South Carolina – Day 2

Today was not a good day.  I woke up after Jason left for work and realized he forgot to leave me the stroller that was in the back of the rental car.  This meant I would have to literally chase Taryn all day long or carry her.  Anyone with a 2 year old knows this isn’t fun.  So I called the Aquarium and as luck would have it, they had strollers there I could use, I would just have to manage both kids and our stuff down to the dock and pier, on the water taxi and then through town to the Aquarium.  Not fun with a toddler who loves to pull away and run off, near water no less, and in 90 degree weather, but doable.

Then as we are getting ready to go, I had to fuss at Ty four times to stop rough housing in the room.  I had my 5D on the bed with my bag to go with us.  He rounded the bed at top speed and knocked my camera with my 24-70 mm on it right onto the floor.  It hit hard.  Thankfully it was carpet but I took some test shots and everything is all fuzzy and flat looking.  I was so mad.  I didn’t say a word, Ty looked at me, hung his head and walked out onto the balcony.  He knew.  I know it’s "just" a camera, but I want to cry.  I can’t stand having to tell him things over and over again, I guess it’s the age.  I still don’t know if it’s the camera or the lens that’s screwed up.  I have my 50 mm with me but couldn’t even face putting it on the body yesterday.  The whole thing just makes me sick to my stomach.  Ty came in and apologized and I know he feels bad.   I took about 160 images with it yesterday and maybe 18 or so were salvagable but they would have to be printed small.  Thankfully we have the D50 with us so I can use it for the remainder of the trip.

So, off we go to the Aquarium, not a very good start to our day.  We took the water taxi across the bay, the kids did good and Ty was the model 10 year, not stepping out of line almost all day.  On our way down the dock we saw a chocolate lab and Taryn got SO excited, just kept saying "HI DOGGIE!!" and then when it was time to go she laid her head on my shoulder and said "Taryn miss Kywee"….awww.  Me too, I miss Kylie too.

Ty was feeling kind of down so Taryn was giving him a little love while waiting on the boat taxi.  Awww.

Taryn loved the boat but was hard to contain.  She wanted to get up and run everywhere.  I finally managed to convince her to stand in my lap and watch the water over my shoulder.  We saw two dolphins, one a tiny little baby, on the way across.   It was a pretty long boat ride, about 30 minutes or so.  Ty was disappointed the boat didn’t go faster.

The Charleston aquarium is pretty nice, we all enjoyed it.  Taryn’s favorite color is yellow, so of course we HAD to stop and look at every single yellow fish.  And she kept telling me to take pictures of them, it was so cute, "PIT-CHUR YELLOW FISH MOMMY LOOK".  All caps because she YELLED it every time.  =)

I am SOOOOOOO excited about this shot.  First, this is the only time I’ve ever taken photos at the aquarium where I liked even one of them.  It’s the speedlight, opens up a whole new world.  A little background on this shot.  I was standing in front of the two story tank.  There was a family of four standing to my right behind the bar.  I bounced my flash off of the family and took the shot.  Doesn’t it look like they are IN the tank?!?!  Maybe I’m crazy, but I love this shot!!  I showed it to them and they loved it too.  I get to show it in return for sending them a few copies of it, they were so excited, it was cool!!  If you look close you can see my arm and my flash going off next to the gentleman.  What do you guys think?

Next we hit the aquarium gift shop.  Had to buy crab glasses for little Ms. Crabby Pants.  She was thrilled, can ya tell??  LOL

There are a million things wrong with this photo technically, weird color, odd crop, it’s kinda fuzzy and I blew out her hat in the full sun.  This one is all about the capture though so I’m sharing it.  Totally cracks me up.  Taryn loved the snakes (nake) so when Ty picked one out in the gift shop, she was thrilled to be chased with it while waiting on the taxi to bring us back to the hotel.  Love that little tongue and look of pure joy!

After a long, much needed nap in our room, we woke up to figure out the AC in our room was broken.  I can’t stand being hot, it was miserable.  The hotel sent us an "air engineer".  Did I mention this is kind of a high faluted place?  On the first day we were here the hill billies that we are called down to the front desk asking where the vending machines are.  They don’t have any, not that kind of place.  So we ate the snacks in the room then replaced them later with some we bought from the store.  Did I say hillbilly?  LOL

THEN a fire alarm starts going off and scares everyone.  It was LOUD and totally freaked Taryn out.  Everything was fine, just steam in the kitchen.  Jason returned from work and we decided we were in the need for some good food.   It took forever for them to bring us our rental car.  Taryn loves the fountain out front, but by the time our car arrived she was soaked.  Jason even dipped her little piggies in to get them wet, she loved it.

We tried to drive downtown for some seafood but it was packed.  Now I love my husband, I do, he’s a wonderful husband and father.  The thing that drives me crazy about him is his tendancy to aimlessly drive at the worst possible time.  Say 7:30 at night after a very, very long day with starving children in the car.  We aimlessly drove all over town looking for food and eventually just drove back to Mount Pleasant for food.  At one point Taryn says "Mommy, I not happy.  Daddy in da car."  LOL!  This totally cracked me and Ty up!  Jason, not so much.  Hahaha!  Even a 2 year old can see the aimless driving is annoying!!  We eventually found a cool little pizza place after an hour and a half in the car.  It reminded me of the pizza restaurants my dad owned when I was a kid.  Cool stuff all over the walls, big brick fireplaces, video games and great food.

Thankfully, Jason put the kids to bed and I got to take a nice hot bath after a very long day.  Sorry for the long whiney post.  Hoping day 3 is better, we plan to just hang by the pool.

Again, sorry if these look off, proofing in the dark with no calibration do-hickey.  =)