Gulfarium

  Hearts Apart is a program the Air Force has to help the families of those who are or have deployed within the past year.  They sponsor activities to benefit those families.  We have taken advantage of a few of their events and have had so much fun at each one.  This past weekend Hearts Apart sponsored animal encounters at the Gulfarium down in Fort Walton Beach.  Because of age restrictions only Kate and Andrew were able to take part in the animal encounter but we all got to enjoy walking around and seeing some of the animal shows. 

  The first show we got to see was the dolphin show.  Kate and Abby have talked about the dolphins often since Saturday.  They could do flips and jumps in the air and speak on command.  It was very cool seeing all that they could do.

 The animal encounter Kate and Andrew got to do was Snorkel with Stingrays.  At first I was a bit nervous about the possibility of Kate or Andrew getting stung.  Like, I don't care how harmless these creatures usually are - they've killed people.  We were told that the end of their tails, where the barbs are, can be clipped off.  Similar to clipping your fingernails.  So these stingrays literally could not sting anyone. That put my worrying momma heart at ease.

Abby and Ellie did great waiting patiently and watching.  The age requirement was 5 years or older so lucky Kate was able to go with her lucky Daddy.

  We were also able to watch the Sea Lions perform but I regrettably did not take any pictures.  Abby especially loved the seals.  They "lost their heads" by bending them all the way back which Abby thought was so funny.  The whole day was just so much fun and I'm glad we finally got to go.