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Wednesday, October 21, 2015

The End of Florida

Well, okay, it wasn't the end of Florida....just our time there.

We had one day before we needed to head home and after all our packed full "park" days were done.

Rainman decided that after all that walking during the week, that he should go play 36 holes of golf.  LOL  He was able to talk D-man into that, but A-girl held firm and only went for 18 of those holes!  I am not sure how we was able to manage that, since this is how I looked pretty much every night when we got back to our room....

( you can see....I need some of your Rodan and Fields magic on my skin!)

The other kids and I decided to hang out at the pool and in the activity center, on site, at our timeshare/hotel place.

We all had fun.  The activities center staff was super, duper friendly and a happy bunch of college aged folks.  But, they were not exactly up on ....hmmm.....not quite sure how to explain this......

They weren't especially busy, so they congregated in the activities center and talked/flirted, told loud stories of stuff that they had done lately.  A few not so good words were used, but my kids were soaking in the glory of mom letting them have unlimited access to actual video games....both Wii and I don't think they even noticed!

We did a few of the advertised activities and this is where my issue came in the most with the staff.  They had little ceramic things for you to paint....yet, they had no painting smocks or anything to protect kids clothing.  Okay, no problem, I said.  Then I asked, "Well, can I just get a garbage bag or something so I can cover up their new, super expensive Disney t-shirts their dad just bought them?"  This is where I was greeted with sort of a blank stare and a, "Ummmm....I don't think we have anything like that here."

So, I told the kids to stay put and I drove back across the complex to our room to get a stained t-shirt for them to change into.

My big girls have a tradition at most of our timeshare places to make tie dye t-shirts, so they did the same at this place.  This time the activities people decided to host it pool side, not at the activities center.  So, Rainman (in between golf rounds) took them over to the pool while I stayed at the activities center with the younger ones.

The activity center personnel actually "made" the shirts for the girls...they put on the rubber bands, the put on the die (based on their color selections and all of that jazz).  My girls actually didn't have a problem with that, because they were thinking the shirts may turn out better than if they had made them by themselves.  The problem came when they were done.

The staff took off the rubber bands, handed the girls wet shirts - full of dye and told them to let them dry in the sun for 24 hours.

So, they climbed back into the van, with their shirts sort of held out away from their clothes as best as they could (A-girl got some on her golf skirt) and drove back to the activities center to meet the rest of us.  L-girl decided to ask if she could lay the shirts outside on one of the bushes.  They told her yes.  That is where they stayed until we headed to the pool an hour or so later. (I will pause for some pool cuteness here....)

So, remember, the shirts are still wet and dripping with dye.  Rainman had taken the van to golf, but a good thing about this hotel is that because the complex was so huge, they had golf carts that staff would drive you wherever you wanted to go.  So, we got a golf cart ride back to our building.

A-man and L-girl held onto the shirts, sort of hanging off the side of the golf cart - to get them to dry -  and also trying not to get the dye on their clothes.  We ended up draping them on the patio furniture at our room - even though it wasn't in the sun, because if we put them in the sun outside, we figured somebody would walk off with them.

Just seems to me that the staff should have a plan for things like this, right?

I will show you the finished products when I write the post on how our "souvenir or not to souvenir" plans went on this trip.  (Spoiler alert:  Rainman won)

What was I doing while a lot of this action was going on?  Well, some of the time I was re-reading the Harry Potter books that I brought along.  Sometimes, I was oohing and aahing over Mario Cart moves on the video games, but most of the time, I was sequestered in the movie room (right next door to the video games - so I could still actually supervise the kids).....watching....

Okay, that isn't a very good picture.....

Any better?

How about this one?

I will see what kind of guesses you have, if you can figure it out from these crappy pictures!  It is one of my all time favorite movies that I have not seen in forever.

I was happy.

Before we left the next morning, the kids wanted to try out the things we had seen by the side of the building all week, but had been too busy running around to use.

They had smaller bikes too...

V-girl actually had trouble riding this one because it had training wheels.  She whips around here on a 2 wheeler like there is nothing to it.  but, this was the only bike that fit her legs.

When the troops returned (D-man and I abstained from riding - which is sort of funny, since the actual reason that I cannot ride bikes anymore is because of D-man.....LOL)...anyway, when they came back, there had been a shift in manpower....

Like A-girl's helmet?

I have to put this picture in because I was trying to get a closer picture of these 2, especially A-girl and her side helmet, but D-man - who was oh so anxious to get going and hit the road so he could see J-girl  - walked into the shot to hand everybody their stuff so we could go!

They had a blast.  Lots of giggling while they tried to get started.  Shifting riders to the front or back to see if that worked better.  Lots of stories about what happened on the ride.  It was a great way to end our trip to Florida.

Pretty sure we will be back.

So, how about it....any guesses on what movie I was happily watching whilst the kids killed brain cells with their video gaming?