Florida: On the road again...

Happy Thanksgiving Weekend to Everyone!
We're "on the road again", taking a road trip to Cape Haze, Florida for a Family Reunion! We rented a five bedroom house so that Scott (our oldest), Tammi (Scott's wife), Josie (age 8) and Sasha (age 5) from Salt Lake City, and Mike (middle son), Jessica (Mike's wife), Andrew (age 5),
Joey (age almost 3), and Catherine (age 9 mos.) from Elmhurst, IL. could join us for the week.

Both families flew in to Orlando a couple of days early to visit Disney World, which they loved and then joined us at the house last Sunday afternoon. The house had a small pool, just the right size for all of us and was heated to about 86 degrees. It was great for blowing off steam and for having some fun with grand kids.

We chose Cape Haze as it's close to Boca Grande on the Gulf - wonderful white sand beaches, great shelling and fairly safe swimming (not big waves like the Atlantic side). It is also located near Port Charlotte, where Bob's Mom is living in Lexington Manor - an Assisted Living facility, about twenty minutes from the house. We picked her up Monday, Wednesday and Thursday about 1:30 p.m. and she was able to stay and eat with us and "bond" with the grand-kids - she especially enjoyed holding little Catherine, who is all smiles right now and just a charmer.Then, we would drive her back home (to her own surroundings and bed) by about 9 or 9:30 p.m.

Mom Finch (Bob's Mom) is doing very well, for being almost 90 years old! She gets around well with her walker on wheels - she is only 87 lbs., so the lack of weight and being in pretty good shape are to her advantage. She is very thin - says that she eats like a horse, but metabolism burns it all up. She still smokes and enjoys a drink of Scotch that she nurses slowly. Doctor is not concerned at this point - at her age, we just want her to be comfortable and positive about life. She was kind of bummed on Wednesday as two residents had passed away the previous night and that very morning! But being with our gang brought her quickly out of her funk. I was glad she was with us this week.

We had a nice Thanksgiving dinner about 5:30 p.m. on Thursday - next time we will make sure our house has seating for all of us. We had a formal dining table that we avoided like the plague (for fear of breaking something) and a large table that seated 6 comfortably, adjacent to the kitchen. So we fed the kids first and then the adults sat and ate (most meals). It was really helpful to have a favorite DVD for a "show" after dinner so that all of us adults could linger before cleaning up the kitchen.

What did we do all week? Wake up early (7 a.m.) - little Catherine decided to be nocturnal this week (teething, perhaps?) and got both Jess and Mike up several times during the night. They were so considerate of us, trying not to wake us up. Catherine stayed in Mike and Jess' room in a pak n' play - but adjustments to a new sleeping arrangement are tough on infants. She is a little doll - she had a little green tennis dress outfit that was just darling.

We would eat breakfast together and then go swimming, or one day, Mike & Jess and kids visited friends in Sarasota, and the rest of us went to Boca Grande. One day, Bob and Mike & family toured Punta Gorda and Port Charlotte and Scott & family and I went to Costa Cay (a two hour boat trip to an island state park) for some shelling and walking the sandy beach and a picnic lunch. We were so excited to see bottle-nosed dolphins up close and personal, they were trying to race the boat that we were on and were about six feet away from us near the propellers at the back of the boat. They were so sleek, powerful and beautiful.

Evenings were Scrabble, Cribbage, lots of beer and wine and trading stories and memories - Mom Finch loved watching all of us laugh and tease each other. It was truly a wonderful week - we were so privileged to have all of us together - altho' we missed our youngest son, Eric - our first reunion without his presence. He spent Thanksgiving with his girlfriend Rachel's family in Ohio and is driving home to Chicago today. We are a close family and even having one sibling absent is noticeable (at least by me).

It is so neat to cuddle and be physically present to my kids and grandkids - to hug, to blow kisses on a baby's cheek and to roughhouse in the pool; to take long walks and tell bedtime stories and to ache for my adult children as they navigate the trials and tribulations of raising active, strong-willed and curious children. I so want to support them and assist, without interfering. They are such good parents - but, as we all know, lack of sleep, strange surroundings and lots of opportunities for testing limits while on vacation can cause challenges. Both Bob and I were so grateful for their willingness to be with us this Thanksgiving.

So...we are now on the way back home...left this morning and followed both kids' cars as we slowly drove through central Florida for one more day in the lush green and clear blue skies of Florida. We stopped for lunch together at a roadside small campground restaurant, next to The Peace River - Bob had a home-made crabcake sandwich and I had a barbecued sliced beef sandwich. One more opportunity to hold Catherine and hug kids and grandkids. We parted ways just south of Orlando and we headed for I-75 and headed into a massive traffic jam of Thanksgiving weekend returnees. At one time, it took us an hour and a half to go forty miles!
What a pain! Just before we got onto the freeway I scored a box of Florida citrus for $10 - grapefruit the size of Bob's fist, navel oranges the size of grapefruit back home and some wonderful tangerines.

We are in a Super 8 in Lake City, FL - will probably get an early start tomorrow morning and avoid traffic, if we can. We ate leftovers for supper (we cleaned out the house's refrigerator this morning) so had juice boxes, snack applesauce, salami/cheese/spinach sandwiches, celery sticks and the last of our homemade oatmeal raisin cookies. Last night we had a great buffet of leftover Thanksgiving leftovers - didn't want too much left to clean out this morning. Missed going out for a family dinner at the seafood restaurant in Placida this time. There will be plenty of opportunities in future years - plus, the grandkids will be older.

More on the road, later...