I'm on a roll today - trying to make up for lost time
. Here's another installment for ya!
______________________________________________________________
Our belly's were full and we were recharged. We left Mexico and decided to take one of the Friendship boats across the water to Germany. By now Angelina's toe is starting to hurt. Her band-aide was slippery through her Croc. Man I wish the rain would stop
.
While waiting for the boat I snapped a few more pics of the girls:
Just putting the camera away when a couple from Arizona walks up. She starts telling me that they were watching the girls and how beautiful they were. I thanked her and we started chatting. She said she was a teacher and had won a free trip (I can't remember how). To which her husband starts
about how expensive their "free" trip really was. She whipped out this great lanyard FULL of nothing but Tinker Bell pins. This was the "trip of a lifetime" for the two of them and she had discovered this addiction. She was telling me about which pin came from where - there were some very cool pins on the lanyard.
The girls got all kinds of excited, because they too had been bitten by this bug, so they pulled out their lanyards to show their prizes. The lady zeroed in on Gabriella's lanyard because she had some Tinker pins on it and was oohing-ahhing over all of the pins. She was telling (teaching) the girls about how some pins were collectables, to only wear the ones that they wanted to trade on their lanyards, put the others away so they could hang on to them.
Chatted a bit longer about the fun that everyone had had trading, blah, blah, blah (excuse my attitude - this story REALLY gets me!) and she then asked Gabriella if she'd like to trade. Of course, she said yes and the woman picked out a Tinker pin that she wanted to add to her collection. She then pulls out a piece of cardboard from her purse and has tiny pins that were pretty cheap looking and says, 'Which one would you like?'.
Here is where my parenting skills go out the window........
Gabriella picked some cheapy pin and traded her WDW Tinker Bell pin that was so cool. The boat pulled up and we all got on - sitting in seperate areas. I look over a Gabriella and she is very quiet and :tears:. I ask her if she regretted trading the pin that she traded. She told me that she did, that she felt that the woman cheated her because she showed such pretty pins on the lanyard and then pulled out the cardboard.
What I did:
and told her we'd find another one and that I would buy it. Thus far, both girls had spent their own money on their lanyards and pins. I didn't know what the ettiquette was about wanting a pin back, so I said nothing.
What I should have done:
Taken the pin off of her lanyard, marched my soaking wet butt back over to the woman and told her to take her trade and stick it where the sun didn't shine, explaining how she thought she'd get away with pulling one over on a 10 year old and how she should be ashamed of herself.
Oh well live and learn. Gabriella wimpered a bit off and on for the next bit. I assured her that there were pin shops everywhere and that I was sure I'd find it for her and replace it.....after all, being a parent, I'm a superhero and can fix anything, right?????
Get to the other side and exit the boat. Head over to Germany while the girls grab their KP communicator so they can save this country that is in perril. The rain stopped for about 5 minutes so I whipped out the camera and snapped a few pictures. Not terribly proud of them - the place was CROWDED and WET, which meant I wasn't willing to set my camerabag down on the ground while trying to set up the pictures. Basically, I have snapshots.
Took a few of the miniture village with the train tracks:
(*Edit, Mary - you will appreciate that there are zombies walking in front of the Church. When the bells toll, their eyes light up red)
and then snapped a few of the buildings:
Helped the girls figure out what some of the buildings were called because the language was confusing them. How can you save a whole entire country if you can't read the words
.
Dashed over to Italy while the girls were finishing up....hey, it wasn't raining
.
By now the rain had tappered off for a bit and we were
thinking, MAYBE it's finished!!!!! The country of Germany was saved by my two little girls - took one more photo of them in Italy:
Wait, what's that???? Oh yeah - it was raining again
. This was turning out to be a LOOOOONG day! Girls went to the Kiosk in Germany and got a new country for their NEXT (this would be #3) Kim Possible Mission. They were given Norway again.
At this point, we'd already been there a few times, so they had a CM override the computer and the International Gateway came up as their pickup country.
Up next - we puddle jump the rest of the way around the world and end up going full circle with a snack......
.Still disappointed I can't see the pictures in the update before Akershus, hopefully they will show back up sometime ?
. Such an inconvenience 
!!!
. School started as well as soccer practices (times 2) plus Gabriella (my oldest) is in our local theater's production of 'Alice in Wonderland' and has practice 3x's a week 
. Sometimes I don't know if I'm coming or going. I'll try to get a few more up this afternoon after I get through some of my work!
.
). Didn't have my tripod today, so dark/handheld pictures are few. Started by taking a few pictures of some handmade wooden trinkets:
, but I didn't want to risk it.
the Mexico pavillion. 
I felt bad afterward that I didn't deal with it.
