely Easter this year (busy, but lovely). I threw a little Easter egg hunt together at 1am the night before and it was a smashing success. Jon was shocked to see what I had pulled together while he was snoozing away! We were leaving for Texas the next day to visit great-grandma Horey so we had tons of prep to do for that on top of the normal Easter preparations. Luckily my mom and dad came down on Easter Sunday and brought dinner with them (thanks guys!) We also celebrated Greek Easter that day (it's rare that they actually land on the same day) but we took advantage of that and had a traditional Greek Easter meal: lemon chicken, homemade Greek Easter bread, orzo pasta, stuffed grape leaves, and the random Hawaiian punch that my great-grandpa would always have with his meal. It's such a nice tradition and I'm so happy to start passing it down to my boys.

Easter has always been a really special holiday for me. It usually falls around my birthday and it's always a nice time of renewal and rejuvenation for me. I was baptized on Easter Sunday when I turned 8 years old and it's just a nice reminder of that day. It's also nice that Spring has finally come and we're enjoying warmer weather. And it's especially lovely to celebrate the Christ's Resurrection. I think my love for the holiday has definitely rubbed off on the boys because we had a great day together.

egg hunt: egg #1

egg #2 (not from the toilet bowl)

the stash: Spongebob for Noah, Dora for Gabey

the hunt

the cutie pies

the boys

Happy Easter!

my new birthday toy...

The big 3-2 was upon me this year and the fam didn't disappoint with a sweet new toy for my birthday! I remember mentioning to Jon that I'd really like a new camera so I could learn how to take better pics of the boys, but I definitely wasn't expecting such a nice surprise for my b-day. I've joined the 'Canon Rebel Club' and it's been pretty fun to play around with so far. These are from our first few photo shoots. I'm hoping to get some tutorials from a few friends of mine that actually know what they're doing. But for now, it's been fun to just snap away!