Happy Anniversary to us!

We recently celebrated our anniversary, and did something we've been wanting to do.
Pier fishing (I almost typed fier pishing there)
Yes, so romantic I know.
But, we've both been wanting to do it for several months and our mutinous children haven't wanted anything to do with it. So, we decided to try it out without them.

It really was fun.


Despite the cold weather.
I know, how can someone say "Florida" and cold in the same sentence? It doesn't seem legal.
We weren't really that cold.
Except that it was sprinkling when we started.
And the tide was in, and it was really windy.

And did I mention that it was raining?
The news crews were even there filming because flood advisories were in effect.

We lasted maybe an hour and a half.
Then we were hit with a deluge and the water was coming down in buckets.
We decided to cut our losses.


My beautiful kermit the frog fleece here, weighed about 20 lbs when we finished. I had to wring it out in the bathroom over the sink, and then it kept dripping pools in the restaurant where we had lunch. They kept getting out the mop!
When we left, 4 news vans were in the parking lot, and we had some fun seeing all of the water everywhere on the roads.  

My husband was victorious and caught 1 blue fin - he decided that he could ocean fish every day, and be quite happy.
I'd never been so grateful for the heater in our car, as we were chilled from the wind after we'd been soaked.
It was quite the memorable day.

Happy anniversary to us - and hoping for many more to follow!

What we are UP to

Loving the weather and all of the other months we get to play outside!


We met some friends a while back, who had just moved to Florida from the UK. We thought the move was tough for us, but they are starting a company on top of it all too! BOY!

Because I love to cook, and as we'd received several Thanksgiving Day dinner invitations, we decided to have an early Thanksgiving Day celebration. Since our new friends had never celebrated Thanksgiving, they joined us last Sunday, as well as their parents who were visiting from Ireland. While I didn't understand 'everything' my friend's father said, we learned all about the different sports in Ireland, the UK, and Trinidad. Ever heard of 'hurling'? I know, it sounds like a 'post Thanksgiving Day dinner, I've eaten too much sort of sport', or 'put your shoes back on, I'm going to hurl'. We laughed a lot! While we only had 14 people for dinner, I (of course) cooked for around 40. 6 pies, a 25 lb. turkey, and an exhausted me later, I didn't do much cooking for the rest of the week.
Later, on Thursday - the real Thanksgiving, I made 3 more pies, Hawaiian bread, and yams, for dinner with friends, we played on the golf course while the guys practiced a little bit, and then decorated gingerbread houses.
We headed over to our UK friend's home, and spent the remainder of the evening with them - meeting members of their family who had come in from Trinidad and California for the holiday. The girls all ended up with graham crackers and frosting, making mini gingerbread houses, and decorating the houses with left over Halloween candy. We loved giving our friends root beer barrel candies and watching their faces as they sampled the different candies here in the states.

Wednesday evening we took the plunge and bought Disney tickets. We headed to one of the parks - planning on staying all evening for the extended hours, but disappointed when rides took 3 times longer than indicated, and we didn't have a chance to find a good place afterwards for the parade. It didn't seem to matter where we went, we were directed by employees to find another place (in a not so nice manner). We ended up being directed right out the front doors - 3 hours earlier than we had planned.
We did spend the entire day on Friday at another park, and enjoyed our entire time there.

Finally, we finished up all of our daughter's allergy testing appointments, and got a final diagnosis on her eyes - convergence insufficiency-met with the school, met with the teachers, and have set up vision therapy which we are excited to start next week. From what we've read, usually within a couple of months, progress is pretty apparent.

I've been volunteering in the classroom and having lunch with our youngest daughter, and in the next couple of weeks I get to work with 3 of the classes doing science projects - my friend and I are the SUPER Scientists for this year. I can't wait for the science experiments!

Oh, and as for me, I finished my hardaanger project - the swedish cutwork embroidery one that I've been working on for about 4 years. Yep - I hit Michaels' 75% off custom framing sale yesterday, and am excited to put it on my wall.

We got our Christmas decorations up, and Christmas projects are officially underway.

The Waiting Game

We cleared the preliminaries, and we are now excited contestants in "The Waiting Game"!!!!
Whoop Whoop!!

Yes, a little ambiguous I know.
So, 2 weeks after moving into our rental home, we were served with papers from the county letting us know that the property we signed a year lease on was going into foreclosure.  It wasn't the greatest day I've ever had, let me tell you.

Of course, we went into a panic and started making phone calls.
We were assured that it was a mistake and that all was well.  So, we went on with life, and periodically kept checking to see if anything was going away on the court case.  While nothing much seemed to be happening, it didn't seem to be going away.  

Two weeks ago I got a phone call, and the owners of the property let us know that they were putting the house up for short sale.

Hence, another flurry of activity, questions, (and I'll admit - a little anger) trying to figure out what now?
They told us that they were working on listing it with a realtor who would want to begin to show the property.
 I felt a little rebellious and angry because we still have nine months left on our lease.  I would have NEVER signed a lease that allowed someone access to my home for the purpose of selling it while I was still living there.  NEVER.

After some prayers and consideration, we decided to put an offer in, and yesterday it was accepted.
As such, we are now waiting on the banks (like half of the nation) for a yes or no.  It could be 2 months, it could be 6.  No one seems to know.

While it initially came as a shock, as I've thought about it, I'm wondering how much might be 'coincidence', or better termed, Heavenly Father's guiding hand in our lives, and it may actually be a blessing - it's that shift in perception that turns everything around.
 
We initially wanted to purchase a home here in Florida when we began to consider our move.
I spent days poring over maps, trying to figure out which area we might want to live in.  Then, I spent days on the internet looking at listings and talking to realtors, and even banks.  They basically told me that it wasn't going to happen for 3-9 months because everything in Florida is essentially a short sale.

So, we started looking for rental properties - and we weren't very impressed.
We found 2 possibilities through people at church who were moving and looked at their homes.  While my heart was set on the other house, we got a very strong impression when we prayed about which one to pick that it should be this one.  I wasn't very happy about it because I liked the other much better.  But, I knew that our prayer had been answered, and so albeit a little grudgingly, but trusting that Heavenly Father knows what is going on better than I do, we chose this one.

This house is in a perfect location.  We have 2 neighbor girls who are the exact same ages as our kids.  We live 1/4 mile from church and 1.5 miles from my husband's work.  Our kids have lots of friends, we live in a really great neighborhood, and have some really great neighbors.  I found out that things would have been very uncomfortable if we had rented the other house.  The owner was going to move into an RV and continue to live on the property while we lived in their house.  Ew - that would be pretty uncomfortable for me...  We had no idea, but wow, we are sure glad in retrospect that we made this decision.

I think we are just learning over and over to turn things over to our Heavenly Father and let Him drive.  As we wait to see how things turn out for our future in this home, we hope things will work out, but also trust that if they don't, they will turn out for the best.

Happy waiting to me!

IT IS A GAP!!

This is what many of my relative's teeth look like.


Mine however, are so tight in the front that I have a hard time getting floss in there.

My gap is unfortunately, on the side.  Let's pluralize that now.  SIDES.
Instead of the lovely gap in the front genes, I got the 'gap on TWO sides genes'.
I'm so lucky.

After all, they are just teeth.

I wish the sunbeams in primary knew that.
There I am, singing away with the little 3-4 year olds, and suddenly one of them points to my mouth and shouts out, 'you lost a toof!!'.  Yes, I did.  I smile and we continue because if I don't, we'll have an entire discussion on lost teeth and gaps, and the tooth fairy, and I'll get to see lots of loose, or not so loose teeth.  And then the stories about when so and so's brother lost his tooth.  

Then the little 4 year old hasn't been to church in a while and viola - he re-discovers my 'lost toof', and once again points it out to EVERYONE.

Well, I was relieved when we moved from Colorado and I didn't think I'd be seeing that little guy anymore.  Whew I thought, I won't have to deal with that anymore.

I was so wrong.  Today in church, I was once again singing some songs with the sunbeams (3-4 year olds), when one of the kids stopped singing, pointed to my side gap, and said, 'you are missing a toof'.

Yeah, yeah yeah.  

The Pine Tree

Here's more of a body shot of the pine tree - really, it looks great from the front!

Halloween Costumes & Sunrise over the Atlantic

Our girls wanted a "Colorado-esque" costumes this year.
Here's what we came up with:
The quinnessential snowman.
She had a really cute carrot nose, and we painted her up and gave her a scarf and a broom for the trunk or treat last weekend. Unfortunately, she ended up with a weird rash on her face that still hasn't gone away. As such, we went with simple tonight.

We went next door for pizza and dessert before heading out trick or treating. The green pine tree on the back right is our oldest daughter. I'm still trying to find that other photo of her full costume. The dark haired girl in the back is our neighbor who is just the right age for our oldest daughter, and the other two girls are another door down -the little one is just the right age for our youngest daughter too.

Here's a picture that sneaked it's way in here.
We got up early while grandma and grandpa were here and headed out to the beach so that we could watch the sun rise over the Atlantic Ocean.  We got there maybe 30 seconds before the sunrise.  In 2 minutes it was fully up - unbelievably quick!
We played in the water for about an hour, then our oldest daughter got stung by jelly fish and tons of jellies started washing up on the shore cutting our beach excursion a little shorter than previously planned.  

Science Center

Last weekend we headed down to the science center.
They had a whole exhibit about bugs set up.
It was pretty gross.
Really.

As we walked in, we were dared to eat a bug.
They said - I'll eat one if you'll eat one.
So, we tried a few.
I didn't care for the cinnamon sugar wax worms,


I didn't care for the fruit dip wax worms,
but the Cajun crickets actually weren't all that bad... They tasted like hollow sunflower seeds.

After the bug eating, they had a bug spitting contest.
Now - let it be known, that the night before, we had headed out to an outdoor concert on the edge of a lake.
While there, the kids and I peered over the railing at the black water below. It was glassy smooth.
We discussed how quickly spittle would disolve in such glassy smooth water - whether spit was heavier than water, or lighter...basically - all of the properties of spit.
My husband was appalled.
I taught my girls how to curl their tongues, and to get some force and really launch it.
(Yes, pretty ladylike I know - and yes, there is a pertinent point here that I'm about to make).

Due to my kid's recently discovered mad spitting skills (from the previous evening) my daughter and I were both champion bug spitters, and we both launched our bugs (yes, from our mouths) over 15 feet.
I'd say that's pretty impressive.


We touched some really big bugs.
Looked at some really dangerous ones.
Watched (and cheered and screamed) a cockroach race

And had fun playing in the exhibit - one of the girl's friends came with us...under that sink is COMPLETELY filled with cockroaches - ew..!

Blue Springs II

We spent about 3 hours floating down the river. We bought a raft for the girls - which was a good idea.
It was a little trippy since we were swimming in a river where there was no where to touch the bottom, and only 2 places to get in or get out. While it was overcast - at first the water was pretty chilly (that brisk 72*), but after a while it felt great.
We swam up to the head of the spring, and swam over some spots from which the water was gushing. Our youngest daughter told us it felt like swimming over Sprite. She was right.
They took off in the raft and left me floating on my back, lazily down the river.
It got a little eerie when I heard the branches and twigs crackling on the other side of the riverbank, keeping up with me.
I was relieved when someone else showed up swimming in the area as well.


Later, from the dock we posed for pictures, and then thought that we had our first real alligator sighting!

It turns out it was just a log...bummer.


As we headed home from the park, we drove past several of these beautiful plants. They were pretty spectacular (and we were told - pretty poisonous)

Blue Springs State Park

We spent some time a few weeks ago at Blue Springs State Park.
It was BEAUTIFUL.

Notice the little message on the sign to the bottom right


We headed over to a dock and across the river saw this bird perched in the tree

We think that the poles in the water are some sort of gate to help keep the alligators out maybe?

The St. John's river.
Blue Springs is a natural spring that emits 100,000,000 gallons of water each day - and it flows into the St. John's River.
The water stays at a constant 72*.
During the cooler months, the manatee swim from the ocean, up the St. John's river where they enjoy the warmer waters of the St. John's river.
We didn't see any manatee yet though...

Downtown Disney

We found a sandwich shop we LOVE
Unfortunately (or maybe it IS a good thing), it is a ways away at Downtown Disney.

Grandma and Grandpa spent a week at Disneyworld after staying with us.
We headed down just before they left and met them for dinner at our favorite sandwich shop - Earl of Sandwich.
Mmmmm - my mouth is watering.

From there, we headed over to Little Miss Matched -
Have I mentioned that my husband took over the laundry duties here in Florida?
He gets upset if I even try to 'interfere'
He HaTeS, DetEstS, ABhOrs that our kids like to wear their socks in unmatching pairs.
If you check out his picture carefully - you can see the grimmace he is making in the background, as he considered the huge tub - filled with socks that didn't match.
Just for fun, the girls and I found some pairs, and started matching them. (The worker lady came by behind us and undid the matches)



Somehow the kids cooerced the grandparents into the sweet shop where they indulged them with their favorite "pucker powder".

Glasses

We hung out at the gift shop for a while, and had a blast checking out the different sunglass styles...

I say - self portraits never seem to be very flattering though..

Pirates! Argh

We hung out with some pirates at the pirates of the Caribbean section

Ripley's Believe it or Not!

Photos with Grandma


And Grandpa


Ok - not really.


While grandma and grandpa decided to head off on their own adventure, the girls and I headed to Ripley's Believe it or Not Museum.
There we found some pretty realistic wax figures that we bumped into.


We spent some time making wax replicas of the girl's hands as well.

St. Augustine

While grandma and grandpa were here a couple of weeks ago, the girls were out of school, and visited St. Augustine again.

We started out at a spot that purports to have the "Fountain Of Youth"
We drank some of the water - it was actually not very tasty. At all. It tasted surprisingly similar to Florida tap water?!

They had some games set up, and the kids had some contests throwing corn cobs through hoops..

We watched a canon firing

And saw the Spanish empire's original
"This is the place" monument where Ponce de Leon landed.

Cicada

We woke up to this guy on our front porch the other day.
HUGE!!
After googling big insects that look like flies, we determined that it may have been a cicada. Whatever he was - he was really ginormous, and no one wanted to go out the back door for the rest of the day!

Highlights from the past month or so

We've had some interesting ups and downs over the past month. Here are the highlights:

• Our spare room (which was ceiling to floor full of the boxes we didn't really want to unpack) got cleaned out and organized. 
• We started a "mom & me" youth book club, and held the first meeting. 
• We had company come into town for a week. 
• The next week my husband was out of town.  He enjoyed meeting up with his cousin for dinner, and meeting some of the people he works with in other locations.   
• We tried out a gymnastics gym -  30 minutes away, practices 4 x wk - including Saturday.  We decided it was a little too much. 
• We tried out the swim team at the YMCA.  
• We've now got our eye on a running club possibly?  Still searching for the right fit for our family. 
• We met with an allergist to figure out which drugs our daughter is allergic to (antibiotics that is).  After an hour long wait, and then a 10 minute visit, we waited for 2.5 weeks to hear back from the doctor, to tell us that he wanted to re-do the tests that we'd already done in Colorado.  I picked up her file as I began looking for other options.  One thing I love about being here is that I actually HAVE more than one option! 
• I filled out a 45 page questionnaire to have our daughter screened for a few things, and received a phone call that  asked us to come in first thing the next morning. We did a couple of screening tests, and were referred on to a developmental ophthalmologist.  (I also learned how to spell that word correctly recently.)  Did some preliminary testing and have 3 more visits set up to determine the extent of our daughter's eyes being out of alignment, causing her double vision, no depth perception, and even crossing issues.  
• The good news is that we can hopefully move forward with possibly some vision therapy, or something to help her get the help she needs, and begin to excel academically.  The bad news is that our insurance won't help cover the costs and they are pretty daunting.   
• We also found a surgeon ophthalmologist and will be meeting with him for a second opinion a couple of days at the conclusion of the testing.  
• We also found 2 new allergists that we will get to meet with.  (Did I mention how much I've been on the phone lately?)
• We met some fun new friends who just moved to the area from the UK.  We love their accents and the way they all speak!  
• We had the primary program this weekend.  I made it through all of the pieces on the piano.  Our daughter accompanied the kids on one song.  I was glad.  It was a tough song, and my least favorite of the whole lot (because it was the hardest one - she's gonna eclipse me very quickly!)
• Our primary presidency is in charge of the church's "Fall Festival".  I'm not even going to go there!
• I've been rehearsing with some fellow musicians, and have put together a sextet to play for our stake conference - so we've been practicing on Sunday afternoons.  It is so nice to have strings in the house again! 
• Finally, this week we had a bomb drop, when the owners called to let us know that they are listing their home (the one we are renting) with a real estate agent, and selling it as a short sale.  Grrrr.  I don't think I said that loudly enough.  Did I mention she wants to come in and take photos?  GRRRR
• This evening we entered the throes of Halloween costume construction, and I should enjoy my creative outlet the next couple of days.  The real estate lady is going to be really excited to get Halloween costume/ward party/room mother mania photos for the listing.  Serves them right I say. GRRRR
• I guess you've got to let come what may, and love it.  GRRR