Big Day!

We had a big day yesterday! We went to the zoo with So-So and Grandpa and the kids had fun walking veeerry slooowly all around. The elephants came closer than I have ever seen them and the giraffes were close too - they are two of my favorites and the kids were impressed (momentarily at least). We went to lunch and then home for naps, which they did not take. They literally talked and jumped and laughed for about an hour and a half before we decided it was hopeless. We took them to an area pool after that and Katie, as expected, loved being in the water but Tyler was much more hesitant (again, as expected). He would get in only if you were holding him and then ask if he could get in the float like Katie and then freak out once he was in there. Katie's new word is water or "watie" so she loved getting in and was learning to kick her legs and swim her arms. She kept wanting down thinking she could swim on her own. I think he will warm up to it and have fun too. Memorial Day snuck up on me and I didn't get them signed up for the swim lessons - I'm going to see if we can still get in and at least have an introduction to water from someone who knows what they are doing.

They were pretty well-behaved, especially in the afternoon when they were so tired but Tyler still cried the WHOLE time we were in the car and had a fit getting into the carseat. The drive down to Florida by myself should be fun! He is definitely testing what he can get away with by having tantrums and meltdowns and we are trying to stay firm but it is really hard when he gets so out of control. All you want to do when he gets like that is calm him down - he has bumps and bruises all over from banging his head, flopping on the floor, and generally looking like a hellion, almost two year old. I am pretty sure this is just a phase - Lance is very worried that he has something wrong. I wish he could be around another tantruming toddler sometime so he would know this is pretty normal. They were great at the birthday party and he doesn't realize that we still get more good times than a lot of people - Tyler especially just has a pretty wicked temper that we are going to have to teach him to control.

I took the camera with me yesterday to get some pictures, but of course trying to keep up with two toddlers in a pool area didn't really allow for picture taking. I am going to try to get some today!

Thanks for all of the kind words! We'll figure something out - I just thought we had some time and we would have hopefully been in a better place financially when we had to make the move. Nevertheless, this is when we have to do it and I think it could end up being a good thing - to get them used to a more school environment and play with more kids closer to their age. I really do think everything happens for a reason and we'll look back at this and think it wasn't such a bad thing!