Baltimore, Nonni, and lots of Fishies

Last weekend my mom was in Baltimore for a conference so the kids and I drove the short drive over to see her for her free afternoon. I think it was just a gift from God that her conference was in Baltimore this year, as it is in a different city every year, and the year we move away it is in a city less than an hour away from us! We got a hotel for one night and Nonni met us right after we checked in. (I'd like to throw in a huge thank-you to the valet who parked my sweet minivan and hauled our luggage up to the room, as I don't know how I would have done it with three children by myself. Oh, and to the nicest front desk clerk ever who gave me an early check-in and was so helpful. I know God watches out for me and helps me with my children. He is so good.) We stayed by the Inner Harbor, which is Baltimore's main tourist area, and a very fun place it is.

It was raining all day (remind me to get a rain hood for my stroller!) but we managed to walk to the National Aquarium down on the harbor and we spent the afternoon exploring so many of God's amazing aquatic creatures. One of the catchwords at the Aquarium was "adaptations," referring to how these various creatures have "adapted" to their environment and made themselves suitable and better able to survive. It just seems to me that it makes more sense to believe that these animals were carefully designed to live just where they were supposed to live. If you think about an electric eel for example, who they say adapted and somehow developed the ability to produce an electric shock to scare off his predators, how would the species have survived being eaten in order to produce this adaptation? They would have all been eaten up before they got a chance to adapt! The dolphins would have drowned before they manged to develop a blowhole. I'm just saying this seems logical to me. Ok, I'll get off my soapbox now. Stepping down...

The kids loved seeing all these amazing jellyfish, stingrays, sharks, turtles, and even a dolphin show up close. I think my favorite was the Green Sea Turtle named Calypso who had been rescued off the coast of New York, which is way too cold for him/her (they don't know what sex it is, which was funny to me). She was hypothermic and had a bad flipper infection which resulted in the loss of the flipper. Since she can't be released back into the wild they keep her there at the Aquarium.

Mac liked the dolphin show and laughed and laughed at the funny tricks they do, especially when they blow air out of their blowholes and make silly noises. That's very boy, you know. I'm sure Ruthie was hoping to see a mermaid, but she settled for a tiny baby jellyfish all polka-dotty and glowy. Harris was wide-eyed and grabby for my camera, and I think he liked the jellyfish the best because they were bright and showy.

Jay rode the metro over that night to meet us and we planned to go out and do some more fun things in the Inner Harbor the next morning, but Mac woke up miserable and with a fever so we headed home. Baltimore is not far, and I'd love to go back, eat crab cakes, tour some ships and maybe even see an Oriole's game sometime. Oh, and Edgar Allan Poe is from Baltimore and they're doing a celebration of his life this year which includes various tours and events which I'd like to get in on. But you know what that raven quoths, "Nevermore." So we'll see.

(I tried to make appropriate paragraphs in this but the stup** thing won't post them. Sorry)