Mountains! Beach! or Both!…

I-phone weather and The Weather Channel both said that today was going to have a high of 73, partly cloudy, with a 10% chance of rain.  Boy were they all wrong!  The highest that we saw all day was 64 and there were wind gusts up to 30 miles and hour.  It was cold.  Our plan was to go the beach today, Lily hasn’t been yet and I had the idea of taking them down to Anna Maria, it rained the whole way down there.  We thought that we might drive through it, but it didn’t get any better.  We ended up doing a drive by and headed south to Sarasota instead.  We ate lunch at The Old Salty Dog and then went to the Mote Aquarium.  Matty and Lilly loved it.  After dinner I had a Junior League function at the Oxford Exchange.  Sarah went with me and towards the end Brandie and Laura met up with us to go out for a late night dinner. 

About 6 months ago I got an email from Sarah saying that she was going to be in Orlando and they were wondering if they could come for a visit.  Of course we were so excited and said YES!  And it just so happened that this was the weekend for the Gasparilla Children’s parade.  Derek and Lilly landed at 1:30,  Dad picked up Davy on his way to the house (Jenni still isn’t over the flu so she stayed behind), we made homemade pizza’s for dinner and strawberry pie for dessert…Yum!  Andy is so excited to have his best friend here… 🙂

Molly and I cleaned the house today, getting ready for Derek, Sarah, and Lilly to come tomorrow.  The weather was beautiful so we opened up the house and planted some spring flowers in the front pots.  Both boys went to school today and here is a picture of Davy looking like the All Tennis Pro that he is!

It’s Monday!!!  I dropped both boys off at school and then headed over to Deliana’s house on Lake Hiawatha for a cup of coffee.  We worked on a few things for Zaylie’s party coming up and I enjoyed the view.  This lake is huge and it would take eight photos just to try and capture its size and beauty.  We just love their property.  They also face the west so she gets the golden light and sunsets that Andy and I love so much over our pond.  If we lived there, I can’t imagine that we’d ever move :). 

After the first week back at school, all of us slept in a little later this morning.  At noon, Mark picked up Andy and Matty and they headed over to Lad’s to watch the Indiana basketball game, while Davy and I had a little one on one time ourselves.  I needed to run a few errands so we headed to south Tampa and made our first stop GiGi’s Cupcakes.  He squealed and immediately picked out the one with the pink icing and sprinkles (Birthday Surprise)….hmm, very similar to his donut selection :)…and then he picked out a chocolate one (chocolate chip cookie dough).  We split them in half and shared, they were melt in your mouth delicious.  We all met back at the house at 3:30 and then left at 4:30 to head over to a dinner party at the Wilson’s home on Davis Islands.  There were five families there and we had a wonderful time.  Here are Avery, Adley, Matty, Bryce, and Davy waiting for the bounce house to be blown up…

I took the boys to the pediatrician today for their annual wellness check.  Both my boys scored between the 85th-95th percentile for height and 75th percentile for weight.  Turns out Davy has an ear infection (we didn’t know it and he says he feels fine), she said that it must have come from the sinuses and is left over from the flu.  Omincef for him.  Other than that she said they look perfect.  At the end of piano lessons today Matty and I got to hear Davy play Yankee Doodle Dandie, so sweet, and it just amazes me how quickly he picked up using both hands.  After work Andy took Davy to the Pinewood Derby Car workshop and they started working on Davy’s car for the big race next weekend.  Friday night is ‘Little Bed’ night in our house, so here are the boys curled up under the blankets all ready to go for their sleepover in our room.

Look who’s back in town!  Papa Bear drove up today to visit us and see the boys.  We had a great day together and even ended up at the farmers market for some strawberries.  My three guys already finished the flat from last week and Jenni flies into town on Sunday, so strawberries were a must.  On the way back to pick up Davy from school we stopped into Keely and Curley winery, a blueberry farm that makes delicious fruit wines.  We picked up a few bottles of the Dry Blueberry, I thought the local wine would be fun to have next week with Derek and Sarah.  The boys squealed when they saw papa, and of course little Matty jumped up and down.

The sickness is over and all the kids are officially back in school so my friends Rochelle and Catie came over today to pick me up and take me out to lunch for my birthday.  Now they didn’t know that I love high tea, so I was in complete bliss when Catie said that we would be going to the Empress Tea Room.  The food was delicious and so was the company.  Love my friends.  Afterwards, I stopped by Deliana’s house to talk about Zaylie’s birthday party coming up and then headed over to school to get in the car line.  There are no after school activities this week so Davy gets out everyday at 3.  Tonight, I had to head down to the Junior League to help kick off the Kids in the Kitchen Project to the second half of the Provisional class.  I introduced the curriculum chapter by chaper, while Christina introduced the supporting activities for the eight week project to 80+ ladies.  We have been so excited about all of the work that they have done to support this project in the community, I can’t wait to see what happens throughout the spring. 

Sometime in the last couple of months, Andy and I decided to introduce the shower game to the boys.  Now, Andy and I have been playing this game for years, so it pleases us greatly to now be able to inflict our prank on them.  The trick of this game is to completely catch your “victim” off guard.  Imagine you are taking a nice warm shower, minding your own business, and out of no where you are covered in ice-cold water!!!  It can come from over the top or even through the door if the person is not looking.  The person throwing the water usually laughs like an evil villain, while the receiver squeals with shock.  Here are the boys post cold water blast, just waiting for it to happen again!