Tiger & Eli: Our trip to St. Simons and Savannah and a little lagniappe...

Last night we returned from a trip to St. Simons Island and Savannah and had a blast! I must say though, that vacationing with 2 babies can be exhausting...particularly hotel sleeping. When we drove up in the driveway I looked over at Aaron and said "Man, I feel like we've been gone for weeks!"

The first night we were away Tiger slept on his little air mattress in the same room as Aaron and I and he was very interested in the fact that we were all sleeping in the same room. It took quite a while to get him to go to sleep, which is quite unusual for my good sleeping boy. Eli slept in the pack and play right by the bed. Well, during the night Tiger kept waking up and yelling out for Aaron and I and I would spring out of bed as quickly as humanly possible to run over to him to calm him down before he woke up baby brother. After about 5 or 6 times of doing that I was just too exhausted to do it again and that is when Aaron rolled over and said "Should we just put him in bed with us?" to which I responded "YES!" So Aaron brought him to bed and put him in between us and that is when Chatty Kathy came alive. The rest of the little bit that was left of the night was spent listening to him saying "Oh, look Momma!" and a very excited "Hi Momma!" and even a few "No, not Rosie...No, not Kya...No, not 'Nette!(it's a game we play)"...etc. This was all accompanied by a few pats on my face by a sweet tiny hand, a few playful kicks by sweet tiny feet, and even requests for hugs. It was sligthly entertaining but I think I would have been more entertained by uninterrupted sleep at that point. :) Amazingly enough, he did not wake Eli up with all of the shenanigans.

We spent the morning in the hotel pool and then went to Chick fil A (or Chick-a-lake as Tiger calls it), which is currently Tiger's favorite restaurant. While we were there Tiger was walking around the dining area and ran face first into a hard steel chair and got a little black eye. It was very, very sad. It prompted the man behind the counter to ask me if I had a double stroller to which I replied "Yes, but not on me!" Then for nap time I dragged Tiger's air mattress into the hotel bathroom and he slept in there. It was a trial run for the upcoming night. After nap we went to a delicious restaurant called Blackwater Grill that was recently featured on Food Network's "Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives" and had the most scrumptious meal. After dinner we took the boys to the beach and all took a dip in the Atlantic for the very first time. It was actually Tiger and Eli's first trip to any kind of ocean/beach so it was really, really cool to see how much they BOTH loved it! Even at 4 months Eli had such a good time. He sat in my lap on the edge of the waves coming in and just talked and talked in his sweet little voice. It was a great time for all of us whities to go since the sun was going down and it wasn't too hot/bright for anyone. Tiger and Aaron spent their time getting knocked over by waves and in Tiger's fearless style he loved every minute. As we were leaving he kept saying "Enjoyed that so much, Momma/Daddy!" What a love. That night Tiger spent the night in the bathroom and woke up around 5 AM crying, so Chatty Kathy made his reappearance in the bed with us.

That morning we packed up and headed out to Savannah once Aaron came back to the hotel. Once we got to Savannah we checked into our hotel, which had separate rooms (hallelujah!). Then we took a drive downtown and ate at a delicious French restaurant where Aaron said it was the best food he has ever eaten. It was really, really yummy. Then we drove around and saw the sights (we couldn't walk because it was raining) and went back to the hotel where the boys went down for a full, uninterrupted night's sleep. It was wonderful. The next morning we woke up and took a very long drive home.

On a side note, Tiger has been potty training for the past month or so and is doing really, really well. I never knew how exciting it would be to hear little feet running off to the bathroom, a pause, then a flushing toilet. It is fantastic. The past couple of weeks when he has gone number 2 he sits there with a sweet little smile on his face and whispers "Good jooooob!" to himself as he is going. Aaron and I have both witnessed this and of course both thought it was hilarious, but kind of puzzling. Well, we figured out after talking about it why he does this funny quiet little pep talk. It's because the first few times he did his serious business on the toilet it kind of disturbed him so Aaron and I would try to calm him down by quietly coaching him through it and saying things like "Good job, buddy!" in a whispering voice so we didn't disturb him even more through the process. So now he coaches himself through it...that's my little independent boy!

And Eli is just getting sweeter and cuter by the second-as if that is even possible. He did SO well in the car which was surprising considering up until now he has been the only baby I've ever known of who actually has gotten mad when riding in the car instead of being lulled to sleep. He seriously would get so worked up that when I would get him out of the car seat he would be sweaty and red faced. My poor boo boo! But he rode like a champ for our trip and spent his time awake looking over at his big brother which was the sweetest thing ever to witness! As we were bathing him in the hotel Aaron swears he heard him say "Momma" and I think I heard it too but was distracted by something at the time. He is a very content little guy who is now spending some of his time during the day in his exersaucer and jumperoo. He is really working his hands lately-grabbing onto stuff and playing with his toys. I laid him on his back on the boppy pillow the other day and he sat halfway up kind of like he was doing a sit up. He is just a joy to watch and we are trying to soak it all in!

Well, that's it for now! Here are some pictures of my little men:

Tiger LOVES giving Eli kisses! He put that toy that is next to Eli by him and said "Here go, Eli!" So sweet.

Here is Tiger patting Eli on the head as gently as a two year old boy can. He kept saying "So sweet!" while he was patting him.

Eli and Momma on the beach at St. Simons-his little outfit is so precious! And yes, I did crop my lower half out of the picture. Having 2 babies in 2 years really does a number on you. :)