Tag Archives: Carothers

August 1, 2011 · 5:20 pm

AMI Vacation 2011 – First Weekend

July 30-31: Saturday and Sunday

YAY!!! It’s vacation time! With much anticipation we have been waiting for this vacation for what feels like months! We reserved the house back in May, and we have been dreaming of our two weeks of fun in the sun all summer. This year Kelly and I decided to set our eyes on Anna Maria Island. We love it here and come quite often for the day, she’s never been here, and it is close enough for the husbands to drive back and forth as needed for work. The house we found is Anna’s Cottage – 309 Spring Ave; it is on the north end one block off of the main street Pine Ave and is three blocks to the beach. The house is a three bedroom with a pool and is adorably shabby. Check in time was 3pm, so Saturday morning we packed up and headed out.

Here is Andy’s truck: 6 scooters, 5 bikes, 3 tricycles, 3 fishing poles, 2 wagons, beach toys, chairs, and tackle boxes, 1 bike baby seat, and 1 easy shade. We loaded up the van, Kelly’s SUV, Brian’s Camry and off we went.

The beach house was everything we expected and so much more…. We are all in love with 309 Spring Ave.

I had to include this picture, because when we arrived at the house, a FedEx from work was already there waiting for me. I just found it so funny that work beat me to my vacation…. :O) If you are wondering what it is, I have been having computer issues and needed a new battery for my laptop. After we had unloaded all of our stuff, we sat down to enjoy a nice cold beverage… :O)

It was a little late and still a little warm, so we let the boys swim in the pool out back.

We went for a walk down to the beach so Matty could see the water…. All little Matty has been asking for, for the last two weeks, is to see the beach.

Kelly’s cousin Brook is still in town visiting and she agreed to watch the boys so Andy and I could go out to dinner. While posing for a picture, I guess the boys are so used to the family photo they just snuck in like it was normal and smiled. :O) Love them.

The next morning, we decided to take the boys fishing before it got to hot. We went over to the Anna Maria Pier. At the end of the pier they have a bait shop, but much to our dismay they were out of bait. How does that happen? Especially, on a weekend. We let the boys cast a few times and then we packed it up because we knew that they weren’t going to catch anything.

After naps we picked up our golf cart and went to Scoops for some ice cream.

Aunt Brandie and Uncle Laurence arrived today so we had to go over and see baby Ryla. Their rental house is 3 beach blocks from ours. She just loves Matty bear.

For dinner we all went to the Waterfront Restaurant. 7 children and 7 adults. Afterwards, we went over to the beach to feed the seagulls and watch the sunset.

My favorite house on the island. :O)

Sand Angels…

At 8:30 we drove back to Brandie’s house to drop them off, we hopped back on the golf cart, and it wouldn’t start. So funny… so we left it there and walked back home to put the boys to bed. You can see how tired & wet they are… :O) I love being on vacation.

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Filed under Anna Maria Vacation 2011, Beach, Carothers Family, Krulik Family, Vacations

Tagged as AMI, Beach, Carothers, Fish, Kruliks, Summer, Vacation

October 31, 2010 · 11:27 am

Happy Halloween 2010!!!

It is finally here!! Happy Halloween!!! The boys were so excited all weekend that they were going to get to go trick-or-treating. This year the neighborhood started off Halloween weekend with an organized block party on Saturday night the 30th. Over on the bridge to the village they set up the annual haunted house, so this seemed to be the perfect location. There were two bounce houses, tables and tables of pot luck food brought out, a bon-fire, and the Trimble’s projected the Wizard of Oz onto the side of the their house for movies on the lawn. The kids got to dress up in their costumes and they had a great time. There must have been at least 100 people who came out for the party. By the end of the evening we ended up in front of the Nugent’s home roasting marshmallows and making smores.

This year for Halloween, Davy decided that he wanted to be an astronaut and Matty we dressed as Mickey mouse. Davy loved his costume and wore it for days… Matty surprisingly loved his too. He was just as proud of his costume. He got a little frustrated that he couldn’t get his gloves to stay on, but he wore his Mickey ears, which squeaked, the entire night.

Mom, Courtney, Andy’s Dad, and Mr. Michaels all came over to see the boys and to spend some time with us. For dinner Andy grilled hot dogs and hamburgers for everyone, including Colin and Connor. It was a perfect, delicious dinner before we headed out to get some candy. Colin and Connor dressed up as the Mario Brothers and Emma was a ballerina.

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Filed under Carothers Family, Halloween, Holiday's

Tagged as Carothers, Halloween, Holiday

October 11, 2010 · 1:35 am

Fall Fun

So my beautiful next door neighbor decided that today she was gonna host a little “Fall Fun” for our gang on the street and boy did the kids have a good time. With so many horse farms near by, it was really easy for Kelly to find a Feed store and pick up a hay bale. For $8.00, a whole bunch of kids (the Carothers, the Zahn’s, the McKinnon’s, and the Heller’s) had a great time making a scare crow and cannon balling in the hay. After the clean-up it was time to bob for apples. It was the first time for all of them and they were super cute trying to get a good bite…. Next up… Pumpkins!!!

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Tagged as Carothers, Fall

August 16, 2010 · 8:30 pm

Seabreeze Kite Flying

Most of time when you head down to the beach at night it is really windy, so knowing this Kelly went out and bought a bunch of kites for our vacation. We went out two different nights to fly kites, the first night the breeze was slight and there were a lot of gnats so we went in early and then the second night it was perfect. Davy, Colin, and Connor each had their own kite and then Emma and Matty shared one. The kids just had a ball running up and down the beach watching the kites soar into the sky. Davy kept saying that he wanted his to go higher and higher and Matty kept asking to hold and try. We only had to untangle the lines a few times. The weather was nice and we also got to watch a beautiful sunset. Life is good.

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Filed under Beach, Little Gasparilla Island

Tagged as Beach, Carothers, Outdoor fun, Vacation

August 16, 2010 · 5:26 pm

Fun on the Beach

There’s nothing better than being on vacation and watching your children just have a wonderful time. Playing on the beach means running, swimming, laughing, treasure hunting, digging, building, chasing Seagulls, growing and so much more. We love going to the beach!… so here are a few of the pictures that we took during the week.

Here Davy and Connor are walking from the condo over to the boardwalk that leads out onto the beach…

There are over 100 sea turtle nests on the island and there are 4 rare green sea turtle nests. We were hoping that we would have enough energy to get up around midnight and take the older boys out to see if we could see any eggs hatching…but we were to tired after long fun days of playing…next summer!

Davy, Colin, and Connor loved riding their Boogie Boards! They rode them for hours. The only problem that we had was after riding the waves onto shore they were to far down the beach and we would have to call them back…

I couldn’t help but take a picture of this perfect beach dog. Every morning that we were out we saw it lazily walk the beach with its owners. For a dog, it can’t get much better than this…

Davy and Connor were making sand angels…

The kids loved having the wagons on the beach. Davy and Connor were always wanting to help us pull the wagons, but in the loose sand with the babies in them they were kind of heavy, so this way they all got to climb in and out and take turns dragging it around…

After each trip to the beach we found it to be easiest if once we got to the condo they stripped down, were hosed off, and then headed inside “mostly” sand free…

Ahhh, how could watching six kids at the beach not be fun!!!!…..

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Filed under Beach, Little Gasparilla Island

Tagged as Beach, Carothers, Outdoor fun, Summer, Vacation

July 28, 2010 · 10:38 pm

The Florida Aquarium

A last minute decision today landed us at the Florida Aquarium. Andy went to Chicago for the weekend to see his friends and family, so this gave the boys and me a lot of time to play together. Kelly had planned on taking her kids, so when she asked us if we wanted to come along… of course we said yes.

When we lived in south Tampa we used to go to the Aquarium often, but lately not so much. So, I renewed our annual passes and am excited about the adventures that we will have this next year.

Some of our favorite parts of the Aquarium are: the coral reefs, the sharks, the penguins, the sting rays, the touch tanks, and Explore a Shore. Explore a Shore is an outdoor play are that is filled with water jets, climb-on animals, a pirate ship with water cannons, a water slide, a sand box, and a place just for toddlers. Also, should the parents need to cool off…they have a large Tiki bar.

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Tagged as Aquarium, Carothers, Fish, Water

July 5, 2010 · 12:46 am

4th of July Weekend

The only way to describe this weekend is….wet! It rained for days and days; in fact, over the weekend we received 5 inches of rain and in a normal summer that is was what we get for the entire month of July. So what did we do all weekend??? We played in the house.

On Sunday the 4th we went over to Mark and Karen’s for a BBQ. Davy got to do a little swimming and fishing with Andy…so I was so happy for him. It drizzled some and it was very overcast, but both boys needed to get out of the house and do a little running. That evening the skies took a break and we were able to go outside and light a few fireworks in the street the guys next door. Davy loved them all and wasn’t scard a bit… Matty was a little afraid of the louder ones like the bottle rockets, but after a while he calmed down and would yell “BOOM” with the other boys….

On Monday July 5th, Ben and Karrie came over with their kids for lunch. Again, the original plan was to spend the day in the pool…so as the plans changed we watched the Princess and the Frog instead and drank our Watermellon Margaritas inside.

It wasn’t your typical 4th of July, an outdoor fun holiday…but in the end it was relaxing and we got to spend it together as a family.

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Filed under Holiday's

Tagged as 4th of July, Carothers, Fireworks

December 31, 2009 · 4:09 am

New Years Eve 2009

Today is New Year’s Eve. This is mine and Andy’s 12^th together and every year it gets better and better. Today we stayed around the house and after naps we created our first Zahn family painting. We set it up in the driveway, laid the paints around it on paper plates, and just went at it. It took Davy a bit to wake up and get into it, but eventually he did. It is 36×36 and now hangs over the TV in the man room.

For dinner Brian, Kelly and the kids came over. We cooked filets, lobster tails, risotto, potatoes and drank Greygoose spritzers with cranberry. Yum Yum! The meal was cooked perfectly. Afterwards, we attempted taking a few pictures of the kids, you can imagine how that went, and then it was time to put the babies to bed. The older boys had waited so patiently to light the fireworks and were just wild when we told them it was time. Not too much, just a few smoke bombs, sparklers, and TNT’s. It was enough to satisfy them.

We walked down to the field and let them play chase for about 20 minutes in the dark. We could barely see them, but we could hear them giggling and laughing. Also, all around us we could hear fireworks. Not the small kind either, the big ones. A lot of people were out and it really was a great evening. They went home and we popped open the Champagne. Davy stayed up the entire evening with us. At about 11:30 pm more fireworks started to go off so we snuck out the back of our house, cut through some trees and sat in the grass on the 6^th hole tee box. We could see fireworks in 3 different places, it wasn’t to cold out, and it was just perfect. Andy ran inside to get Matty so the 4 of us could sit together and stare out over the pond. At about 10 till we came inside, climbed in the bed and waited for the ball to drop. I can’t believe that it is already 2010. As Andy so kindly pointed out, we will have officially lived in 5 different decades: 70’s, 80’s, 90’s, 2000’s, and teen’s. Nothing like making me feel even older… The ball dropped, we gave each other big big big kisses and then all of us went off to bed. Davy slept in the little bed and Matty in his crib. Hello 2010!!!