Berry's

We came here on our way home from our Florida trip with Gigi and the cousins. It's in Mississippi and I absolutely love this place! You walk into a wonderful atmosphere with Christian music and videos playing (at least on the Sunday we came). They even have a sign above their entrance that says something like, "If you feel the Lord's Presence here, it's because It is!" They serve lots of gluten free food, including the best catfish, sweet tea in oversized metal mugs, and they sold handmade and wooden gifts. We brought home a wooden Lazy Susan that says, "As for me and my House, we will Serve the Lord." It is on our dining table. It is my hope that we come through there again!

Florida Trip (Continued)

The False Alarm Shark Scare and the Real (eek) Shark Scare

So apparently Ryan has a pretty hilarious version of his own. At least that's what friends say! Bailey and Caden were in a two man raft in the ocean one morning in Florida. I went down (with Cameron) to watch them. I have been swimming in the ocean before (California, Florida, Texas, Mexico...) but I have never had any encounters with sharks, dolphins, anything like that...Caden yelled out, "Aunt Amber!" and pointed. I followed his finger with my eyes. I saw two fins. Fins!!! Never did it occur to me that it was anything other than shark fins. I panicked and started screaming for them to come to shore. I started running, flailing around. I remembered I had my 3 year old with me. I couldn't run for help and leave him. I ran back and forth, continued screaming, yelled more, hyperventilated, cried without tears, yelled at the boys some more to get into the shore NOW! The boys were scared and abandoned the raft. I wasn't happy that they were out of the raft but, at the same time, was relieved they were finally making progress coming into the shore. Finally Ryan showed up. I said, "What took you so long?!" in the hoarse voice that I kept for the next couple of days. He said, "I saw you...And then I saw the dolphins." He took his sweet time getting down there! He assured me they were dolphins. I took a look. I saw five of them swimming together. Oh. It took a little while to calm down from that. The raft was very far away. Ryan and Derrick were going to go after it but decided it was too far gone. Then Ryan saw it come back to shore and went and got it. It had a hole in it. :(

The  Real Shark Scare

Later that same day a bunch of us were swimming. Everyone had gone in and Ryan, Bailey, and I (with Cameron in my arms) were making our way in. A man came up and said something to Ryan when we were still in the water. Ryan thanked him, looked at me, and said, "C'mon." "Ryan? What did he say?" Silence. "Ryan...?" "Ryan! Get us out of here!" He pulled us up to the shore. Once we were out he told me the man said a 5 foot bull shark (the most aggressive ones) was right by us. I went and talked to the man and his wife and he said it was coming toward his wife and he'd never seen one being that aggressive before. He told her to get out. I asked him if they saw them very often. He said they patrol up and down that area all the time. Really? Then I asked him how long we should stay out of the water. He made a gesture like he was looking at his watch and said, "3 minutes. Get back in!" Hmm...Possibly Floridians don't seem to be as freaked out about sharks as I am?

More of Our Florida Trip

Well, I'm so sad that I lost most of my pictures of the Florida trip that were on my phone. Shortly after we moved in our house Cameron fell into the pool trying to grab a pool toy! He had a life jacket on but looked scared and seemed to be struggling a bit with his mouth in the water. I had my phone in my hand and, really, I think I threw it in the pool, jumped in with my clothes on, and grabbed Cameron's face up from the water. A couple of minutes later and after we were relieved, Bailey pointed down to the bottom of the pool, "Mom, your phone!" Great. I lost all my contacts, pictures, the phone...We had gone to the Naval Museum but I don't have any of the great pictures I got.  :(  However, I was able to steal some pictures of the trip off of Dana's blog! :)

The Beach House

This is the 6 bedroom beach house we stayed at in Perdido Key, Florida with the cousins and Gigi. It was SO much fun and I miss it. We had fun cooking and eating yummy meals. Ryan made French Toast and the best omelets with roasted peppers. Ryan and Derrick grilled chicken, pork tenderloin, burgers, and corn. Dana made chicken orzo, salad, and sauteed veggies. Mia made kettle corn, smoothies, and helped with other things. I made granola and the famous "Powell balls" (energy balls) several times. Well, Mia made the last batch, as she loved them. A lot of nights the kids were served ice cream or ice cream and berries for dessert. The ocean was amazing, of course. We had a couple of shark scares- one real and one that ended up being dolphins. I'll get to that in another post.

Our Trip to Florida

This is where it all began! We were on the road for Livi's birthday. We split the drive into 2 days. I think we may have been in Texas in the picture. We stopped in Louisiana and stayed at the Barksdale Air base. The commissary was closed but we managed to find some little donuts for Livi's birthday breakfast the next morning!