The Tale of 2 Tintles: Dublin

Hey everyone! Sorry for the long delay in writing. Theo has been growing like crazy and Shane and I are quickly learning that being parents means being flexible. The perfect example was our recent trip to Dublin. Aug 29th was the last bank holiday of the summer so we decided to do a 3 day holiday in Dublin. Some family friends live over there and had offered to lend us their carseat and buggy to make traveling less difficult for us. This was great although we quickly learned that Theo does not like to sleep on us. He likes to play with us and will do anything in his power to avoid sleeping when we are carrying him. As a result we arrived in Dublin with one exhausted and unhappy child! Patrick, our family friend, picked us up at our hotel and took us on a pub crawl/driving tour of Dublin. He owns 4 pubs and took us to a few of his favorite as well as one that he owns. It was a great way to see Dublin and Shane thorougly enjoyed his pints of Guiness at each pub. Theo lent to the ambience by screaming for at least 10 minutes in each pub we visited.
The next day we visited Christ Church cathedral, went to sevice at St Patrick's cathedral, walked around Trinity college and the Temple bar area. Poor Theo was quite overstimulated and refused to sleep in his buggy. After a minor meltdown we headed back to the hotel and left him with our family friends who kindly babysat him for 4 hours while Shane and I went to the Jameson Distillary and dinner at the Winding Stair (delicious!)
Monday the 3 of us visited the Kilmainhaim jail (where many of the Irish patriots, as well as the men of the 1916 Easter Day rising were imprisoned and hung) and the Guiness factory before heading home.
Overall it was a great trip but Theo was very happy to be home :o) We are now gearing up for Southern France in 3 weeks and praying for a slighly smoother visit!