Weekly Review July 19 '24

 I'm writing a day late this week because I was at Girls Camp most of the week and yesterday I had a lot of catching up to do. After I wrote last Friday, I made a batch of cookies (for dinner the next day) and I took Seth out driving for a while and he drove on the freeway for the first time. I've been trying to give him a chance to drive for at least 30 minutes every day so that he stays in practice and gets more experience. It seems to have helped and he is getting a little more confident and seems more willing to try new things. On our Friday drive, we saw a pretty rainbow. 

(I took the photo when we pulled over for Seth to adjust his seat. Unfortunately, there were power lines in the way. When we got out into the country it looked even better but I couldn't take a photo since I have to keep really alert to help Seth with driving.) 

Last Saturday (the 13th) I had a hair appointment in the morning. Frank was awesome and got the grocery shopping done for me while I was at the hair salon. That helped me out a lot! I don't remember everything else I did that day, just that it was busy with packing for Girls' Camp and a lot of other chores. We had the missionaries over for dinner that night and after dinner I took Seth driving again.

On Sunday we got to church early because Seth had a missionary correlation meeting at 8:00 am. We enjoyed attending Sacrament meeting in our own ward and not sitting in the foyer...the first time we'd done that in 5 weeks! After Sacrament meeing one of the nursery leaders asked me if I could be the second adult in nursery with her because her husband wasn't feeling well. I was happy to do that. There's only one little girl in our ward's nursery, so it was pretty easy! She colored and played happily by herself for most of the hour and we (the adults) got to chat. 

After church I got in a lot of scripture study time and I also went with Seth for another drive. Jared & Jessie came over for dinner as usual and we played a new game that I got Frank for Father's Day...Uno No Mercy. It's a very aptly named game. We had fun though. 

Seth did not hear back about his job interview before I left for camp (still hasn't heard from them, actually...he needs to follow up) but I left a list of things with Frank to have Seth work on while I was gone which included most of my regular chores (laundry, vacuuming, etc.) plus a few other jobs like breaking down cardboard boxes for recycling, shredding paper (we have two large garbage bags full of old receipts and stuff that need to be shredded), cleaning his room, and helping Frank clean in the basement. I also asked Frank to take him driving every day. 

Monday morning Frank headed into work for a few hours but got a call partway there that the air conditioning was out in his building so everyone was teleworking that day, so he came back home. I said my goodbyes to Frank and Seth and  headed to Costco when it opened to help buy some food items for camp. That was a very busy day because we got up to camp and had to unload all the food and get the kitchen all set up and then prepare dinner for 150ish people. (Dinner was pasta, salad, and bread. We made 3 or 4 different kinds of pasta and 3 kinds of sauces.)  I also made a run to a local grocery store to get a couple of items we hadn't been able to get that morning. After dinner was also busy because part of breakfast for Tuesday morning needed to be prepared that night (french toast bakes) and lunch the next day was going to be served at a nearby lake, so we needed to pack up all the lunch food in coolers and boxes (sandwich fixings, fruit, chips, cookies, etc.) Oh, and of course we needed to clean up the kitchen and do all the dinner dishes too. The lady in charge of the meals (her name is Val) told me that we'd be in the kitchen from 6 am to 8 pm every day, but that turned out to be an optimistic estimate most days. On Monday we didn't finish everything until about 10:30 pm. After that we still needed to take showers before going to bed. We were in a cabin with 4 other stake leaders and it did have a bathroom with a shower and flush toilets, which was nice. By the time we got back to the cabin, the other leaders were ready for bed and they turned out the lights and went to sleep before we finished showering.

I forgot to mention that temperatures this whole week were in the high 90s or low 100s with high humidity levels and that there was no air conditioning in any of the buildings at camp, so it was miserably hot all week. The dining area next to the kitchen had two small air conditioning units to help keep the heat in that room down a bit and in our sleeping cabin we had a lot of fans which helped keep it relatively comfortable, but the kitchen and dish washing room were both really hot all the time, especially when we had the oven, stove, and / or grills on. The kitchen overall was a great kitchen, though...it was large and had all kinds of great equipment and gadgets including an industrial size refrigerator and freezer, a huge oven, two large grills, a serving area with built in warming trays and an area for keeping things chilled, a large pantry, a large stainless steel island for preparing food, plenty of shelves and drawers for cooking equipment, two microwaves, an industrial can opener, an ice machine, and several large sinks for dish washing. (There was also an industrial dishwasher like they have in cafeterias, but we didn't know how that thing worked, so we didn't use it!) The very best part of the kitchen, however, was the very large walk in refrigerator! All of us took refuge in the refrigerator at times when we just needed to cool down a little bit. A few minutes in the refrigerator, and I was ready to face the heat again for a few more hours. (I meant to take pictures of the kitchen, by the way, but I never had time for that!) 

In spite of how tired I was, I didn't sleep very well Monday night. (I even took Melatonin, but I still kept waking up.) I woke up at 6:10 and got to the kitchen about 6:30. Val was already there...she hadn't slept well either and finally gave up and got up about 5:00. We put in another long exhausting day although we did have a little bit of a reprieve after we sent all the food for lunch to the lake around 10:00 am. Dinner that night was taco salad, though, and the following night we had Hawaiian haystacks so there were a lot of vegetables and such to cut up for those things. We did get to sit down for a little while after breakfast and got some planning done before we started working on chopping up ingredients for dinner. We did get done with dinner and clean up a bit earlier that night. I had planned to go home Tuesday night to take a really great shower (including washing my hair) and to hopefully get a better night's sleep and I was able to leave camp by about 9:15. It felt really great to get in the shower at home...I felt like I was washing off 25 layers of dried sweat! I still didn't sleep great, but it was good to be home for a night in my own bed and to see Frank and Seth briefly. (I had no cell service up at camp so I didn't have any contact with them at all while I was away.)

One of the reasons I had trouble sleeping every night is that my feet were hurting a ton. My back did not give me much trouble at all during the week (which I am VERY grateful for) but my feet were a different story. About 2 hours into each day my feet would start screaming at me and they would hurt a lot the rest of the day, which was usually 12 - 14 more hours. I was wearing good shoes so I don't know what the problem was but it definitely made the whole experience a lot more difficult. I very rarely had any time to sit down, but tried to catch a few minutes off my feet here and there and occasionally was able to sit down to do a few tasks (like peeling a lot of hard boiled eggs). The work surfaces we had were definitely made for standing, not sitting though, so it was really hard to get a chance to sit. 

I returned to camp by 6:30 Wednesday morning. The drive to camp in the early morning was beautiful and I saw a couple of deer. While at home, I decided to grab my pillow (I took up an inflatable camp pillow with me, but it wasn't very comfortable), a fan for the kitchen (which helped quite a bit), and my nice vegetable shredder because I shredded my finger instead of some carrots on Tuesday when I was trying to use the shredder that we had at camp. 

Val and I were the only two official camp cooks that stayed all week. We had at least a couple of other people come up to help us each day, but on Wednesday two of our helpers weren't able to come last minute, so we were short handed. Fortunately, a couple of brothers who were there that day to help with some dutch oven cooking (for a class) were free during the breakfast hour so they manned the grills and made pancakes for us. It was a huge help!! (We still had plenty of other things to do...warming up precooked bacon, making oatmeal, making whipped cream to go on the pancakes, setting up the serving area, putting out strawberries for the pancakes, yogurt, cereal, fruit, oatmeal toppings, etc.!) For lunch we had a salad bar and made little pizzas using Naan bread for the crust. It was hectic because even though we had 14 cookies sheets, that wasn't enough to make all of them at once so we had to keep making more pizzas and putting them on trays as they emptied. After lunch I had to make a run to Costco to get rotisserie chickens for the Hawaiian haystacks. I also got watermelons and grapes because we needed more of those. It was nice to get off my feet while driving there and back although standing back up after being in the car for a half hour was pretty painful. (I also really enjoyed the air conditioning in my car!!) By the time I got back to camp, dinner preparations were in full swing. (Thankfully we did have quite a few helpers.) 

We were up pretty late Wednesday night because the 4th year girls, who had been on a backpack trip Monday through Wednesday, had s'mores ingredients they hadn't been able to use the previous night so their leaders asked if they could make s'mores in the kitchen. We didn't have to help or clean up, just needed to be there and everyone (girls and adults) hung out and talked for quite a while. When we got back to our cabin, the other leaders were still showering and talking so we talked with them too while we waited for our turn in the shower. It was the last night of camp so all the girls were in a party mood and wanted to stay up all night and everyone got to bed a lot later than normal. 

Thursday morning we made a lot of scrambled eggs and warmed up more bacon and put out all the leftover fruit, bread, pancakes, french toast bakes, etc. We tried making some breakfast casseroles and I knocked one pan onto the floor which of course made a huge mess and I felt really bad about that. It all worked out though and after breakfast we got the breakfast stuff cleaned up and then packed up all the leftover food and kitchen equipment (we had to bring all of the cooking utensils, pans, etc...none of that was provided) and deep cleaned the kitchen. We did have a number of adults and also quite a few of the girls to help with all of that so it wasn't as bad as it sounds. We got everything done and the kitchen passed inspection and I was able to head home shortly after noon. Believe it or not, I have left out a lot of details of things that happened! 

Meanwhile at home while I was gone...Frank worked from home all week so that Seth wasn't left alone the entire week. They did get some cleaning done in the basement and Seth broke down a lot of boxes so it looks quite a bit better down there. Seth also did some paper shredding and a few other household chores but not as much as I would have liked. They didn't go driving every day because I forgot that Seth's permit was in my wallet. (Faceplant.) I left his permit at home when I came home Tuesday night so they did go driving a little bit on both Wednesday and Thursday. It was Seth's first time driving with Frank in the car and predictably they got frustrated with each other but at least we got over that hurdle. 

It was great to get home--see Frank and Seth, take another shower, get unpacked, and start working on some of the things I've been neglecting at home. I didn't get a whole lot done on Thursday but we did do laundry and I made it to the store to get a few groceries and also took some things to Goodwill. I had Seth take me so that he could get in some driving hours. Shortly after we got back from the store, Scott called and I talked to him for about an hour and then we needed to leave for the airport to pick up Tanner, who was arriving that night. It's great to have him here, of course! We got home pretty late and Frank needed to go into work the next morning so he didn't get very much sleep. 

I got up around 6:30 Friday morning and decided to try exercising...I wasn't sure if my poor abused feet were going to be able to handle that, but I was able to do it. I had a lot to do yesterday too...meal planning for next week and updating the finances to name a few. I also had a really great scripture study session. I was only able to snatch a few minutes to read a couple of verses in the Book of Mormon a few days this week...a couple of days I never read at all. But yesterday was really awesome...I had so many strokes of inspiration while I was reading! I also had a few thoughts come to me about Seminary stuff so I pulled out a notebook to write those down and then kept remembering other thoughts that have come to me over the last few months so I wrote those down too and before I knew it I had filled up over two pages. It was sweet and humbling to realize that the spirit has been nudging me with different ideas through these last several busy weeks even though I haven't had much time to put into Seminary preparations. All those thoughts were in my mind waiting for me when I was ready to focus on them and write them down. So lovely and I'm so grateful!! 

Jared & Jessie were able to come over for a while yesterday too. Last week was Jessie's last week at her job and Jared will be working until the 2nd of August. They are heading to Texas on August 6th. We will miss them so much, but we are so grateful they have been able to live nearby the last 18 months. Even though their reason for coming here was a difficult challenge, it's been a real blessing in so many ways to have them here. We have particularly loved getting to know Jessie better and can tell that she is a lot more comfortable with us now. It's been a real joy to develop relationships with her. Yesterday she was playing songs for us from her 80's playlist and we were guessing the song titles and what group sung them; it was fun! Jared and Tanner left to go shooting and Jessie stayed behind for a while before she had to leave to run some errands. I know she wouldn't have done that a year and a half ago...she would have left when Jared left. So glad that things have changed!

Here's a photo I took yesterday...I love seeing how much fun my boys have when they are together! (So cute that they are all squished together onto the loveseat.):

We've enjoyed visiting with Tanner the last couple of days. I can tell that Seth particularly loves having him here. Tanner has been pretty tired, though, and has needed to sleep a lot. He always has sleep issues and last week both he and Scott had Covid so he's still recovering from that. I didn't take Seth driving yesterday but Tanner had to go to a couple of stores so Seth drove him to do that.

Today (Saturday the 20th) I've been getting caught up on more of the regular chores...hopefully I'll be back to a normal schedule soon (maybe!). I'm slowly getting there. 

I'll finish up with a couple of random pictures related to Girls Camp. I only took about two pictures the whole time I was there...no time for anything else!

Here's a photo of some of the leaders who decided to have a meeting in the walk in refrigerator so they could cool down:

The second morning of camp, we found these love notes for us on the door to the dishwashing room:

I did take a minute to take a few close up shots so that I could read them later because I didn't have time to read them then! I finally read them today and they were really sweet.

Here are some of the 4th year girls at the serving area; two of them are in my ward:

I took this shot of the sign on the kitchen / dining building on the last morning. (The theme of camp this year was "Stay by the Tree" but that's about all I know about what everyone else was doing because I never left the kitchen!):

Photos of all my battle scars, which I took after I got home. This is a burn I got on my hand while making pizzas. I didn't have time to stop and put it under cold water so it blistered a little bit:

Finger that got a decent cut while I was shredding carrots:

And on the last morning shortly before leaving I tripped on the steps to the kitchen building and bruised both of my knees:

I have quite a few more random bruises on my legs; don't even know where those came from!

Finally, here is a photo of my birthday presents, minus some cork trivets because I had just mopped the kitchen floor before I took this photo and I couldn't get to them:

The game was late and arrived while I was at camp this week. 

I forgot to mention that the head cook, Val, is moving to Tennessee on Monday. I still can't believe she was at camp the week before moving!!! She is really an incredible person who can stand on her feet and work all day and still seems to have plenty of energy. I felt like a total wimp next to her! I've actually had to fight off feelings of inadequacy all week and on Thursday felt pretty down all day, feeling like I didn't do a very good job...that I wasn't much help and complained about my feet hurting too much, things like that. The more rational part of me knows that isn't true...knows that I worked really hard and did the best that I could and that it doesn't matter if anyone else thinks I didn't do enough because I know that I did all that I could. I think sometimes the adversary sows seeds of doubt in our minds when we are serving because he doesn't want us to keep serving others. That being said, though...I'm not sure I'll be able to help in that particular way again. My spirit is willing, but my flesh is weak! 

Weekly Reviews July 5 & July 12 '24

 We were in Florida last week so I have two weeks to cover now. 

I'm happy and grateful to report that even though I was still feeling really sick on Friday the 28th of June when I last wrote, I woke up the next morning feeling almost completely well. (Seth was feeling better too.) This was a great relief to me since we were planning to leave Sunday afternoon for Florida. I was able to get laundry and packing done on Saturday the 29th and Frank made a trip to the store to get a few things we needed for our trip.

We originally planned to go to both hours of church Sunday morning and then leave for Florida, but since we had all been sick and might still be contagious, we decided to just stay for Sacrament Meeting. We sat out in the foyer again and we all wore masks. We came home and changed clothes and loaded up the car and were able to leave by about 11:00. That first day we drove to Florence, SC. It took longer to get there than we had hoped since traffic was really bad getting through Washington DC / Northern Virginia. We also had to stop more often than usual...probably because we were all getting over being sick...and we stopped for an hour each for both lunch and dinner. We did make it to our hotel without any problems, though. 

On Monday July 1st we had breakfast at our hotel and then hit the road. We drove the rest of the way to our destination in Frostproof, Florida, arriving around 5:00 pm. I took a few photos of the sky on the way because the clouds looked amazing:

We also stopped at the Georgia welcome center where Seth & I got to sit on a bench and listen to Forrest Gump:

In Frostproof we stayed at a place called Shepherd Christian Community. They have camps there all summer but they don't have camps the week of the 4th of July, so they rent out their places for really cheap. It was a really phenomenal deal, actually. We had a cute little 2 bedroom 1 bath house that was probably built in the 50s and probably last updated in the 70s, which gave me flashbacks to my childhood. It was very clean and we enjoyed staying there. 

Here is our little house:

There was this great tree with hanging Spanish moss right next to the house:

And across the street, there was a lake:

Bathroom cabinet that reminded me of my childhood, especially the countertop:

Seth had a room with cute twin beds:

And a closet that also reminded me of my childhood:

Hallway to the bedrooms:

Living room:

Jack and Jill bathroom (taken from our bedroom):

Our bedroom:

There was an eat in kitchen too, but I guess I didn't take a picture of it. 

It was super hot and humid the entire time we were in Florida, but thankfully this house had great air conditioning and ceiling fans, too.

After we got settled in the house, we went to visit Frank's Aunt Linda and Aunt Myra. (They live together...both of their husbands have passed away.) After visiting with them, we stopped at a grocery store to get some items for breakfasts and grabbed some McDonald's for dinner and while we were on our way back to our house, a torrential downpour began which unfortunately hadn't stopped by the time we got there. We finished eating our dinner and waited for a bit of a lull before getting out of the car but we still got drenched getting inside and bringing in the groceries. That's kind of par for the course in Florida, though...it rains nearly every day and unfortunately afterwards it's not any cooler and it's more humid than ever. 

On Tuesday the 2nd we went to a place called Bok Tower Gardens. Frank and I had been there once before...with Scott, when he was one year old. It's a large beautiful garden with a Carillon bell tower and thankfully quite a bit of shade. It was still very hot and we got pretty wiped out walking around but we did enjoy it. We were pleased that Seth seemed to really enjoy it too...he commented on how serene and beautiful it was. At one point, Frank and I got lost and ended up walking around the entire perimeter of the garden, and that really wiped us out! 

(Just a statue of an alligator!):

Seth walking through the gardens:

Feeding fish in a pond:

First glimpses of the tower:

Tower details:

A squirrel friend:

On the far side of the tower was this beautiful big lawn with lovely old shade trees and a gorgeous view. I could have stayed there all day:

Sundial on the tower:

A Japanese lantern:

Reflecting pool on the other side of the tower:

A gecko with a missing tail:

There was also a beautiful 1930s house on the grounds that you could visit for an extra fee. Bonus: it had air conditioning! We really enjoyed touring the inside of this house, which is called El Retiro:

The entrance foyer. The whole house had unique (original) light fixtures, terra cotta tile floors (from Cuba), beautiful windows, and beautiful carved wooden doors:

There were also lots of hand painted tiles:

Butler's Pantry:

The original 1930s refrigerator:

Original 1930s stove / oven:

Dining room:

The "round room":

This room was called The Loggia. It had large pocket doors on either side so that a breeze could come through the room:

Views through the pocket doors:

Living room / music room. They would have dancing in this room:

There were large sceened porches on either side of this room:

 

More living room / music room details:

Behind a door in this room was a spiral staircase leading up to the master suite. The owner would escape up these stairs when he was getting tired, leaving his adult daughter to entertain guests for the rest of the evening:

Master suite:

Guest bedrooms:

Hallway to the guest bedrooms:

The grandkids stayed in this room when they visited:

This large room was used by the owner's oldest daughter, who was often hostess for him:

The morning room:

Beautiful grounds around the house:

Seth walking down to a pond that was at the bottom of the hill. (Frank and I opted to sit in the shade and drink water while he did that!):

"Window on the pond". Frank and I got lost trying to find this. Seth found it and took us back to see it:

Beautiful sky on the way back to our house:

We got a few souvenirs at the gift shop and we ate our lunch at the cafe in the gardens. There was also a museum with a lot of information about the garden and the tower. 

After resting at home for a while, we went back to Frank's aunts' house to have dinner with them and then we played a game of dominoes called Mexican Train with them which was really fun!

On Wednesday I went grocery shopping with one of Frank's aunts and a few of his cousins. They had planned dinners for all the family coming in for the next 3 nights and I went with them to help get the groceries and also to help pay for some of it. The city of Frostproof did fireworks on July 3rd instead of the 4th for some reason. The fireworks were shot off over the lake that is right across the street from Frank's aunts' house, so the whole family gathered there for a spaghetti dinner and then we walked across the street to watch the fireworks. 

Frank and his dad looking a lot alike:

Frank's aunt Linda with one of her cute great granddaughters:

Frank visiting with his sister and a couple of cousins:

Kids waiting for the fireworks:

Sunset over the lake:

On Thursday the 4th we went to a place in Orlando called Discovery Cove. It was a water resort with a river, large reef pool with tropical fish and lots of rays, sandy beaches, an aviary, and other animals such as otters and marmosets. We also signed up to do a swimming with dolphins encounter. Included in the admission price was towels, lockers, sunscreen, wetsuits, snorkel equipment, and food for the day which included breakfast, lunch, and unlimited snacks. (It closed at 5:00 pm). I enjoyed doing this a lot more than places like Disney World because there weren't any lines (except to get in when we arrived...that was a very long line) and we were in the water a lot so we could keep cool. 

Seth and Frank in the reef pool:

Floating down the river:

In the aviary:

An anteater:

Back to the river:

Otters:

Marmoset:

In spite of re-applying sunscreen several times, my shoulders got sunburned, but not too bad. Probably our favorite part of the day was the dolphin encounter. We got to meet and swim with a 16 year old female dolphin named Luna. 

This picture has a great story behind it. After we finished the dolphin encounter, Seth texted his brothers: "Hey guys, guess what? I got a 16 year old girl to kiss me!" His brothers were all pretty intrigued and asked lots of questions and only half believed him. He told them that I had a photo of it that I would send later. We weren't able to get the photos right away so he kept them in suspense for a few hours before sending them this photo. Very cute!!:

Frank swam with Luna's mother, because she's bigger:

We got a few souvenirs at the gift shop here, too. Leaving the park at 5:00. It was starting to get really cloudy and by the time we got back to the freeway, another torrential downpour came along:

We drove back to our house and showered, then went back to the aunts' house for another family dinner...hot dogs and hamburgers this time. There were fireworks in Lake Wales (about 20 minutes away) but we were tired and decided the fireworks the previous night were good enough! Instead, we enjoyed a beautiful sunset over the lake across the street:

Frank's dad and some of his cousins fishing:

Frank's mom feeding bread to the fish:

Friday July 5th was somewhat quiet. We did laundry in the morning and napped in the afternoon. We had a yummy chicken and rice dinner at Frank's aunt Treva's house that evening with a lot of family. Since it was my birthday, I got calls from Scott and Tanner and Frank, Seth, and Frank's parents gave me cards. Frank tried to order gifts for me before we left but they were all going to arrive while we were gone, so he decided to wait until we got home. He did manage to order one gift and have it delivered to his aunt's house...a new computer bag. I've been taking my laptop to Seminary in a laptop sleeve and another bag to carry all my stuff. Now I can fit it all in one bag, which will be nice! Frank's parents also gave me two little slices of cheesecake, so I got to enjoy one of those that night.

Saturday the 6th was the official Bracken family reunion. We all met in a building on the same grounds as the house where we were staying, which was really nice and convenient for us. We had a big potluck lunch (Frank made a pretty great cheesecake) and then visiting and pictures. 

The building had air conditioning but it didn't work very well with all those people there so it got kind of uncomfortable. In the afternoon I started to get a bad headache and felt dehydrated, so I retreated to our house for a while to drink water and rest in a cooler atmosphere. That evening we went back to Aunt Treva's house for more visiting and then went with Frank's sister Dawn and some of his cousins to get dinner at a little local restaurant. Seth and I shared a pulled pork sandwich and I got a root beer float because the water was gross (Florida water!) and I was a bit full after that.

We said our goodbyes to most of the family that night because we were leaving the next morning after church.

The next morning (Sunday July 7th) we got checked out of our place and then went to church in Lake Wales. Frank's parents and his sister Dawn were there too. We just stayed for Sacrament Meeting, then said our goodbyes to Frank's family and headed for St. Augustine. The traffic was pretty bad but we made it to Timo & Megan's house around 4:00 pm. It was so nice to see them and to meet Autumn finally!! 

We brought stuff with us to make Hawaiian haystacks (except we forgot the pineapple but luckily Timo & Megan had some) so we made that for dinner and then Timo & Megan had some chocolate ice cream they shared with us. After dinner we all went to a beach about 30 minutes from their house which is one of their favorite beaches. They sometimes find shark teeth there and Frank and I both did find a few! (Mostly tiny ones.) There were a lot of shells there also...we didn't find any big ones but we did find a lot of smaller ones. The sand on this beach is full of tiny bits of shells. There was a lovely breeze blowing so it was very pleasant and beautiful and peaceful!

It is believed that this beach is the place that Ponce de Leon first sighted Florida, so there's a statue of him there:

 

Frank on the beach:

Frank looking for shark's teeth (Megan and Autumn also):

After a good night's sleep, we said our goodbyes to Timo's family Monday morning and headed into St. Augustine to do a little sight seeing. We went to an old Spanish fort called Castillo de San Marcos, which is the oldest masonry fortification in the continental US. Again, it was very hot and humid but the fort was very interesting (and the gift shop had air conditioning!) There were a lot of displays and lots of signs to read but we also went to a ranger talk and he covered a lot of the information on the signs so we didn't need to read them all. The ranger talk was quite long...probably 30 minutes or more...but he told the whole 400 year history of the fort in an engaging way and he was very entertaining! (He had a lot of pictures in an accompanying power point presentation as well.) I was pretty impressed that he was able to rattle off that whole presentation without using notes. He's obviously done it a lot of times. 

A drawbridge we could see from the fort:

The fort walls were built of a stone called coquina which is layers of fossilized shells and it turns out that it's very, very good at resisting cannon fire because all the air inside absorbs the shock of the shells. Cannon balls would just stick into the walls without exploding and the Spanish would go out in the night after an attack and pull out the cannon balls and putty up the hole it left and the walls were as good as new!

The soldiers sleeping in these beds must have been pretty short!

The soldiers scratched a lot of words and pictures into the walls all over the fort. A lot of them were very hard to see. Spanish soldiers scratched pictures of war ships on the walls. Later, when the fort was in American hands, the American soldiers added American flags to the ships...I thought that was funny! I took a picture of this wall because you can see "Cleveland" pretty clearly. Someone from Cleveland Ohio scratched their name, native city, and the date on the wall back in 1880:

Up on the ramparts:

After we left the fort, we wanted to walk around a bit in the historic district. Thanks to Timo's advice, we found a free parking spot on a side street and we walked past some cute houses:

And a big restaurant which isn't that old probably but is built to look that way:

We walked over to an information center where there were some displays and a gift shop and we discussed walking around to see more of the historic district and to find a place to eat lunch but we were so hot and tired by then that ultimately we decided we'd seen enough and we walked back to our car and drove a while until we found a pizza place to have lunch. While we were eating, it started to rain but thankfully it was mostly done raining by the time we finished eating. That wasn't the end of the rain for us, however. We drove back to Florence, SC that afternoon and we drove through one storm after another...many of them with rain so heavy that it was hard to see the road or any of the cars in front of us. I'm thankful Frank was driving because he handles that a lot better than I do!

We did make it safely to our hotel, had a late dinner, and went to bed. 

On Tuesday July 9th we drove the rest of the way home. The trip was long but uneventful. We got home around 5:30, got unpacked, and went to get some dinner. We were all tired and very glad to be home and looking forward to sleeping in our own beds!

Frank worked from home on Wednesday (July 10th). I spent most of the day regrouping and planning meals for the next 10 days or so. Later in the day, Frank went with me to buy groceries. We also took a few things to the storage unit and picked up some medicine at the pharmacy. That evening, I attended a meeting at the church with a small group of people from my ward to talk about some things we could do to help another member of our ward who is struggling. Seth also had a YM activity, so I stayed at the church until he was ready to come home. I've been trying to have him drive every day, so he drove to the church and back. (We offered to let him drive on our trip more than once, but he always declined.) Frank stayed home and went to bed since he was back on his regular work schedule and getting up very early! When we were driving home from the church, the sky was very cloudy (looked like a bad storm was coming in, but we didn't get a storm) and the sun was going down and it created this really amazing ambiant light. It was more golden when we were driving home, but by the time we got home it was more pinkish. I tried taking photos but for some reason my camera changed the color so that it looked really bright purplish pink. I mean, the photos look pretty cool, but the sky was not really this dramatic of a color:

These photos taken from the deck are closer to the real color, but not as dramatic as it really was:

Yesterday (Thursday July 11th) I did a lot of laundry and some house cleaning and organizing. Seth had a job interview at Roy Roger's so I took him to that. We'll see if they decide to hire him. A book I put on hold at the library before we left for vacation finally came in so I had Seth drive me to the library and back to pick it up. After we got back from Florida, we ordered a few gifts for me and most of them arrived on Thursday. I got a couple of books and stayed up a little later than I should have last night, looking them over. My boys also went in together to get me a copy of Jesus the Christ with wide margins, for taking notes:

Today (Friday July 12th) I got up pretty early and got all the finances caught up before going to lunch with my friend Rebekah. We went to a place callled Glory Days Grill because we are on "G" in the alphabet. It was pretty good, and it was great to get caught up with her. This afternoon I have been working on this post and now it is time to make dinner already. I am going to Girls Camp next week (starting Monday morning) so tomorrow is going to be a busy day, getting ready for that and doing a lot of other things too. I'm glad to be home, though, and getting back into my exercise and scripture reading routines. (I did keep up with scripture reading fairly well while on vacation, but I have time to do more now.) After Girls' Camp and Tanner's visit, I hope to get a lot more done on summer projects although clearly I'm not going to get as much done as I had hoped. It will be August by then, and time to focus on Seminary preparations. 

It's been great to see so many of you this summer!