School Trip

Randy and the teachers went on a weekend retreat at a nice hotel only a half hour away from the village. The girls and I got to tag along. It was great fun especially for the little girls. Hannah had a hard time containing her excitement! On Friday afternoon, we returned home from New Day to pack our bags. I packed Hannah's first and then proceeded to work on Elizabeth's and mine. From the moment her bag was packed, she literally sat near the front door, bag on her lap--ready to go!! Although I kept telling her we weren't leaving for awhile, she continued to sit and wait asking every few minutes when we would leave! After about an hour and lots of convincing from everyone else in the family, she left her bag and played for awhile. Every time I got up or walked by, she asked if it was time to go. As soon as it really was time to go, we headed for the door. Unable to contain her excitement any longer, she did a little dance and excitedly screamed!! It was too cute! We only stayed overnight and half the next day, but all the girls were looking forward to the activities they had at the hotel. There was swimming (oh--their absolute favorite!), bowling, shuffle board, and video games. Since dinner was so late (not finishing until 8pm) we decided to wait until the next morning to swim giving them several hours of swim and playing in the pool. Hannah and Elizabeth was already showing signs of needing to head to their regular bedtime at 9pm or so. Instead we went bowling and they had a lot of fun doing that--after the typical "negotiations" and everyone sitting around deciding if they really wanted to bowl since things weren't exactly as they originally told us (very typical here). Although we were told that all these activities were open until midnight, who knew that swimming wouldn't open until 2pm the next day?!! Boy, I had some really disappointed girls! All of them were really looking forward to it and we figured that Hannah had probably never swam before and was looking forward to seeing her enjoy (or maybe not) the swimming--at least find out her reaction to it! Instead, the girls all went "swimming" in the bathtub in the hotel rooms. After not having a bathtub for several years now, it was rather enjoyable to them to play around in the tub. The girls really miss having a tub to soak in and play in! Then they decided to play some cool video games only to find out several calls later by the person in charge, that they couldn't do that either because it took special coins to play the games and the person who had them was in a meeting. Wow, another disappointment! About the only thing left was some outdoor playground equipment we'd spotted on the way into the game building. They happily played on it for some time before getting too cold, but it was then time for dad to get out of his meeting anyway. We found out that Hannah absolutely loves the slide! All the girls enjoyed the rides as you can see! One of the reasons the school decided to go there was because it was off season and the rates were really cheap,it was a nice hotel, and they had several activities to enjoy. Although we were told that all these activities were available, obviously they were not!! Guess they will take that into consideration when planning their next trip there (if there is one). No, we haven't picked up a another new girl yet! The extra girl you see in the picture is the Chinese principal's daughter that I watched while they were in their meeting.