v.2

The long waited part 2 of vacation is finally up! I realized I do have a lot of photos from Myrtle Beach so part 2 will be divided into 2 parts. I promise not to wait as long to do part 2 of part 2 as I did to post part 2!

Our Room at Camelot by the Sea. We stayed in a 1 bedroom. Top left shows the bedroom with the front door. Top right shows the kitchen which leads into the living room (bathroom is opposite the frig). Bottom left is the living area with balcony. Bottom right is the couch in the living area.

The lazy river! Our first time experiencing a lazy river. This was the first and last time we tried it. I thought it was fun although I was giggling the whole time I was floating around it. I guess because I don’t know how to swim and I’m not familiar with that floating feeling is what was making me giggle. The water was pretty warm. I think Sienna rather be in the water than floating on it.

Pool! There was the lazy river and 2 pools and 2 jacuzzis (one of each partially inside and one of each fully outside), and a wading pool with a water sprinkler. This was the inside pool. I don’t have any action shots of us enjoying the jacuzzi because I was mostly in the jacuzzi enjoying it!

Here are views of the outside pools from our balcony. The blue awning was over the bar.

Beach time! A self portrait. LOL

View of the hotel from the beach

Food! A sampling of some of the food we ate.

Waffle from Waffle House. This is Yves’ waffle. I don’t put butter on mine. Actually, I don’t usually get a waffle at waffle house! HA! We only went 2 times.

Our thai dinner after our first full day.

Our 2nd time at the River Cafe. We came here the first night we got there. Sienna really liked this place because you can throw the peanut shells on the floor and she got doritos with her hot dog.

After a full day of fun, this is what we found on the sofa:

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Videos that Yves took!

Photos and another video in my previous post!

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My little girl “graduated” from Nursery school last Thursday (a lot earlier than I had thought!) Her celebration included her class marching in (to the tune of “When the Saints go marching in” LOL), singing and calling out their designated colors (hers was white), obtaining their “diploma” from the principal and then marching out (to the same tune.) So very cute! Then there was cake and refreshments afterwards. It happened to be one of the hottest and muggiest days (95 degrees!) of the year but the sweat factor wasn’t bad. My dad came but it was too early for my mother (9:30 am).

Sienna got to sing 2 songs (most of the kids sang 1)
Singing Twinkle twinkle little star with Megan, Natalie and Abby.
Singing Puff the Magic Dragon with William, Abby, Megan and Kosta.
Getting her diploma!

Walking over to Pre-K

The cake

Here is a video I took of them as they were walking off the stage. Hopefully Yves will post a video of Sienna singing her songs soon.

Sienna officially “graduates” from Lisa on Vimeo.

Sienna with Mrs. V, the assistant teacher

Sienna sitting on the lap of her teacher, Mrs. D and Mrs. V.

Sienna and Darany (her and Megan would fight over Sienna!)

Sienna and Lexi (I find out the scoop from Lexi!)

Sienna and Sarah. I don’t know Sarah too well since she is a full day student.

Sienna and Abby. I overheard Abby tell Sienna she likes her. Awww!

Sienna and Caius. Caius always gives Sienna gum after school.

Unfortunately, I was not able to get photos with the rest of her classmates! There is the last birthday party next week so she will get to see her old classmates another time. I’m happy to report that Sienna got into the public school that was our first choice. We registered earlier this week and met another little girl that will be in her class. Thankfully, they started playing with each other as me and her mom were filling out forms. I’m hoping that would get her excited about starting at a new school. Fingers crossed!

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I’m going to separate our vacation to Myrtle Beach into 3 parts. Part 1 will be the drive down, part 2 will be the actual Myrtle Beach vacation and part 3 will be the drive home. So here is part 1!

Yves’ plan was to leave at 8 am on Saturday and we actually left on time!!! Since the drive to Myrtle Beach is supposed to take 12 hours (and that’s without stops), we were going to stop somewhere past the 6 hour mark and stay in a hotel. I sat in the back with Sienna since this was going to be such a long trip. Things went pretty smoothly. We stopped at a rest stop after 2 hours and then for lunch after about 4 hours. We somehow ended up at Frank’s Diner in Jessup, MD. Pretty unassuming place and kinda happy we didn’t end up at a chain (we took care of that on the way home! LOL). It’s an old diner that smelled like old people when you walked in and even had mini jukeboxes at each table! There were only a few tables occupied but like 6 waitresses. Sienna got a grilled cheese and both me and Yves got patty melts with different bread and cheeses. Something must have happened in the kitchen because our food took awhile to come out. The waitress apologized to us and even when Sienna and Yves’ dish came out, mine took another 5 minutes to come out. I do have to say, tho, that it was pretty good!

With the help of our ipad2, we found a Hampton Inn in Colonial Heights, VA to stay in. Although it was not really super necessary to use the ipad to find a hotel, it sure helped us find one with free wifi (which most hotels offer), LCD tvs (which not every hotel offers), indoor pool and vacancies without getting out of the car! Come on, that’s cool, right? We almost picked a hotel with the tube tvs, which would not have worked with the apple tv we brought along, so quickly found one with the LCD. It ended up not working anyway because their wifi was not so high speed. We relaxed a bit in the pool and jacuzzi (woohoo!) before having dinner at Ruby Tuesdays. Yes, a chain but unfortunately, I did not have the energy to try and find a local place. Surprisingly, the food was pretty tasty! We even got dessert! They had one of 4 mini cupcakes (2 red velvet and 2 carrot cake), which was perfect for us!

The next morning we ate the breakfast the hotel offered and off we went! Sienna decided to take over my camera and wanted to take photos too, just like mommy and daddy! Here are her feet:

Find her set of photos on my flickr page here.

We had a planned stop at South of the Border, a place I really wanted to check out! We were going to even eat lunch there but after some investigating, decided we would rather stop somewhere before that to eat (reviews were pretty bad for the restaurants). I used my ipad to find a restaurant and found rave reviews at the restaurant we ended up at. Well, what a disappointment! It wasn’t horrible but wasn’t all that. I can’t even remember the name or where it was!

Anyway, we made it!

It was a pretty hot day so we didn’t stay that long here. If it wasn’t for Sienna, me and Yves probably could have spent a couple of hours walking around the place taking photos! But that’s ok, we got some nice photos.

and some ice cream!

(You can see more in my flickr set!)

Here’s another Shot by Sienna photo that I would like to end this post with. After South of the Border when we were back in the car. Cracks me up!

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Easter turned out to be a beautiful day so we had our first BBQ and dyed eggs outside. It was a nice day!

Getting started with the dye kit. I know I could have made my own dyes but the kit was cheap and a no brainer.

That was the egg Sienna dyed in school and she was fake eating it because she doesn’t eat eggs.

I think the colors came out nice! Sienna’s playing with them here.

Skippy is saying “what’s going on up there?”

The chocolate lollipop was from school and the Godiva was from my Aunt Helen (they were super yummy!)

Wha?

Inside the Godiva

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During the middle of Sienna’s spring break, we went into the city to have lunch with Peter, or as Sienna calls him, Uncle Peeder. Sienna really enjoys riding the subway into the city although she pretty much asks if it’s time to get off at every stop (starting from the 2nd stop from our house!)

Entertaining ourselves while waiting for the train

Checking out the scenery outside

Pete and I both enjoyed the short rib pierogies at Veselka last time so we decided to go back. This time I got the meat combination because I knew I could give Sienna the kielbasa portion of my meal. Pete also gave me one of his short rib pierogi (thank you Pete!).

They gave out wikki stix, a nice change from the standard crayons.

Pete showing off the bracelet Mike made him for their 1 year anniversary! The dark beads are made of the roses Pete gave him from their monthly anniversaries! (Cute AND crafty!!)

My meat combo sans kielbasa (off to the left on Sienna’s plate)

Pete humors me by making goofy faces when I take his photo

Stuffed!

We stopped by Sundaes and Cones for ice cream afterwards.

Pete had to go back to work after that so I decided to check out the newish playground at Union Square. Of course, while we were still eating ice cream, Sienna had to go to the bathroom. We hightailed it outta there and I was hoping to be able to make it to Whole Foods to use their bathroom. I realized we probably wouldn’t make it so we stopped into the Amsterdam Billiards. I usually don’t like to do that but they were really nice and accommodating.

Notice how she is wearing a t-shirt now? I knew she was going to be hot in the long sleeved shirt even though she was so adamant on wearing it. Good thing I brought a short sleeve shirt for her to change in! But she was still hot…(it was a beautiful day!)

I told Sienna she shouldn’t be doing that out in the open! HA!

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Here’s the 2nd in a series of food posts. I went to dim sum with my parents and aunts in Queens on the first day of Sienna’s Spring Break. I forgot to take note of the name of the restaurant but they were having a weekday special where all the dim sum was $2. Needless to say, I stuffed myself and I actually did not eat much dinner later that day! There were the usual standard fare (none of Yves’ favorite-funkore-probably not the correct spelling!) and then a few different items. Chow fun noodles, fried chicken (never actually saw fried chicken at dim sum before), some crab meat dumpling wrapped in rice and muscles with a cheesy like topping. Everything was pretty tasty.

Chow Fun

“I’m gonna eat you don tat”

Fried Chicken

Crabmeat with rice, this was eh

Mussels with cheese like topping. The mussels were good, the topping not so much.

Sienna thanking Aunt Helen for the stuffed dog (among other toys she got from her!)

I really dug these lamps

Sienna asking who I was taking a photo of!

The next night was date night! We dropped Sienna off at grandma’s and grandpa’s and headed over to The Burger Bistro. You get to choose every aspect of your burger, from the bun and meat and cheese and toppings! I was tempted to get the lamb, as I do love lamb burgers, but since it was our first time there, thought it better to see how they make their beef burgers. We started off with one of the special appetizers, frito pie. Basically nachos with frito chips instead of nacho chips. The waiter really played up the dish but it fell short of expectations. Oh well. Thankfully the burgers made up for it! It was huge! I got beef with cheddar, portobello mushroom and bacon on a whole wheat bun with a side of frizzled onions. It was very good. My only complaint was that the bacon were crumbled into bits. I much prefer they were kept in strips. I’m not sure what Yves got and I didn’t get a good photo of his burger. Definitely beef and probably bleu cheese!

This didn’t warrant the $7 price tag and I hate when places use sliced cheese melted over nachos!

Can you tell how huge that burger was? (I did not eat breakfast the next morning!)

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Last week, Brenda was able to answer my call of distress and go out to dinner with me. I had a bit of a crazy week with Sienna being sick and in need of getting out of the house. Sienna had a fever for 4 days!! She’s never had a fever that long, usually any OTC meds I give her for fever takes care of it within a few hours or by next day. Her fever would reduce but then it would come back. She also complained about her ears hurting (she had an ear infection in both ears last month!) and a bellyache so we went to the doctor. The doctor said her ears were fine (thankfully!) but that she had a throat infection! Total surprise on that one. Since the throat infection was viral and not bacterial, he didn’t give her any meds. I felt so bad for her. She started getting better by the 5th and 6th day and it was actually the aftermath of the sickness that drove me batty! Mopyness and whinyness…she is now back to her usual, happy self! Whew!

Brenda suggested we head out early and go to The Meatball Shop. Been wanting to try this place as my friend Pete likes it AND they’ve been on the Martha Stewart show!

Brenda got the Everything but the kitchen sink salad with spicy pork meatball (she shared one with me!)

I was tempted to get the naked meatballs but you could only pick 1 protein so I opted for sliders and got veggie with spicy meat sauce, chicken with mushroom sauce and beef with tomato sauce.

Veggie

Chicken

Beef

My favorite meatball was probably Brenda’s spicy pork! They were all good (although I wasn’t too keen on the mushroom sauce) and I definitely want to go back to try more. But wait! Here is the best part and probably the main reason I would go back; homemade ice cream sandwiches! I love that you could pick the cookie and the ice cream (which is housemade! Awesome!!) Brenda chose the one I would have picked, chocolate chip and mint so I got the ginger snap and vanilla, which actually was the better one. I loved that they use fresh mint but it was a little too much. The ginger snap was so good and just the right amount of ginger.

Since we were in the ‘hood, had to drop by Bisou Ciao and picked up 2 macarons for home, the salted caramel and blood orange with dark chocolate filling. Do I have to tell you they were delicious?

Our next stop was Baohaus. When Brenda sent me the link and asked if I wanted to stop by after meatballs, I said hell yes!

We got the Chairman Bao, which is pork belly. Very delish! Definitely need to go back to try more!

A very small place

Cute family photos on the wall

And of course, how could I not pick up some Sugar Sweet Sunshine cupcakes to take home for the family (big wink)?

2 pistachio (by far their best), a peppermint chocolate and spicy pumpkin. And proof that family ate it:

More photos of food excursions to come as it just so happened that I went out to eat 4 days in a row! Oy, my belly…

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As mentioned in earlier posts, we went to the Please Touch Museum in Philadelphia a few weekends ago. We decided to make a weekend out of it and booked a room at Crowne Plaza Hotel, chosen because of the indoor pool (which ended up being close for renovations! GRRRR!) Anyhow, lots of photos were taken so I’ll keep the words short. Pete joined us for the trip and it was great fun to have him with us. The museum totally rocked, the building majestic and I would definitely recommend this place and want to go back!

On to the photos!

Pete was a good crayon assistant to Sienna in the back seat

The sign outside

The beautiful ceiling (I can’t believe I didn’t take a photo of the building, which is beautiful)

They had a few of these cutout head bodies. Lots of fun!

Garage

Water Area

These clouds and rainbow were above the water area, I loved them!

This cracks me up!

They have an awesome Alice in Wonderland area!

We played with blocks for a little bit and Sienna enjoyed knocking down all our blocks.

These were taken downstairs in the “city” area. I don’t remember why they had a vespa there. Sienna found this dog in the house area and played with it what felt like forever! This was also the area where Pete’s video was taken of the shopping. There was also a hospital but we did not go in there.

There was also a section of old stuff and I really thought the typewriter was cool!

They also had a display of retro toys (not in the same area as the old stuff). I had to take a photo of this because we had one when I was younger.

Waiting in line to shoot a “rocket”

Shooting the rocket!

There really are so many photos I am not posting. I ran into some old friends at the museum (small world!), me and Sienna rode the carousel, Sienna ate a hot dog for lunch and we went to Dalessandros (recommended by a friend) for cheesesteaks! MMM!

And of course, I have to show Sienna wearing the 4 shirt I made for her for her birthday (which she did not want to wear on her actual birthday but the day after!)

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This embroidery was made for the Profile Stitch swap for cobalt gypsy

Mug Rug swap for zigg13pra, who is a GS volunteer.

Sienna went to a birthday party in early March for Olivia and I made her this shirt. Funny and cute photos of the party can be seen on here!

I have been getting Sienna into more crafts! The first photo she is coloring Princess shrinky dinks from a kit I got at the craft store (plan to make my own next time!). The 2nd photo she is helping me paint a box for Yves to keep his watches in. That one is still a WIP because we have to put Spider-Man stickers on it.

I’m happy that Sienna likes Super Heroes as much as Princesses so I made her this Wonder Woman paper doll cut with my Silhouette

And that was before she got a real Wonder Woman doll and Green Goblin (or Gobalin as Sienna says it) from my former boss at Mada Design! How I love Facebook!

Sienna’s school had a Wacky Tacky day. Wear the wackiest outfit for a chance to win a free lunch (although Sienna doesn’t eat lunch at school!). So I sewed together 3 different parts of 3 different shirts that Sienna pretty much outgrew. I wanted to take a couple of photos and she totally went into pose mode. I posted the above photo and 4 others here. She is such a crack up. I did not give her any direction whatsoever! All these poses were done on her own and within 5 minutes!

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