Family Time

Dani, Carlee and I had out first experience at the Ringling Bros and Barnum and Baily Circus in Baltimore on Thursday. Matt was their too but he has already seen the circus a few times. It is too bad that a show primarily for children is so late, starting at 7 and ending several hours later. Carlee was already tired going into the circus. There was so much going on between seeing her second cousins, eating junk food, tons of people, sweating from the hot arena, so many lights and so much noise...she had a total melt down about half time. Dani did great. It is interesting to note that when I was younger and people would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I would say that I wanted to be an acrobat in the circus even though I had never actually seen them perform! It did look fun and very challenging indeed. It was an interesting experience. Driving through parts of Baltimore made us feel grateful to live where we do! We were so preoccupied that we didn't take a single picture! Hopefully we will get some from my cousin Jess and Brian who invited us and let us stay at their place after words. Thanks again Jess and Brian!!!

We made a weekend of it. Friday we headed from Port Deposit, Maryland to Gettysburg. It was a rainy day. We checked out the newly opened visitors center which was actually a museum really. There was so much to see, read, watch, and learn. We spent a long time in there. I was engrossed. Luckily our girls let us enjoy our time there. We listened to "The Killer Angels" by Michael Shaara on the drive. It is a 1975 Pulitzer Prize winner that tells the story of the horrible 4-day battle at Gettysburg. Between that and the visitor's center, I really learned a lot. We ate at the Lincoln Diner and then got to stay in a hotel! It had a king sized bed, a bath tub and a pool, yeehaa! It was fun. We checked out the actual battle field the next afternoon and it was crazy to actually be walking around the place where so many people suffered and died. Anyway, we then ate at a really yummy pub and I walked into this antique store called 17 on the Square while Matt was playing with Carlee outside. I thought I would just quickly check it out but as it turns out, I could have spent hours looking at stuff in there! There was live music, jewelry, specialty candies, antiques, toys, you name it and for cheap! (Matt finally came looking for me and said he couldn't wait any longer but I had enough time to buy a Gettysburg Glow candle that smells soooo good, an adorable dress for Dani for $4.95, a very cute old school little "Myself the Elf" doll for Carlee for $6 and a picture book for Easter, ya baby!)



So, the little Nielsen family get-away ended up being a very well rounded one indeed: some entrainment, some learning, some relaxing, some swimming, some laughing, some good (and bad) food and some shopping too! It was good quality family time and we needed it! We didn't take a single picture of any of this. Matt had his hands full and there really wasn't much to take pictures of anyway...we just have one picture that we stopped and took on the way there, stay tuned:)