March Update - Spring Break

Hello Friends!! OOOPS -- I missed my March update deadline that I imposed on myself, so guess it's ok that I'm a little late. Better late than never!

Anyway, so during the middle of January and an incredible way below below-zero temp time and mucho snow, Maddie and I decided we needed to make a plan to get out of town!! And go to the beach! You know where we usually go . . . Disney! Well, this time we went to Tampa Bay. We needed a beach and Tampa sounded right and close to some beaches though we had never been there before! It was a very quick trip - I think we stayed 3 nights. Connor joined us from Jacksonville and was our driver extraordinaire! The traffic there is kind of nightmarish-especially for a chicken driver like me!

We hung out at the hotel some, went to the downtown river walk (that may be what it's called) and went to Clearwater Beach! Oh my word!! The BEACH!!!!! I had been longing for some feet in the sand for a while and the sand there is so smooth and soft -- not crunchy or rough at all. LOVED IT!!!

While there, we went on a river tug boat to see the dolphins! Amazing that we beat the usual spring break crowd, so our tugboat - Little Toot -- had only about 20 people on it instead of the usual crammed-in 50 people! The dolphins were so amazing. They followed the boat and came alongside it and gave us a show over and over. It was really a highlight of the trip. I'd post a video, but am clueless as to how to do that, so just take my word for it!

That's the pirate ship above -- we should have gone on that one too!

The weather was warm enough for the beach for Maddie and so I was able to get a few photos. She said she's always wanted photos at the beach and we got a few! It was a more relaxing trip than Disney where we run, run run. We still love Disney though, but a change was good. After such a fun trip, the rest of March seems like a blur.

Maybe it's a bit of a blur because I got a new job! I'm working in the Children's and Gift department at Von Maur. Von Maur is where Maddie and I usually do our Christmas gift-wrap jobs. I felt like I needed a little job, so am working 4 days a week and around 25 hours a week. It's been fun and such a nice place to work. Very calm and everyone is super nice. I will admit it is a bit tiring. Usually I have two 9-hour shifts a week and those can be killers on my old lady legs and feet. But, it's working out well for now.

As always, I will try to post more regularly - but we will see about that, won't we! Take care and stay tuned!

A Dolphin Mis-Adventure

Maddy and Grace - Ready to see some dolphins!

Seeing that we are generally landlocked here in Nebraska, one day in Hilton Head we decided to spend a few hours going on a dolphin-watching cruise! Doesn't that sound like fun!! It was a beautiful day on HHI and off we went to the Oyster Factory to meet up with one of Capt Jim's workers, Capt Clint. We got in a cool little speedboat. Just before I was about to ask for a life jacket, Capt Clint snickered that only one time had an adult asked for a life jacket! Kids had to wear them, of course. Almost right away, we saw dolphins -- a mother and her calf! So cute and it seemed like they were tagging along right with us. Of course, it was difficult to get a photo, but see if you can find the little dolphin fin. Before we got on the boat, the kids thought it was a shark fin -- ha ha -- no sharks there! At least I don't think there were any sharks around!

Anyway, as we boated along with Capt Clint giving us the history of the area, we saw a buoy-thingy and oops -- we ran it over!! Not good!!! It was a crab-catching pot and guess what happened?? The crab net with real live crabs in it got tangled up in the boat's propeller! Oh my -- what a disaster! We were only about 30 minutes into our 2 hour cruise at the time. In an effort to get the net off the propeller, Capt Clint cut his hand in a couple places and was bleeding all over. Then, our boat started drifting toward a huge barge where they do fireworks at night. Somehow, with the tide and all, we ran into the barge and some rope holding down the barge came barreling across the front of the boat where Grace (my niece) and I were sitting. We ducked out of the way but both got pelted with nasty river gunk from the rope, ruining our shirts. Surprise surprise, the boat was a mess too. Finally, he got the boat propeller untangled and headed back to dock. Capt Clint graciously offered to reschedule our cruise, but after that little adventure, we decided that we'd probably seen enough dolphins! Now, do you understand why I don't like boats! :) We couldn't be mad though -- especially since Capt Clint was SO embarrassed by the whole episode and, after all, we did see some dolphins!