It feels so weird and wonderful all at the same time to be back writing again! I have missed this very much and now that my girl is SO FAR AWAY, I'm even more excited about being back in the blogging world :)
Ok, first let's back up a bit to before Lil' Chef left me for newer and cooler state...
In January of this year, I became a nanny to these two sweet nuggets right here. They are 5 years old and 9 months old at the moment and so stinking' precious!
We do lots of activities to try and wear them out, and this particular day had been quite busy and they both fell asleep on the way home... SO SWEET!
This is Big Brother :) He starts Kindergarten this week and loves legos, mac and cheese, swimming, his baby brother, and several different educational kids shows! I love him to death and his little sayings will forever amaze me and make me laugh.
This is Little E :) Gosh, that face!! I just can't get enough of him! He just turned 9 months old and is ALMOST crawling. He loves his puffs, Batman (their dog), swimming, and most recently, mac and cheese... Takes after his brother much?! Oh, and he has two teeth :)
He truly LOVES to be in the water! Every time we go swimming, he will swim for a least an hour.
Big brother with Lil' Chef :) Jesus allowed her to be able to spend a lot of her summer helping me nanny so that we could spend more time together before she left. It was such a huge blessing and BB LOVES her so that was a bonus for him :)
Before Lil' Chef left, we had to go to the Georgia Aquarium since neither one of us had ever been before. We absolutely loved it and we definitely got our moneys worth... We were there for 8 hours... Yeah, we seriously know how to take our time and enjoy every moment :)
We couldn't take photos of the actual performance, but their dolphin show was amazing!!! So amazing, that we saw the first showing of the day and went back and watched the final show of the day as well!
We took a photo of this piranha cause he was huge! He also looked so grumpy... guess feeding time was taking too long...
Like I said, we did everything! Including this kids interactive exhibit that took us about 30+ minutes to do. It was really fun and we even learned a little on the way!
When it comes to money, we stretch it as far as we can, so this was our lunch :) We packed a cooler and stuck it in the trunk and half way through our time at the aquarium, we went back to our car and ate in the parking garage!
It was delicious and way cheaper (and yummier) than eating inside. We didn't mind looking like freaks sitting on a cooler, in the middle of a parking garage, eating food out of a trunk just to save a few bucks! And the memories are priceless!
When we went back in, we went to watch this 4D show...
It was a HOOT watching Lil' Chef! She had never seen a 4D show before and every time water sprayed or bubbles came out she would jump :) It really was well done and very fun!
Next was my favorite part of the aquarium! But first, I have to show you this sawfish... SO COOL!!
Manta rays are so beautiful and they glide so effortlessly in the water... mesmerizing to watch!
These by far were my favorite animal!! The whale sharks! They are HUGE and so neat. We literally sat there for over 30 minutes just watching them swim around. They were truly breathtaking to watch and experience!
Of course we had to touch everything possible that was allowed to be touched :)
And take photos with seaweed! We are starting to look tired in this photo... a lot of people are at the aquarium on a Saturday in the summer and all of the noise and crowdedness started to show on our faces :)
I love jellyfish and so I had to put this photo in... so beautiful!
In front of the dolphin tank after watching the dolphin show for the second time!
This really is a neat place and they have done a great job making it both entertaining and educational.
It was yet again, another AMAZING trip with my girl and everything went so perfectly! I love going on adventures with this one :)
Virginia Bound!
Now comes the part in the story where I get emotional... ok, I'll try not to be too sappy, but I can't promise that it won't get a little emotional.
We left on Friday morning headed for Virginia!! We were both actually really excited about the adventure of the road trip as well as all of the future adventures we would have now that we lived in two different states.
Our first stop was Kroger (a grocery store) to get the essentials for the trip! We randomly came across this shelf of half off Disney dishware and loved it all! So, we decided to each buy a piece as a momentum of this road trip as well as another reminder our incredible trip to Disney World last year (you can read my post about it HERE and Lil' Chef's post HERE :))
After SEVERAL stops, one of which was to buy Adventures in Odyssey cause we forgot all of our CDs to listen to on the 9 hour drive up, we finally made it to Virginia!! It was a glorious site to see for sure because it was supposed to have only taken 9 hours, but we did it in....
11 HOURS!!! What the heck!? This is how we felt about that! I know we stopped a lot... but really folks!? Anyway, we got to her place around 9pm and that's when reality set in... This was my girl's new home. I almost started crying when I saw her house because I just couldn't believe this day was actually here and in less than 2 days, I'd have to FLY home and leave her here... I loved her little apartment though and the family she is renting from is so sweet! We were actually able to unload her whole car that night with the help from a friend and the family she is renting from!
On Saturday, we slept in as best we could and then got up and started to make the place feel a little more like home. It was an incredibly emotional morning. I can't remember another time in my life when there was such a rollercoaster of emotions happening inside me. One minute we'd be happy and talking about the future and then the next we would be sitting on the floor in a puddle of tears either reminiscing about the past or just letting reality hit us smack in the face.
Thankfully we were able to go over the Anderson's that afternoon and hang out and I got to meet everyone and then Joseph took us down to this adorable harbor! I LOVED this ferry so much. If we had had more time I would have loved to go on a ride on it :) It was a beautiful day and it just felt so nice to be out of the house and seeing more places that Lil' Chef now calls home.
Ok, this is in here cause I thought this was so cool! This is a fire truck for the water and I guess they were having to practice or something cause they were spraying that water so high into the air and it was creating rainbows on the water... So neat!
This picture is actually from the drive up, but I loved it so I am using it here :) Sunday came too quickly and all too soon I found myself sitting on plane, south bound, and about to take off... This girl right here is seriously my dearest friend, my other half, my partner in crime, and one of the biggest blessing Jesus has ever given me. No, it was not easy to leave her in Virginia and fly back to Georgia, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it'd be either. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that she is exactly where God has called her to be and I am beyond excited to see what He is going to do with her up there! I am so proud of her and Lord willing one day we will live near each other once again!!
I love you Lil' Chef and I am SO excited for your future!!
Until Next Time,
LoLo
Nicely done!
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