Florida Trip

In February we took a whirlwind trip to Florida for Roy's cousin Carolina's wedding.
The Plan: Rent a minivan with Roy's parents and drive to Florida all together
Monday: Snafu with rental place, Roy's dad found a better deal online, with pickup in CR
Wed-Thurs: Driving straight through to arrive in time for Rehearsal at 5 p.m. Thursday. We tried to see a lunar eclipse on Wed night (in Tennessee), but the clouds got in the way.
Thurs Noon: Arrived in Coral Springs, FL. Spent time at Tia Ligia's house, where the kids got t-shirts from Carolina saying "Coin bearer" and "Ring bearer". Checked into La Quinta Inn, very nice accommodations. Went to Aaron's tux fitting, minor tailoring to be done by Friday. Lily's dress fit well but straps were too long - dropped it off at the seamstress' house, to be done by Friday. Rushed to hotel to get ready for Rehearsal. Kids did a great job at Rehearsal, of course! Rehearsal dinner afterwards at Romano's Macaroni Grill. VERY good food.
Friday: FUN DAY! While Grandma Myriam stayed behind to do the wedding cake, Roy, me, Aaron, Lily and Grandpa Dale went down to the Miami Seaquarium, about an hour away. A relative's mother-in-law works there, so we had free tickets!! LOTS of pictures from the Seaquarium in the video at the bottom.
Friday evening: Pickup Aaron's tux and Lily's dress. Kids go swimming in Tia Ligia's pool, with quick warm-ups in the hot tub!
Saturday morning: Aaron gets into his tux, dubbed "The Monkey Suit"; the pants are a little short, but the jacket sleeves are better. Lily's dress straps are just right, and her dress looks good. We have a family photo shoot in Tia Ligia's backyard. Aaron and Roy's cousin Daniel head to the groom's house for pictures. Aaron is SO excited about riding in Daniel's Mustang.
Saturday afternoon: Lily gets to ride in the limo with the bride and her 5 attendants, the junior bridesmaid, and Tia Ligia and Uncle Pat too! The wedding starts about 20 minutes late, but it's Florida time! The kids do a wonderful job. Aaron is the ring bearer, and Lily is the coin bearer or "treasure girl" as she calls it. She carries the "arras", which is a small ornate box that holds thirteen gold unity coins (arras) which are given to the bride by the bridegroom, signifying he will support her. This represents the bride's dowry and holds good wishes for prosperity. These coins become a part of their family heirloom. The kids walk down the aisle together, and Lily later brings the "arras" up to the stage. Carolina and Carmine are married in a traditional Catholic wedding.
After a few pictures at the church, the wedding party sets off in the limos to Carmine's parents' house. Lily rides in the limo again, but we're going back to Tia Ligia's house! Roy's cousin Christian volunteers to drive behind the limo and pick Lily up, just so she can have another ride in the limo.
Saturday evening: The reception has a "Rockstar" theme, complete with VIP passes for every guest, CDs of Carmine & Carolina's music, and party favors. The kids each have gift bags waiting for them with activities to pass the time. Myriam's cake is gorgeous, and she even had time to make a groom's cake for Carmine. It's a replica of his favorite black hat, complete with silver buckles. The wedding party is announced, and here comes Aaron, with Lily on one arm and the flower girl on the other! Carmine and Carolina have their first dance with the guests surrounding them. Dinner is excellent, with choices of Prime Rib, chicken or salmon. There is a slideshow of Carolina and Carmine growing up. Carolina's family is Latino, from Nicaragua. Carmine's family are New York Italians. And there was an Irish priest! Sounds like the setup for a joke, right?! We dubbed the reception "West Side Story", as the two families were seated on opposite sides of the room, with the dance floor in the middle.
The DJ gets the music started early. Aaron and Lily love to DANCE! And they're pretty good at it, too! Roy even gets me out on the dance floor a few times. Finally, at 10 p.m., Myriam asks why the cake hasn't been cut? Oops! The bride and groom cut the cake, and it is delicious! We get back to the hotel very late and fall right into bed.
Sunday: We mentioned going to the beach today, so Daniel (Roy's cousin) and his girlfriend Angel volunteered to take us to their favorite beach in Fort Lauderdale, about an hour away. The ocean is calm and we can see the sand on the bottom. Aaron and Lily get in the water, and Lily sputters, "Why'd they put salt in it, Mommy?!" I told her GOD did, and the ocean has the most colorful fish because of the salty water. The kids swim and collect seashells. Aaron makes a friend but doesn't ask her name. They start digging in the sand until the waves get a little bigger and start filling in their holes. Lily takes some time to tan. Even with SPF 50 she already has a tan line going.
We walk to a place called Sloppy Joe's for lunch. It's a restaurant on the 2nd level of a store, so we can see way out in the ocean. Gorgeous! The food is excellent. Aaron even had popcorn shrimp! After lunch we start looking for t-shirts for the kids. Lily finds a pink and blue tie-dye one, but Aaron wants one with sharks. When the beach starts to get insanely busy, we had for the van. Parking is so scarce by now, that we had three cars waiting for our spot. One woman spotted Roy with the remote in his hand and asked if we were leaving. When he said yes, she jumped out of the passenger side and came and stood by the van, then blocked the spot so her husband could park there. Yikes! Another car had to back up just so we could get out of the parking space.
Then we went to the Discovery and Science Museum. WOW, that place is cool! Lots of hands-on activities for everybody: fly an airplane, test wind resistance, take a ride on the NASA moon rover, check your weight on different planets, and even a volleyball game on a big screen! Aaron found a shark t-shirt in the gift shop too! Daniel bought some Astronaut Ice Cream (freeze-dried), which wasn't too bad, but the Astronaut Strawberries were better. We spent so much time on the exhibits, we didn't get to the IMAX movie we had planned to see there. Luckily it rained while we were at the museum, and it had stopped by the time we left. We got back to Coral Springs later than we planned, but we had a great time.
Monday morning: One last breakfast with Uncle Pat, Tia Ligia, Abuelita, Christian and all of us (including Roy's parents). On the way back, we managed to stumble upon the Russell Stover Factory Outlet somewhere in Florida. Not very much chocolate made it all the way back to Iowa though.
Monday-Tuesday morning: Driving home. We came up through St Louis to avoid driving through a major snow/ice storm. The roads were cleaned off by the time we made it to the Missouri/Iowa border. We were NOT excited to see all that snow again. The next day, Lily begged to wear just a jacket and sandals, because she missed Florida so much! Enjoy the video of our pics: