Thursday, August 13, 2009

Beach Shots

Just want to share some (oh, just a few dozen!) photos so far from our beach trip. Tomorrow is our last full day here - boo!!! I will blog more extensively on the trip later, I hope... plus I will do separate posts on things like our visit to the fort in historic St. Augustine. Since there are so many photos in this post, I have provided you with some background music below. I chose this song because, for some reason, it has been stuck in my head the past few days. Rick Astley songs always reminded me of Florida, anyway, so maybe that's it (I promise I am not trying to "Rickroll" anyone - it's a different song!). Push play and listen as you peruse the pictures, if you'd like. And sorry for the recent live version; it's the only one I can find available to embed... he still sounds the same nearly 20 years later, huh? Anyway, enjoy the beach shots!



We stopped at Grandaddy's and Leila's in Jax before we continued to St. Augustine Beach

Dad grilling the red snapper and amberjack

Mike and Crystal taught us a card game called Golf

The rest of the fish caught by the men while deep-sea fishing

Cecilia swims with "Buh-buh"

Chris put the water wings on her instead of Caroline - and she loved it!

Adults stayed close since the wings are for ages 3 and up...

She loved the freedom - a natural in the water!

She wanted to swim even without the wings - she instinctively put her legs behind her and held her head up, kicked her legs...

Caroline enjoys floating on the noodle

Cecilia learned to count to three by doing this... "Un... doo... fwee!!!!"

The wings are bigger than her head!

Caroline likes to stay near the steps when a flotation device is not available

Stephen made this appetizer from some of the small snapper (vermillion) that they caught... it is raw fish, fresh cilantro, red bell pepper, and lemon and lime juice. The citrus juices sort of "cook" the fish as it chills in the fridge... yummy, and not at all like what you'd imagine it to taste or feel like...

Two of Mom's three boys helping in the kitchen... and neither one is Mike. This is rare.

Uncle Stephen draws with Caroline. They drew boats and fish.

Same as above, but including wall o' mirrors and bizarre chandelier

A great shot of Uncle Mike and Aunt Crystal with the girls... don't they say that pregnant women "glow"? Mike looks pretty glowing as well!! :)

She would have forged straight ahead if I didn't hold her back!

Waves!!!!

Caroline doesn't quite understand how to boogie-board...

Happy to be getting splashed!!

Wandering along the shore...

Both the girls stroll along

Such a free spirit...

Discovering a shell

Precious beach bum!

Daddy and daughter

Showing a shell to Grampa

Cool Dude!!!

Group effort sand castles with Uncle Tim and Daddy

Our condo... well, it was more of a townhouse

Seminarian Uncle Tim builds a sand cathedral

Grampa shows Cecilia how to make a tunnel using a foot an some sand

Grampa removes his foot and makes the opening on the tunnel

Cecilia checks it out - future engineer

Tim's completed cathedral - it even has flying buttresses

Tim's cathedral with the Latin underneath: "Behold the Lord God, King of the World"

I built a little village similar to one that Stephen and I had when we were about 3 and 5 on a trip to the beach... I should dig up that old photo and post it too!

Rare shot of both girls looking at the camera

Carolne shows off the lizard she caught

Double flotation protection

More later - we're having a great, sunny time, as you can see!!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can't believe your blogging on vacation. How do you keep hats on everyone? Looks like a great time. The latin under the cathedral cracks me up.

Erin said...

Yeah, I am only blogging here because the upload speed is incredible compared to at home... so since I could, I uploaded tons of photos!

I'm just lucky on the hats, I think... Caroline's personality is such that she'd never remove her hat, and Cecilia... even though her hats don't attach under the chin, she left them on. I told her, "Must wear hat at beach," and she was cool with that for some reason... maybe because the rest of us had hats and she just wanted to be the same?

Tim had fun building that cathedral. Today we went to the real cathedral in St. Augustine, as well as the Our Lady of La Leche shrine. Hopefully I will get a chance to post the pictures sometime in the next week.