The Keys

A few weeks ago, my parents decided to surprise my brother's family and us with a last minute vacation to the Florida Keys. Of course we were thrilled to leave the cold snowy weather we'd been experiencing and head to warmer climates, and we flew down last Sunday.

As it turned out, the Keys were experiencing record low temperatures just prior to our visit. Luckily the temperature did rise throughout our stay and we were able to enjoy t-shirt and shorts weather most of the time.  

The guys spent one "unforgettable" day fishing in a rented boat on the ocean.  While they did catch Yellowtail Snapper, Grey Snapper, Puffer Fish and Grouper, my brother also caught a case of seasickness.  Fishing in the sea turned out to be quite a bit more grueling than anyone had anticipated, so they decided to forgo additional days of fishing for more family time, which was just fine by the rest of us. 

Unfortunately, my brother was not the only one under the weather for some of the trip. My poor little niece Lexi had a stomach bug which seemed to hit most at night. Lily, Corey and my mom also experienced some sickly moments, but fortunately, they were all still able to thoroughly enjoy the trip. 

We spent two beautiful days at the beach.  One day we went to the beach at Bahia Honda State Park. The sand at this beach was awesome! It was almost like clay, it was so fine and stuck together wonderfully for building sand castles and such. There was a neat little sand bar just off the beach that we could wade to get to. The other beach we visited was Sombrero Beach on Marathon Key (the same Key our rental house was on).  This was another picturesque beach with lots of nice sand only it was a little coarser with more tiny shells. Lily loved the beach, venturing into the water even though it was quite chilly.  She also really liked feeding the seagulls and playing at the playground next to Sombrero Beach. 

My photos in this post are a mix of cell phone shots and a few taken with my nice camera. I didn't take my DSLR on the beach for fear of sand particles making there way into my camera. Luckily my iPhone does a pretty good job.

While Lil didn't have the dogs to feed while on vacation, she was able to find other animals willing to share her snacks.

At the aquarium in Key West, checking out the "Touch Pool".

At the butterfly conservatory

Finding a creative way to keep Lil's head propped up while she napped.

and at the National Key Deer Refuge on Big Pine Key

Thanks Mom and Dad, for a great vacation!

P.S. This was not the first time Lily had visited the ocean.  She got her first glimpse at the ripe old age of one week. 

This was in San Francisco, of course. That is "The Rock" behind us.

*edit to add. I just realized that I am wearing the same white sweater in the last two photos. It was really cold in SF that day, so I had it layered under my sweat shirt. You can see it peeking out of my hood.  I wear it a lot, obviously!

A little out of order

I have lots of pictures to post about the surprise trip to the Florida Keys that we just took, but I didn't want to forget about these photos I intended to post awhile back.

Lily really enjoyed helping decorate the tree this year. 

Here she is helping daddy hang the lights.

When it was done, she thoroughly inspected his work.

She loved taking each ornament out of the box and inspecting it before handing it to me to hang on the tree.

Sometimes the ornament inspection required a taste test. Or then again, maybe she was trying to blow into it. It was a fake horn, after all.



The best little helper a mommy could ask for.



Last but not least, the star. We hadn't even told her it went on top yet, but she decided it made a good "Lily topper".

Quick little video

I have much more to post about our vacation in the Keys. Here is a quick video to prepare you for the cuteness that is Lily in a swimsuit...

Right now

Once in awhile I find it fun to post the random tidbits that make up our life right now, in this moment. So here goes:


Lily is OBSESSED with moisturizer. She wants to put in on 24-7.  Mostly her legs, sometimes her stomach and often the dogs. She cries big fat tears if we take it away.  You know, if she's eating it or something.

We recently bought a membership to the WonderLab, a science center in Bloomington. They have a really neat water table with squirties and whirlpools and such. Best of all (for Lily, at least) there are lots and lots of brightly colored balls. She LOVES the water part. Each time we have gone, I have to drag a screaming drenched child away from the table when it is time to leave. I have learned to bring a complete change of clothes.

Lily loves to watch herself on video.  We take tons of home movies and she really enjoys watching the ones of herself.  Her absolute favorites are the videos she calls "Balls!!!" which are videos of her at the WonderLab. Go figure. They crack her up every single time. Other than that, she doesn't watch TV. We're choosing to wait until she is a bit older for various reasons. She hasn't showed any interest in TV whatsoever, which is probably because Corey and I don't watch it much ourselves.

Right now, if you were to ask Lily for a kiss, you'd get one of two things. Either she would nod and "allow" you to kiss the top of her head only, or she would give you what my dad refers to as a "Carp kiss". A carp kiss is a big sloppy kiss with smooshed out lips, like a fish. She randomly assigns people their own kind of kiss. Goofy girl.

Since I need a picture to go with this post, I'll post this random, badly cropped selfie, taken at my friend Lex's house. She has the most ridiculous blanket with feathers on it. How impractical is that? She says it's all about the style, not practicality.



Well, thats all for now. I'm going to bed.

Lucky cat

Lily just spontaneously told Stinky "Love you". She's never told me that.

Tree Time

Last night, we made our yearly trip to the U-Cut Christmas tree farm.  Corey always wants to get a tree fairly early, while the tradition at my house growing up was to wait until about the middle of December. I don't mind going early though, as it it just that much warmer. It loses some of the fun if you are racing from tree to tree whilst trying not to loose appendages to frostbite.  The weather was quite nice yesterday, so it was a good day to do it.

You know it is a bad sign when as you drive up to the tree farm, the employee tells you the standing trees "are looking pretty bad this year" and points you toward a barn full of shipped-in trees. Corey immediately shot back with a "NOPE!". "We'll cut our own, thank you!".  Our feeling is, the whole point of dressing up the tree is to make it look pretty. What fun is a tree that is perfect to begin with? I want a tree with character, darn it! So yes, the trees were quite yellow and sparse but that didn't deter us a bit in our quest for the Rieman family tree.

 

Seeing how my parents U-Cut farm put me through college, you know I had to represent. Indiana Fresh Christmas Tree Growers in the hiz-ouse!

You know what's funny? I used to wear this same coat back when I was the one measuring, shaking, hauling and baling the trees. 

Lily had a permagrin as we walked among the trees, discussing the positives and negatives of each.  It didn't take long for us to find one that was just the right size for our living room. 

Lily even got to straighten the bottom with daddy's help.

Picking out a Christmas tree with our own little girl is just a dream come true. Every aspect of our life is so much more fun these days.

It's official...

She spends too much time with the dogs.



I promise, we did not teach her that.

In this one, she is saying "See ya, bye" to Chloe, but seems to be thinking the opposite. I love how she looks at the mess on the floor and seems to be thinking "I wonder who did that?". Yeah, I wonder!