Celebrating 18 years

Today started with a walk along the beach to Thomas' donuts.  We arrived to find a long line, and after about 20 minutes in line, another customer informed us that they were out of donuts.  No big deal, but the staff should have done that.  It was hot, really hot, and we were facing a long walk home.  Savannah was with us and had left our home away from home without applying sunscreen.  Now that is a problem  for Savannah.

We then spent the day poolside.  After a few hours of this, Andy and I left everyone else for an anniversary celebration. Our marriage will turn 18 years old on Sunday (which will actually be the day that this post is published).  However, that will be a busy day for us with a trip to drop Wyatt off at camp.  We will also have to pick up Shiloh during the same time frame as Wyatt leaves for camp.  Plus a dinner out at the beach is so much more fun.

We enjoyed an early dinner at Montego Bay Seafood restaurant so that we could beat the crowd.  We feasted on coconut shrimp, grouper sandwiches, and key lime pie.  I was stuffed, and I do not like to feel full, but it was worth it.

The plan was that we would have our date and then catch up with the others for some shopping.  Jonathan bought Danielle a very cool nail art kit at one of the local shops, and others want this kit.

Andy and I walked out on the pier and ended up staying until sunset.  We could not reach the others to find out what their plans were because our phones don't have great service here.  As it turned out, their trip was derailed by a trip to Urgent Care for Logan.  His ear has really bothered him for two days and is swollen.  We thought it was swimmer's ear, but he actually has an ear infection.  Andy and I stayed on the pier to watch the sunset.

That is a sucker fish attached to this boy.

After the sun set, we bought the nail kit that Tara and Savannah wanted. We returned to our beach home where I experimented with Savannah's and Julia's nails.  This is a really cool kit allowing us to easily add nail art to our nails, but there is a learning curve to getting used to it. 

We celebrated our anniversary early, and the story of our love is here.

Just an update on Zach's phone and ipod.  It looks like the phone will recover, but the ipod is showing no signs of recovery.  Savannah offered the phone that she is about to get to replace Zach's.  That is very sweet of her, but she has to pay the bill, so it isn't happening.  The reality of this situation is just now hitting Zach.  He may very well face a very long drive home without his treasured music.  He is also beginning to realize that if this does not get fixed he will be without an ipod at least until his birthday in October.

Happy Birthday Danielle!

Wednesday, July 20th

Fifteen years ago on a vacation, we took a boat ride out to see dolphins.  I know it was fifteen years ago because I have an adorable picture of an eight month old Zach in the captain's chair on the boat.  I have wanted to do this again since that time, and this year I whipped out the credit card to make it happen...only it almost didn't happen.  I booked the reservation yesterday and gave my credit card number as required for a group as large as ours.  We started the day with an under the weather Julia, so we had to stop for some pain reliever.  We were running just slightly behind our desired time but plenty of time ahead of the boarding schedule, but we could not find the marina.  The GPS indicated that the address on the brochure did not exist.  We tryed to follow the map on the brochure and did not find it, so we turned around to head back home.  Then we found it, on accident five minutes before take off.  So we boarded and enjoyed the cruise.

The seagulls were like tour guides gliding along the side of the ship.  Feeding them was encouraged, but we did not partake.

This was our greeter at shell island.

The water was this clear.  Who cares about shells when you can play in this?  Okay, Wyatt still cares about shells.

We made some attempts at a family picture.  My goal is something good enough to replace the blog's two year old homepage picture.

All too soon it was time to board the ship again with the promise of some time to see the dolphins.

This dolphin was the only one that we got a good look at, and this picture is about as good a look as we got. 

Pelicans greeted us as we returned to the marina.

Julia had to be carried off the boat.  The jury is still out on whether she is actually sick or was just extra tired.  She just recovered from a strep infection and actually finished her medicine the day before we left.  She was very hot to the touch this morning and complained that she was cold.  Julia is quite prone to strep, so we will wait and see how this goes.









When it was all said and done, Zach was the first to thank me for this adventure.  I am proud of the good manners that my kids have and that they will even thank their parents for things.  They aren't perfect by any means, but they are pretty good on this.

It was time for lunch and the pool upon our return, and Julia perked right up.

Tiffany had some fun braiding hair.

We then did some shopping.  We are allowing the kids a small budget for t-shirts, but shopping tonight was not a success.  Julia found a shirt she liked, but the store did not have her size.  We decided to head further down the strip for some Pineapple Willie shirts for some of the group.  It took over an hour of sitting in stop and go (mostly stop) traffic to make my way back down the strip, and I did not dare stop.  Bickering from the back seat did not help, but the sunset through the palm trees was pretty amazing.

Wyatt offered the quote of the day.  We were leaving a shop next to an Oyster bar.  Wyatt then made this statement: I have never tried oysters.  Come on, Mom, give me a chance!

When we finally made it back to the house, Andy almost had the steaks on the grill finished.  We feasted and celebrated Danielle's birthday.  The only glitch was that after multiple failed attempts from multiple people, Austin finally pushed Zach into the pool.  The bad news is that Zach had his cell phone and ipod in his pockets and was wearing brand new tennis shoes (as in tennis shoes purchased the day before we left home for this trip).  His ipod and cell phone are now in rice and will remain there for at least 24 hours. We are hoping that they will be fine.  We cannot replace either. 

We ended our day chatting poolside and laughing over funny things we did growing up.

Tuesday July 19

Tara decided that our bar needed a bartender.  Watch out!  He's armed with a high range, powerful watergun.

To give you an idea of the obnoxious behavior that takes place poolside.  You can see that swimming in clothing, in this case pajamas, occurs as people are pulled into the pool.  It's all in good fun.

Gavin is Logan's buddy who is along for the trip.

An Attempt at a Decent Family Picture

Monday, July 18, 2011
Check out Andy's fun post on his start of this day....A Mile for Donuts

Today was a day spent at the pool and beach.  There were some obnoxious water gun fights that resulted in a panic over a soaked laptop and Bible-all turned out okay.  A couple of kids landed in the pool fully clothed.  I keep my cell phone in my pocket (even though our service here is touch and go) and my new watch on my wrist and use these things as deterrents to landing in the pool fully clothed.

Dad couldn't go a full two days without a run to Sam's, so he Jonathan and Danielle made the trip, and I got to hang with Regan.  We ended up napping together in the recliner...check my "A Few of my Favorite things" post.  Regan is a very good baby, but she can sure bring out the tears when her mean Aunt Tamara forbids her to chew on a battery.  You would have thought that they had become best friends in their three second relationship.

Andy grilled salmon on cedar planks for dinner, and we got that started a bit late.  I was still determined to try and take care of the family pictures early in the week rather than later, so we made our first attempt tonight.  Much to the chagrin of the kids, I am afraid that we will need to try again a little earlier in the evening and with less cloud cover.  I think I found one okay picture in this bunch.

This is the one that may be a keeper.  Of course Julia had to go all diva on us.

I did allow them to get silly.

Then we saw this huge pelican and had to turn the camera on it.

Logan had some fun running and jumping into the seaweed infested ocean.

We spent some time at the Pier Park shopping center.  Wyatt found some rocks that he just has to have.  Julia complained of sore feet. I bought a bracelet.  Joshua started feeling bad, so we left.  Our only true accomplishment was some Tums from Target and a new memory card for my camera because the old one has been acting up.

Then it was back to the house for Scattergories, TV, video games etc.

We have been doing these big family vacations for some 15 years now.  Some are better than others, but we generally have a good time.  This year it stinks that Tony and Mom aren't here.  It stinks that Jonathan is so limited in his mobility.  So far we haven't been to the E.R. (btdt on three vacations that I can remember- Joshua's blood sugar dropped dangerously low on the drive to one destination, Jonathan dislocated his finger one year, and Austin visited for toddler asthma one year). I plan to splurge some this year and return to some of the fun we used to have on vacation such as doing something touristy....hoping to accomplish that on Wednesday.

I almost forgot that Jonathan is on a mission to nickname everyone, this is what he has so far.
Jonathan- Hopalong
Danielle - BabyMama
Tiffany - Air Tide (actually she is typically called the laundry nazi because she keeps the washer and dryer running on vacation)
Dad - Sunshine
Tara- Chef (She gets up and cooks every morning.)
Tessa -One Hip Wonder
I am BenchWarmer
Andy-Cedar Plank
Savannah -Gingervitis (red hair)
Wyatt - Decibel (he's loud)
Julia - Junk Food Julia (I caught her eating two full size candy bars back to back yesterday ...ewww).