We're Back!

I'm back from vacation and I must confess, I've stared at this blank screen for a couple of days trying to come up with clear enough thinking to get something of value down! I want to tell you all about our vacation and, more importantly, about the fantastic book I read while sitting in the sun (and in the car!). So I suppose I should just get at it!


We have good friends, that do a timeshare in Pompano Beach, who invited us for a few days. We spent four totally lazy days sitting in the sun and walking on the beach. It was very out of the ordinary for us as we are "movers". We always have places to go and things to see. Being in one place with "nothing" needing to be done, was quite a switch. We survived, however, and thank God daily for spf50! We found some awesome nature finds that we dutifully carried home with us to examine at a future date, and daughter (5yo) learned to swim fearlessly. Both my children came home covered in chlorine rash.

Our time there ended with husband having a terrible allergic reaction to shrimp. He was very sick all of our last night and most of the way home. Food allergies are nothing to handle lightly, that is for sure. It's too bad restaurants don't get that and aren't careful!

Even with that, he gathered enough stamina to take us to Ft. Myers and the Ford-Edison Winter Estates. I remembered going there as a teenager and was anxious to show my family the largest Banyan Tree in the continental US. It is incredible!



The estate was nothing like I remembered it. They've added museum buildings and gone "public". It was expensive to go to for what it was. Especially considering they rarely talked about Edison, but focused on the local botanics (though I was interested in that) and who else lived there over the years. We were disappointed. The museum was neat though. They had a pictoral exhibit from the Smithsonian that was wonderful.


We will miss the beach though...and the pool. We saw one glorious sunrise from the beach which is inspiring, to say the least. We saw lots of shells, a few fish, the Goodyear blimp, & wayyy too much skin! We have sand places that sand just shouldn't be and now the children are fretting because their skin is drying out from our awful cold winter. We are officially counting the days till summer! The smell of salt air is very relaxing. The breezes are divine and the time to read was priceless!

And that brings me to the book I read: A Charlotte Mason Companion, by Karen Andreola. Wow! What a great book. My brain is very full and will need to purge itself in another post. If you are in the arctic north like us, enjoy the pictures and think warm thoughts.