Old Town & Chapel (last post from Florida in May)

But wait! Before we delve too far into our road trip this summer, I have one more draft about Florida sitting in my queue!

Here are some pictures of the little downtown area in St. Augustine. We visited the Cathedral Basilica of St. Augustine a couple of times, once when Rachel was sick and then once again when she was better. She had really hoped to see the oldest wooden schoolhouse in the USA, so we took a picture in front of it for her. We considered going inside but it was, like, $6 per person or something and...so we just looked at the outside. We stopped here with Rachel as well, though I don't know where the picture of her is.

Bridge of Lions (May 21)

Taking us back to Florida for a hot minute (since it's been so cold and rainy here in Utah), here is the Bridge of Lions in St. Augustine that we crossed many, many times—once on foot and several by car. We felt rather lucky to be on it when it opened, but we soon learned that it opens quite frequently (just about every hour and every half hour). It was still exciting, but not as exciting as the first time we saw it open.

Here's Andrew helping Phoebe touch the lion:

Beach Pictures II (May 24–25)

It feels so strange to be writing about this still—like an experience from another lifetime! Since taking these pictures we drove a couple thousand miles, across swamp and desert and mountain. We'll get to those pictures soon. 

In the meantime, yes, I'm still trying to get my thesis finished...so you get beach pictures. And we'll get caught up on our road trip soon. The kids all had travel journals and were supposed to be taking notes about what they observed and felt while we were touring up and down the countryside, so hopefully they'll have some fun things to share as well. I think that really helped me get these beach posts up...and yet, here I am...making more beach posts.

*****

Phoebe really loved this pink chair. Unfortunately for her, we retired this generation of chair after this trip because we purchased them about 10 years ago for $5 each at Kroger. They had served us well, but we really were afraid we were going to rip right through them every time we sat down.

Beach pictures I (May 21—23)

Let me see if I can guilt my children into finishing their writing assignments by leaving some passive aggressive hints in (and wide open spaces for them to add information to) this blog post...

Phoebe loved the ocean. She squealed with joy practically the whole time we were at the beach. She'd take a wave to the face, looked stunned for a second, and then get right back to splashing around and having a grand ol' time.

Goodbye to the Beach Pictures

We have a tradition of taking a family picture at the end of every beach trip. It began 10 years ago when we first took our kids to Wrightsville Beach in NC (though I'm sure that (a) there is a family picture of us at the beach from before then and (b) that we've missed snagging a few family pictures since then). It would take me too long to hunt all of them up right now (and my list of things to do today is already a mile long), but here's a link to that fateful trip in 2013 (the one that started it all):

The Timucuan Preserve (a guest post by Benjamin)

May 26:

On the way back to  Georgia we stopped at a place called The Timucuan Preserve. 

It is on an island in the middle of the Saint John River. [Mom edit: The drive was surprisingly beautiful. We were on a winding dirt road for a good 10–15 minutes. The canopy of trees above us, draped with Spanish moss was divine.]

Fort Matanzas (a guest post by Benjamin)

 May 24:

14 miles away from the Castillo de San Marcos there is a tiny fort  called Fort Matanzas. Its perimeter is only 200 feet and its sides are only 50 feet long; it is shaped like a very short L.

It was made two years after the British laid siege to Saint Augustine because the Spanish had been resupplied via the Matanzas River so they needed to protect the inlet. The solution...

Fort matanzas!  

Castillo de San Marcos (a guest post by Benjamin)

May 24:

A couple days ago we were in Florida visiting a fort called the Castillo de San Marcos. The oldest masonry fort in the US is so cool! They built it in a star shape so that they could catch their enemies in a crossfire, which basically means that you are getting shot at from three sides.

That is terrifying! 

Caldecott's Grave and Our Lady of La Leche (a guest post by Miriam)

May 21, 2023:

On Sunday morning all of us were supposed to go to the older part of Saint Augustine, but that didn’t work out very well. Because of the stomach bug that we got right before we left for Florida, we all took turns being sick, and today was Rachel’s turn. We were planning on making our way to the ferry at Fort Matanzas today, but we decided that maybe that wouldn’t be the greatest idea, considering Rachel was feeling nauseous the entire day, and going on a boat, with nausea, not a good combination. So instead we spent the morning and afternoon in downtown Saint Augustine (and the surrounding area).

 

Pirate-y Stuff (a guest post by Zoë)

May 22 (a day no one was sick):

We went to Florida for a week. In that time, Miriam made a bonnet [knit head kerchief], that on the way there [to the Pirate and Treasure Museum], she said she felt like a pirate in the bonnet. 

Later, we made up the nickname Smee-me. Like a pirate. 

Smee-me [was wearing] pirate clothes* when we called her Smee-me, and she hated it!!!! Like, literally! She said, I quote, “I said I felt like a pirate! I don’t anymore!”

*What I mean is that she was wearing a striped shirt and black pants. Pirate clothes. See???



Anyway, we got to go to the pirate museum at Florida, AND got to fire a REAL cannon! I mean, who even lets KIDS fire cannons? The coolest thing I did though, was fire a cannon! It was CRAZY! It wasn’t a real cannon, [but it was still pretty cool. We put a lighting stick to the touch hole and held it there until *BOOM!* Phoebe was scared of it]. My favorite part of the pirate museum was probably firing a cannon. It was awesome!

Watch a storm roll in with me

For some reason or another, I was alone with the kids at the beach late Sunday afternoon/early Sunday evening (May 21). Miriam will be writing about what we did on Sunday downtown. But when we got back...I took the kids to the beach. 

Perhaps Grandpa was napping.

Perhaps Daddy was making dinner.

Whatever the case, Mommy was at the beach with the kids. Even Rachel had tagged along (though only to sit on the beach since Sunday was her sick day and she didn't feel like playing much).

Zoë's 8th birthday (a guest post by Rachel)

Two more of us fell to this week’s mysterious plague today: Mom and Grandpa. Because 2 of the adults were down for the count, Zoë had a pretty low-key birthday. In the morning we just hung out at the beach (Grandpa was still feeling alive at this point so he came with us). 

6 little kidlets sitting in a tree...

Here are our sweet kids in a live oak tree outside of the Fort Matanzas National Monument just last week (May 2023):

Rachel (15), Miriam (13), Benjamin (10), Zoë (8), Alexander (5), Phoebe (1)

And here they are sitting in a tree along Flytrap Trail (Carolina Beach, NC) in April 2017:

Miriam (7), Benjamin (4), Zoë (1), Rachel (9)

What a difference six years can make!

First day on the beach (May 20)

We just arrived home—safe and sound—from St. Augustine. It was a...week...a week full of wonder, a week full of woe. Mostly I think most of us had a good time most of the time. The rest of the time we took turns with that tummy bug I alluded to earlier. But I think every day at least some of us managed to hit the beach and have fun. And on the very last couple of days we all managed to get out and do things together. So all in all it was a wonderful time!

Here are a few pictures of our first little jaunt to the beach on Saturday (May 20) when we arrived. We unloaded the cars at the beach house (after convincing Alexander that we really had permission to be there) and then while Daddy went to get some groceries, the rest of us headed out the door and to the beach. 

Whereas last year we had to walk and walk and walk along the world's longest boardwalk to get to the beach from our "beachfront" condo, our beach house was literally 300 feet from the beach (about a 1 minute walk to the boardwalk, which was also rather short). The kids were confident enough that they would walk back and forth between the beach and the beach house alone or ahead of us to fetch things or use the bathroom or rinse their feet off or whatever (depending, of course, on which kids we were talking about and which adults were where).

I wouldn't want to stay there during a hurricane, but it was quite lovely for while we were there.