Playing in the Rain

Florida has wonderful afternoon storms. Today Jack asked me if he could play on the porch and watch the rain. It wasn't long before he put on his boots and ventured off the porch. Once Will saw what Jack was doing he just had to join in.

   

 

Am I a Bad Mom?

Will has always been a fan of dogs but when Will met Nacho it was love at first sight. Nacho belongs to Will's swimming teacher and I think the only reason he doesn't complain about lessons every day is because he gets to see Nacho. Am I a bad mom for not getting him a dog? You decide. (Sorry the pics are low quality. They were taken on my phone.)

Embassy Suites

 

We decided to spend the last weekend before Ed started working in Disney World. I spent hours online looking for a good hotel deal and we finally settled on Embassy Suites. It was not the cheapest hotel (you don't want to stay in the cheapest Orlando hotel...scary!) but both Ed and I have good memories of staying in Embassy Suites when we were kids. We love the atrium with the waterfalls and live trees, the managers reception with snacks and kiddie cocktails, but most of all we love the hot breakfast in the mornings! The boys really liked staying in the hotel. Jack asked if it was his new house. It made me realize how many places we have stayed over the last 6 months and how confusing it has been for Jack. The boys love the fresh hot breakfast in the morning too. They ate as many scrambled eggs and pastries as they wanted. We got our money's worth.

 

We asked Jack which park he wanted to go to an he chose EPCOT. He really likes riding in the "big ball" and now calls it by it's proper name "Spaceship Earth". He also really likes "Living with the Land", a boat ride through EPCOT's green houses, or as he calls it "the vegetable ride". It was a really hot day so we found a nice air conditioned hallway to eat lunch in. Lucky for us it was connected to an ice cream shop. Jack was very pleased with our fresh baked cookie ice cream sandwich.  

One reason I can return to Disney World time after time is I am always finding something new. This time we stumbled upon a Dinosaur Dig Site (giant sandbox) in the Animal Kingdom. We found it in a play area we have visited several times but never crossed the bridge leading to it. The entire area was shaded and had giant fans and misters hanging overhead. Because it was so secluded not many people had found it so it was quiet. It is now my favorite spot to cool down and relax.

I hope to bring you more new and exciting finds from Disney World very soon!

La Chua Trail

My new favorite pastime? GATOR HUNTING! I don't really want to call it "hunting" though because when I hear the word hunting I think of killing. I can't even watch Swamp People because I feel bad for the gators.

There is something so thrilling about seeing a giant gator in it's natural habitat. I guess there is a good healthy feeling of fear there too, when you know that right around the corner there could be a gator sitting in the middle of the trail, just chillin'. That is an actual possibility on La Chua trail that runs through Paynes Prairie Wildlife preserve, just outside Gainesville. The preserve is home to alligators, deer, bison, wild horses and a variety of birds. It is my new favorite gator sighting spot. When we visited there last weekend for our Sunday Afternoon Adventure, we saw more gators than we could count and not just the tiny baby ones either, big monster ones. There was one giant who crawled out of the water and all the young gators scurried away in fear. Unfortunately, we went towards the end of the day, shortly before the park closed, so we were not able to walk the whole trail. I guess that just means we will get to go back and experience even more gator excitement.

Here is a panoramic shot of a bend in the river where we saw a lot of gators. Click here to see more pictures of our trip on La Chua trail and some of the gators we saw there.

Ichetucknee Springs

One of my favorite childhood memories was tubing down the Ichetucknee River, so I was so excited when I found out that it is only 45 minutes from our house in Florida.  An easy day trip for our family!  We went to Wal-Mart, got ourselves some tubes and headed to the river. When we got to the river, we realized we didn't really have any idea where we were going. The park ranger directed us to a tram that would take us up river a ways and told us there were exit points about 30 minutes downstream and 1.5 hours downstream. We hopped in the water and everything was going great. Ben fell asleep and the boys were singing Row, Row, Row Your Boat and having fun splashing in the water. As we approached the 30 minute take out point, we assessed our situation and decided we were having enough fun to keep going.

BIG MISTAKE. About five minutes later Jack started asking, "When are we going to be done?!" A few minutes after that, Will started crying because he was hot. A few minutes after that, Ben woke up and started crying too, although he couldn't really tell me why. Finally, we made it to the end of the line and hopped back on the tram to go back to the car for our picnic lunch. It would have been a perfect day if we had just gotten out at the 30 minute mark. Due to our stupidity, I have downgraded it to just a great day. Next time, we will know our limits!

 

I feel like I should comment on the Strawberry Shortcake floaties. Somehow we got all the way to the state park before we noticed we did not have any flotation devises for our boys. We stopped by several tube rental places and none of them rented life vests. We were directed to the Dollar Store in the near by town where the only arm floaties they sold were these beautiful pink girl ones. At least they were only $1.29.

Alachua Splash Park

 

There are two playgroups we participate in already, one is with our church friends and the other is for all resident families.  For the resident playgroup this week, we headed 20 minutes north to the Alachua Splash Park. It's the perfect place to play on a hot summer day. Admission is FREE. It's fenced in so the kids can't escape. It's not a pool so I didn't have to actively participate in the kids play. And, my favorite part, it had beautiful grass. One thing, and probably the only thing, bad I have to say about Florida is they have crappy sawgrass everywhere. This park had what I like to call "golf course grass". It was really short, cool, and soft on your feet. I took my shoes of and walked around a bit. It made my day.

 

 

Lake Alice

We'd been living in Florida for three weeks and we still hadn't seen any gators. I figured it was time to go hunt them down. I heard from a friend that I run with that you can almost guarantee a sighting at Lake Alice on University of Florida Campus. We packed up the kids and our bug spray and headed to the swamp for our second Sunday afternoon adventure.

 

At first I was skeptical because we were looking everywhere and we still weren't seeing any gators.

 

I knew we must be getting closer when I saw this sign.

 

While taking a picture of the sign I notice the ground begin to move. Right under my feet were hundreds of these tiny little frogs jumping all around. Ed caught one and let the boys hold it.

 

 Still no gators. Just lots of soft shell turtles.

 

Then, we spotted him! Our first real live Florida gator!

 

Isn't he sooo cute! Right down the path were two of his gator buddies making it a total of 3 gators on our first gator hunting trip. We are real live swamp people!

 

After about 30 seconds the boys were like, "Alright Mom, enough with the gators. Lets go eat fruit snacks!".

I was so excited to see those little gators. My next goal is to see a BIG gator. Stay tuned for more gator hunting fun.