FMB 2018

Oh Florida, how we love you!  We had such a great week at Fort Myers Beach this year.  We left Sawyer with my parents and had so much fun with just Summer!  Aaron and Cassie also left their youngest so we piled into a van with them for the trek down and back.  

Oh, this girl.  Last year on the way down she slept AWFUL.  And I do mean awful.  We had high hopes that she would do better through the night this year.  Our hopes were crushed.  I can't say I blame her too much, not being able to move around in her seat at all when she's used to tossing and turning all over the place.  But really- it was like, every 20 minutes she would wake up and whine and cry and be totally irrational. And she does have an annoying whine.  Especially when you are also feeling irrational because it's 3 in the morning and she just won't sleep for more than 20 minutes at a time.  Not fun.  And that was with an adult dose of melatonin!  Siiiiiggghhhhh.....

Finally after breakfast she fell into a nice peaceful sleep.  For about 30 minutes.  But at least there was no more whining when she woke up.

Our first visit to the ocean for the year.  I definitely prefer lounging by the pool, but Summer looooved the beach.  Would have spent all day every day there if she could.  Thankfully she has a daddy who was pretty willing to take her!

Our Sunday afternoon tradition is to go to Sun Harvest Citrus to taste their amazing juice samples, load up on oranges and grapefruit, and get ice cream.

We were the mean parents who didn't get Summer her own ice cream cone and so she went begging to others to get her fill.  She found one generous cousin who would take a bite of her cone,....

..... and then kindly offer a bite to Summer.  That went on for most of the cone!

There is a library with a great kids section just down the road from where we stay and we went there one day after breakfast.  It's kind of a nice break from the sun for us fair skinned types:)  It also just happened to be story hour when we got there so we got to participate in that.  It was agreed that our normal story hour is better!

This hole got bigger and bigger as the week went on.  The kids all had a great time with the excavation project!

Sunset on the pier one night.

Another favorite of Summer's: bike rides with Daddy.  If you haven't noticed the trend, Daddy is the more adventurous one who Summer likes to tag along with!  Mommy enjoys sitting by the pool reading books:)

Cousins, cousins, cousins!!

We went to a lot of yummy restaurants, and while I am not typically a selfie person, sometimes a long wait requires taking some to kill the time.

One of our annual breakfast spots has this fun pond filled with fish and turtles and some animal statues around it.  These three cuties had a grand ole time jumping off of the alligator until the one of the right took a hard fall and came face to face with the concrete:(

When we started the week, Summer was still petrified of swimming by herself.  Holding onto an adult with both hands was the only way she felt safe and didn't freak out.  By the end of the week she could swim all around.  Still not ready to jump in or put her face in the water but for now?  Mission accomplished!

So much fun in the sun!

We left Friday night but went to grab a quick bite to eat before hitting the road.  Summer had woke up at 6:30 in the morning which is almost 2 hours earlier than normal.  But she was doing great and not getting crabby so we didn't have her take a nap.  Come supper time though, she couldn't do it anymore and fell asleep on Danny's shoulder while we waited for our supper.  We had gotten it to go so once we got back to the room she nestled in for a nice nap.

The night time travels went a teeny weeny bit better on the way home and we didn't hit any traffic.  Still, we were glad to be off the road and out of the van!  And glad to see our Sawyer Boyer.  We are thinking next year won't be quite so care free since we are planning to have three kids with us instead of just one.  Bring it on???