Our Favorite Garden

A stroll through our favorite garden today.  Just a few pictures for those of you stuck in the drab of winter; the quality is not great but you get the idea.  My camera is on the list of things to replace :)  

Things have a way of balancing out and I'm thinking come April when you are all enjoying your beautiful weather we'll be paying our dues sweltering in a bug infested sauna.  In the meantime, we are really enjoying winter!

Merry Christmas

From all of us. . . 

And Mathilda :}

Isn't she lovely?  I think this is as close as we'll get to a snowman.

14 Years

My sweet hubby took the day off and I didn't even have to ask!  Made me so happy.  We went for a stroll at the Japanese garden, lunch at an enjoyable restaurant, evening playing at the beach, a little impromptu Christmas light drive, and dessert at home.  Everyone was tired and happy.  It was nice to have such an unrushed, relaxed day with my favorite people.  And the first year ever that we haven't frozen our tails off celebrating our anniversary out of doors in December.

Mama duck and ducklings on our way to the car after lunch.

Lots of blue bottle jellyfish on the beach.  By necessity we have now learned how to take care of stings.

I finally realized, after years of feeling a bit guilty for not making gifts a higher priority in our anniversary (aka not at all), that we just aren't huge 'gift' people.  At least not in the traditional sense.  We're happiest spending time together doing something we all enjoy.  We do give tangible gifts through the year, it's not taboo, they are just usually of the small-not-saved-for-any-particular-occasion type.  If there is something someone really wants/needs it is likely to show up at some point and if it's expensive we might use a holiday budget as the extra moolah needed to buy it.  But there's just often not any 'thing' on the gift list.  Maybe we are just that boring. ;)  Except the kids of course, they have a year round list.  Seems to work perfect for us.

Florida- Part II

The month of November. . .

The unpacking came to a halt when I ran out of places to put stuff.  There's not much point in taking things out of boxes if you can't put it away, right?  Work in progress, still hunting down furniture and storage solutions.  Which also means lots of projects in the making as we redo furniture and decorate, but that's a ways off.  Functional first, pretty later.

Thanksgiving the kids were sick.  We celebrated when their appetites came back then surprised them with passes to Disney World!  Early Christmas gift.  We've been saving to go to Disneyland in California for over a year.  Disney World was a 'yeah, that would be nice but I don't think it's going to happen.'  And then, voila, living in Florida makes it so much easier; they have awesome discounts for residents.  So much fun!

Look at all the flowers!  And the cute kids :)

This 'photo-op' turned into a 'nap-op'.  It was the end of the day, we had to shuffle them off the cushions for the next people who wandered through.

The blur on the left.

The car broke down. . . twice.  The first time 5 hours at Costco.  Could be worse right?  The second time we got stranded at a truck stop in the middle of nowhere on our way to Legoland for Bug's birthday.  Oops.  The weather was great, we met some really nice people, I almost got the kids to eat 'fresh local alligator', and we witnessed a Canadian scratch fest-- don't ask.  Missed Legoland but made Disney the next day (see trip above), so no worries.  And it finally convinced my diy hubby to let someone else diy the car rather than spend our vacation in the parking lot of an auto parts store!  24 hours later we also acquired a nice dent.

We've been hit once.  Let me rephrase that.  I'm surprised we've only been hit once.  I know that sounds cynical but it wouldn't if you were riding in my passenger seat.  We might trade the car in for a tank.  If it shoots lasers that would be a huge bonus!  Not that I would shoot anyone *coughmuchcough*

Anyways, the dent.  Ironically the guy who hit us was not one of the many common sense allergic or highly vision impaired folks driving around here, but an out of towner in a rental car.  After pushing our back bumper in he simply backed up a couple of inches and parked right behind us.  I'm assuming he believed we wouldn't notice because he wasn't happy when we called him out to the parking lot.  First he tried to blame it on our car (which was parked and empty), then he tried bullying, and finally he turned and shushed his poor distraught wife when she tried to tell the officer what happened.  I don't think it will be the highlight of his trip.  But, if we choose to leave the dent, it pays for the engine repairs :}

Lise started skating classes.  Ever see the movie Bambi?  She reminded me so much of that the first few times out on the ice; all long, spindly limbs going every different direction.  In six short weeks her skating has improved a lot!  She's actually doing small jumps and spins now.  Determination does wonderful things.  She looks forward to next year when she can participate in the professional ice show the rink puts on at Christmas and starting some 'notests'- the non competitive version of ice competitions.  The classes are really fun to go watch.

Crossovers

She would practice every day if I would take her.

His version of ice skating is zooming around as fast as he possibly can with the glider.  Or, standing in one spot digging like a mad man with his skates to see if he can find out how they get the logos under the ice.

Just down the street from the rink is Bug's favorite store.  They have a play area with literally thousands of legos out, we can easily spend a couple of hours there.  He's taking a 'class'; basically the teacher sits with the kids, shows them a piece and shows them exactly where to put it on the model she is building and they copy it with theirs.  Not as free-creative as I thought but they have built all kinds of things from helicopters to amusement park rides that fling lego people.  Of course he loves them.  I think next time rather than class we'll invest the moolah into some gears and motors for home!  Maybe a stop motion station.

The people flinging lego contraption.

We're starting to find our way around, find things we really enjoy, and making a few friends along the way.  My kids chat the ears of anyone who stands still. . . including those held captive in check-out lines.  They either run in relief when they finally get through or give us their contact information.

Well, if you weren't sleepy before you started I'm guessing there are at least a few nodding heads out there now.  Now that we're 'caught up' I'll try to post shorter updates more often and save everyone's eyeballs.

We miss you all!  Pass around a hug.

Florida- Part 1

Pictures in the camera, pictures on the computer.  I'm splitting it up into two parts.  It will still be long, get comfortable.  Caffeine might be a good idea ;)

Staying out of the way while the movers pack.
What better way than filling every possible pocket & hair follicle with sand?

Ted chilling on the concrete- it was still toasty in September.

The move was about as uneventful as moves can be, which is pretty much why I'd prefer to buy one house and never move.  In the end we made it, our stuff made it, and a little time solves the rest.  Friends and family came to our rescue more times than I can count, for which I am deeply grateful.  The flu that hit the day before we moved was thankfully a short stint.  My poor boy still didn't fare the flight so well, I'll spare you those details.

You're welcome.

It was hard to coax him back onto the plane at our connection.  He says he's 'allergic to motion.'  His plan was to camp at the Houston airport for a couple of days and then drive the rest of the way to Florida.  While the airport did have an assortment of the great restaurants we enjoyed when we lived in Dallas and we would have been perfectly content to live there for a couple of days, realistically it obviously wasn't going to happen.  We had a short family picnic comprised mostly of meclazine and put the poor kid on our next flight.  He fell asleep as soon as we took off and the second half was considerably easier than the first.  By the time we got to our rental it was dark and we were all exhausted and glad to have beds.

First thing next morning the kids headed out to explore our temporary backyard- lizards, coconut trees, bugs, and all.

Anoles everywhere.  They jump!

Climbing the coconut tree.

A better plan than climbing.

From the coconut trees we quickly learned it is best not to climb coconut trees infested with fire ants.  And, coconut trees are almost always infested with fire ants whether you see them or not.  They both came back peppered with red bites.  All of us were easy bug pickin's until we figured out what and where to avoid.  It looked like we were recovering from a nasty case of the chicken pox.  We filed it under 'things the locals already know' and slathered on the hydrocortisone gel.

We also learned that screw drivers make pretty good coconut peelers if you're determined enough.

After days of holding out hope that there was a 'machete' stored somewhere at the vacation house they settled for a screwdriver.

And it worked!

We celebrated a birthday!  And waited several days for the rain to go away to try out the new boogie boards (Toni, we need pointers).  It rains a lot here.  We had grand plans of going to Sea World or something similar but those quickly faded into the realization that we had to find a place to live sooner than we anticipated; limited market, background checks, application processes, negotiations and all that.  She was a good sport about spending her day in the car looking for a home.  I think that qualifies for a birthday do-over.

The house hunt was fast and furious.  In Florida 99% of rentals go through realtors, kind of  a pain for the poor realtor since they make squat off the deal.  After running our perfectly sarcastic and refreshingly honest realtor ragged we finally found a place within our newly adjusted reality check budget for living in Florida. 

So nice to go for a stroll at the end of a crazy day.

Isaac hanging out on the back porch.  Look closely at the coconuts :)

So we moved out of the vacation home and into our new place- the kids won't let me call it an apartment because they say it makes it feel like it isn't a house.  On paper it's about as big as the house we left but storage doesn't seem to be a huge priority in Florida houses. . . or townhouses.  The guys who unloaded our crates kept shaking their heads and saying, 'This is going to be interesting.'  Yep, we still need to get rid of LOTS more.  We did manage to unpack the bare necessities by digging and get somewhat settled just in time for Halloween.  It was a low key affair this year- dinner out and some homemade treats.

The wizard and Hiccup from 'How to Train Your Dragon'

Unpacking has been an adventure.  If the boxes are labeled they are often labeled in code, by abbreviation, or by whatever was thrown in at the top of the box.  We've found boxes marked 'lightbulbs' that were full of blankets and boxes labeled 'misc' with no other indication as to what's inside that housed an assortment of board games plus a butternut squash.  Random.  We also unpacked a bag of garbage (thank goodness there was nothing of a decomposing nature) and several other things that were never meant to tag along.  Every box is a surprise.  It's like a 300 box Christmas!  And while I really appreciate the fact that our stuff was boxed up and ready to go so quickly I don't think I'll ever have strangers pack again- company paid or no.  Next time I pack.

The limitless supply of boxes and packing paper we currently have on hand have been put to good use though!  They've been cars, houses, villages, hideouts, forts, places for art, giant origami, and even substituted as a pile of leaves to jump in and 'snow' for angels.

As close as we are getting to leaves or snow here.

We are still in the process of settling in.  It's been slow with the hubby working long hours, needing furniture, not having large amounts of storage space, life in general, and just trying to get things going and get reconnected to everything at the same time.  The place is starting to become more functional with the faintest glimmers of comfort-- and dare I say organization?--at the end of the tunnel.  Long tunnel still.  Parts of it are fun.  And having a space that works for our family all put together will be wonderful.  For that the work is worth it many times over.  And we're all under one roof- best part.