Family Fun in Florida in February!

We left for Florida on Friday, February 13th at 8:30 in the morning. Here are the kids and the luggage all loaded up and ready for the long haul. The kids did really well. They had tapes, books, colouring, food, and dvds to keep them entertained and it worked well.

We stopped at a rest stop in the night to sleep for a few hours, but made it to the resort by 10am. The kids were wired by this point so it was right down to business with a trip to the pool. This was probably our hottest day -over 80F, though every day was beautiful except one.
Here is Kylie headed down to the pool after her nap.

There was lots of time to relax, but not as much as in previous years. The kids keep you hopping - especially Kylie. We really had to keep our eyes alert! In the picture below, Jonathan is reading "The Hockey News", which many people informed him was a real giveaway to his place of origin!

Kade used water wings at first until Kylie bit a hole in one of them and after that he just made up his mind to do with out them and it wasn't long before he was quite confidently swimming through the shallow end and the deep end. (both of which are well over his head)

Kylie loved the water too - at first. She was very brave and very dangerous and then fell down the stairs under the water on the second day and after that she was content to just sit on the edge and splash with her feet!

Kevin loves the water too, but always gets cold much quicker than Kade and is therefore most often the first one out. (not including his mother:)) And another benefit of "summer" that we really enjoyed was bbqing. Food seems to taste so good on the bbq!

Kevin taking Kylie for a little walk before supper.

Kevin and Kylie liked to accompany me on some of my walks and even Kade was convinced to come on this one. Kade loves to swim and could be found wearing one of his bathing suits at any point of any day. He wanted to be prepared for any opportunity that might have arisen!

These pictures are taken down by the marina where all the boats are docked.

Kade got this guy from someone at the market we visited and they were quick friends and seldom separated.

The golf cart is the preferred method of transportation here and the boys loved driving it around. Kevin got to be the official driver for Jonathan when he went golfing. The resort has a small 9 hole golf course which Jonathan visited at least once a day. I tried a round on the last day we were there and almost beat Jonathan too!

Jonathan and the boys went for a night swim after supper once. The water feels wondefully warm --until you get out and then it's a mad dash for the hot showers!

I put french braids in Kylie's hair for the first time and it turned out so good I just had to take a picture:)

This alligator was hanging out right at the end of the boat loading/unloading dock.

This turtle climbed right up to about a foot away from the pool before i noticed it. Kylie also saw it and was rather frightened , but then she seemed to forget about it and ran right past it and saw it when she was about a foot away. She flipped right out which was rather funny to watch!

Jonathan ended up picking it up and putting it over the fence where it crawled amazingly fast (whoever said turtles were slow never saw this one) back to the pond!

Jonathan played water volley ball with a group of people one day which turned out to be a lot of fun!

We went to Rogers/Venetian Park in Leesburg one afternoon before going out for supper at the Golden Corral (highly recommended if you ever see one). This is a great park that we have visited every time we've gone to Florida and the kids have a blast there.

Kylie did too - although she had to do everything 100 times and then got mad when we moved on to the next thing.

I thought this would make a great picture, (and it does), but a lady fishing off of the bridge gave Jonathan a funny look to which Jonathan loudly had to reassure Kylie that he would never do such a thing!!

I think these birds are very pretty and Kylie did too. She kept chasing them around yelling, "kuk, kuk, kuk!"

And then before we knew it, it was time to go home. We were there for a full six days, but it goes by soooo fast and really isn't long enough. But we were very thankful for the break we got and very thankful to Grandpa andGrandma for letting us stay in their home once again!!
Here are some fun pictures of Kylie on the way home. The kids were fabulous on the way home - so good that we hardly had to stop and therefore were making such good time that we just kept on trucking and made it home in 18 hours!

We are slowly adjusting to live back home where things are so different. Some of us are having easier times than others adjusting. Kylie doesn't seem to quite have things figured out yet!

THANK YOU GRANDPA AND GRANDMA!!!

A Place of Wonder, Excitement and Imagination . . .

. . . And we did not even have to take a trip to Odyssey!! Wednesday afternoon Christina and I visited the childrens musem in London. This is a wonderful place to take your kids - a place where you can play all day, do lots of pretending and using your imagination, and learn a lot of new things at the same time. All of the kids had a great time - even the one year olds. The only time we saw sadness was when it was time to go home. Here are some (many:) pictures of our fun day out.

This is Kevin, Elyse, and Kade ice fishing in the Arctic.

And of course the most reliable mode of transportation up there also happens to be the mode of transportation that Kevin has been talking non-stop about for the last month. "Mom, I can't wait till I'm big b/c then I'm gonna buy my own snowmoblile." "If I had a snowmobile, I would probably be zooming all over the yard all day and never come inside!" "Mom, when I'm 17, would I be able to drive my snowmobile to school all by myself?" and so on . . . He did find the model below unsatisfactory as it was "so rusty, you could hardly turn it!" I didn't notice any rust myself - maybe lack of muscle power!

One of the special "visiting" exibits the museum had on was "SHARKS". There were lots of pictures and facts to read/look at. Both of my boys are fascinated with sharks since we read a book about a teenage surfer who was attacked by a shark, lost her arm, but still surfs! (This is a Christian girl who homeschools and tells a neat story - Bethany Hamilton)

Elyse and Marieke were a little nervous about sitting in this big mouth, and had to take several glances back to make sure all was well.

Next, we headed to the ocean and beach for some fun in the sand searching for shells, crabs, octopuses, treasures, and more.

We then paid a visit to Sifton Village which has everything a small town would have - Mc Donalds, Post Office, Sunoco, Valu-Mart, Goodlife Fitness, Police station, a home and more. These are the cars the kids could ride around on and this is Kylie and Emily in a tight spot/traffic jam.

The kids could also do a bit of plumbing and electrical which of course makes Dad proud!

We visited the dinosaur exhibit and the caves and the kids got to see some dinosaur teeth, claws, and poop! (which of course they had to guess what it was after feeling it!) (all were molds - except the last on the list!) My kids also love dinosaurs and often set up and play with the ones we have at home. So this "lesson" was fun for them. Oh and they got to dress up too.

Here are the budding paleontologists uncovering dinosaur bones with their paintbrushes.

And Kevin in the cave with the bats!Then we were on to the old school house and kitchen where the kids enjoyed their "imaginary snack" of jellybeans. Kade had to retrive the "Bible" from the school room as a necessary component of the dinner table.Kevin as a firefighter.

. .. and Kade.

Then on to his job as mailman.

How many places can you think of where you can work as a fireman, mailman, electrician, McDonalds employee, paleontologist, grocery store clerk etc in a few short hours?!! I was impressed even though I'd visited before.

Our last stop was the space center where the kids climbed the spaceship and I'm not sure what all else. This was near the end of the day and Christina and I found a seat and parked for a while.

So this was our very fun day out and we'll definitely be back. Thanks again for coming with us Christina! So if you are ever looking for a fun (and reasonably priced) day out, try it out and of course the fitting ending to this post would have to be . . . . But why take my word for it. Find out for yourselves when you join us on todays adventure in . . . . the museum.