Tbilisi Part 4

Last Part
After lunch at Wendy's, we decided to walk to the funicular because it was just over a kilometer away.  We walked and we walked and we walked.  We had the funicular located on our map and kept walking and our little dot moved closer and closer to the spot on the map.

Random nothing on our walk

One of many homes we passed on our walk.

Justin half dead on our walk.

We somehow ended up at the mid point funicular station.  There is a bottom, a halfway point, and the top. We arrived at the halfway point, wondering WHY they have a stop there, but so glad that they did.  We had a card for it, but didn't know how much money was on it because the friends who gave it to us hadn't known.  The kids were free, I got through, but there was not enough left on it for Rob.  Yes, they have a cashier there.  No, it wasn't open.  The employee took pity on us and told us to pay the extra at the top.

There was a group of three people there waiting for the funicular already.  They seemed to have been at the middle stop on purpose though.  Heaven knows why.  A couple arrived at the stop and evidently they had been trying to find the bottom station as well.  They had no card at all.  The group already there swiped the card for them.  Guess we weren't the only idiots that day.  Seriously though, we followed the map AND signs that said funicular.  You would think that if they are going to put signs up for tourists they would try to get them right!

At the top, we tried to pay and the cashier said she couldn't do that.  Okay.  On we went then to the amusement park.  Evidently Mtatsminda Park (also known as Bombora) was the third most visited park in the USSR back in the Soviet days.  I think that is just so sad.  It is a pretty bleak park.  It makes me think of the kind of place you would pick for a creepy movie set.  My kids don't know any different though, so they were happy.

Haunted House

Coming out of the Haunted House.

 Rob went into the haunted house with the boys.  They loved it and even wanted to go again.  I asked Rob if it was scary and he said no, but that it was highly inappropriate.  Nice.  Oh well.  I am happy to report that they did not have any nightmares.

Many of the rides were closed.  Much of the park was just strange.

What exactly is this and what is it holding?

See what I mean?  What is it and why?

Decorative or scary?

So this is cool because...

 Justin got to go on this swing ride, but they said Ryan was too short.  Too bad because he really likes this ride.  He was a good sport about it though.

One of the nicer looking rides.

Oh look!  My family in a weird sculpture.

 Ryan had to go to the bathroom while we were there.  We found one that was really well marked.  We went in and Ryan was horrified to discover the toilet was squashed.  I told him it wasn't squashed, it was a squatter.  Why a boy who can pee outside has so much trouble with a squatter is beyond me.  He had the worst time and wanted to know where to stand, how to aim, etc.  I should have just had him go in the bushes.

The entrance (which is at the opposite end from where the funicular pulls up) has a funky structure that is fun to climb on.  What a cool tree house.

There they are!

 The regular bumper cars were not a choice for my kids, but the junior ones were a go.  They were fortunate that they were the only two in there at the time because they were not the most coordinated people you have ever seen in your life.  Oh my.  They had fun though.

Junior bumpers were the perfect size and speed for them.

Down we went once we were done.  We rode from the top to the bottom this time rather than walking halfway. :) Nice view of the city from the top and as we went down.

From the bottom we caught a cab because we were tired!  We got some ice cream and then slowly walked back to our hotel.  I had the best pistachio ice cream I have had in a long time.

Ryan is trying to make a cute face.

Random pic by the ice cream place

Restaurant where we had our huge meal the day before.

 We doubted that we would be hungry for dinner.  The boys were up for a little cotton candy though.  We picked up bananas and a few other odds and ends to snack on later.

 The next day we started home.  Here is a fairly decent stretch of the road.  There are no potholes as big as our car nor are there cows in the road.  If only the roads were this nice the whole way.  Oh, and love the bus in front of us.  We passed as soon as we could see around it or we would probably still be driving.

Home again with laundry to do and bags to unpack.  Sigh.  The part of the vacation I don't enjoy.

October 27, 2013

This was Fall Break for Justin's school so he was home all week long.  Ryan still had school on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings as usual.  Let me just say that it was a looooooooong week.  Justin seems to have forgotten that I don't always just sit around and watch TV all day.  He was a bit annoyed when I would do laundry, cook dinner, or do something else besides play with him or rush to meet his every need.  There were a few play dates, but it is amazing how many hours are in a day. I can hardly wait for Christmas break when I have them BOTH for over three weeks.  Hopefully new birthday and Christmas presents will help keep them entertained.

On Tuesday afternoon, Ryan complained that he was itching.  I ignored him because (1) he tends to itch a lot and (2) he seemed to itch the most when he was asked to do something.  Put away his shoes?  No, of course he can't because he itches.  Well eventually I looked and he seemed to be getting a rash under his arms, on his stomach, and in the groin area.  Soon I saw a bit on his face.  It spread and seemed to get worse.  I gave him benedryl and put him in a cool bath.  I asked Rob to find out what is available here to help with itching.  Evidently not much, but he brought some zinc oxide home.  More benedryl and a body coated with zinc oxide had him comfortable enough to sleep.  By the time I got ready for bed and checked on him, he was cleared up.  Go figure.

Isn't he pathetic looking?

It got a lot worse than this, but no naked shots for the blog.

 With so much extra time to play, Justin was bored because of course the kids don't own any toys.  So what did we spend hours doing?  Yep, drawing on cardboard boxes.  We made cities by drawing directly on the boxes and by adding additional touches created on other paper.  I knew I saved out some boxes from the move for a reason.

This is Justin's first of three boxes.  He made bridges to connect them.

Ryan didn't get quite as into it, but he had fun adding to J's so I gave him his own.

I bought some straws for a project we are going to do.  It was cheaper for me to get 500 straws than 100, so we have plenty of straws.  These were individually wrapped and I need them unwrapped.  We had fun shooting the straw paper off of our straws and seeing how far we could get them to fly.  Justin was the champion.  He could even shoot off multiple straws at a time.

We also made cookies.  Well, I made the cookies and the boys got to help frost some of them.

Ryan made some pretty scary ones, right?

Plenty of pumpkins so we could share and have our own. :)

 We made some Halloween bags for some missionaries who are here from the US.  Along with the cookies, we had a variety of candy and a few other snacks.  The boys had fun coloring bags and then filling them up.  They could hardly wait to deliver their bags and the missionaries enjoyed getting some American treats.

 On Saturday, we went over to the Hansen's for their garage sale.  Their kids are younger, so we knew we didn't need what they were selling, but a local farm was selling some pumpkins there as well.  We had to pick up a pumpkin for Halloween!  Ryan's preschool was also selling goodies to raise money for charity.  The boys were more than happy to support a good cause by eating cookies and hot chocolate.

After that, we went to church to help clean it and get it ready for Sunday.  The boys would have been in the way more than they helped so we parked them on chairs and let them play on the iphone and ipod while we worked.  When we were finished, we headed to KFC for lunch.  Who could ask for a better treat than that?  The boys were excited.  Funny how we don't go to KFC in the US, but when that is your fast food option, all of the sudden it is awesome.  Justin is eating more lately and Ryan less.  Funny to have their roles reversed, but Justin probably needs to eat a bit more if he is going to get taller.  Don't know that he could get much thinner.  We went to Yum Yum Doughnuts after KFC and got ice cream as a treat.

J loves to pose making funny faces.

Ryan has to try to be as funny as Justin.

 On the way back to the car we passed a bouncy thing by the Opera House.  We let the boys enjoy the nice October day by running and bouncing around for awhile before heading home.

I think this building is interesting and since we were stopped at a red light I took a pic.

 At home we were able to get to our pumpkins.  Since the boys can't carve yet, they had markers, stickers, wiggle eyes, and pipe cleaner to decorate their pumpkins with.  It kept them busy for longer than I thought.  Ryan also got to choose what kind of eyes he wanted me to carve on the larger pumpkin.  Justin chose the mouth.  I tried to copy their drawings and fortunately they were simple enough. :)  They couldn't agree on a nose, so our jack-o-lantern went without.

Left to right: Justin's, mine, and Ryan's

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

I -Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For Boogies!

Justin was playing with his toy food, making a great party for me. Tiny was also present, though he was more of an uninvited guest. Justin asked me if I would like boogies on my ice cream.

"Boogies on my ice cream?" I asked.

"Yes, because I think that I took some boogies from my nose and squeezed them on the ice cream and then said ha ha ha and moved away from left to right so do you want boogies on your ice cream or no?" he explained.

I guess I should just be glad that it isn't real food.