Florida 2022

We had such a great trip to Florida-lots of much needed sunshine! Our hosts were incredibly gracious as they always are and we enjoyed many delicious breakfasts and dinners :)

We stopped just south of Nashville on Thursday night-left a day early because of the snowstorm that was predicted for our area that night. Turns out we made a good decision...the boys' school was canceled Friday anyway!

Made it to Florida right at dinner time on Friday. Kids had to go visit the pool after we ate. 

Saturday we got up and took our time, rode bikes and then went to the beach for a little while. 

On Sunday we tried to go to Caspersen Beach but it was way too crowded so we opted for Venice Jetties which we hadn't been to with the kids before. It was pretty crowded there too but they managed to carve out some space to play football. 

On Monday we went to our normal spot at the Nokomis Jetties. Dave and I took a walk out to see the fishermen and then we went to get some ice cream. 

We are so sad that our normal ice cream place is shut down now! No more grove pictures. But we took one last picture. Then we found a new ice cream place :)

Kids love a good bike ride/walk in the mornings! At this point I wasn't documenting which beach we went to which day anymore. But every day we went to the beach and the pool and the kids rode bikes everywhere around the park!

Finally made it to Caspersen Beach on Tuesday. 

I spotted the gator on a solo bike ride and we never saw it again!

The kids discovered the bocce ball court in the park. They played there a ton over the week!

Family bocce ball. 

How cute are these fellas?!

Last day...back to Caspersen to search for shark's teeth. A very nice guy gave us this scooper thing to have-he was flying home and didn't want it!

 

For our last night we started a new tradition of getting Chinese food. We had overstayed by a day so Grandma Mary ran out of meals, ha! Did I mention they were fantastic hosts who let us stay a whole extra night :)  So Josh had the great idea of getting take out and man it was delicious!

Kids were so sad to leave. Ha this picture is too funny. 

Braces, Wrestling, Covid and Robotics

Well we really had a heck of a first half of February. Unfortunately the main takeaway was Ike and I getting Covid, but we both had very mild cases and Josh and Dave were able to avoid it!

Ike on his last day of no orthodontic work. He has an expander and we cranked that bad boy for 3 weeks! 

Here's what it looked like every evening when we had to do the expanding. He was a total champ about it and never complained. Now he has the expander in for a year before they evaluate what our next step is!

Ike had his first wrestling meet. We are pretty sure this is where the Covid came from. Lots and lots of people and he was clearly in close contact with all these kids. He did pretty well, didn't win any matches but he learned a lot!

We had a big snow storm and the kids were out the rest of the week! We didn't find out Ike was sick until Saturday though so everybody was out the entire next week as well.  But we did get in some sledding and snowboarding before the sickness took over!

Since I ended up testing positive into the next week, Dave had to be quarantined still for their robotics meet (but Ike got to go). His team was super awesome and he got to watch from home. They did fantastic and qualified for state at this meet!

Dad and Kyra came to visit to go to WinterJam. We had so much fun! Highlight of the night for our family was definitely KB. It snowed yet again and getting home was a struggle but the kids got a snow day out of it and spent the day hanging with grandma and grandpa.

Ike in a chess match with grandpa Charlie. They each got one win.

And they were able to see one of Dave's matches. Ike's team didn't go to this one (it was a really big meet) so he stayed home with Grandpa Boo instead. It was a looooong day but Dave had a great time!

 

January Wrap-Up

The boys sure kept us busy during the month of January! Dentist appointments, basketball and robotics were the theme of the month.

Ike at their dentist check up. Found out he definitely needs braces, more on that in February!

Dave finished out his basketball season for the 6th grade team. He ended up playing a lot more minutes for the A team towards the end of the season. A team finished without any wins and I think B team ended up with 2 wins. Looking forward to next season!

Ike finally received his last Christmas present! Grandpa Dave went in on this with us and Grandpa Charlie and Grandma Kyra got him a target. Can't wait for it to warm up so he can practice!

The boys have really gotten into playing music with Josh. He finally got his amp back so there have been lots of jam sessions lately. 

Ike cannot resist going outside no matter how cold it is!

We did take a walk on the last day of warm weather before a big snow storm hit.

We have all been going through our things to donate stuff before we move. Josh parted ways with his wedding suit but not before Ike had a little try on!

Ike wore the wrong color to the varsity basketball game. 

Josh and the boys went to a birthday celebration for some of his cousins. 

Gamma came to visit! She was able to attend one of Dave's basketball games, one of Ike's wrestling practices and a robotics competition! 

It was a really cool competition-the boys got paired up for the team part!