End of June 2021

A few days after coming home from Utah, we left again to spend a few days at my mom's house. One morning I got up to go running and got to explore around my mom's small town. This is an old jail that is infamous in the county for being haunted. It is privately owned and recently changed ownership. They make money on it by renting it out to ghost hunters and doing ghost tours around Halloween. Creepy!

Old train depot:

I looked around my mom's area for interesting geocaches and found a few at a nearby living history farm. To find the geocache, you had to solve riddles that sent you around the different parts of the farm. The park ranger saw we were looking for the clues and helped us out. She also let the boys try out the old sugar cane grinder and be the horsepower.

Finding another clue:

Success!!

This geocache was placed by Florida State Parks and there are specific geocaches all around the state with informational cards inside. If you collect the info from all the cards, you can turn it in for a special patch from the rangers. So far we have collected two out of six this summer.

Priming the water pump:

Exploring the family home was so interesting. So many beds in each room and the rooms were so small!

Finding another geocache at the general store:

I bought the boys a jacobs ladder toy at the general store. They were fascinated by it! They said that it "defies physics".

While we were visiting, my brother brought home his Christmas puppy! Her name is Rose and she is the absolute cutest thing ever!

Anthony taking a nap on Father's Day:

For Father's Day we met up with the whole family at a park by the river to visit and celebrate my mom's birthday. The park had an old railroad bridge preserved as a historical artifact: 

My mom's delicious cake!

One evening we got together with some old friends in Gainesville. On our way out to dinner, we drove by the graffiti wall to show the boys. They thought it was so cool! 

Trying out PDQ's for the first time. It was delicous!

I convinced the boys to practice writing this summer by writing letters to companies, places, or people that they are fans of. They turned out so cute! Rett's first letter was to Haribo candy company and James's first letter was to Nerf.

We drove almost an hour to try to find our next state park card geocache. The GPS brought me to a trailhead that had this huge oak tree. It even had its own plaque! After exploring the tree, we realized that the geocache wasn't there and the pictures showed that it was near sugar mill ruins. I googled sugar mill ruins nearby and drove a few miles down the road to a different area.

 I parked the car and the boys and I walked down a trail to find the ruins.

When we got to the end of the trial, we saw that we could have driven straight to the ruins! The boys were a little irritated by that fact :) We walked around and explored the ruins and by the end realized that it wasn't the right sugar mill ruins.

So we drove a few more miles to find yet another old sugar mill and finally found the correct geocache!

James had his first swim meet! He swam in two races: 9-10 year old backstroke and 9-10 year old freestyle

                                                                                  

Fourth in backstroke!

Rett was not a fan of all the sitting and waiting. It was really hot and of the hours we sat there, James was only racing for about 4 minutes total. We learned our lesson and ordered a sunshade for the rest of the swim meets.

                                                                                   

Third in freestyle:

After the meet, they opened up the pool for swimming and turned on the water slide. Rett got to cool off in the water and James couldn't wait to go down the slide.

James and I went shopping around town while Rett went to a friend's house for a playdate. We decided to check out a new comic/collectible store that recently opened up nearby and we found some vintage gems!

My brothers and I used to play this exact board game! It has a VHS tape that you stop and start as you play. I sent this picture to them to see if they remembered it and Daniel said that he still has this game!

Rett got a third stripe on his blue belt. The next step is moving up to a purple belt!

I joined an amazon deals telegram group that sends me texts where there are crazy good deals on things on amazon. Usually it is only for a few minutes or for the first few customers, so I don't always get it but this time I did. I was able to get a crazy expensive telescope for $20!

There is even an attachment so that you can put your phone's camera to the lens and take pictures of what you are seeing.

A friend of a friend passed away unexpectedly, so Anthony took a few days off work so we could go to Tampa for the funeral. On our way over there, we stopped at the Florida mall to go to the Crayola Experience. The boys had fun, but it is definitely meant for much younger kids :)

The mall also had a Tesla showroom, so the boys got to check out their absolute favorite car close up. It was a dream come true! They even brought their hot wheels Tesla that happened to match the showroom car exactly!

The next day after we checked out of the hotel and started for home, the GPS showed a car crash on I4 that was causing a big delay. So we drove over to hang out in Bass Pro while we waited for it to clear up. The boys found this cot bunk bed on display. It would be perfect for camping!

There was also a large bed on display that had its own tent: