Weekend Adventures: Summer First

The first weekend of summer vacation was filled with lots of activity!

Friday, after our school's end-of-the-year luncheon, Dan and I headed into Orlando to surprise my mom for her birthday. My stepdad and a friend of my mom's had been scheming for weeks to throw her a surprise party at the VFW. She had no idea!

Saturday, Dan had to go to work, so I drove back to Orlando to spend the day shopping with mom. Just as I was pulling into her driveway, she sent me a text wanting to know if I wanted to go canoeing with my aunt and uncle. Wasn't exactly dressed to spend the afternoon on the water.... jeans aren't ideal for being out in the Florida sun! But, it was just another excuse to go shopping.

Sunday, my best friend came over with her two kids. Her husband had some stuff to do around their house to get it ready to put on the market (they're moving to Texas at the end of summer), so we used it as our excuse to take the kids to the pool.

Overall, it was a great way to kick off the summer!

Under Construction

Can you see what's wrong with the picture below?

Beautiful sunset, right?

Too bad it's being ruined by the sights and smells of smoke.....

This is the new view from our balcony. There use to be this huge field full of trees and tall grass behind our apartment complex. But now, most of the trees have been taken down and the grass has been replaced by dirt. Every morning for the past couple of weeks when I've left for work, there have been huge construction vehicles getting ready to do their thing.

It's sad really.

I'm told that they are planning on putting up a subdivision behind the complex. And, to make matters worse, they've cleared the land in front of the complex between it and the highway to start construction on a mini strip mall. And, the land beside the complex is for sale too - so I'm sure that will be under construction soon.

The one thing I am happy about is the fact that the large tree you see in the pictures has been spared. And I'm sure it's only due to the fact that it's on the complex's side of the property line.

This is just one more reason why I can't wait to find our first home and move out.... with that said, we are making progress, but I don't want to jinx anything. I'll share more on our house hunting another day.

Sunsets and Tornado Warnings

This past week I attended a Common Core workshop in St. Petersburg with a few of my colleagues. We stayed two nights in a really nice hotel right on the beach. Even though I was sitting in a high school classroom each day, Dan got to enjoy the beach while I was working. Each night we got to enjoy a gorgeous sunset over the water.

And, each night, when we turned around and looked at the hotel, we saw menacing clouds....

Rather than being able to walk along the beach and enjoying the evening, we were cooped up in our hotel room while the tornado warnings were being issued.

One night it was reported that a water spout had formed and made landfall a little south of where we were. Luckily, no one was hurt and very little damage was done.

It always amazes me how quickly the weather in Florida can change during the summer months.

Weekend Adventures: Navarre

This past weekend we took a little road trip up to the Florida Panhandle to visit some friends of ours.

You might remember them from our wedding – they got engaged the day before Dan and I got married. And they got married on the beach a few months later.

Both of them serve in the military. One is active duty Air Force and the other is in the Navy Reserves. He is currently stationed near Navarre and they recently bought their first home. We've been dying to visit them and see their new place, but couldn't find the time to do it.

Two weeks ago, I got a call about a surprise birthday visit. Who could say no to that? So Friday after work, Dan and I loaded up the car and drove the 7 hours to Navarre. It was pretty late when we got into town….

Keep in mind, that’s Eastern Standard Time on the radio. Technically, it was only midnight Central Standard Time when we got there. But our bodies didn't know the difference.

The birthday boy was totally surprised! I wish I had gotten a picture of his face! But cell phones and going from dark to lighted rooms just doesn't work well.

The next morning we all woke up, made breakfast sandwiches, and hung around the house for alittle bit.

Then we headed out to Navarre Beach for their Fun Fest event. The event was pretty small – a few vendors selling art & crafts, a local dance troop performed, food trucks – the typical small town festival.

 We headed out to the water to check it out.

I can see why they call this the Emerald Coast. Beautiful, clear, green water. Too cold for our likes though. We just dipped our toes in it for a few minutes before heading back to the car.

Later that afternoon, our friends got a call from someone who was interested in buying their truck – that day! As in, he wanted to buy it in the next couple of hours. So, after taking a quick tour of the military base and making a bunch of phone calls to the bank and the buyer, we headed out to Pensacola and sold their truck. Luckily we were there this weekend, because that truck was their only vehicle. They’re planning on downsizing to a car and will hopefully find one this week (they've rented a car for the time being).

We headed out to a place called Helen Back for dinner.

Our friends said they had the best pizza around. Plus, they had outside seating that would let us catch the Fun Fest fireworks. My opinion of the place: really crowded (UFC fight night), horrible appetizers (I could make better – no joke!), terrible service (I don’t know if the girl was on something or what), decent pizza (which we only found out after we had to send the first pizzas back because they were made wrong), and really expensive considering the quality of food and service.

After dinner we went back to our friends’ place and watched a movie until we were all too tired to keep our eyes open. Sunday morning we had to say goodbye and make our way back home.

I seriously can’t wait to visit them again! Although, maybe next time they can come visit us and see where the retirees all hang out in Florida.

Weekend Adventures: Swimming with Manatees

Hello everyone. Long time, no posting. This semester is seriously kicking my butt. I'm at school an hour earlier than I need to be, everyday, and I'm usually staying two hours after the final bell rings catching up on grading or helping students study for their next test. Progress reports have already been handed out, which means we only have a few more weeks until Spring Break!

Anyways, I'm getting way off topic, aren't I? What does school have to do with manatees? Absolutely nothing. Time to get back on track.... shall we?

I mentioned that one of our new year's resolutions this year was to go swimming with the manatees. It wasn't a hard resolution to accomplish considering my mother-in-law gifted Dan with vouchers for his birthday back in November. We finally got around to booking a trip last month.

Early one Saturday we headed out to Crystal River, which was a little over an hour drive. We got to the dive shop a little early. Considering I had never been inside a dive shop before, this place was pretty cool. Equipment... souvenirs... anything you could need to go snorkeling or diving, they had it. They even had an indoor dive pool for their scuba diving certification course. Let me tell you, Dan was like a kid in a candy store!

We checked in, signed waivers, and got our wet suits, fins, and snorkels.

Now, I've never worn a wet suit before. The only thing I had to reference were all of those TV shows and movies where the character has the hardest time getting into one. In reality, it wasn't that bad. The only thing I really struggled with was zipping it up. Now, wet suits aren't flattering on anyone (especially at the butt crack of dawn), but we both sucked it in up and took pictures while we waited for the rest of our group to show up.

We saw that patch at the shop after our tour was over, and I simply couldn't resist posting this on Instagram!

Our tour guide was named Deanna. She was awesome! Really personable and answered all the questions our group had. Although, there weren't a whole lot of questions considering there were only 6 of us on the tour. Yep, 3 couples. Wanna guess which couple was the youngest? It's okay, we're pretty use to it where we live.

Anyways, we took a quick trip down Crystal River to get to the spot.

When we first got there, there wasn't a whole lot of people in the swimming hole. It was kinda nice being able to swim around without plowing into anyone. Because later on, another tour group of about 30 people showed up... yeah, things got a little crowded. But we still had a pretty good time.

We purchased one of those underwater cameras to take on the tour. The pictures didn't turn out all that great. People kicking around dirt in a shallow swimming area. Manatees eating plants on the bottom of the swimming hole. Basically, it was really cloudy once you got in the swimming hole. It was so bad, that you'd be floating on top, and all of a sudden a manatee would appear below you from out of no where trying to surface for air. 

So, interesting fact we learned on our tour: Citrus County is only county in Florida that allows you to touch the manatee. Manatee are protected by more laws than there are fingers on my hand (we had to watch a video before we went on the tour). If you come across them while boating or fishing, you're suppose to leave them alone. But, considering most of Citrus County is manatee habitat, they have been granted special permission to host tours into the rivers for people to get up close and personal.

Oh, and another interesting fact: Manatees are slimy, but rough and bumpy at the same time. Most will have scars on their backs. They'll also have algae growing on their backs because they are such slow moving creatures.

All in all we had a great time. The hot cocoa that was served back on board our little boat was the cherry on top (remember, we did this tour in the middle of January!). 

If you're ever in the area and you want to snorkel with the manatees, I'd highly recommend this place. It's a little on the pricey side (if you bring your own equipment you'll pay much less), but its definitely a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

Check one off the bucket/resolutions list!

Anyone else out there ever swam with the manatees? Or maybe dolphins? That's another thing on my bucket list... I've pet dolphins and fed them fish, but never swam with them. How cool would that be?!

P.S. While we were out in Crystal River, we dropped off the geocoin we found on our first geocaching adventure. So far, it doesn't appear as though anyone else has found it yet. But we keep checking in on it to see where it travels next!