Jacksonville Trip

Wow - I can't believe our Jacksonville trip is over and done with already! It went so fast (as vacations tend to do). I was so worried to start off. I worked last Sunday and Monday nights, and when I got home from work Tuesday morning I was told Mira had thrown up over night. Of course it had to happen the day before we leave for a vacation! I had terrifying visions of Mira barfing all over us on the plane. But she didn't get sick again the rest of the day and she was eating and drinking okay so who knows what that was all about. (Update: I took Mira to her pediatrician today to see if we can figure out why she's been having these random episodes of vomiting and then diarrhea. Neither of us could make out a pattern or common denominator to any of the episodes so we're just going to have to watch her and make note of everything she did and ate the 24 hours previous if it happens again, and if it keeps happening the next step would probably be a referral to a pediatric gastroenterologist. Hopefully we don't get to that point but we're not there yet). Our plane left at 1:00 AM Wednesday morning. Mira was, understandably, very wound up and extremely tired so when we got on the plane she wanted to run around. Obviously, she couldn't do that. So, she screamed. And screamed. And kicked and thrashed and hit and threw anything she could get her hands on. I was about ready to cry myself after awhile. We were officially those people. You always hope when you get on a plane that there won't be any little kids to ruin the flight with their screaming - well, now I was on the other end and I wanted to shoot myself. Luckily, as soon as they turned the lights off in the cabin and we started moving, she settled down and fell asleep. Mark and I didn't sleep - it's impossible to sleep on a plane. But luckily that was the worst part - thanks to Benadryl Mira was fine for the rest of the traveling.

The big thing Mark and I were looking forward to during this trip (besides visiting with family, of course) was taking Mira to the beach again. As you might recall, Mira has been in both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans already, and hated it thoroughly both times. I was hoping that since she has started to enjoy her little wading pool and splash pads and such she would have more fun. So we took her to the beach and as soon as she saw the water and took off running for it as fast as she could go! Mark and my brother Ian had to scramble to get to her before she got to the water. Certainly a different reaction than before! She was a little unsure once she actually got in the water but at least she didn't scream the second her feet got wet this time. Here come the pictures:

Every time we go to the beach my Dad brings a fishing net so he can go into the shallows and try to net little fish swimming around. He got some really amazing catches this time - I've been watching him do this for years and I've never seen him get so much stuff! We started to worry about what would be chasing all these fish close to shore. Mira was a little scared at first about the larger fish (because they splashed water once they were in the bucket) but she was obviously very fascinated.

Got shrimp?

Some sort of ray! We ended up throwing him back.

Mira also spent a lot of time chasing after the birds she saw.

Her little run is so cute!

If you're not fast enough she'll get away from you!

Watching the waves come in

Umm never mind

Playing in the sand with Aunt Sara. Mira ate a LOT of sand that day.

Another catch

Mira investigating

Maybe I'll watch from back here...

Nothing quite as nice as your toes in the sand!

I have no idea what she's doing here.

Off to chase the seagulls

Mark was really good about making sure Mira had fun in the water this time. He took her out to about where the waves were breaking and would jump the waves with her. Finally she would get a huge grin on her face with the big splash as they jumped the waves. Yay, she finally loves the beach!

She's cuddling because she's sleepy. My dad is in the background ready to cast his net.

This was so bizarre. Enlarge the picture and tell me if it doesn't look like the ship is floating.

Obviously it wouldn't have been a trip to Jacksonville without our annual visit to St. Augustine! This time my dad and siblings went with us, which was great. We didn't go to the fort, since we've been there before and we had a bit of a late start, but we spent some time walking around the shopping district and, of course, we ate lunch at the Santa Maria Restaurant. Mira had so much fun feeding the fish! We would give her a slice of bread to feed the fish, and she would tear off a small piece and toss the large piece into the water. She's so silly!

Poor Mira was so cranky by the end of the day - she didn't get a nap and there was so much going on she wasn't able to settle down. Even when we were driving back she wasn't able to fall asleep, probably because there were so many people in the car.

As we were driving back into my grandparents' neighborhood, we had to stop as a family of ducks crossed the road.

One of my favorite parts of visiting my family is when everyone gathers in the house and we just relax around the TV. Scenes like this are some of my favorite memories as a little kid.

My Uncle Glen's "dog" Skippy.

Just for size comparison

Mira of course enjoyed being the center of attention. Skippy wasn't so sure about being upstaged but Mira took full advantage of the situation! She got to eat as much junk food as she wanted (again, one of my favorite memories of visiting my grandparents growing up was being allowed to watch TV as much as I wanted and eat whatever I wanted) and she had lots of new people to play with. She kept us all on our toes though - the first night we were there Mark caught her just before she dropped a remote into the toilet. She chased people (or got chased) around and around the sofa, and she would run laps around the entire house multiple times (where did she get all that energy???). We figured out we had to keep the doors locked because she could reach the door handles and escape the house if we didn't. She had fun opening and closing my grandparents' bedroom door playing peekaboo with everyone. My favorite moment that had everyone laughing so hard we were crying involved Mira finding the toilet paper roll in the bathroom. We were all watching TV in the living room and next thing we knew Mira pranced in with a long trail of toilet paper leading all the way back to the bathroom. That was priceless!

Look - I finally got a picture of her talking on the phone!

No hands!

She also found the landline phone. We kept waiting for the National Guard to show up at the house.

Mira did not want to cooperate when it was picture time

The Vandermolen clan

Mira fell asleep on the drive to Jacksonville Airport. This is so sweet. :)

We really need to go back for another visit soon! We only had 2 full days there and 2 partial days, but that's not long enough. Hopefully we can squeeze in another trip before Mira turns 2 and we have to buy her her own plane ticket. The problem with short visits is it's tiring - although I would like to point out that going on vacation with a small child doesn't make it much of a vacation because of the amount of work still involved. We took Mira on a trip to Yellowstone when she was about 3 months old and as fun as it was, there was definitely a new level of stress involved to bring a little baby along and this felt the same way - fun but so exhausting. Luckily there were lots of people around willing to help out, but still, it would have been nice to spend more time just visiting with family. Time to start saving up for the next trip!

Mira did well on the flights back to Salt Lake. The plane to Atlanta had lots of empty seats so we ended up having a row to ourselves. So we sat Mira in the seat next to the window and she had so much fun looking at the wings and pointing at stuff outside the window, and when we took off she turned to me with the hugest grin. Mira was cute in her own seat - the first thing she did was reach for the seat belt and try to buckle herself in. She's really good about that - any sort of seat with buckles she reaches for the buckle and tries to buckle herself in. Once Mark and I took her grocery shopping and Mark put her in the shopping cart without buckling her in. She tried to do it herself and when she couldn't she tried to give the straps to Mark and squealed and shrieked until he buckled her up. She slept for most of the flight from Atlanta to SLC - she was starting to get fussy but once the Benadryl kicked in she was out for the duration.

What a busy summer it's been!