The World's Oddest Photo Shoot

Oops...these pictures just posted accidentally!  But you know what, it's been a hard day.  ANOTHER day without heat when we woke up.  A day with hurt feelings instead of a nap.  A day when I wished I got more stuff done.

Fortunately for me the day ended with a conversation with a dear friend. She might have thought our conversation was to help her, but it also helped me remember things I already know and had momentarily forgotten.  Thank you Katie!

So now I'm going to sit here for a little while thinking about these pictures instead of worrying about whether or not we'll have heat tomorrow.

~~~

One year ago we had just returned from a beautiful Thanksgiving week at the beach with Russ's wonderful brother and his amazing wife.  The beach and the water were so beautiful, and even though the weather was chilly we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly.

One morning I had walked the couple of blocks to the beach later than everyone else.  As I walked down the steep stairs to the sand I saw something sitting farther down the beach.  I zoomed with my long camera lens to see what it was.

It was a yellow chair, sitting all alone near the edge of the ocean.





The chair seemed so picturesque sitting there by the water that I started taking pictures, wondering what  would be it's best angle.  (And laughing at myself all the while.)  I figured it surely must be the world oddest photo shoot.

I'm still not sure which picture I like best, but one thing I do know--they all bring back wonderful sunny memories!

The Neighborhood that Never Was

One of the fun things we did while were were staying with Larry & Gaye at Santa Rosa beach for Thanksgiving was to drive around exploring.  One chilly afternoon we left the kids at the house (happily watching cable tv!) and went for a long drive.  It was really interesting, since the beaches we go to seem to have beach houses that are all fairly similar to one another.  We passed communities that had formal houses,

Italian houses, tiny houses, and French houses, and one that had all white houses.

We drove all through Seaside, the community where "the Truman Show" was filmed.  They houses were miniscule--many with only 1 bedroom, yet they cost millions of dollars.  We went into Seaside's grocery store so that we could see where the other half shops.  It was nice to know where we could get our Belgian White Chocolate Strawberry Curls if we ran out!

The store was kind of L shaped, and the inner wall was covered with shelves and merchandise.  It was really amazing.

Our favorite explore (as Winnie the Pooh would say), happened closer to home.  One afternoon the four of us loaded into the golf cart and drove around different neighborhoods near the beach.  After looking at lots of fun beach houses, Larry announced that we were now going to their favorite place.

And then we drove into the twilight zone. Seriously.

He drove the golf cart through a narrow lane and we emerged onto a residential street.  It was a lovely neighborhood.  There were common areas with green freshly mown grass and benches, and a tower in the middle of the neighborhood where you could climb to the top and see the ocean.

There was a lovely bridge over a narrow part of the lake and still more neighborhood on the other side.

There were street signs and walking paths.

There were two gazebos with boat houses underneath them.  The one that we went to was furnished with beautiful rocking chairs and had lots of small tables with chairs.  (Larry and Gaye like to go and sit in those rocking chairs on Sundays to read.)

There were not one but two beautiful pools.  The pools were surrounded by lounge chairs and umbrellas waiting to be opened.

There was a small shelter on one side of each pool that Larry called "the meditation room."  It had a large wall waterfall in it.

There was a larger shelter on another side of each pool that had a big fireplace in it.

I wanted to swim in these pools.  Well, except for the fact that it was pretty chilly.  But they were both beautiful and inviting.

I'm sure you're wondering why this neighborhood was the twilight zone.  Well, have you noticed the one thing I haven't described?  That's right.  There were NO houses.  Ok, there was one house.  Way on the edge of the neighborhood, with no one living in it.  But other than that one, not a single house.  There were lovely entrances,

and a guard house that houses a guard to chase Larry and Gaye off of the rocking chairs every Sunday.  But other than that, nada.

Seriously, the strangest thing we've ever seen.
Or not seen, as it were.

Beach Fun

I've finally managed to sort through and upload pictures from our 4 days in Florida last week. As you can see, Russ's brother Larry was really excited to see us.

And we are always happy to be at the beach.

We've never been to the Florida Panhandle before, so we didn't know what to expect. This was really the most beautiful beach we've ever been to. The sand was white and fine and didn't stick to you much at all. The water was extremely clear and either blue or green--both beautiful. Sometimes it was totally flat and calm, and if there was a good breeze there were tiny little waves.

The main event of the week was, of course, Thanksgiving dinner. Russ & I went for a walk in the morning, we spent much of the day on the beach, and had our turkey dinner only after we watched the sundown. An awesome way to spend Thanksgiving!

On the first morning I went for a long walk by myself. I was wearing sweats, but who was I kidding? By the time I had walked along the beach for an hour I needed to put my feet in the water. And by the time I had walked in the water for 20 minutes my sweats had come unrolled and I was wet to the knee. So worth it, though!

The water was quite cold, but Russ and the kids got in (all the way!) every day.

They were braver than I; as you can see in this picture I didn't even get in to my waist, and only then with a sweatshirt on! (In case you're wondering why I'm standing so far away from Russ & the kids in this picture, it's because I totally didn't trust them with my dryness. Russ's favorite thing to do when he's all wet and I'm dry is to give me nice big hugs, and this was one moment where I wanted to stay dry much more than I wanted a hug.

The kids had fun building a sand castle,

Josh had fun getting a sunburn,

and Jason had fun reading

and texting.

The first day we were there was the nicest, and it got progressively cooler as the week went on. But only 1 day was just too cold to be on the beach altogether; the rest of the time we just put on more clothes.

Feeding the birds was a big hit. Gaye spent a lot of time trying to entice the seagulls to pick up pieces of cracker off of her towel. They were fun to watch.

We decided that the birds definitely prefer chips to crackers. Jenna & Jared had a great time throwing chips in the air and watching the birds swoop in to catch them.

One fun moment of the week was hearing an ice cream truck in the neighborhood. Our kids have only seen an ice cream truck once or twice, and never gotten to buy anything from one, so they were pretty excited.

On the last afternoon Larry took the kids down to the beach by himself. By the time the rest of us were ready to go, Larry was back with the wet & shivering kids. They had gotten in the water and were cold and didn't want to go back to the beach. We left them at the beach house to get warm and play video games as much as they wanted, and we adults (& Jason) spent the entire afternoon at the beach. We were smart enough not to get wet that day, and we enjoyed the calmer adults only time.

Russ & I had a great time playing frisbee,

Especially once I remembered how to throw the thing. Jason did a nice job of taking pictures for us.

Here are some of the lovely sights of the week.

I really love to see pelicans fly by, but especially when they fly right over me. I think the visible bone structure of their wings is just so prehistoric looking!

I also enjoyed taking pictures of the seagulls. I experimented with the continuous picture mode on my camera, which filled up my camera camera card pretty quickly, but did get some interesting shots.

I always love the interplay of light and water.

I was also charmed by moments of unbelievable serenity


I'm told that I missed the best sunset, which occurred the first day while I was taking a desperately needed nap. Fortunately I saw plenty of other lovely sunset moments.

The last night was spectacular — it seemed a fitting end to a terrific week!

Thanksgiving Week

For Thanksgiving last week we drove many hours to arrive hereSo that we could spend time with Russ's brotherAnd his wife.They are some of the coolest people we know, and spending 4 whole days with them in such a beautiful (though chilly) place made us all happy.

I'll post more fun trip pictures later, when I have recovered from the 14 hr trip home!