Seaworld

I wish I could say that my kids always woke up with rainbows sparkling in their eyes, ready to start the day bright and cheerful with a wonder and innocence only children can have. I wish I could, well I could say that my child woke up that way because that would be true. I just wish it was both. Unfortunately one wakes up with glitter in his eyes while the other wakes up with...with...well with something the complete and total opposite of rainbows and glitter. 

As you can imagine having someone that wakes up in such a manner makes it a wee bit hard on the rest of us. Sometimes one would wake up so foul that only she could sit on the couch and no one was allowed to look at her. Other days screaming and yelling would be the treat we were given. Not a very pleasant way to start the day. I finally decided that enough was enough and something had to change. We couldn't walk on eggshells until someone decided they were happy. I discovered that once she ate, her mood lifted and she was sweet and loving, but only if she ate. Seeing that her behavior was something that she probably couldn't help I made it a requirement that she was to eat as soon as she got up. No cartoons, no playing. Food. This seemed to cure the problem. To further help our days along I started the "Stella's Nice Lady Chart". Basically what this chart does is makes Stella accountable for her actions, with prizes to finish out the week. If she was nice and pleasant for 5 days in a row, she was given a treat of some kind. Last week we went and got ice cream. This week the prize was a trip to Seaworld. 

I have to tell you, I was so not looking forward to going to Seaworld. It's summer so it is very crowded. Teigue and Stella are bigger so I can't really keep them in the stroller or Ergo to help corral them. It's busy. I have been putting it off and putting it off. Then she was good for 2 weeks in a row! I could not procrastinate any longer. Well, actually I did. I got the kids to agree to go later on in the day so we missed some of the crowds. And you know what? We had so much fun! We watched the dolphin show, saw some sharks, laughed during a 4D movie, touched some sea stars. We got dizzy on Abbie's Sea Star Spin and ate pretzels shaped like Shamu. We discovered that Teigue is big enough to go on a big kid ride (boo!) and Stella only wants to shake hands with Zoe and Elmo, not that big bird. 

The best part of the night? When I tossed a ring on the top of a bottle and won the biggest giantist gigantic stuffed dolphin for my little munchkins. Me! And only 1 bucket of rings was bought! You think I'm lying about this dolphin? Well, it takes 2 strong big kids to carry it through the park.

Thankfully it was very useful during the 9:50 PM fireworks show that Teigue insisted that we stay for since he didn't get to see any fireworks on the 4th of July.

It's a good thing we own a truck. I have no idea how people with regular cars get these things home. It almost didn't fit in the bed of the Tacoma.