Post Christmas and ETC

The kids all had a good Christmas.  They got so many toys that I feel like I am wading in a sea of toys.  You should see their rooms. And my living room. And my family room. And the den. We are living in our very own Toys R "US".  My goal this week is to get rid of a bunch of their old toys. 

 Christina's school is having a fund raising drive for the Children of Haiti, so all the old toys and too-small-clothes will be put to very good use.

Leonard, Michelle, Mom and Dad came to visit us for the Holiday.

The trampoline really got its limits pushed! (I too was in there prior to taking the picture)

Poppie with his youngest Granddaughter. I love this picture!

Poppie, Caleb and Mikey went golfing.

They had a great time. 

Caleb-Golf Course, Poppie-Golf Course, Mikey-Golf Course = Great times!

Christina was in a beauty pagent for a College Scholarship. Only one girl could win, and unfortunately the judges were blind and didn't pick her.  She looked beautiful tho! Her BF Ben certainly thinks so too!

I don't remember exactly what was going on here. But Leonard, Michelle, Christina and Ben were torturing the KIDS slide.

They rolled it all over the place.

While the family was here, the extended ones went to Disneyworld, and Mike and I took the boys to Miami for a few days.  They love going in the pool and spa. Here they are pretending to be Santas.

At the hotel Mike and I ordered Sushi. We thought we got enough for the two of us,

until Caleb saw it, and decided he had to have one of everything also.

 (Zachary won't touch it, he had microwavable Mac N Cheese)

Caleb ate all his sushi, plus an entire Shrimp Head. Mike was kind of enough to give one of his up.

As I type this right now, he is over my shoulder going "YUMM I remember eating that, it was sooo good!"

We also went out for Sushi with Leonard and Michelle. We had a great evening.

Hmm. Now I am craving sushi.  (Mike whats for dinner tonight??)

While Michelle was here she cooked dinner several nights, and had her little helper next to her.

All her dinners were very good!  I cooked also, but had one bad dinner. I made Clam Chowder, and it started out really tasty, until I made the roux. I only had whole wheat flour, and it made the entire soup taste awful.  I mean AWFUL! Whole wheat flour is good for pancakes, and muffins and breads, and even small amounts in a roux, but NOT good in big amounts.

  I now have 'all-purpose' flour so I don't make that mistake again.

Gramma Ann--Mike fixed the Avalons window! Apparently a bolt that holds the mechanism together had slipped out of place and fell into the bottom of the door. He took the door cover off, I reached in, found it, and he put it back with a washer to attach it, and the window now works perfectly!

 Same with the passenger window. 

YAY! Christina is happy that she can roll down the window in her car!

It was so cold here the first few weeks of January, that we were all miserable. Florida rarely gets below 70 in the winter, and our highs were averaging low 40's, if even. YUCK.

All our beautiful tropical plants are brown (hopefully not dead) and the grass is brown.

Our wonderful lush green yard is now browner than our desert yard at our house in Phoenix.

In fact it was soo cold that there is ICE on Calebs putting green and the grass. 

 Manatees can only survive in warm water, so they all came to a place called Blue Springs, off the St. Johns River. Its temperature stays about 73 degrees normally, and is much warmer than that in the summers.

 Its a beautiful place to come and see Florida in its Natural Setting. So we went up there to see all the manatees up close. (its about 40 mins north of us). At last count they had 311 Manatees! A record! Remember the post where we were swimming with them out in the ocean? Well we saw dozens here up close, but weren't allowed to get in the water. Unfortunately they had 57 of them die from the cold. 

We are sitting on the patio of a house that was built in 1872 called the Thursby House. Check out this web page for beautiful pictures of Blue Springs Florida: http://www.squidoo.com/bluesprings

Zachary had his Boy Scouts Pine Wood Derby race last weekend. Last year, his poor car came in so close to last that it was pathetic. So this year, Mike enlisted the help and advice of Leonard, (who is an Eagle Scout) and he and the boys set out to design their cars. Caleb was able to enter the sibling race.

Thanks to the 'inside' info that Leonard gave him, the boy's cars did great! Zachary held the track record for more than half the races. He went to finals and ended up finishing 2nd out of 15 in the Bear Scouts, and 7th out of 85 total Boy Scouts! Caleb was 3rd out of 7 in the siblings race. Way to go boys!

(Zachary's the shortest one in the middle)

The boys are now into Dominoes. They love building these, and they have made even bigger ones with ramps and bridges, but by the time I get my camera, they have fallen.

Elektra celebrated her 3rd birthday at Chucky Cheese. Leonard was able to fly out and spend the week of her birthday with her.  Chucky Cheese is like all the kids most favorite place to go.

Wow. Look at all that blue dye frosting on Calebs tongue!

We are spending this week getting ready for DAYTONA! Mike is rebuilding our platform to make sure it all still fits, and is numbered for easy building at the track. Lets just hope the weather behaves itself, because I do not want to camp in 40 degrees!