This Summer We: had fun decorating

The girls and I enjoyed setting everything up and decorating the house on the bay.  It was fun to pull out all of our sea shells and sea glass, too.

We have old blue mason jars full of shells sitting around here and there (the same jars from the camper)...

We also filled an old tackle box with some pretty shells...

The sea glass found a home in some of my milk glass dishes and in an old feed scoop...

Good thing I have so many helpers to keep up with the dusting and cleaning chores :)...

yes, he is dusting in his bathing suit...doesn't everyone ;)?

The girls each have their own bedroom in this house, something they have only ever had once before.  We had donated their bedding to a mission in South Dakota before going on the road, so they were allowed to pick out some new bed linens for their rooms here.  I love seeing their different choices :).

Audrey chose rainbow polka dots...

Ashlyn chose blue and yellow tie dye...

I even got something new and wonderful for MY bedroom!  My husband built a beautiful headboard for our bed using...pallets!  I had been wanting him to make me one out of old barn wood, but that stuff is expensive and hard to come by (understandably).  Pallets are free and you get the same look.  Love it!

He even built me a little book shelf out of the same pallet boards.  I just love them both...because they look fantastic and also because he made them for me <3.

Back in the living room...yes, I skip around sometimes :)...I hung up some of my favorite wall decor...

It was fun to get my globe collection out of storage and back up on the big red cabinet Dan made for me a few years ago.  This cabinet is made from barn wood that came from eastern South Dakota, hand picked and created for me by my talented husband :).

I enjoy finding interesting plants in the yard to clip and bring inside to go in my big blue vase...

For the guest bedroom, we scored a basically new furniture set via Craigslist.  The couple that had it were moving across country and were practically giving it away to avoid having to move it (been there, done that a few times).

For curtains, I had my resident artists whip me something up.  Aren't they fabulous?...

Our magnet board from the camper found a home, too.  On a short wall between the kitchen and my office...

Wait.  Office?  YES!  I have my very own (shared with only 6 other people, hehehe) office.  It's everything I never knew I needed storage wise :).  We keep all of our homeschool, craft supply, bill paying, files, etc in there. 

that stack of boxes is about half of their school work for the next year

The only room left to show you (other than bathrooms, prolly not happening) is the boys room.  They have the entire 3rd floor to themselves...big open bedroom, closet, and their own bathroom.  Just picture 3 twin beds on one side of the room and legos pretty much everywhere else, hehehe.  I'm kidding.  They keep it neat, I just for some reason haven't taken any pictures of it yet.  I'll have to do that soon!  Right now, I have to go water that poor thirsty plant sitting on my desk.  Talk to ya'll later :)!

This Summer We: enjoyed our backyard...

...our backyard just happens to be the bay ;).

The house we have been renting in Florida is in such a fun location.  Just a hop, skip, and a jump and we are at the waters edge...

view from our dining room

I will let the pictures do most of the talking :)...

usually we see small boats passing by, this one was HUGE

jets from the AFB across the bay from our house

Blue Fish Trevor caught on the bay

Like the words of one of my favorite country songs says..."it's a sweet sweet life living by the salty sea...".  Sure is :)...

This Summer We: grew a garden

We have had so much fun this summer with our garden.

Once the plants came up, they really grew fast :)!

The first thing ready was the leaf lettuce.  We had SO much lettuce...there was lettuce for us (we ate it every single day), for our neighbors, our parents, our friends, even for my mom's chickens!  Way too much...note to self:  a little lettuce goes a long way, plant less next time ;).

The green beans were next.  We enjoyed many meals of freshly picked and cooked green beans.

There was even a little extra for me to can.  I haven't canned veggies in a long time, so that was fun :).

When the squash started producing, I got a little surprise.  I had chosen yellow squash and zuchinni seeds, the standard.  Well, the zuchinni didn't look quite right...they weren't long and thin, they were short and round.  Little balls!  I got online and looked them up...turns out they were an heirloom variety of zuchinni, perfect for stuffing and baking.  I couldn't wait to have enough of them to try a new recipe with!

Lots of yellow squash....

...carrots...

...and surprisingly, lots of sugar peas!  I really didn't expect these to grow very well, but they were second only to the over-achieving lettuce...

The two things that barely produced were the cucumbers and the flowers.  We got maybe a dozen cucumbers, enough for snacking on, but not enough to make pickles with as I had wanted to do.  Oh well, that's ok.  The flowers were sparse, we picked a few for taking inside but mainly we just left them for the bees and butterflies :).

I almost forgot the okra!  It came in quite a bit later than the other veggies, and it really didn't do that well...maybe we just didn't plant enough.  It took forever with cutting the okra every other day to get just enough for one meal for our family.

stir-fried okra

My 8 year old was so amazed at the food that we grew from just a handful of seeds :).  He made the comment..."we are SO blessed to have all this good food right in our own yard"...  smart kid ;)!

I spy...

...a little girl doing her school work.  But she's not alone!  Look closer...

One of the many fun perks of homeschooling ;)

Happy 13th Birthday Trevor!

I am officially the mother of a teenager.  A teenager!  Our oldest son turned 13 this year and grew at least 6" taller...seemingly overnight.  He is actually taller than me now, which is happy/sad...where has the time gone???

Ok, enough mush...he IS a teenager and all ;).

His Dad was away at work on his actual birthday, so we just had a laid back day doing whatever he wanted to do.  What did he choose?  A seafood lunch and then a trip to one of our favorite beaches on Cape San Blas...sounds good to me :)!

the sand there is so powdery soft, it squeaks when you walk on it :)

It was a really windy day, so swimming was out of the question (rip currents and red flags).

We still had an awesome time.  Just as we crested the dunes we were greeted by the sight of several dolphins playing just off shore.  The little kids happily exclaimed that they were "birthday dolphins"!  Hehehe, cute :)...

that black blur in the water is a dolphin

There was the always coveted tidal pool in the sand that had fresh sea water flowing through it the entire time.  Those are the best!  This one was deep enough that the kids could lay down in it and be covered by the water.  They spent most of the day lounging in that pool.

They also made drip castles, pretty big ones...

There were tons of sea shells to pick through that day.  Always fun...

We stayed until nearly sunset, the biting bugs come out down there as the sun goes down and we really didn't want to stay for that part ;).  The ride home was nice, pretty views of St. Joe Bay...

At home, it was time for cake and a few gifts.  We also picked up pizza for dinner, at the request of the birthday boy.

When Dan got home on his days off, we had a triple birthday party...Dan's birthday is 2 weeks before Trevor's, and Dan's dad's is the same day as Trevor's.  A busy month :)!  The three of them had went fishing down near Orlando and so we had a big fish fry for the birthday dinner...complete with more cake and gifts for all the birthday boys :).

Happy Birthday, teenager ;)!

listen closely...

I had walked out to the seawall behind our house to watch Dan and Tristan coming in with our little boat. 

What did I find in his usual spot?  Mr. Stingray, of course :)!

I was waiting on the boat, so I started playing with the video on my phone.  I am going to try to put the video on here for ya'll to see.  Yes, it's just a stingray.  The part that I like about it is the sounds.  Turn your volume up all the way and you can hear what I hear when I take my little walks along the seawall :)