Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Belly and Baby Pictures Weeks 17-21

Week 17

Week 18 now (on the left) and week 18 from 5 years ago (on the right). We attempted to recreate the picture, but without going down to the Statue of Liberty. Axel is cuter anyways.
 

 Week 19

Week 20, halfway there!

Such an excited kid!

My boys looked so good, I had to take a pic!

Axel picked out 2 outfits, one for a boy and one for a girl.

I had my ultrasound in the morning, we picked up Axel from a babysitter, then loaded up the car for a roadtrip to Florida for a long weekend. Axel didn't want to wait until lunch to find out, so we did it on the side of the road (note the snow). Poor guy wanted a sister so bad! He is happy now though.


A great picture of his leg. He was kicking the whole time. The ultrasound doctor had to chase him to get a good picture of his face. I make crazy babies!

Face profile with his hand right by it.

It says "Hi Axel"

Good body outline. Still with his hand by his face, but he was kicking me.

 At Disneyworld!

21 weeks at the beach in Florida



Florida!

We decided to do an epic roadtrip down to Florida to visit Grandma J and Luke.

We left after my ultrasound (its a boy!) and it was snowing, which turned into rain by time we got to New Jersey, then it rained the rest of the day. We stopped for the night in Fayetteville, NC.

The next day was beautiful, and we were able to enjoy stopping for breaks (instead of just running from the car to the potty like the day before). Here we are at a rest stop in South Carolina.

We did a long stop in Savannah, Georgia, for lunch. Jeff had the best crab legs of his life! 


We walked along the shoreline for a bit. This cute boat was along there.


Give me all the salt water taffy! This candy shop had a taffy puller that was cool to watch.

Super steep "historic steps"


This isn't a great picture, but I was trying to capture how pretty the trees are there.

We made it to Orlando at dinner time and had dinner with Sheri and Luke. The next morning we headed to Disneyworld! We took the ferry in from the parking lot.




Our first ride was on Buzz Lightyear.


Then we did the astro orbiter. We decided it would be more fun if we squished into 1 spaceship. My pregnant belly made it difficult, but we did it! And laughed the whole time because we were absolutely smashed together!

Then we did Autopia. I couldn't ride, but Grandma J and Axel rode together and Jeff went alone.



With the Gaston fountain.

 I got my giant pickle! And had to share it with a little moocher.

So strong!

Axel and Jeff did the teacups.


On the Little Mermaid ride.


Then we did Haunted Mansion. Afterwards, Axel said, "Now I never have to do that again." Haha! It isn't that scary, kid!

We ran around Tom Sawyer's Island for a bit. The boys are reading it right now so it was fun to see different set-ups from the book.

Crooked mine shaft on Tom Sawyer's Island


On Jungle Cruise.

Jeff, Axel, and Sheri on Splash Mountain (they are in the last row)




I got myself ice cream since I couldn't ride.

On Pirates of the Caribbean


It was a weird place for it to take a picture. There was nothing to look at except a bright flash.

With our onesie in front of the castle.



So pretty at night!

Sheri and I watched the laser show and then the fireworks. Jeff and Axel went to ride more rides since the lines were shorter.

Dumbo

I think this is Thunder Mountain Railroad. Or Barnstormer. I'm not sure. They rode both of them during the fireworks.


We collapsed in bed that night (got back to Grandma J's after 11). But we got up again in the morning to go to the Kennedy Space Center! There was SO MUCH to see. We saw probably half of what was available with general admission, and we were there for 8 hours! If you are interested in more things that we did and saw (that I didn't take pictures of), here is the website https://www.kennedyspacecenter.com/explore-attractions/all-attractions#IncludeWithAdmission



The "Rocket Garden"

Watched a cool 4D presentation about the first American astronauts

The real flight control center for John Glenn's orbits. We watched real recordings from liftoff and from when they had to abort after 3 orbits.




We took a bus tour around the Assembly building, launchpad, and all that good stuff. We also saw several alligators in the surrounding canals.

The Vehicle Assembly Building. When you look at it, you can't even fathom how big it is. There is nothing around it for reference. But it is the largest 1 story building. If you chop up the Empire State Building, it can fit inside this building 3.5 times. Each stripe on that flag is 8 feet wide. The entire flag is 20 stories high. Just crazy. Those vertical grey fixtures on the side are actually the doors to take the space shuttles and rockets out of.

One of the crawlers (they take the rockets/shuttles from the assembly building to the launch pad). The Falcon Heavy launch was 4 days before we were there, and the tire marks were still in the gravel from transporting it. So cool!

 The Space X building (where the Falcon Heavy was built). Interesting fact: NASA assembles its rockets vertically (hence the huge building) and Space X assembles its horizontally (resulting in a building that is not quite as impressive but still gets the job done).

Standing underneath a real rocket (Saturn V) that was recovered after liftoff.

Snoopy the Astronaut

The walkway used for the Apollo missions! They had a picture underneath to show how small everything looked from way up there. Unfathomable to me (despite the fact that I live in NY and have been in very tall buildings)

Alan Shepard's spaceship he wore on the moon. There was moon dust all over it!

Apollo 14 capsule

Touching a real moon rock!

The shuttle Atlantis, which has been to space 33 times!


Axel in the replica shuttle


Pretending to be in zero gravity in a mock space station

Space slide!


With the original countdown clock.

What good looking astronauts.

Getting some help eating "Space Dots" ice cream

Seriously if you are in Florida, go to the Kennedy Space Center. I can't even list off the cool things we saw, because there were so many. It was amazing! Do you like history? Do you like space? Do you like cool things? Then this place is for you!

 We picked up Luke and went to a BBQ restaurant.

(Next morning) That's one way to eat breakfast!

The next day we went to a beach. It was so lovely! Not crowded, nice weather... So great!

21 weeks!

Evolution of man?




Axel's cute little footprints.

The water got their hole!

Trying to fill up the bucket!



"Dadville," which quickly got destroyed by the waves.


Two tired boys.

The next day we left at 6am to drive back. We made it home at 12:15am. I was surprised how easy the drive was (16 hours of driving, 2+ hours of breaks). Jeff and I switched driving shifts every 2-3 hours (timed with potty breaks) so we never felt too fatigued. My butt definitely hurt, but that is to be expected.

I am so glad we came down for a long weekend. It was nice to escape the snow and cold, and sooooo nice to see Grandma J and Luke. We love you guys!