They don't close Florida

Just after 1am Sunday morning, we finished packing and went to sleep. The plan was to wake up at 4:30 and be on the road around 5am - a seven hour drive with two kids in diapers on 3 hours sleep, how bad could it be? I awoke to the sound of Michele saying something earnestly (I can't remember what) but I looked at the clock... it was 6am. We crawled out of bed, showered, loaded up the car, woke up the kids and headed to Florida at 6:45.

We came across a pretty bad wreck that tied up traffic just as we were getting into Atlanta, then hit construction traffic on the southside that had us completely stopped for about 30 minutes. Less than an hour on the road and we were already almost an hour behind, plus we left almost 2 hours late.

We made it to my Dad's in Homosassa around 2:45. We visited for a little while and then we all went to a local animal park. It was very nice and we saw some cool animals including manatees. I've never seen a manatee in person, it was very cool, I'd like to go back in the winter and swim with them.

Three generations

We spent the night in Homosassa at a hotel on the waterfront. The hotel has a really good restaurant and an interesting attraction, Monkey Island. There is a tiny island just about 25 feet or so from the shore which is a habitat for a group of monkeys. There is a cool story of how it came to be HERE.

The following morning we left for our next destination, Treasure Island. On the way, we stopped at the Clearwater Aquarium. It's not a typical commercial aquarium, all of the animals are rescued. There were dolphins, turtles, sharks, otters... etc. The best part was the dolphin tanks are out in the open - you are only about 6 feet from them and you're looking right onto the top of the water, not through a glass.

We made it to the hotel later that afternoon. After settling in, we went down to the beach. It was a very windy day so the sand was blowing around quite a bit making it not so fun. Sullivan hated the whole experience. He didn't like the sound, water, sand, wind... he wasn't having it at all. Addison didn't mind sitting in the water with me and playing in the sand a little but everyone was done with it in about 10 minutes.

The view from our hotel room

Van is screaming in this picture

The next day we spent at Busch Gardens. It was tiring, but we all had a lot of fun. Addsion got to see all of the animals she has been watching on tv or in books. She even saw some new ones that she really liked and still talks about. Sullivan was just along for the ride but he seemed to like being around all of the action and pushed around in the stroller. They both behaved well which made it an enjoyable day for all.

Addison loved that this bird landed on her shoulder

She hated that it bit her, but only her feelings were hurt

We left Florida the following day but on the way we stopped and visited my Grandfather & Natalie. They were excited to meet the kids and the kids had a great time visiting.

crawling with great grandpa

We had one last stop before we left the Sunshine State, the Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa. It was voted the #1 Family Friendly Zoo in the country. We really liked it. It was better (and way cheaper) than Busch Gardens. We only got to see about half of it but it was a lot of fun and we plan to go back to see the rest.

covered in dirt after a face-plant trying to chase a goat

The last stop on our trip was in Valdosta, Georgia. We got to the hotel pretty late so it was right to bed and then up early to visit Wild Adventures. It's an amusement/animal park - like a smaller version of Busch Gardens. It was more kid-friendly in my opinion, Addison got to go on a few rides (even one all by herself!) and feed a giraffe. We left the park mid-afternoon to pick up Haley from boarding before they closed.

first ride by herself

Addison was scared going down but cried when she couldn't do it again

We got back home Thursday evening and spent the last few days of Spring Break recovering. I don't have time to write everything we did but those were some highlights.

We had a really great time visiting family - it has been way too long since we've seen them. We had more fun than we've ever had together and now that the kids are big enough to travel, we plan on visiting more. There are 160+ pictures from our trip HERE. Take a look when you get a chance, you'll get an idea of how much fun we had.

There are also a bunch of new pictures in the April folder HERE. There are a few from Easter as well as the popular 'Faces of Sullivan' & 'Addison Tries to Take Her Bib Off' series.

The next update will probably be after Addison's birthday NEXT SATURDAY!







Anyone get the title?