Random Tidbits

I've never done a random tidbits post, but I've been thinking about it lately and decided that it's time. So here goes.

Yesterday, Sydney and I started swim lessons. We're doing with my friend Karie and her son. I'm so glad she gave me to motivation to take the plunge (no pun intended). I've been wanting to get Sydney in these lessons since we've been in CDA but we've never had a full month of not going anywhere. I was having a hard time making the commitment because I didn't want to miss any of the lessons (twice a week/4 weeks). Well, sometimes you just gotta do things even when you don't know what even the next week will hold. Sydney loved the lessons, she loves the water, period. She's not quite old enough to get everything out of it, but if nothing else, I'm learning a lot about what I can teach her once she reaches the appropriate developmental age. Also, Karie and I are the only ones in the class, so it's a great time to hang out with an old college friend.

We are on the very down hill slide of this deployment. John should be home in a little over a month. We're both planning on what we think is the latest possible time he could get home, which we think is April 15th. I'm having a hard time counting down the days yet, because I feel like, although we are close, a month is still a long time. Maybe once we hit March 15th, I'll start a count down.

Home, hmm, what is that anyway...
Well, we are not sure what our home will be. We currently have a contract on a house. The inspection and appraisal are complete but whether or not it will all go through is still pretty iffy. The house is a duplex that we put a couple offers in on before John left. So either we are thinking the 3rd time's the charm, or we're just really stubborn.

Kelsy and I spent the last 2 days taking care of our friends kids while they are on vacation. Four kids in all (with Sydney). I thought it would be interesting to see what it was like with four children under 7. It went very well, mostly due to the fact that these parents have their children very well trained and it made things a lot easier because of that. But it was also good to know that it is not even possible to have children as close together as the youngest two are (8 months apart). This is where Kelsy was a huge help because she pretty much handled there youngest, while I handled Sydney, who has a very short invisible string these days(more on that next). I'd say our time with them was a success!

Sydney's invisible string...
We're going through the separation stage right now. And let me tell you, it's bad. She no longer will let her aunt, who we've lived with for the past 5 months, hold her without crying. I can't even go to the bathroom without her crying, unless I bring her with me. Church has been pretty tough because if I take her to the nursery I spend the entire service listening her crying back there (yes the sounds carries into the main room) and if I keep her with me I get nothing out of the service. So I'm not really sure what the point of me going right now is. I guess I should be flattered that I'm so needed.

Thank you all for your support of the new etsy endeavor and spreading the news among your circles.

Whelp, that's about it. Hope you enjoyed the first installment of randomness. Sorry it ended up being so long.

What We've Been Up To Lately

Traveling- We went to Iowa to visit my grandparents,
I'm so thankful that Sydney is a good traveler

Talking on the phone, everything is a phone these days.

Four generations

Great-Grandpa and Grandma

Sydney had fun with Great Grandma's walker, and it must have given her the practice she needed, because...

We had a visit from our PMS (pretty much sister), Julie, she also posted about her trip and you can read it here

Best friends in the making!

And Kelsy and I topped it off with a Mat Kearney concert, and Sydney had her first real babysitter! All went well and it was an awesome concert!

That pretty much wraps it up for the past month!

The rest of the story...

No, our travels did not stop in Norfolk. After saying goodbye to John, realizing that I forget my wallet in the terminal after trying to buy some gas, going back and saying good-bye once more, we set out for Fairmont, WV to visit Aunt Katy, Uncle Eli, and Xander. We had to go through DC and never having been there, I thought it would be a shame to just drive through. So we took the exit for the Memorial Park. Sydney and I walked through and saw the Washington Monument, White House, Lincoln Memorial, Vietnam Memorial, Korean War Memorial, WWII Memorial, the Capitol, and we even had time to hit the Holocaust Museum (which I would like to go back and spend more time in).

After that little break, we went onto Fairmont. By the way, it took me a good 45 min. to figure out how to get out of DC and get back on the freeway. I kept missing my turns, but thank goodness for the iphone and the maps app. Otherwise, I would probably still be there. We got to Katy's at about 7:30 that night. It was quite a long day.

Our time with Katy was filled with lots of playing. Sydney and Xander had a very good time together, playing and mimicking each other. We made it to the WV zoo, which is literally in someones back yard. However, they did have an impressive selection of animals. Sydney got her first bee sting there and I'm happy to announce that she's not allergic to bees. I think the bee landed right on her nose and she swatted at it, thus getting a bee sting.

It was sad to leave them after only a few days, but the beautiful fall colors were a nice pick-me-up on our drive to Chicago. Once there, we took in the Chicago Marathon, which I'm proud to say, my uncle completed. What an accomplishment for all those people. We also went up to a pumpkin farm and did a corn maze, went on a tractor ride, and picked some pumpkins out, of course. My dad flew in the last day in Chicago to drive the rest of the way with me.

Onto Cedar Falls, IA to meet the Great-Grandparents...

We spent a few days in Cedar Falls, mostly relaxing and playing with Great- Grandma and Grandpa. Grandma Betty couldn't take her eyes off Sydney and it was fun to see them all interacting. 

After leaving there, we were pretty much headed straight home. We stopped in Moville, IA to see my Uncle (dad's brother), I realized that I hadn't seen him since I my senior year in high school. I guess I've changed a little since then. :) We made it to Chamberlain, SD that night.  The next day, we stayed in Sheridan, WY with a stop through Mt. Rushmore and the Crazy Horse Monument. The following day we drove a short (relatively that is) distance to my good friend and pretty much sister, Julie and her family. She was kind enough to house us for a night. And the next day we made it to Coeur d'Alene. Ahhh, what a sigh, when we parked the car and knew that we would be here for a while.  It was a wonderful trip. I think we made the most of it as a family. Sydney was awesome the whole time. The only downfall was that John couldn't finish the trip with us, but we would have never done the trip if he hadn't been deploying. I appreciate my dad for taking the time to drive back with me. Sydney is such a good traveller, that I think we could have done it ourselves, but it was sure a comfort to know that we if we got a flat tire, or something else unexpected happened, that there was someone there to help. Plus it was some good quality time with my dad that I haven't had in a very long time.

p.s. after being in Coeur d'Alene for 2 days, we hit the road again and headed to Tacoma. You know, just can't stay in one place for too long. Well, Sydney did have to go for a dr. appt. and we had to pick up some of our stuff there, and of course see the westside grandparents. 

A welcome to DC surprise

Washington Monument

White Huse

Vietnam Memorial

Lincoln Memorial

Unfortunately the reflecting pool was under construction

It seemed interesting to be taking this picture the same day that John deployed,  good reminder

Okay, so I actually did a drive by past the Capitol building, I was a little tired of walking

Playing with cousin Xander

Xander decided he needed help walking too

And I think he wanted to be a baby again

feeding the goats

Kind of a happy camper after the bee sting

Siberian Tiger

Just chilling

Xander was really enjoying the chocolate cake

Sisters

Fall colors in Pennsylvania 

Go Uncle John

The crazy Kenyans leading the pack

Hanging with cousin Mary Faith

There he goes (green shirt)

Looking pretty good for running 26 miles

Corn Maze

Great-Grandma Betty

having a snack together

Mt. Rushmore

Crazy Horse, they still have a long way to go

Grandpa Dave, with Julie's kiddos

Breakfast time

Group Pic 

back from the hiatus

If you've been wondering, "where in the world is the Robbins' Family." 


We've been everywhere...


Or at least that's what it feels like. I believe we left off in Altus, OK. On Sept. 17th,  almost exactly a month from when we got to Altus, we rolled out of town, heading south east toward Hulbert Field on the panhandle of Florida. John had his final training for the deployment there for a week. We had some beach time, some visiting old AK friends time, and some date time (the first real one since we've had our little monster) (pictures to follow). 


After finishing up at "Hurby," our next "had to be at" destination was Norfolk, VA on Oct 2nd. So we took our time heading up the East Coast. Our first night on the road, we were intending to get to Savannah, GA, but due to a torrential rain storm we decided to call in quits for the night and ended up finding a delightful little island off the coast of Georgia called Jekyll Island. Keep in mind that we got there in the pitch dark of night during a rain storm, so it was pretty neat getting up the next morning and figuring out where we were. Apparently this is the island where all the hoity toity people from back in the day came to vacation, such as JD Rockefeller. And before that there was a large plantation inhabiting the island. The island is also home to Georgia Sea Turtle Center where they rehabilitate and/or house injured sea turtles.


Moving along, we did make it to Savannah the next day, which was only a two hour drive. Savannah was a charming southern town. We were able to tour one of the old historic homes, the museum and take a walk along the riverwalk. 


The next day we headed to Charleston, SC. This was about a 4 hour drive. We started off with meeting some more old Alaska friends for lunch. Sydney got to meet a new friend and see an old one too! After that we went to the Boone Hall Plantation which was just on the out skirts of town. It is very interesting to see some of that part of our nations history. For dinner we headed downtown to Hymans, had some good southern cooking(complete with hush puppies and gritsa) and then walked around for a while (great downtown area). The next day we took a tour of Ft. Sumter, which was a strategic location for the Confederates during the Civil War.


Next we headed to North Carolina and the outer banks. We had a plan for staying as far east as we could, which meant taking a few ferries between islands on the outer banks. Well, we found out from a lovely lady at a gift shop we just so happened to stop at, that one of the ferries was closed due to hurricane Irene. So that changed our plans a bit, but we were still able to see most of what we wanted. We stopped in this quant little town called New Bern, NC. It has some really neat old churches and buildings and is the home of Tryon Palace. Next stop is Kitty Hawk, NC.


We made it to Kitty Hawk pretty late in the night. In the morning we got up and headed to the Wright's Brother Memorial. John had never been, so it was pretty neat for him to see where the first flight had taken place at. It was funny to think that something these two guys did so long ago, would effect our lives so directly. Next we headed to Currituck Lighthouse. We climbed all the way to the top and I have to admit, I was a bit scared once there. The wind was blowing pretty hard and we could kind of feel the lighthouse moving with it. The adventure continued as we set out in search for wild horses. Yes, there are a few islands on the east coast that are still home to wild horses. But to get there we had to drive on the beach and through the island which only had sand roads, no gravel, no pavement. We were a little nervous, as we really could not afford to get stuck out on this beach somewhere. Well, come to find out it really wasn't too big of deal and this island is very much inhabited by humans and not just horses. It kind of reminded me of spotting moose in people yards in Anchorage. After we found our "wild" horses, we took some time to soak in some sun and some beach. No sooner did we get everything out, everyone in their swimsuits, then a massive rain cloud rolled in and down poured. Luckily it only lasted a few minutes and we were able to enjoy the beach one last time.


On to Norfolk, we rolled in late in the night again. That seemed to be the pattern of this trip, we couldn't get into our hotel before 10pm to save our lives. As we drove closer and closer to Norfolk, I think both John and I were starting to feel the weight of it all settle in. But we tried to put that behind us as much as possible and enjoy the time we had. The next day we spent some time in the parking lot organizing and repacking car once more. We took the afternoon and went to Williamsburg. We actually got there later that we intended and only had a few minutes to check out Old Williamsburg. However, as short as it was Sydney still managed to make more friends and get into a little trouble. We had a lovely dinner and then headed back to the hotel for some sleep and to prepare for an early departure. 

While in FL we were able to be there for our friend Jessie's (right) surprise 30th birthday party

Beach time

And for our first date, we wanted to do something we couldn't do with Sydney, since usually we can pretty much bring her anywhere, so we decided to go parasailing

All the way up, 500 ft.

View from up top

the rain storm

Jekyll Island Club, pretty posh, wouldn't you say?
Notice the couple playing croquet 

My dorky hubby

the sea turtle

and our little turtle

this style of bridge was very popular, we saw it a couple times, makes some pretty neat pictures

checking out our new digs

playing dress up at the Savannah Museum

beautiful rainbow during sunset

Friends from AK, Emma(right) was born a few months before Sydney and Avery(middle) was born a few months after

drive up to Boone Hall Plantation, interesting trees

the house, this was not the first house however, this one was built in 1936. 

slave homes

this was an interesting sign in downtown Charleston, just thought it was kind of funny

Ft. Sumter

Church in New Bern

Tyron Palace

Wright Brothers

the memorial, Sydney's really excited

Currituck Lighthouse

driving on the beach

our first horse spotting

a few more

cleaning the naked baby

we saw these ones on our way out, kind of neat

repacking, where's Sydney

I know you've seen this one before, but it's too funny

we had some trouble too

the crowd that gathered around Sydney while we were getting our picture taken, how funny

family photo

last supper with dad