Postcard from Florida

Apologies if the following feels like being forced to sit in someone's basement looking at slides of their vacation - you can of course skip this if you want!

We had a great time on vacation last week. 3 days prior to leaving, my wallet was stolen from my office. Ugh. I immediately told Joe that I didn't care if he had to fly with Georgia alone -- I'd drive unlicensed all the way to Florida by myself and meet them there if necessary before we were going to miss this trip on account of me not having i.d.! Fortunately, it didn't come to that since I was able to quickly obtain a new license. But, I gotta say, even though our money as a couple is conceptually combined, (so it never really matters for our bottom line who pays), there was something about being on vacation with no wallet, no credit card, no debit card, no nothing, that made me feel like I was on some kind of all-inclusive trip. Kinda fun and freeing.

We took oodles of photos and have included some highlights below. (For the full set of all 160 (no, seriously), you can click on the Flickr badge in the sidebar.)

I'm foregoing paragraphs now but have pasted at the bottom of this post our running list of memories that we compiled on this trip. (Maybe more for us than you, but we're happy to share!)










Oh, yes. We did buy the dorky Sun Smarties tent from One Step Ahead, and it rocked. This thing folds up to the size of a pizza in about 10 seconds.




Taking the importance of sunscreen to heart...



Sanibel is famous for its seashells. We threw most of the best ones back, though, since their inhabitants were still happily living inside.






Do I hear the Charleston?


Sanibel Memories 2009

• “Go beeeeeeach! Go beeeeeach!” (Bobinx surprisingly excited to see the beach and ocean from our balcony. She said this a lot.)
• “Go look ocean.” “See ocean.” (Bobinx woke up for the morning/from her naps often requesting to immediately go to the balcony to see the ocean, almost as if to check to make sure it was really still there.)
  
• “Here comes…. A BIG one!” (Bobinx displays an inappropriate lack of fear in the face of ocean waves.)
• “More waves!”
• “SPLASH!” (Bobinx fascinated by watching pelicans dive into the water. She got a stuffed pelican souvenir at the Ding Darling reserve after we went canoeing through the mangroves, and could later be heard saying, “SPLASH!” to this pelican while in the pack n’ play in her room.)
• “Shame!” (We were discussing the recent demise of the Hummer brand, and how it had gone from being a hot item to being perceived as an item of shame. Georgia picked up on this word and shouted it out at other tourists near us.)
• “Grandpa Dave’s house” (Georgia labeled the condo “Grandpa Dave’s house” and really never let go of this idea. Repeated it for days, and we gave up attempting to correct her. She also picked up a truly disproportionate number of shells from the beach “for Grandpa Dave.” She seemed a little obsessed with him on this trip for some reason. Alice probably came in 2nd in the shell count.)
• Frequently identifying blond women as “Nana.”
• Loved jumping to mom and dad in pool, being thrown up in the air, practicing swimming, and even going underwater (for about 1 second at a time), which Georgia dubbed “waterfalls.”
• Showering with mom daily (sitting together on tub floor) due to awkward angles of tub/shower door making it too difficult to bathe her from outside the tub.
• Morning walks on the beach in the Ergo on Joe’s back. No stroller all week.
  
• Loved the fishes in the tank at McT’s. We recognized our waitress as having been the same woman from last year’s trip.
• Appliance Direct!
• Egrets, pliated woodpecker, kestrel, vultures (when we left the airport), herons, anhinga, cormorant, pelicans, sand pipers, cardinals, crows, redheaded woodpecker.
• Our first trip to the Lazy Flamingo.
• Canoeing at Ding Darling. Georgia sat on pregnant Kate’s lap. Joe paddled all 3 of us the entire time. Thankfully, Georgia seemed to like the ride and wasn’t trying to squirm away or anything. Saw mullet jumping out of the water.
• “I KNOWS IT!” (said while pointing at her nose, as in, “I NOSE IT.”) Bobinx picked this up after Joe said, “I’m just a poser, and she knows it.”
• Bought Georgia new sunglasses after reading stuff making us feel like she’d go blind without them. Figured she’d leave them on for about 5 seconds, but to our surprise she quite liked them.
• Sighted dolphins at play – about 15 or 20 of them! Jumping out of the water! Probably about ¼ mile offshore.
• Georgia pronouncing “raft” (which she loved to float in in the ocean) much like “giraffe.”
• Canoot = canoe
• Drove all the way to the end of the island (Capitva side). Nice drive, unbelievable houses, amazing landscaping. Planned to break it up by having lunch down there. Oops – got all the way there without any form of payment.
• Georgia pointing at certain moles/freckles on Kate's shoulder, leg, etc. and saying “boot,” her current version of the word “boob.” (I swear these are tiny moles, not nipple-sized moles!)
• Tried Island Cow for the first time (for dinner).
• Found lots of sand dollars. Didn’t take any.
• “That’s a good one!” (Bobinx got into the shell hunting and would say this each time she picked one up. Which was cute, because of course she would pick up just about any old shell - tiny, broken, whatever.)
• Got a stuffed pool frog from Jimmy, the mentally and physically disabled kid in the pool. We remembered him from last year. Gave him a small beach ball in exchange.
• Enjoyed walking around the marina with the sea plane and boats around sunset. This was followed by a big allergy scare at Gramma Dots. Too bad it kinda ruined the meal (fried grouper, of course). Georgia was ravenous and we couldn’t keep up with her demand, so we started sharing food. Mistake. It was just fruit but there must’ve been something on it or cross contamination from our silverware. Crying, hives and Benadryl ensued. Georgia recovered quickly. Her dad, not so much.
• Naked soccer (with grocery store pool/yard ball – best kind!) in the kitchen.
• 5 successful potty trips! Rewarded with stickers. (Did they have a magic toilet? She hasn't done this once since we returned.)
• 4 runs, 2 ocean swims, and some pull ups.
• Kate, freaking out about small fish swimming into her legs while sitting in the ocean. (Screamed and basically shoved Georgia down in the process. Georgia was unphased.)
• Kate hating jellyfish more than anything in the ocean. Scarier than sharks.
• Georgia saying, “pee pee! pee pee!” with a concerned look on her face, and Joe saying, “What? Baby? Baby?” in response, in a lame attempt to cover up what was clearly happening (and being announced to all bystanders in the pool). Good thing for swim diapers.
• Yummy homemade salads. Broke CAFO for our standard Sanibel salami and mustard sandwiches. Ate copious quantities of Jerry’s M&M cookies. (Which Kate as a cruel joke told Georgia were broccoli (since she couldn't have any for allergy reasons), and then felt bad about later because Georgia did actually start referring to these cookies as broccoli.)
• Joe making 2 DQ runs for dip cones. Mmmmm…. (Chivalry is not dead.)
  
• Singing approximately 75 verses of the “Hello” song (from Georgia’s music class) on the extended drive to and from the end of Captiva. Named parties included such people/things as, Aunt Beth, Alice, Sam, Harry, Max, Crystal, Stephie, Nana, Pop Pop, Gran, Grandpa Dave, Aunt Sara, Maggie and Anna, flamingo, pelican, diaper, and Uncle Lach. Except it took MANY tries for her to start saying Uncle Lach, because the first 5 or 6 verses had him labeled by Georgia as “Aunt Lach.” (Sorry, Lach, it's true, but you should take it only as a compliment. I'm sure she meant it only in the most endearing way.)
• Georgia frequently calling Joe "Joe" instead of "Daddy" and hollering out "Hey, Joe!" all the time. (Gee, I wonder where she picked that up from?)