After church, we had Mother's Day lunch at my parent's house and then we headed to Galveston. Instead of going straight to the hotel, we went on down to Seawall Blvd and ate at the Rainforest Cafe. Soon after we got seated the elephants and monkeys started their "shows" and Connor got extremely scared. After assuring him that they were toys and they turn on and off, he quickly warmed up to them and couldn't seem to get enough of them. There were 3 monkeys and Connor started calling them "Daddy monkey, Mommy mokey and Connor monkey." After dinner we walked across the street and took our shoes off to play on the beach. Connor and Brad played in the water and fed the birds.
It was starting to get dark so we had to drag Connor away from the beach and go check into our hotel. We stayed at Moody Gardens which has a ton of activities for the family. We planned to go to the beach again the next morning, but when we woke up our plans quickly changed. I had noticed that Connor's eye was red the afternoon before, but I didn't think much of it until he woke up the next morning and the first thing he said was "Mommy, my eye hurts." It was very red and had a bit of crusty stuff on it and I was pretty sure it was pink eye, but we called his doctor and they advised us to see a doctor just in case something was in it or he needed antibiotics. So, instead of having my parents meet us at the beach as planned, we ended up having them meet us at an urgent care facility where the doctor confirmed it was pink eye. I didn't get photos of this part of our vacation. ;) By the time we got done with the doctor, had lunch and picked up his medicine it was time to head back to the hotel for a nap. There was a nice playground at the hotel so we let Connor burn off a little steam before naptime. He and Brad went back to the room while I went to get Mom and Dad checked into the hotel. When I got to the room I found both of them asleep in our bed, which was Connor's first time to sleep in a big bed.
We have never let him sleep with us so when he is on a big bed he always thinks it's playtime. I can't figure out how Brad got him to sleep, but as soon as he woke up we headed to Stewart Beach. It was a nicer area than the free beaches along the island, but since it's not quite Summer, the facilities weren't open and they weren't charging admission. It was very windy and cool, but Connor didn't care. He had a great time playing in the water, digging in the sand and feeding the birds.
After cleaning off as much sand as possible, we headed to Gaido's, which is a restaurant we used to eat at when I was a child that is still open today. Well, it wasn't actually open on Monday of this week (we aren't sure why) so we ended up at Fish Tales on Seawall Blvd for a great seafood meal. We headed back to the hotel where we had a connecting room with Grandma and Grandpa. Connor loved going back and forth between rooms and even got to read books with Grandma and Grandpa while Brad and I went down to the pool for a cool evening swim. By the time we got back to our room, Connor was fast asleep on their bed laying on a big boy pillow. He looked so peaceful, but we decided to move him back to our room into his portable play yard/bed.
On Tuesday we all headed to the aquarium pyramid at Moody Gardens. Although Connor was very excited about going to see the "poosh" (fish) before we went, he was very indifferent once we got there. I'm not sure what was going on in his head, but he finally kicked into gear and ran around like the wild child that he is. :) He enjoyed seeing the fish and especially enjoyed taunting the penguins.
After the aquarium we headed over to one of the other pyramids at Moody Gardens and had lunch before entering the Rainforest. I have to say that the Rainforest was much less exciting than expected, but it did give Connor some good exposure to bugs (is that really good?) and many different plants, trees and flowers. We didn't see a single bird or animal although they had many sounds piped in through the speakers. Oh...we did see turtles. The kind you would see crossing a road....not what I expected in a tropical environment. Not sure why I expected big turtles.
Connor was pretty exhausted after the pyramids so we headed back to the room for a nap. After his nap, my parents came to the room to babysit while Brad and I went out for dinner. We went out to The Strand to find our vacation souvenir and then went to Fisherman's Wharf on the pier. Dinner was great and we even saw a dolphin surface a few times shortly after we sat down.
Wednesday morning we packed up and headed back home. Since we didn't stop at Kemah on the way down, we went on our way home and we are really glad we did. I haven't been to Coney Island, but I imagine that is what it is like...maybe a little nicer since it's been rebuilt since Hurricane Ike last year. There are shops, restaurants and an amusement park. As we were getting ready that morning, I asked Connor if he wanted to go ride the horses (carousel). He enthusiastically said YES and continued to tell me that he wanted to ride the horses until we got there. So, the first thing we did was ride the carousel a couple of times. He picked the Seahorse to ride with Daddy and the Zebra with Mommy.
We then rode the train so we could scope out what we wanted to eat for lunch. We saw a pizza place just a couple of doors down from Marble Slab Creamery. Perfect! After the train, we at pizza before going to see the fish in a restaurant called the Aquarium. We let Connor play in the water in the spray park and then we coaxed him away with ice cream. (that was an easy sell!) After sitting down and enjoying ice cream on the patio, we rode the horses a couple of more times and then Connor was ready for a nap so we hit the road. We had a great Mother's Day and vacation and this is the first vacation that I have taken in a long time that it didn't rain!
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