One day while in FWB, we got to take Sophia over to the Santa Rosa Sound Side beach across the street from the base and another day we took her to Beasley Park Beach on the Gulf going towards Destin. The girl has no fear and kept Grandpa and Grandma busy holding onto her hands or carrying her on out into the splashing waves, which she enjoyed. She is such a cute little beach baby running around playing in the sand and romping about in the water.
Valerie has found a few "splash"
parks where the kids run around a big flat surface waiting for water to spray them from various objects or shooting up right out of the ground. Sophia's favorite is what I call the "mushroom" as the water looks like a mushroom cap waterfall. We went to a couple of those while we were there and Momma even joined us on those 2 occasions.
Valerie finished her very 1st quilt following 4 weeks of quilting class and it looks really nice in the babies' room.
She did a terrific job on it and I like her personal touch w/the butterflies. She also made us a nice table runner for our coffee table. It's 2-sided w/one of palm trees for summer and a flowery one for spring. Thanks, Val!
While at FWB, the 4 of us got to celebrate my birthday and Tom's and my 43rd wedding anniversary. Except for Sophia having a sour stomach, which caused a big ol' mess in Val's car (poor baby), on the evening we were all going out to Carrabas for our anniversary, we had a really nice 2 weeks in the Florida Panhandle. Oh yeah, we had a wonderful time the following evening at Carrabas and, on the way back from Destin, Grandpa pulled into a parking lot so we could watch the fireworks that were being shot off out on the Gulf. Sophia was mesmerized and kept saying "boom"! She loved it.
On SA, 8-6-11, we dropped Val and Sophia off at their dear friends (Matt, Brooke & Seth) home near Tampa then Tom and I proceeded down to Kira-Mar in Ft. Lauderdale. Not sure how the ocean was going to be since Tropical Storm Danielle had moved on through a couple days before that, we were greatly surprised to see the clear water and mild wave action. We spent LOTS of beach time while there and even went to Miami South Beach to check it out.
What a bust! After finally finding a parking spot, walking 3 blocks to the beach to check it out then hauling our chairs and umbrella back down there, it stormed. Tom didn't even get a chance to set the umbrella up let alone get in the water. After hauling everything back to the van, since it was just sprinkling, we walked around several blocks looking at the upscale shops then headed back to Ft. L. Thankfully, the weather cleared up early evening so we did get some Ft. L beach time. In my opinion, the ONLY draw to Miami Beach is the slight chance you might see a movie star. So, I don't care if we ever go back there.
We picked the girls up in Tampa on SA, 8-13, spent the night w/them in FWB and got back home on MO, 8-15. It's nice to be back in IL for a while even though we pent this past weekend w/our camping club at Ray Behren's cg on Mark Twain Lake near Hannibal, MO.
