Tuesday, July 26,2011

As you can tell, I have been remiss in writing the blog since we left to come home to visit. We arrived at Gina's (our daughter) house on Friday morning. We got to see half of our grandchildren on Friday. Jeff (our son) called Friday night and said his air conditioner wasn't working. That's not a good thing. It's wicked hot here and they had weekend guests. Murphy's Law. It was too late to get parts, so John waited until 6:30 A.M. on Saturday morning and went out to help him fix it. It needed a new fan motor and a capacitor and was fixed by noon.

We had to make an emergency run out to John's aunt's house because she had fallen and couldn't get up. She ended up in the hospital. Then we went to Jay's (our other son) house to see them. We went out to dinner with all of our children and grandchildren, and our son-in-law. Both of our daughters-in-law were occupied with out of town high school friends. It was wonderful to see them all. We will be seeing them all a lot while we are here.

Sunday there was a Mass for my Dad at Little Flower. After Church, my brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, daughter, two grandchildren, and my mom went out for breakfast. After breakfast, we went back to Mom's for the afternoon. Before going back to Gina's, we took a ride out to our old harbor and visited with a few of our boating friends. It was nice to see them. We are planning to spend the weekend with them all in August.

Yesterday I spent the afternoon with my Mom. It would have been their 58th wedding anniversary. Today is the 7th anniversary of my Dad's death. We all miss him terribly. He was one heck of a guy and a great Dad!

Tonight we are going to see my friends from high school at Cindy's house. She has invited all of our families as well for a cook out and swimming. I'll try to be better about writing while we are home, but our schedule has been pretty full and fun.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

We are all packed and ready to go tomorrow. We still have a few things to do to the boat. We should be home Friday morning sometime.

A strange thing happened at Happy Hour tonight. There were five or six of us sitting around when a man and a boy came up at a little after six looking for gas. The gas dock closes at 5:30 and the guy said he didn't have his wallet on him. His car was at Flagler Beach. He asked if anyone had some gas he could put in his jetski and he would bring it back tonight or tomorrow. John told me to give him what was in our gas can for the dinghy. It amounted to about two gallons of gas. They were from England and have a house here which they visit about three times a year for a month each time. The man said he's been coming here for 24 years. We were just sitting down to eat dinner when they came back with their gas can and refilled ours. Then the man sent the boy up to the car and he brought us a dozen roses and a bag of Russel Stover candy. That was above and beyond. When you have a good experience like this, you are more likely to help the next person who needs it. They were very nice.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

We began clearing out the salon today in anticipation of the work to be done on the fuel tank. The V Berth is getting quite crowded. All of the bar stools, the lamps, the tables, the printer, the cushions, and all of the small decorations have to be out to make room for the engine. The love seat is going to be on top of the bar and the engine is going to be where the love seat is now. We are expecting to receive pictures emailed to us as the work progresses. Our fingers are crossed that all goes well. We are glad that we will not be here when the work is being accomplished. I've got a feeling John will be stressing while we are home, worrying about what is going on here.

The weather here is better than in Cincy. Today it was 85 degrees and Happy Hour was nice with a gentle breeze. There's always air conditioning though. Three more days.....

Monday, July 18, 2011

T Minus 4 and counting......

Today I finally got my hair cut. It seems like it's been forever since the last time. If only I could convince John to cut it. It's hotter at home than it is here, so it was time. Doesn't that seem funny, that it's hotter at home than in Florida?

Today is Monday, so there was a whole marina Happy Hour (and a half) up in the ship store. Everyone brings an appetizer to share. By the time dinner rolled around, I wasn't even a little bit hungry. I made chuck roast, mashed potatoes, and beans for dinner. What was I thinking? We have plenty of leftovers for tomorrow night's dinner.

I've been on the phone with our children, ironing out our plans for the month we are at home. It sounds like we will be pretty busy. We are both looking forward to every planned outing and the time spent at each family's home.

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Sue had taken this picture of a jelly fish.

Seas 2 Day and Runaround Sue at Palm Coast Marina

We found a Catholic Church to attend, now that we have a vehicle here. The Church is Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton Catholic Church. They abbreviate it: SEAS. That seems rather appropriate for a Church in Florida on the coast. It's a big, beautiful, new Church building. After Church, we picked up Norm and went shopping and then to eat at Mezzaluna's Italian Restaurant. We had a large pizza. Usually, a large is pretty close to what we can eat at one sitting. Not here. This pizza was so big that we could only eat 2 pieces each. We brought the rest home for later.

Al from Al's Mobile Marine Service who is going to do the repairs to the fuel tank came tonight to discuss exactly what he is going to do and what he wants us to do before we leave to get ready for him. He said he will send us pictures as he progresses along. That ought to make John feel better while we are at home.

We had a four hour Happy Hour tonight. The temperature was perfect and it was so comfortable out that we stayed out from 5:00 P.M. until 9:00 P.M. Different people from the harbor came and joined us for shorter periods of time. It's interesting to hear peoples' boating stories and it's nice to get advice about different places to stop along our future route.

Needless to say, we are T Minus 5 and counting.

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Now it is less than a week before we leave to come home for a visit. Yea!!! Today was pretty much like yesterday, except that it only looked like it would rain. Happy Hour was perfectly comfortable. It was cool with a nice breeze and we could have stayed out all night, that is until we got hungry and it was past time to start making dinner. We had shrimp scampi for dinner, my personal favorite meal. Even though we have our van here now, we are not going very many places. We are trying to use up all of the food before we leave since we will be gone so long, so we are not going to the grocery store. We are going to Church tomorrow morning, however. And then we are picking up Norm and going out for brunch. That should be fun. Counting the days (6).

Friday, July 15, 2011

Today I worked on things to get the boat ready for when we leave to come home. We had a pretty good thunderstorm this afternoon. We sat out on the aft deck and played cards while the rain came down in buckets with lots of thunder and lightning. I love listening to the rain hitting the canvas on the boat, especially during the night when we are in bed hearing it hit. Sleep comes easy then. Other than that, we are just chillin' counting down the days until we come home to visit.