South Padre Island: Last Week

It's so hard to believe that we just finished the Texas part of our trip. It went by so fast! This last week in South Padre island we spent as much time on the beach as possible. Lots of walks and playing on the beach:

Good bye Texas! It was fun!!

South Padre Island: Week Seven

Our seventh week in Texas was filled with beautiful sunny days and lots of activities!

Friday night we went out for dinner:

Saturday was our Valentines Day cruise:

Sunday we walked down the beach to where the Sea Turtle Rescue Center was releasing 17 of their rehabilitated turtles. There were lots of people there to see the turtles released back into the ocean.

The rest of the week was filled with lots of activity.

Levi and Zack went boogie boarding:

We played lots of tennis:

Learned how to play shuffleboard:

And walks on the beach... with handstand contests:

Black Dragon Pirate Ship

For Valentine's Day, we all went on a pirate ship cruise. The boys have been wanting to go on this pirate ship since we arrived! It was a nice calm, sunny day, so we decided to go on Saturday. The kids had a great time!

Here we go:

The picture they take of you as you get on the ship:

There were all different events through out the cruise. First a water gun fight:

Then a search for treasure. Levi got picked out of the crowd to help the pirates:

Pirates!

Each kid got to have a sword fight with the pirates:

The sunset on our way back:

The cruise was a lot of fun and the kids really enjoyed it!

South Padre Island: Week Six

We have been in Texas for six weeks - half way through our trip. This week was an interesting week! On Saturday morning, Michael left for Amsterdam and the boys and I spent the week alone here. We all missed Michael, but the week went by pretty quickly.

Friday we went to the Bird & Nature Center:

Friday evening we went out for dinner and took a few family pictures:

Saturday morning we dropped Michael off at the airport. The rest of the week we swam, played on the beach and enjoyed the beautiful, sunny weather:

This is a slow motion video I took of the boys running down the beach:

Wednesday was Jakob's fishing day:

Thursday we picked Michael up from the airport and just like that... the week was over!

Jake's Fishing Experience

Yesterday Jakob got the chance to go fishing. A really nice man (Bob) that we met at the pool offered to take him one morning. Bob is a retired school teacher and he taught Jake a lot about ocean fishing. Jake was so excited!

They met early in the morning to head out. They set up and walked right out into the ocean, in front of our condo. Standing knee deep, they fished for about 2 hours.

Jakob caught 4 little fish. He was so happy!

When they were done fishing, Bob gave the other 2 a little lesson on fishing. 

Checking out Jake's catch.

South Padre Island Birding & Nature Center

On Friday our field trip was to the SPI Birding & Nature Center. I don't really like birds, they kinda freak me out. But... the boys love them and it was a great learning experience. Not one bird attacked me or came near me, so I made it out alive :)

There was over 2 kms of walkways around a marsh, ponds and by the ocean. There were a lot of birds everywhere.

In one of the ponds was an alligator:

Lots of cute little turtles:

And of course... birds. This one was as tall as Zack.

We saw at least 20 different (maybe more) kinds of birds.

Not sure what is going on here, maybe they are acting like birds??

South Padre Island: Week Five

Week Five! This past week went by so fast! 

On Friday we went back to the Turtle Rescue center...

We went out for dinner and all tried alligator, frog legs and some yummy seafood:

On Saturday we went shopping to the outlet mall, Costco and to Cavenders. Michael bought himself a pair of cowboy boots! The boys tried on cowboy boots and hats too:

On Sunday, Zack lost his first tooth. He was so excited!

And of course, our daily walks on the beach. 

Foggy days...

and sunny days...