A Mother's Day Tradition

After 3 years of spending Mother's Day at my mom's condo at Amelia Island, I think it's safe to call this a tradition. I know I'm already looking forward to next year's Mother's Day at the island. Like last year, this year's vacation started with Saturday morning at the Jacksonville Zoo. This year we came prepared...(1) double stroller, (2) swim suit with change of clothes and (3) a long talk about feeding giraffes days before the trip. That's right, Savannah got to feed the giraffes!!! And since we talked about it for 3 days prior to the trip, she was up for it when it game time came.



The Jacksonville Zoo has a cool play park for the kids. Last year we didn't know about this and didn't bring Savannah's swim suit or a change of clothes. Regardless of that fact, I doubt Savannah would have gone anywhere near it last year. This year, however, Savannah loved the water park in the children's area.




In years past, instead of coming back to the condo with Stephen and I, Savannah would have gone home with Nana and Papa Bob. This year, however, we wanted to take Savannah to the beach. Since Gage isn't quite old enough to enjoy the beach, Nana and Papa Bob took Gage home with them Saturday night. This gave Savannah some much needed Mommy and Daddy time. She loved the beach!!! While I'm still not a big fan of sand and salty wind, there's something really cool about playing in the sand with a 3-year old. Savannah and I build a sand castle while Stephen flew a Pooh and Tigger kite. Savannah even let Stephen and I bury her legs and turn her into a mermaid!



After a quick shower, the three of us went out for pizza and then off to miniature golf. Given that it was after 7:30 before we finished dinner, we didn't think Savannah would last more than 5 holes. Boy, were we wrong! Savannah loved putt-putt!!! She even birdied the first hole beating both Stephen and I. After the first hole, however, it turned into Savannah teeing off, picking up her ball and either (1) teeing off again so she could watch the ball go down all the hills or through the hidden tunnels or (2) placing the ball next to the hole and then tapping the ball in. Once all the balls were in the hole, she would pick them out and assign each person a new color ball. In an effort to prevent a fit after the final hole, we started explaining around Hole 15 that on the 18th hole, the ball would go into the hole and we would not be able to get it back. Good thing we did...no fits after the ball went to Neverland.

Sunday morning (Mother's Day)...we got up, had a quick bowl of Cheerios and headed back down to the beach. We played for about and hour and a half and then went back to the condo to shower before lunch. We had lunch downtown and then drove up to St Marys to see Nana, Papa Bob and Gage. Savannah stayed the night with Nana, and Stephen and I had a fancy dinner at The Beech Street Grill back on the island.

Monday, Stephen and I went to my favorite breakfast spot on Amelia and then drove over to The Plantation for a few hours of leisurely bike riding. The Plantation is absolutely gorgeous! In all the years of vacationing on Amelia, this was my first visit to The Plantation. After lunch, we went back to the condo. The plan was for Nana to keep Savannah and Gage another night, however, after about 5 minutes of silence, we were desperately missing the kiddos and thought Savannah needed one more trip to the beach before going home on Tuesday. So I called Nana and she brought Gage and Savannah back down to Amelia so we could take Savannah out to the beach one last time. Nana did take both kiddos back to St Marys with her for the night to allow Stephen and I one more delectable dinner at Espania...yum!



Mom and Bob, thank you for another wonderful Mother's Day weekend at your beautiful condo!