Cloudy And A Chance Of Runny Nose

Day 3 didn't exactly get off to the best start this morning, partly because Day 3 started at 3am with Gracie throwing up. They day continued to look bleak at 8:30 am when Gracie continued to throw up. Needless to say Gracie is sick, and I continue into my 2nd week of "no sleep."

It looks like it is just a cold. She was extra cranky last night and started sniffling. Luckily, we bring along every medicine our daughter could possibly need--just in case. We gave her medicine last night before bed, and as is the case when Gracie pukes; she was choking on well...snot.

She got very little sleep, but after another dose of cold medicine, a granooda bar, and about an hour of Nick Jr., she had her spirits back. Garren and I discussed going home, but I was in the "it's too soon to tell/too drastic a measure camp," and cooler heads prevailed.

We headed to the sand around 10:30am.

She had stopped puking, Candice, and hadn't shown any signs of doing that again since 8am.

I was surprised that the water and sand were as warm as they were. It was overcast, but we enjoyed the time. Gracie made sand pies and decided not to take off her shirt and shorts and get in the water. I didn't push her, but her water-loving spirit bounced back when we went to rinse the sand off after an hour of sand play. Once back in the waves, she was squealing and jumping with delight. She even pulled me so I would go further in with her! The wind was pretty strong, so were the waves. We got blasted by several large ones, and she just giggled. It didn't take long and she was soaking wet and it was getting cool. We wrapped her up and headed back for the room, much to her dismay.

She took an off & on 2 hour nap and got some much needed rest. It wasn't raining at this point, but it looked like it could start at any time. So, Daddy found a nearby mall, and thought we could mill around for a while. She was excited at this prospect, and immediately started talking about riding the horses. We have a carousel at our mall, and she was sure this one would too. Boy, was she about to get the surprise of a lifetime!

We reminded her as we got dressed and loaded into the car that this mall may not have horses. She seemed to understand, but I was a little leery.


Wouldn't you know as we pulled in to this very large mall parking lot, you could see the lights from what was to be a double decker Victorian Carousel. I wish you could have seen her eyes!! She was ecstatic. The rides were $2 a piece. I am cheap, but I knew there was no way out of this one. She chose a horse on the bottom layer of the enormous carousel and she and Daddy climbed aboard. I snapped pictures and took a video, but they don't nearly capture the splendor of this thing. For the nest 50 minutes as we roamed around the very large mall, all she could talk about was the horses. She stopped babbling for a few minutes as we came to a Disney Store and went in an looked inside. But the talk resumed quickly.

Knowing I had been licked (that and the pure joy of this treat), I told her she could ride again before we left. This time she took Mommy along and we went to the top of the ride.

As you can imagine we heard about the horses all the way back to the hotel.

We kept our activities few and short today because of Gracie's cold and the threat of bad weather, but as I keep reminding myself; we had 2 gorgeous days on the beach, and tomorrow we are headed to the Aquarium before the long drive home. We may even make a stop at the Purple Cow.


**Bottom: Mommy got in a few touristy-picture stops before we headed off to the mall. This one was one of my favorites. The beach has all sorts of sculptures all on the ocean front and I have made it my fun task to photo as many as possible. When we get back home I will put tons on Picasa.**

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