Getting ready for Grandma and Danette to arrive took a lot of our time. We spent the whole week doing laundry, cleaning, and more cleaning! After the cleaning, we did soccer, soccer, and more soccer. School is going okay for the kids. They had a harder time concentrating knowing that Grandma and Auntie Danette were coming this week. They finally arrived on Thursday morning. We just took it easy for the first couple of days. You never know how you're going to react to the jet lag. We did get to go shopping (or tried to go shopping). Danyon is going through his terrible twos now. He is really wanting to show his independence. If he doesn't want to do something, he lets you know--really loudly. That made shopping not so much fun--twice. But, we won't let that stop us!
We showed Grandma and Danette a fun night on the town in Vienna. We went to a concert that Csaba (Dane's saxophone teacher and friend)was playing in. We had a great dinner and then listened to some great music. We loved hearing the band. With the jet lag, we only made it through the first set. We headed for home, but somehow got stopped at the ice cream store. No night on the town is complete without ice cream!
Saturday, we took Grandma and Danette to a couple of Easter Markets. We went to one that was just down the street from our house and we also took the crew to the Schonbrunn. We didn't buy the entire stock of items, but we did enjoy buying some food. We found baked pretzels, spatzle, and kaiseschwarm. It's fun to try new stuff in a new country.
Since the kids had a week off for Spring Break, we packed up and headed back to Turkey. We were so excited to get a week away. We arrived on Sunday afternoon. We were able to explore the resort. We tried the buffet. The weather was a little cool, but better than in Vienna. On Monday, we decided that we would like to experience another Turkish Bath. We even decided to let the kids try it to see if they liked the cool bubble bath. Dane and Deagan weren't too sure about it. Danyon definitely hated it--until they rubbed his head. Dyllan absolutely loved it! She asked if she could go to the spa everyday! Since I had thrown my neck out the week before from sneezing (yes, really from sneezing), we decided that we would get massages too. It was just what my neck needed. I was just like Dyllan, begging Dan to let me go back to the spa every day.
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 Fresh sqeezed orange and
pommegrante juice are
abundant here |
On Tuesday, we took a very crowded bus into town and shopped at the Bazaar. Some things we paid good prices for, and other things we paid too much. Dan's favorite part of our trips is the shopping and bargaining for good deals. Turkey is the perfect place for really good, high quality, genuine fakes. We took a tour with our guide from last year, Aykut. He took us to another local Bazaar. We bargained for more stuff! We also got to go to Perge again. It is really cool to see all the ruins. Then we ate our authentic, homemade lunch made by a Turkish grandma. We all loved our fresh squeezed pomegranate juice. We wandered around and saw Roman aqueduct ruins. We smelled the orange groves in full bloom. We also saw one of the bridges that the romans would have built. We really enjoyed our day. Then it was off to the buffet, again!
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| Spending more money in Turkey |
You can't really beat spending an entire gorgeous day on the beach. The kids built castles, they played in the water, Danyon slept, and the adults just visited and relaxed. I loved that day. That night everyone was very sun burned. We had one day of rain. It was pouring, actually. It really cooled things off.
By the afternoon, the rain had burned off and Grandma, Dan, and I decided to head back to the Bazaar to pick up all the items we regretted not getting before. But, it turns out that the Bazaar was not open that day, possibly because of rain. We kind of struck out, as the store owners are not as willing to bargain as much as the flea market people. We ended up coming home with just one bag of stuff. Auntie Danette stayed at the resort with the kids and they had a great time swimming in the pool. The water was cold, but that didn't stop the kids. After about 10 minutes, Deagan's lips turned blue. Dane lasted about 20 minutes. Good old Dyllie lasted 4 hours. That girl is like a fish!
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Danyon picked up a shoe
fetish. Any shoe will do! |
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| After a morning of shopping! |
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| Dancin' up a storm! |
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| A dressing room at the Bazaar |
We found another Bazaar and decided that the adults would head to that while Dane babysat the other kids at the room. We had tons of fun shopping again. We finally returned home and then we spent the rest of the day watching the kids swim. We tried to go to the beach again, but it was too cold and the waves were very rough. We spent the afternoon at the pool, watching the kids swim, and slide down the water slides. We enjoyed sipping our drinks poolside.
We decided to try the Italian al la carte restaurant on Friday night. We found the food there to be the best in the resort. We enjoyed everything from the starters to the dessert. Dan even got to try the squid ravioli. It was a fun and delicious 6 course dinner. We rolled out of there feeling fuller than after Thanksgiving dinner. The kids had a hard time staying awake for the dinner. Danyon fell asleep and Deagan was not far behind.
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| Are my lips kissable? |
Even in paradise things aren't always as they seem. Because of the language barrier, we had some trouble at the resort. They had European customer service. We were disappointed that we were only allowed to eat at one of the 5 al la carte restaurants. We were also disappointed that they only served 3 non alcoholic drinks. The same 3 drinks get a little tiring after a week--especially when the alcoholic choices were 3 pages long. We couldn't get any of those drinks minus the alcohol though. We also had a problem that they didn't stock our fridge every day as promised. With a family of 6 in one room, we go through a lot of water bottles. When I went in to complain about the "service" (or lack thereof), I had a very hard time communicating with the manager. After spending 20 minutes trying to state my case, I decided to just give up. However, to make amends, the manager offered us a dinner reservation in the main restaurant (buffet), served with cake. When we got to the dining room, our table was very nicely decorated with flower petals. We ate our dinner, and then the staff came and served us a cake. It was a nice gesture, however, it was the exact same cake that we had been eating all week, and could have gotten all we could eat at the buffet. But, the waiter thought we were celebrating a birthday for Danyon. He got a cake and got to blow out the candles. We drew the line at singing. We were sharing the table with some people and they thought we were weird for not singing "Happy Birthday". We didn't tell them that the cake was our consolation prize for not getting the service that we were promised.
But Sunday came and it was time to pack up. We were all ready to be back home, but were very sad to be leaving paradise. The sun was shining and we thought we could handle more vacation time. We had extra time at the airport and they had lots of activities for kids. They had an arcade, a train, a ball house and a rock climbing wall, all at the airport for those waiting to depart. Dan took the kids down to the climbing wall. They had a good time getting to the top. Dan decided to give it a try, too. He made it just fine, but he said that he would feel it tomorrow. We arrived home safely and the kids even found that the Easter bunny had been to visit! We had a family stay at our house as part of a house swap. They fed our cats for us while we were away, and they got to stay at our house for free. It worked out really well. They left our house immaculately clean. They also left us a beautiful hydrangea plant, chocolates, and soap from Paris. We have never met these people, but heard about them through friends from church. We were glad to swap with them! We hope to visit them and finally meet them in June--at their house in Paris.
Fresh sqeezed orange and
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