Real Life: Florida 2021 ~

We went on a family vacation that involved sandy beaches instead of snow mounds. Palm trees instead of snowy pine trees. Sunglasses were used to block the sun instead of the glare of the snow. It was warm and not cold! We left white and returned home brown! Aren't vacations fun!?! Especially winter vacations that take you to the sunny, warm south!!!!!????!!!!

We planned this vacation back at the end of summer time already in 2020. We started booking a vacation Florida homes from AirB&B and we love the host that provides us with such good places!!!! Thank you Jane!!!! It's always a guess to pick the perfect dates but using the winter break days at school to our advantage is something we did the past two years.

I did think of basketball season and went by the schedule used from last year. But when the season was put on hold for three weeks right after Christmas because of Governor Wolfs COVID orders, it pushed the season back three weeks and right into our vacation dates. Instead of Matthew missing only one game, he was now missing five!!!! That's kinda a big deal!!!!! We also ordered plane tickets back in the fall for this vacation because I think we have arrived to flying south as our favorite option!!!! We used to drive those 16 hours straight from our home to the sunny south vacation spot but last year we flew and loved it!!!! You pack lighter, you take less and arrive in three hours!!!!! Well, I had to call and cancel Matthew's plane ticket when we decided to make things a bit more complicated and have him come and go at different dates so that he wouldn't miss any basketball games! When I called Frontier Airlines, I said that I needed to cancel Matthew's ticket. I was told that we were sent an email back in December stating that the entire flight was canceled. There was no flight leaving on February 10!!!!! What??? Oh goodness! Instead of canceling one flight, I find out a week before we were leaving that our entire flight was canceled! I thanked God that it was then that we found out and not the early morning when we all arrived at the airport only to find out the news of no flight. I quickly took a look at other airlines and we booked with Alligant Airlines for the same date but different time. It worked out even better because now the little ones could attend their Valentines Parties at school, enjoy the PJ day at school and watch the movie at school that all happened the day we left for Florida.

The day came for us to pack up our bags and head south!!!! I knew it was going to be a long day for the littles because they went to school in pjs, decorated Valentine Cookies and watched a movie at school that day. I picked them up at 2:35 and when we came home, we jumped into the Yukon and drove off to the airport!

We grabbed some Auntie Annes pretzel nuggets before boarding!

Matthew and Jeremiah stayed back in the cold while the rest of us traveled to the sunshine state!!!!

We arrived at 9:30 PM and hopped into our Turo vehicle and drove off to our rental vacation home. Hadassah and Mike were both asking for groceries but the only store open at 10:00 was Walmart. I don't like shopping at Walmart at home and for sure not in the south. There are so many better options but we needed some drinking water, milk and eggs, etc. so Hadassah and I went that night yet to grab some basics.

The next day, I went to Yoders for these beautiful foods!!!!!

We didn't waste time with getting our feet on the white sands of Siesta Key!!!! The day was so lovely and a perfect start to a ten day vacation!!!!

We also didn't waste any time with dropping by at our all time favorite frozen yogurt store! Yogurtology has the best toppings! We love this place and made many stops here while on vacation!

Here's the house that we stayed at and it had a pool in the back yard! The little ones LOVED this! It's our first time renting a home with a pool! We will be doing this again!

School work had to go along but it wasn't bad at all! Austin's teacher said that he could catch up after we get back because he only missed I think one day. We planned our vacation over some dates of "no school" and Presdents Day. Then they had a snow day or two leaving us with barely any work to catch up on! Ashlyn had a few papers to do and it usually happened first thing in the morning.

On Friday, Jeremiah flew down and met us at the vacation home! It was fun having him with us while vacationing!

Saturday morning, Mike had seven men over at our house at 6 AM to play Acquire. This game does weird things to the men that like to play because I've never heard of being on vacation and getting together at such an early time to just play a few games. But I did like that they had family time in mind and chose to play this game early in the morning that the men could join their families the rest of the day! I snuck out of the house early that morning too to go to the Sarasota Farmers Market again. Mike and I walked to this market when we were down for our anniversary getaway and I loved it! I wanted to go again! This time I bought me some gorgeous sunflowers!!!!

Then it was another day on the beach!

And another stop at Yogurtology!

We were lucky to be able to watch Matthew's basketball game that night online!

Jeremiah joined our family and now we can't wait for Matthew to join this crew yet!!!!

This is one of the main reasons we make Sarasota, Florida a vacation spot almost every winter. Mommy D. lives in Florida every winter. Her and Daudy D. started this years ago. It's a place that they have loved for many years. Now she lives there alone from January - March. The kids and Mike would bike to her house every morning to say hello. The weather was nice but we did have some rains here and there and one time when I biked with them to see Mommy D. we had to wait in her house til the rains passed by.

Florida is always a memory to me with finding lizards. When I was a kid we used to catch these and spy them along the sides of the house. Now my kids are catching the lizards and this one even dropped it's tail. Gross.

Matthew joined us in Florida by flying solo on Saturday. We seemed to know that route to the airport and back by now! We all went out to Lazy Lobster to eat and then Matthew and Austin took a swim in the pool.

February 14, Valentine's Day, was spent with those we love the most! Hadassah and Jeremiah went out to The Chart House on a date while we had supper at Mommy Lapps. I went to Detwiler's Farm Market on Saturday and bought two cakes to take along. This store is awesome!!!! I love to shop there! Here's the reason I hated to shop at Walmart because this place is one hundred times better in my opinion! Mike ended up going to an event with Ritchie but that was OK because our Valentine Date is planned for the next night!

The back yard of our vacation home had a fence and it was lined on the opposite side with these gorgeous flowers that dropped over the top and spilled over into the property that we were on!

Valentine's Day is also Jeremiahs birthday! We played our favorite birthday song off of YouTube for him and then him and Matthew made heart shaped pancakes for breakfast!

I love Florida trees, plants and flowers!!!! The Spanish Moss trees down there are my favorite. Some day I would love to have family portraits with these kinds of trees in the back ground!

Look how this fern is growing out of this tree!!!

Mike treated me to a Pina Colada on Valentines!!!! We ate so many nachos and cheese dishes on this vacation. Look out for them seagulls!

I didn't realize how much Matthew adds to the beach life until he arrived! Austin doesn't really like the beach because he hates how the sand sticks to you so much. Then he goes to wash it off in the ocean and and it sticks again. When Matthew showed up on the beach, he dug a huge hole in the sand for the kids and Austin was all about it!!! His day was much more enjoyable out there!

Cousins joined us on the beach too and that always makes for a fun time! Janessa and Angelyn are some of Ashlyn's best friends and they had a blast together building sand castles!

On Monday night, Mike and I went out on a double date with John and Kathy again! We did the same thing last year and loved it! This time we ate at Shore and I love pretty foods! It tasted so good, the view was wonderful with the water right beside us and time with John and Kathy is always fun!

Look at this pretty food!

We left the littles with Jeremiah, Hadassah and Matthew. When we got to the restaurant I was texted that Austin is fishing with the boys. Oh Lord Jesus, watch over him! They were good sitters and all went fine! They treated them to ice cream and we all met back at the house.

I had a few things in mind to do while in Florida. I like to do something on the educational side of things if the kids are out of school but this year Ashlyn was begging to go find shark teeth again. That was it! We drove to a place near Venice early one morning. It was easy to spy the teeth in the sand once you had an eye for them! Matthew is good at this!

This is only a few of ones we found! So cool!

Mike was playing Acquire again with his guy friends and decided to join us later on the beach! Here's the crew that went with me!

Just down the street from our vacation home, was a park. It's a nice park with lots of those Spanish moss trees and the kids loved, absolutely loved the climbing obstacles here! They called it their "ninja warriors course".

And because there were so many beautiful trees, I asked the kids to pose for me! Ashlyn was so nervous because there was a sign saying to beware of the alligator!!!!

She was uneasy the whole time!

We didn't see a gator but as soon as I said we were finished, they took off running!!!!

Before we left for vacation, the kids got haircuts. Austin begged for a haircut like Patrick Mahomes. He loves watching him play for the Chiefs. Ashley tried her best but Austin was in tears when he hoped of the barber chair because his hair wasn't curly like Mahomes. Well now .... at the park, I grabbed a hand full of that pretty moss and put it on top of his head. There you have it!!!!

Another day Mike and Matthew went golfing. Austin was not into the beach, so we spent the afternoon at home. The littles swam in the pool and I enjoyed the sunshine!

God story here ... we decided to go back to this fun Mexican Restaurant. We loved it last year and wanted to go again! We made reservations for nine. Ritchie and Katie were coming along! It was a long table and we were being ourselves as we waited to order our foods. Chips and salsa were brought to the table. We stopped to say a prayer before our main meal arrived. I even made a comment as to why someone was seeming 'snippy'. Live music was going in the back ground. We ate and enjoyed the food. Then our waitress came up to us and said that the couple next to us saw that we prayed and brought our family out to eat and they were reminded that there are still good people in this world and wanted to pay for our meal!!!! The waitress was asked to tell us after the couple had already left the restaurant. This even touched our waitress as she held back tears telling us this. Thank you to whom ever you were that treated our family that night!!! The only thing we know to do is to pass it on!!!!

And then, as we were leaving, the kids put a few bucks in the guys tip jar that was playing music at the restaurant. He then gave the kids a free CD. We left that place feeling very blessed!

Matthew left for home again on Wednesday afternoon. If everything goes just right, he was going to make his game that night yet! Lena took and picked him up at the airport! Many thanks for that Lena! It was crazy to have Matthew with us that day and then watch him play basketball online later that night back home.

The kids went on so many bike rides down there!

One of our last days on vacation, Mike had a small business trip to take for the day. I decided to eat dinner with Mommy D. We ordered a salad and sides from Yoders. When I asked her what kind of pie she likes, she said she usually gets the butterscotch pie!!!! I laughed because that's my favorite too!!!! We got a piece to share!

We also went out for breakfast with Mike's mom because she's down for the winter months too. Der Dutchman still gives out these wax bands with the kids menus. I remember them when I was a kid!

One last time at Yogurtology.

We went racing out to the beach to watch the sun set. This was our last night there and Hadassah and Jeremiah also wanted to go watch this. Matthew had flown back home to play more basketball, so Mike asked Hadassah to watch the littles one more time. Him and I went out alone for dinner.

The sunset was pretty. Then we went to downtown Sarasota and found us a restaurant in town and ordered food. I was having heart burn all day long from something I ate at the restaurant for breakfast. Mike did buy me Tums and I chewed on those twice! While we sat at the restaurant, I was miserable. My heart burned and I had horrible indigestion. When our food arrived, it was not good. Not gonna go back to this place again. You win some and you lose some. I hadn't eaten much because of how I was feeling most of the day but I hoped that after some dinner, the acid in my stomach would calm down. My baked sweet potato was good but my fish was not. I couldn't wait to go back to the house and lay down. I hate heart burn.

The next morning, it was time to pack up our things and head back home. It was snowing and cold at home and our flight times got changed twice. The kids were hoping to get a canceled flight and then we could stay the weekend yet. It was tempting because the weather back home was not good but Matthew was already home and there's always a time to come and a time to leave. We said goodbye to Mommy D. and headed off to the airport.

We had to wait at the airport because the times got delayed but we drank coffee and ate KitKats awhile.

Finally on board. Hadassah and Jeremiah were behind us a few rows.

I was happy to have a window seat! Those are my favorite! It was up to Mike then to aid to all the littles many needs since he was right next to them. He was tired of all the drama between these two by the time the plane landed and said no more gadgets for the day!