St. Patrick's Day in Dublin

Kevin and I had really wanted to spend St. Patrick's Day in Dublin and see how the Irish celebrate, so we booked a trip for the 13th-18th.   We had a wonderful time and enjoyed the trip, the weather could have been better but hey, what can you expect from Ireland this time of year. 

We arrived on Friday the 13th pretty early, so we had time to head out and do some exploring before dinner so we decided to checkout the Guinness Storehouse.  Sadly, I lost a lot of photos from the first day and a half (long story) but one of Kevin's co-workers had the software to recover some of what we lost.  Unfortunately there was a video of Ivy he couldn't recover and it breaks my heart because it's one that I would have loved to share with all of you, either way I still have nice memories to share with you.

  Needless to say Ivy enjoyed the Guinness storehouse more than we ever thought she would.  Excuse the pics because they are dark but I didn't think to put my flash on before heading into the building.

Kevin and Ivy in front of the Guinness sign

Ivy doing her thing

 

 Family photo

 Ivy posing with the advertisement animals

 Kevin and Ivy enjoying a drink together after the tour

 

The next day we took it easy since it was cold and Ivy and I were pretty tired.  St. Patrick's Cathedral was right around the corner from our hotel so we visited the Cathedral, took a tour and afterwards let Ivy play in the small playground. 

 

Since we were all exhausted we went back to the hotel to nap before venturing out to the to see the boat races.  Now we only saw one since it took 30 minutes in between races for them to start the next one but it was an enjoyable event.  We watched UCD vs Trinity and we stood at the beginning but we read in the paper the next day that Trinity won.

  Than we headed off to let Ivy ride some rides before heading to an early dinner since we had to get up early for a day tour.

 

The next morning we got up super early to catch a tour bus at 6:50 AM to the Cliffs of Moher and the Burren. I have to say Ivy was a super trooper on this tour; we spent most of the day on the bus taking all these little stops on the way to and from the Cliffs.  We enjoyed the trip but honestly we wished we had more time at the Cliffs and the Burren.. The Cliffs were 5 miles long and they only gave you 1 hour and 30 minutes to enjoy them and 15 minutes at the Burren. We were very fortunate the sun was out and the weather was beautiful while we were at the Cliffs, such a breath taking view!

The Cliffs o f Moher

The Burren



 

The Next day was another leisurely day and after breakfast we checked out the Dublina Viking and medieval museum.  This was a very hands on museum and is great for children, of course Ivy had a blast and we enjoyed it as well.  

 

After taking a nap we headed over to the festivities where we enjoyed St. Patrick's festival  music and dancing, Ivy enjoyed a huge park, more rides, dinner,  and some street performances which Ivy refers to as " the Dresses."  I have never seen her so excited over something like this before in my life.  They  also  appeared in the parade the next day and she went nuts!!!

 

 

Finally, St. Patrick's day arrived and since it was our last day and we had to catch an early flight we had a nice slow paced enjoyable day. After breakfast we took a 5 minute walk to Christ Church and walked through before heading to the parade and getting a good spot so Ivy could see.  While we waited for the parade to start Ivy took a nice nap in her stroller and she woke up just in time for the parade. The parade was unique in it's own way and we all enjoyed watching it, Kevin even met a local celebrity while waiting for the parade to start.

 

 

Afterwards the hotel had music and food, we went back (which seemed to be the popular thing to do as it was pretty crowded) and listen to music and had a few drinks and relaxed, before heading out for dinner. We had a great time and were pretty tired at the end of the trip but it was well worth it!!

 

I have a few posts I would like to share with you over the next week or 2 so please check back!!  I hope you all are having a great start to spring. 



Blogging News!!!

Hello Everyone, I am so excited to share some news with you today.  Kevin and I have been working hard the last few months, hence the lack of posts in this blog, to create a new blog.  I know what you are thinking, "you can't even keep up with this blog," but I promise you we will work hard together to keep on top of the new blog and I will continue to work hard to keep you up to date on this blog. 

Without dragging it out any longer,  our new blog is called "Trekking with Tikes."  It's a blog we created to help others who want to travel with infants, toddlers, and young children have a more enjoyable trip by sharing our experiences and tips.  Kevin came up with the idea and I created the site and together we have worked very hard to get this blog up and running. 

Currently, the blog is a bit bare.  As we post more, features like a photo side bar, an events calendar side bar, and maps will appear.  Our goal is to get as much information out as soon as possible to help those traveling with children feel more comfortable.  There really isn't much information out there to help parents. 

What does this mean for my old blog?  The new blog is just about traveling with children, so any future trips and old trips you can check out on the new blog. There will be no personal pictures of Ivy or any personal information distributed on the new blog.  The old blog will be pretty much the same except when it comes to trips it will just be our personal stuff that we want to share with you not the world.  Basically, if you want to know where we stayed and the details you will have to visit the new blog, but the old blog will cover news about Ivy, something special that happened on our trip, life events, or fun things I want to share. 

Ok enough rambling, here is the link to the new blog so please check it out and share it with your friends, especially those who are thinking about traveling with their children!

https://trekkingwithtikes.wordpress.com/

Ivy's Bithday and Fasching!

It's so hard to believe our little peanut turned 3 years old, she is growing too fast!!  It amazes me watching her as she grows through the years; how much she has learned in the last 3 years, how much character she has developed, and her personality traits. She has taught me so much, like how to slow down and enjoy the simple things in life.  I admit I still struggle with this but we can learn a lot from a child's innocence.

She had multiple parties prior to her birthday and through last week, and she still has a good bye party at her kita (daycare) this Friday before going to a new kindergarten next week.  A week before her birthday we had a party for her at Kinderwelt, an indoor play area with bouncy castles, climbing castles, trampolines, carousels, etc.  She didn't find out about it until an hour before because she was already wanting to know why we weren't celebrating her birthday. She gets excited about these things way too early and doesn't understand why it isn't happening now.  We invited 2 of her friends, one of her friends was leaving for China for 3 months the week of her birthday hence the early party.  I can't share a lot of pics from her party since they have her friends in them and I wouldn't want to upset the parents for posting their children's pictures.  I do have a few cute ones of her though. 

Pumpkin muffins I made for her party

A selfie of Ivy and I before going to the party.

 

 

The pumpkin muffins topped with cream cheese frosting with some cute sugar lady bugs.

 

 Ivy anxiously waiting for her friends to arrive at Kinderwelt.

 

  Ivy's Birthday usually falls around the same time as Carnival (Fasching) which fell on the Tuesday after her birthday but her kita celebrated Fasching on the 12th and 13th so they celebrated her birthday the following week.  She also had to dress up for Fasching at kindertanzan on Wednesday and she chose to be a princess since Grand Mommy and Grand Daddy gave her a princess outfit for Christmas.  She really enjoyed dressing up at both kindertanzan and her kita, it was also special for her to dress up on her birthday even thought they didn't celebrate it that day at her school. 

 

Ivy waiting for the bus to go to kindertanzan.

 

 Daddy and Ivy

 

 My little princess is 3 years old.

 

 Ivy style, wanting to wear her crown even though it's cold outside so this was her compromise

 

After her busy day of Fasching at school, she came home and celebrated her birthday that evening.  We had homemade chicken tenders, mac and cheese, and peas followed by some leftover muffins with fresh cream cheese frosting.  She decided after her bath, that her pj's just weren't good enough so she put her princess dress over her pj's before opening her presents.

She had a great birthday and spent the next morning playing with all her new gifts.

The Monday before carnival is Rosenmontag which is a holiday for kids more than it is for adults and all the schools and daycares close.  On Rosenmontag the carnival festivities start with a costume parade.  We weren't aware of any parades last year but my friend told me there was a pretty big parade in the town of Burbach on the other side of Saarbrucken, so Ivy and I got on a train and ventured over to Burbach to check out the parade.  We had a great time and Ivy did very well considering she didn't have a nap all day, however the parade was crowded and a little crazy for me.   Especially since this was a parade where they tossed out candy and everyone (parents included) scrambled to get some.

 

Finally, the Wednesday after they celebrated Ivy's birthday at her daycare.  I didn't want to make a cake this year since last year a lot came back, so I found a recpe for cake balls which Ivy helped me make.  This was my first time making them; they are like cake  pops but with out the stick and everyone thought they were pretty tasty because the container came back empty.

Ivy helping me make the cake 

 

It has been a busy two weeks but we all had fun and in light of carnival I will leave you with this cute pic of Ivy using playdoh to make a clown nose.  I hope you all had a great weekend!!