The Nutcracker

 We recently traveled to Jacksonville with some friends of ours to see the Florida Ballet's production of The Nutcracker.  We enjoyed the show.  This was our first experience with seeing a ballet, and it was a successful one.

 Since we were in Jacksonville anyway, we decided to do the Jax Illuminations drive-through Christmas light show.  This is a mile of lights that are timed to music.  It wasn't terribly expensive, and they gave you free hot chocolate to enjoy as you drove through.  The kids really enjoyed this.

 Seeing the Jacksonville lights just put us in the mood for more lights.  So, on the way home we detoured to Hortense to view the Lewis family light show.  This family has a major set-up at their house that they open to the public for free.  This placed was packed!  I don't think that we could have fit another thing into our day, and we were exhausted when we got back to the house.

Train to Plains

 Owen's WINGS field trip this year was a train trip on the SAM short-line railroad from Cordele to Plains, Ga.  Plains is a small town whose claim-to-fame is that it is the home of President Jimmy Carter.  Owen was chaperoned by his Papa, and these two had a great time.  They were served a light lunch on the train, and there was even a visit from Santa.

 Once in Plains, the group toured the Jimmy Carter National Historic Site and then walked around downtown Plains.  They were able to see some things, but my dad said that they didn't really have enough time to see everything because the lay-over wasn't long enough.  Owen's souvenir from the trip was one of those fake cans that you and a plastic snake jumps out at you.  The can was made to look like a can of peanuts (because Plains is famous for producing peanuts). Owen played with his toy all the way home (and tried to trick us over and over again once he got home).  It was a nice trip.

Christmas Parade

 We had a great time at the annual Christmas parade.  Daddy parked a truck at our usual spot, and we all met up to view the parade together.  Cassie and Nick were in town, so James was even able to come.  There was a band, several floats, and other parade participants who wished us all a Merry Christmas.  One of the highlights was the delegation from the high school- featuring Buddy the Elf (Kelly).  Another highlight was Olaf from Frozen.  He walked over to our group and greeted Julianna personally.  She loved that.  As always, the parade ended with Santa.

 After the parade, the Christmas in the Park event began.  We were parked right beside the park, so we decided to walk over and check it out.  The had a live nativity, an area with fake snow that the kids cold play in, different rides for the kids, a meet-and-greet with Santa, and a couple of bands that entertained the crowd. We had plans to go out to Gigi's for chili, so we didn't stay long but we did enjoy walking through and checking everything out.

Tech Fair

 Both of the kids decided to compete at the district Tech Fair this year.  Olivia and her partner entered in the category of video production, and Owen and his partner entered in the category of game design.  While neither of the kids' teams placed, I am proud that they chose to participate, worked to learn the skills necessary to complete the project, and presented their work in front of judges.  They are already looking forward to next year.

Georgia Aquarium

While we were in Atlanta, we decided to pay a visit to the Georgia Aquarium.  The kids had not been since Olivia was 2 and Owen was 6 months old, so a return trip was needed.  In case you haven't heard, the Georgia Aquarium is the largest and, in my opinion, best aquarium in the country.  Since our last visit, they have expanded the aquarium and now have dolphin and sea lion shows.

 We arrived around 10:30- just in time to see the penguin parade. A couple of times a day, the staff marches a few penguins down a ramp in the atrium.  This allows visitors to get an up-close view of them.  Penguins are Owen's favorite, so he was especially excited to witness this.

 My favorite part of the aquarium is the Ocean Voyager gallery.  This is where you will find the four whale sharks that the aquarium is so famous for.  Those things are amazing.  I could sit in front of the large window for hours and watch them swim.

 The new dolphin show at the aquarium was surprisingly well done.  I would say that it was on par with the dolphin show at SeaWorld.  We sat in the "splash zone", so we had a great view of the show.  It was very enjoyable.  We also attended the Sea Lion show.  It was pretty good as well.

 Both of the kids were really fond of the beluga whales.  Olivia even chose a stuffed beluga as her souvenir.  I think we spent more time watching the belugas than any other animal at the aquarium.

 There were several touch tanks throughout the aquarium, and I think Olivia touched every single fish in them.

 The kids favorite gallery was the Tropical Diver.  They enjoyed watching the colorful fish in dart in and out of the coral reef.

Another pleasant change to the aquarium since our last visit is that the 4D theater that used to be an add-on is now included in the price of admission.  We enjoyed watching a "Happy Feet" show.  There is also a new hands-on educational area for kids.  There was not much traffic in this area of the aquarium and I don't know why.  Olivia and Owen enjoyed all of the interactive games.  I practically had to drag them away from this area.  Another interesting thing about the educational area was that there were windows where you could see the top of the various tanks.  That's a part of the aquarium that you don't always get to see.  We spent a little over four hours at the aquarium.  We could have stayed longer, but needed to get on the road to head home.  I would definitely be interested in doing a behind-the-scenes tour or animal encounter here in the future.

First Robotics Competition

 Last year the kids' school began an VEX IQ elementary robotics team. There were (and still are) no other elementary robotics teams anywhere near our town, so the kids just built and practiced with the robots but did not enter any official competitions.  This year the coaches decided to take the program to the next level by registering for a few competitions in the Atlanta area.  The first competition was last weekend.  Olivia and her partner competed in the "alliance" portion of the event.  This duo was paired with teams from other schools to work together and score as many points as they could in a sixty-second time frame.  Olivia drove the robot for the first thirty seconds.  Her job was to knock down the four hex balls with the robot.  She would then pass the controller to her partner who would try to park the robot on the bridge.  There are other things that you can do to score points, but knocking off the balls and parking on the bridge was our team's strategy.  Olivia and her partner ended up finishing 26th out of 40 elementary and middle school teams.  That's not too bad for their very first competition.

 Since the competition was in Atlanta, we decided to stay an extra night with Cassie and James (Nick was out of town).  I'm so glad that Cassie lives nearby.  I accidentally flushed my keys down the toilet and had to have my car towed to the Honda place to have a new key programmed.  What a mess! Cassie came to the competition and then took my kids home with her while I sorted out the key fiasco.  She was a real life-saver.  Once the key situation was taken care of we all went out to eat at Longhorn and then spent the evening loving on my favorite nephew.  Sweet baby James sugar is just what was needed after a long day.

St Augustine Field Trip

Olivia's WINGS class recently took a field trip to St. Augustine.  It was an all-day affair that included a trolley tour of the city, a visit to Ripley's Believe It or Not, and a trip to the Fountain of Youth.  Olivia reported that she had a great time.  She liked the Ripley's a lot and even took a picture of the metal "Chucky"- the same statue that almost caused her to have a breakdown when I took her last year.  She also liked visiting the Fountain of Youth and thought it was cool that her class got to see a canon firing.  While the canon was cool, the water from the "fountain" was not.  Olivia said that it was gross and made her feel ill.  Olivia was chaperoned by the lovely Granny Mel who also had a great time.

This is the Fountain of Youth (yep, that's it)