Florida, Day 2

On Saturday morning we woke up and hung out in the condo for a while.  We asked the kids what they wanted to do, swim or play on the beach - they picked the beach.  We headed down there armed with lots and lots of sand toys.

We were worried that we wouldn't be able to play on the beach at all while we were in Florida because the beach had red tide.  Well, I guess there was red tide in the ocean and that caused the fish to die.  All of those dead fish washed up on the beach and littered the shore.  It was GROSS - a 10 foot wide stretch of dead fish running the entire 3 mile length of Siesta Key beach.  Ewww!!

We were happy to walk down to the beach and see that most of the fish had been cleaned up.  There were a few here or there, but overall it wasn't too bad.

Hooray for a fish-free beach!

Cameron was very excited to get digging

Cutie #1

Cutie #2

Going down to the ocean to get some water

Cam was playing a funny game where he was making lines he had to jump over and past.  He jumped and jumped and jumped.  Unfortunately, I didn't get any very good pictures of it.

On their way back, Leah did not want to carry a bucket anymore.

She was also getting very annoyed that her hat kept flying off.

With buckets full of water, they were all set and ready to go.

Cam was so, so happy to be playing on the beach.

Leah had fun burying Mama and Daddy's feet

After the kids played for a while, Tim decided to dig a big hole.  I think he looks forward to doing that every year as much as the kids look forward to playing on the beach!

Cameron testing out the hole - not even close to deep enough!

Cameron tried squatting down but Tim still didn't think it was deep enough.

Cam and Leah making "soup" - they dumped sand into the bucket of water.  It was really, really difficult to get the soup out of the bucket when we were done playing!

The hole is now deeper than Leah is tall.

Cam thought it was pretty cool this deep.  Also, check out the wall he was building around the hole to protect it.

Yep, pretty darn deep.

Two kiddos in a hole

Daddy tries it out - not quite as high on him.

Cameron buried Daddy and then helped pull him out!

Then it was Cam's turn to get buried

He was even able to get out of the hole all by himself, which he hasn't been to do in the past.

After playing at the beach for a few hours, we headed to the pool.  We didn't actually have the camera with us, so there aren't any pool pictures from today.  But we swam and swam and swam some more.  We spent a lot of time in the pool this trip!

We decided to go out for our annual trip to St. Armand's Circle for ice cream.  As usual, we walked around the circle first.  The kids liked looking in the stores.

What a cutie pie!

There was a very cool new store that had all kinds of neat hammocks and swings.  We all liked this swing.

This one was soooo comfortable!

We made it around the circle and went to Kilwin's for ice cream.  Cameron picked his usual, Superman.  It is quite colorful.

Leah wanted her own bowl this year and she picked the Superman ice cream too.

She was pretty happy to have her very own.

Superman goatee and mustache

Yummy, yum, yum - a delicious tradition!

Florida, Day 1

For our annual trip to Florida to visit Omi and Opa, we had to be a bit more creative this year.  Since Cameron is in school now, we can't just take off whenever we want for as long as we want.  Well, I guess we can, but we felt bad about taking him out of school again after we already had for 10 days in October!  We ended up flying out on Thursday afternoon after Cameron got out of school.  We flew into Tampa and arrived around 9pm, so we rented a car for the night and drove down to Siesta Key.  The kids fell asleep in the car and slept while we brought them up to the condo and put them to bed.  It worked out quite well.

On Friday morning it was a bit chilly (well, chilly for Florida... I think it was in the high 50s, low 60s) so we decided to return the car and then go for a walk.  We did some geocaching, stopped at the drug store to buy a few things, then walked back to the condo.  It was a very nice day for a walk - sunny and not too breezy.

One of the things we bought at the drug store was sunglasses for Cameron and Tim.  It was a good thing we did because it was really sunny.

We found an awesome banyan tree while we were walking.  Cam was fascinated by it.

Who wants to ride in the stroller when there are balance beams to walk on?

Cam thought that Leah had a pretty good idea.

Artsy flower shot

When we got back from our walk, we ate some lunch and then headed down to the pool.  It was a bit chilly outside but we had to swim on our first day in Florida!

Leah is so darn cute in her little swim cover up!!

Before we headed to Florida, we got some new summer clothes and swimsuits out.  Cam was very excited about his new swimsuit that had cool sharks on it.

Very excited to get into the pool

Brrrr, it was a little bit chilly.  Check out the background - not a single person on the pool deck!

Happy to be swimming in Florida!

Swimming with Daddy

Daddy and kiddos

Leah got cold pretty quickly, so she came out and got wrapped up in her pink towel.

Cam and Daddy swam for a while longer, but even they got cold pretty quickly.

We headed back up to the condo for dinner and playing, then went to bed kind of early.  The weather forecast for the rest of our trip looked good, so we wanted to be rested up for lots of swimming and playing on the beach!

"Christmas" in Massachusetts

The first weekend in January, we went to Massachusetts to celebrate Christmas with the Walkers.  We arrived on Friday night after dinner and put the kids to bed right away.  On Saturday morning we woke up and drove up to Kim's for the day.  Jack had a basketball game at noon, so that was our first stop.  It was fun to watch and Jack made a basket.

After the game we went back to Kim's and spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out with everyone.  Of course, Kim made lots of yummy things to eat so we gorged ourselves!  After food and hanging out, we opened Christmas gifts.

Leah checking out her gift from the Olivers

 Cam's turn

Mimi and Lucia snuggles!

Ella, Mimi and Cathy check out Lucia's gift

Cameron playing with one of his favorite gifts - a hockey rink with players, goalies and refs.  He loves it!  Also, Lucia is rocking her new slippers.

More gifts for Cam and Leah

When did it happen that little Ella grew up??

Lucia is very interested in what Leah is opening

She loved Ella's sparkly iPod case

 Leah playing with Grandpa

 Silly bow-head #1

Silly bow-head #2 (also an excellent balancing act)

Cam loves his Hess helicopter too

What a cutie pie Lucia is!

We had a very fun weekend with everyone!!