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Showing posts from February, 2012

Meeting the Martins, another RVing family

We got to meet the Martin family when they stopped in our campground on Lake Harris on their way through Florida. There's certainly not much in Tavares FL, so we were glad they decided to come anyway! We've "known" them online for a while now and looked forward to meeting them. And what could be better than meeting another RVing family?... Well, meeting an RVing family with 5 boys! At least our boys were happy. Lizzy not as much. :)

19 RV families

Here in Orlando, when any family pulls out, it seems another pulls in! We hardly have time to mourn the loss of our new friends/neighbors as we're off to meet even newer ones. It's actually starting to be a blur! There were campfires, cookouts, deep discussions, silly jokes, workouts, dancing, music, and more. I actually forgot my camera for a while (weeks!) and just enjoyed our community while we had it. We all head south for winter, so we'll disperse soon! We spent fun time with many combinations of these NINETEEN awesome RVing families: Marrs , Brewers, Hensons , Chalfants, Frenches, Nims , Dials , Lakos , Bennetts , Sparks, Taylors , Malsons , DeMichiels , Sommers, Schriers, Heisler-Quinns, Pailes, Weavers , and the Coast to Coast Trips . Also saw the Knabe and Hoog families, who are hoping to hit the road! It's been great for the kids too! So many games to play with so many kids. If you've been wondering about getting an outdoor rug, it's great for h

Josh is 12

Josh went and turned 12 on us! I tried to stop him, but he was very excited to be 12, which is almost 13, and to have lemon cake. Yuck! We actually had to hurry and celebrate because he had friends here to play with. So after some quick cake & opening his huge present (a gift card, totally got him!) he was back outside. Our big 12 year old. *sigh*

Manatees

Allen & the kids went to see the manatees at Three Sisters Springs in Crystal River with the Marrs , Nims , and Schrier families. (I stayed home to work.) Allen took his kayaks and the rest rented a pontoon boat. They had great weather (though the year-round 72° water temp felt cold apparently!) and saw lots of manatees. They got to swim with them, touch them, and just hang out! On the way back, Allen and Josh (in the kayaks) had a fun encounter. A playful manatee kept coming up and doing a spin move trick to have its belly rubbed. Troy got an awesome picture of Josh shaking its flipper! (Do you call them flippers? Guess we'll look it up.) A big THANK YOU to Troy Marrs who took and shared great pics, all of which I've shamelessly used here for my your viewing pleasure!

Challenges schmallenges

This question was posed as part of the February Group Writing Project … What challenges kept you from making your dreams a reality? Is it fear of the unknown? Your spouse? Your extended family’s reaction? Money? Even if you are OTR, do you find yourself still holding back? Of course I have to say NO challenges kept us from hitting the road! The challenges were all there, fear, reactions, money, (not spouse though, he was all in!) but none of those warranted much thought. I don't know that we're super bold, we just know what our family wanted and made it happen. Once we decided, we were all so eager! It took a few months to sort out the details and do the manual labor of selling, buying, packing, and going. Do we hold back now? Again, NO! Once we finally realized life is literally (not just figuratively) what you make it, and you CAN make it anything you want, how could we hold back? We hear so many say I can't , I wish , you're lucky . We're not lucky! We&

Photoshoot

After our Valentine's Day party , Kimber did a little photo shoot with the kids. They got all dressed up and headed to the lake. The girls were all so pretty! And I guess the boys didn't want to be left out. I heard they had a surprise for me and wow, I was surprised! 80s rock band style!!! They felt better back in their usual gear.

Valentine's Day

The lovely Jenn Nims threw a fun Valentine's Day party! The kids got together and made lots of Valentines to hand out to the other campers in our campground. They had fun and the retirees really appreciated the hand made cards! Jenn also read the story of St. Valentine and many of us learned something new. Then they had ice cream sundaes with lots of LOVELY toppings! It was a beautiful setting on a beautiful day and a fun way to share the love with each other then other campers too!

More families

This was another spontaneous campfire with more RVing families. It's getting hard to remember now we've had so many! I need to blog right away so I don't forget. This time the Schrier and Bennett families came from other campgrounds to visit those of us still at Orlando Thousand Trails, the Marrs , Nims , Sparks, & us. We were sad to miss Gayle Bennett though, we've still not met her and she was in the hospital. The girls worked on a sweet get well card for her. :)