Trip to Tampa, Day 1

I am a week behind on the Photo Challenge but I took lots of pictures last weekend in order to catch up.  We went to Tampa, FL for a long weekend.  I gave Bernie Yankees Spring Training Tickets for his Christmas gift, and I knew it would be the last family vacation the four of us embarked upon before we officially become a family of five.  I am so glad we went.  We really had a great time.  I spend a lot of time in the Tampa Bay area for work, and it was fun to show the boys the sights.  I am not sure how many pictures that blogger is going to allow me to post at a time, so this may be a multiple blog entry post – bear with me.

We arrived around midnight on Friday night, and on Saturday morning, we had plans to participate in the Gasparilla Distance Classic. There are various races over the course of two days with the culmination being a half marathon on Sunday.  I am planning to run a half marathon in Vegas this year with some friends who have just started and re-started running.  LaDonna and Dean came with us to Tampa and LaDonna and I had planned to run the 5k (as the first part of preparation for the Vegas race). Gene has no plans to run in Vegas but wanted to join us for Gasparilla. Here are the three of us:

I totally look like a pumpkin and may never wear that shirt again (LOL).  Gene was the only one who actually ran.  I have had to cut back significantly on my workouts because of the pregnancy (7 weeks, 3 days to go, but who’s counting?), and LaDonna was doing great with her training until baby Addie had all of those complications with her heart.  Little Addie is doing great now and was actually released from the hospital just before LaDonna left for Tampa.  Gasparilla is a very well organized and attended race, about 10,000 participants per day.  I highly recommend it to anyone who might be interested.We walked the 5k and just enjoyed the Florida sun and beautiful scenery along Bayshore Drive:

After the race we headed to Brighthouse Field in Clearwater, home of the Phillies’ Spring Training Facility. There was a ton of traffic and we were almost an hour late for the Phillies v. Yankees game, but it was fun nonetheless.  Jack enjoyed watching the mascot, the Phillies Phanatic, especially when he drove around the field on an ATV.  He wanted to know when the “piggy” was coming back.

We then headed for Clearwater Beach where we met up with LaDonna’s friends Alison and Todd, and their almost two year old and very cute daughter, Jillian. We had dinner at Frenchy’s Rockaway Grill, watching the sunset over the Gulf of Mexico.  I only wish we had more time to spend at the beach.  The sand was incredibly soft and white.

 To be continued...