For Your Time and Effort

What do three fleece blankets and one evening have to do with a vacation to Florida?
Quite a bit, actually. Here is the abridged version of our story…
Disney is offering up to six 1 day only tickets to one of their theme parks in exchange for your time as a volunteer. You must go through Disney’s website and sign up under the Give A Day, Get A Day program to qualify. You then pick a volunteer program you want to work with in your area, volunteer, follow all the steps to complete your participation and make your way to Disney!
The program I chose for our family is called Project Linus, which supplies homemade blankets to children who have suffered from illnesses or other tragedies. This was a great thing from the beginning. We picked out three fleece blanket kits from Jo-Ann’s, took them home, and started and finished them all in one night.

Audrey chose a very sweet girl pattern with birdies on it. I can just imagine some tween wrapping herself up in it! Ben chose a Mickey pattern because we were going to get to go to Disney ourselves. Maybe the child who receives Ben’s blanket will have their Make a Wish dream come true and get to go to Disney someday! Luke chose a puppy pattern because he LOVES puppies. I know that there is another little boy out there who scampers around on all fours, barking and insisting that his mommy call him a big puppy, instead of a big boy, too.

Audrey’s was perfect because though she had to measure and cut all the tabs herself, she was able to do a very good job and kept at it diligently. And I thank God because he allowed me to put aside my perfectionist tendencies (thus ruining a great thing) and let my daughter do it her own way. Ben’s was perfect because his was pre-marked and so he was able to do it almost entirely on his own, as well. Luke’s was perfect because he went to bed before the other two and Audrey and Ben did his for him, which ended up being a perfect example of teamwork!

It was a little hard prying these very warm blankets away from their own bodies. It was also a bit difficult explaining to a four year old that this very cute puppy blanket is for another child that they will never meet. Out of sight, out of mind is a very good thing.
There was a chance that Disney might not process our information in time and it wasn’t until two days before we went that we discovered that we did indeed have tickets reserved for us at Disney. After that, though, we had our final day planned for us!

Even if you never intend to go to Disney this year (or ever), I would highly recommend you follow through their link to see the local organizations you can donate your time and efforts too. Start at www.disneyparks.com

On the Lookout

By Friday, we were on the lookout for some nice beach weather- and we got it! We broke out the suits and hit the beach. Well, after liberally applying sunscreen. The kids played in the surf a bit, but it was still cold and the water just wasn’t warm enough, so we just walked along a bit, found some shells and headed poolside.



If you’re serious about running on the beach, you need these kinds of shoes: Vibrum Five Fingers. Bill loved them. I got a new suit for the trip, Bill got new shoes.



We had supper at a great restaurant- Skidder’s. They have great Greek food, but also American food.If you are in St. Pete’s Beach, you must eat here at least once. We ended our day with fireworks that I happened to notice being set up while I was going for a run on the beach. It was a nice closure to our beach front time.

Executive Decision

By Wednesday night, Bill had decided that this wandering aimlessly around St. Pete’s was not going to cut it for the rest of the week. While we were still on vacation, the weather was just not cooperating and we were left twiddling our thumbs. So, Bill made the executive decision that we should go to Kennedy Space Center. The reason I say executive decision is because I, myself, wasn’t exactly cooperating with this vacation thing, but more on that in another post…
Since it only took about 3 hours to drive across the state of Florida to the other coast, we didn’t have to get up too early. We arrived at the Kennedy Space Center’s Visitors Center a bit before noon and started touring around. We got to walk through a section of a full size model of a space shuttle and look at full size models of the rocket boosters used for the shuttle. They also had a launch simulator that you could ride. It looked like a lot of fun to experience that, but 1. Luke was too short, 2. Ben was barely tall enough and 3. Audrey was completely panicking before we even started up the ramp. Since we had all three strikes pretty much against us we opted for the observation area, which was not quite as fun as the actual simulator, but still enjoyable.
The Visitor’s Center has arranged a bus tour of the NASA areas, including a viewing area of the two launch pads, a drive past the shuttle assembly building (which is humongous), a visit to a building containing an Apollo rocket and everything related to the Apollo rocket era of space flight and then to another building which housed the training facilities of the astronauts and a model of what live is like on the international space station. The whole tour, depending on how fast you moved was about two hours long. We spent quite some time at the first two stops but by the last one the kids were tired and we were off and on the bus quickly.
While we were at the viewing area, I happened to notice a guy that looked familiar and he turned out to be our friend, Stuart, from church. He and three more of his friends were vacationing in Florida, also, and we all just happened to be at Kennedy at the same time!! We took a group photo for them and they snapped one for us.
But really the best part of the trip to Kennedy was the rocket launch. Part of Bill’s determining when to visit the center was based on the fact that a rocket was scheduled to launch later that day. So we stuck around and waited. It got dark. It got cold. The kids were getting tired. I was running out of creative ideas to keep the kids happy, warm and occupied as the launch was being pushed back because of weather. Finally, the countdown was on. I hoisted Luke onto my shoulders, Bill had Ben on his and Audrey manned the camera. Before the launch, I turned to watch the crowd and it was amazing. Everyone either had cameras or cell phones out to record it. Just one single thing bonded everyone for one moment of time. I turned around just in time to see the flash of light and we all watched the rocket successfully launch. Then we clapped and cheered. No, this wasn’t a very momentous launch, just a satellite being placed in space somewhere to monitor something, but still a feat, nevertheless. And we got to witness it. Amazing!

The Best

Thursday was a low action day. We were hunting and searching for things to do since the weather was not exactly cooperating with lounging by the beach. It was cold and windy.
We had heard of a seabird sanctuary and decided to check it out. It was free so we figured it was at least something to do. We got to see a lot of birds in confines and were very glad for a breeze since many birds in cages are, um, stinky.
After lunchmeat sandwiches in the car, we decided to try our luck at mini-golf. We had coupons for Smuggler’s Cove so off we went. After looking at prices, the kids only got to golf. They had live alligators that you could feed for a price, so we skipped that part. Instead, I tried to feed them a bit of Luke’s leftover sandwich but the alligators were forgoing dry crust for a bit of sunshine and a snooze. This was the nicest mini-golf course we had ever been on. I mean, the course was nicely maintained, the greens were green and it was a lot of fun. Luke scored a hole in one, amazingly. You should watch him golf. It’s more chasing the ball around and no aiming whatsoever. But the kid has luck on his side. He will probably grow up to be the kind of kid who is naturally talented and if he worked hard he could really go far, but occasionally just gets lucky (thus deterring him for really applying himself). And his cute looks totally work for him! Anyway… the kids loved the course.

We decided to check out downtown St. Petersburg. There were a couple of art museums that Bill, Audrey and I would have loved to see, but decided in a couple of years would be better. Instead we went to The Pier, which would be a really great place to watch all the boats on a nice, sunny, non-windy day. But today was not that day. So we looked through the binocular thingy at whatever we could see, ate some ice cream, bought a couple of post cards and left. We traveled back to the mini-golf for a second round. Audrey scored a hole in one. We would recommend the mini-golf if you have nothing else to do on a windy, cold day in St. Pete.

Wildlife

After the Marine Aquarium, Bill wanted to take a drive up to a park he’d heard about. So we drove up to Honeymoon Island. The beaches there are rated the best. Unfortunately, it was way too windy to hang out on the beach, though we watched a few guys kite surfing, so we took a short hike through the nature preserve. It was only about a mile in and back. We saw many osprey and their nests. It is said they are always hunting and always protecting. Their squawks as they spotted us definitely told us to keep away from their nests.

Ben found a good size stick and spent the rest of the hike peeling the bark off, dragging it through mud, pole vaulting and whacking things. Luke was not much into the hike, so he spent a lot of time on my or Bill’s shoulders. I snapped this picture of Audrey and Daddy a little too late since right before that they were walking ahead holding hands.

A sign before we entered the park said that rattlesnakes were very common and we should be aware (we never saw any!). It also mentioned the osprey and a couple of other animals, but it never mentioned armadillos. We saw 5 on our walk! The novelty of armadillos wore off quickly for Ben and he asked us if we were going to keep stopping every time we saw one. Their eyesight is not very good so they passed right by us without even noticing, unless we were upwind. I snapped this picture for one of my students, Gabrielle, who had just composed a piece about a jumping armadillo!

We got to what ended up being the top of the trail and met a couple who told us that there was a bald eagle’s nest just a bit further in. The entire area had been fenced off so as to not disturb the nest. We could see the birds through the trees. There were two older babies. What a treat for us!

The vegetation along the way was so amazing. We really enjoyed this area!

A Little Wet

On Tuesday we went to Clearwater Marine Aquarium. Here they rescue and rehabilitate hurt sea animals. We saw a short video about a dolphin named Winter who has a prosthetic tale. Apparently, Winter’s story of determination is inspirational, especially to those who also need prosthetic limbs. The video was very touching and when I looked over at the kids afterwards, Audrey was teary and I think Ben was too. (I didn’t say anything, though, because that would have ruined the moment.)
We saw many sea turtles and Ben got to reach in and touch a sting ray.

Then we watched the dolphin show. The trainer was working with two dolphins. They did several tricks and the kids really enjoyed the show. They were able to sit right up next to the glass and got splashed a little during some of the tricks. They thought it was great.
Finally, the show was over and one dolphin did one last trick, which was to swim by very fast and slap the water, which in turn SOAKED the kids! The audience jumped back in surprise and laughed, except for my two boys, who cried. Audrey got the most wet and later on she was the stinkiest, since getting splashed with marine aquarium water is not the same as pool water.

Taking Off

So, we went on vacation! We went to St. Petersburg, Florida for a week. Here is a picture of the kids waiting for our plane at the Des Moines airport. I love it.

Ben and Luke were fascinated, while Audrey was worried. She has a height/motion sickness/this is a new thing deal. She made it through just fine and didn’t get sick or turn purple from hyper-ventilating herself.
As the plane prepared to take off, I was sitting next to Ben, who was quite excited. He suddenly grabbed my hand and wanted to hold it. It was my favorite memory of that day.
I asked Luke later on what his favorite thing of the day was and he said chewing gum.