Quiet Morning...

 

 

Penguin Alert!

Excuse me for interrupting the "Be a Tourist" series, but I wanted to share what little furry creature visited Charles' school yesterday - a penguin!  One of Charles' classmate's father works at the SC Aquarium, and he brought over the cutest penguin for the children to see.  He was so furry and soft - his name is Granddad, being all of 17 years old.  He is a Magellanic Penguin, which is from South America and grows to be about 8 1/2 pounds.  The children loved watching him eat fish and petting him using the "two finger" rule.   Frances cried when they brought him out, but warmed up to him as he waddled about.  Charles, however, was amazed with Granddad.

 

 

Be A Tourist - Day 2

The next place we visited was the Fire Museum - what kid would not love a museum full of fire trucks, fire poles, and truck simulators?

 

 

Tourist Season

In case you've been wondering what we have been up to over the past month, we have been touring our little city.  Charleston offers this neat $50 pass during the month of January for free admission to over 30 museums, plantations, historical homes.  We've already saved $130 over the cost of the pass.  It's called Be a Tourist in Your Own Town, and it has been so much fun exploring all the awesome sights this city has to offer.  So, I plan on posting a few pics each day over the next week to show you our adventures.

New Year's Day, we visited Patriot's Point.  Even though it was raining and freezing, we had a great time exploring the USS Yorktown.

When it's raining outside...

A few pics from Christmas

Two sweeties

 

Helping her cousin

 

 Little Construction Worker

Her favorite gift - rain boots

Big Boy

I'm on a roll

Still catching up from Christmas pictures - here are a few that were supposed to be our Christmas photo cards...BUT, as you can see, I could never get the perfect picture - having to work with wind, sand, lighting, snotty noses, and two silly babies was just too much this year...maybe next year.  Even though we didn't get the money shot, we had a lot of fun at the beach and I did get some cute pics.

 

 

 

Festival of Lights - SC Style

I'm backing up a bit, and wanted to share a little of December with you.  We went to the grand Festival of Lights on James Island.  It has over 3 million lights displayed all around the county park - as Jacob says, "a redneck's paradise."  The kids absolutely loved riding around and looking at all the lights - they have every kind of light display you could imagine - everything from marching soldiers to the Ravanel Bridge to Santa playing golf.  You could hop out of the car line and roast marshmellows, have story time, sip on some hot chocolate, and take a train ride.  We had so much fun...especially with our Aunt Julianna going with us - she just moved to Charleston and have loved every minute of her being here.

Getting ready for the train ride

Aunt Julianna and Frances

They spotted a dog!

The fabulous train

Keeping warm

And a Tutu

Here are a few cute pics of Frances' first tutu from Christmas.   I won it in a raffle at a cute cute maternity/baby store.  They normally go for $45!  With my new sewing machine I got for Christmas, I plan to make an assortment of tutus for Miss F.   I will keep you posted on the sewing homefront - my plans are to make a cape, tutu, and pillowcase dress for starters, so if you know any good sewing websites, please let me know!