Well, by popular demand (thank you for your comment, Cathy), I decided to finish out the blog for this trip, even though this is a week (or more) late. Some of my pictures of Andrew were just too good not to share, especially the sandbox ones.
So we were at the Doctors Froeschke for 15 days. The first week John had to travel to Galveston, so we (hopefully) were helpful to Bridgette as she was dealing with the last few days (hopefully) of morning/evening sickness. We did a lot of book reading to Andrew, especially Grandpa who for some reason seemed to be points ahead of me. Some mornings they had read 20 books before breakfast.
And we continued the daily popsicle ritual when he got home from daycare.
John returned Thursday night and we went to the zoo on Friday, except Bridgette who had to go to work. I accidentally left my camera in the truck so no pictures from the zoo. But we checked out the rhinos (his current favorite), the water buffalo (a close second), and of course the goats in the petting zoo. Then he played in the water park, which was great because it was really hot and humid. I wouldn't have minded running through some of those water sprays.
Saturday we all went to a Halloween pumpkin patch kind of place, with lots of exotic animals there too. Andrew really enjoyed this. We started and ended with pony rides, but he got to see and do a lot of things here.
Bridgette fell in love with a guinea pig, but we managed to leave there without adopting it.
We had a little rest, then Andrew tried out the tricycle, then we went on a hayride.
He loved playing on the hay, and in the pumpkin patch he has to try to move every pumpkin. Then he found a palm frond that he became quite attached to and drug it around for a while.
And there was the python. The biologist parents were excited that he wasn't afraid of it anymore. Me, not so much.
We finished the day here by climbing on the posts, then we headed back home, plenty tired.
We did work in a birthday cake celebration for John today, since he was out of town on his birthday.
We managed to get in a little sandbox time on Sunday.
John had a four-day weekend, so we had one more day for fun. It was a fishing trip on Tampa Bay, launching their pontoon boat at Alfalfa River. We didn't have too much success, although John caught one sheepshead, which is Bridgette's project fish, and Grandpa and Andrew snagged two small mangrove snappers, which I failed to get a picture of. Grandpa let him work the fish in the water for a while, so Andrew really liked that.
John drove over and scared up a bunch of seagulls on the water, so Andrew got all excited watching them. Then we had a small pod of dolphins performing around the boat for a while for our entertainment.
After the parents went back to work, we finally got some rest. But then it was time to think about getting ready to leave. Fortunately, Joe had a little help washing the motorhome.
The Halloween costume (rhinoceros) arrived the evening before we left, so we got a very short preview of that.
He wouldn't put the headgear on, so hopefully by Halloween that will change.
Finally, it was time for final reading on our last night, so Grandpa (of course) got the honors again.
