Wakulla Springs

Last weekend the Critters, Rian, Grandma Kate and I headed south to Wakulla Springs State Park. As you can guess from the name of the park there is a huge fresh spring there. The best part is while the temps outside are cold the water temp in this spring is 69 degrees (year round). This means that manatees, or sea cows, head here to winter in warm water. While we did not see a plethora of sea cows we did see a mama and her baby.

After a brief stint on the dive tower, we took the boat tour. Unfortunately we could not take the glass bottom boat because they said the water was murky. I will say it looked pretty dadgum clear to me. It was a really nice boat ride, we saw tons of birds, alligators, turtles, and fish. The peacefulness was soon broken when Hadley decided very loudly to let everyone know that she was tired and wanted to take a nap. Usually this is not a problem and we are not often confined to a boat in the middle of a fresh water spring. Rian did her best to sooth the savage beast and placate her until the boat docked. We quickly headed for our nearest exit and shot back up 19 to Tally.

Here are a few pictures from our adventure:

The melee started as soon as we exited the car.

Peach showing off her shades.

Brother walkin to the dive tower.

Brother making sure that no one goes swimming.

Peach giving the cartoon manatee a big kiss.

Peach when she finally saw the real manatee.

The infamous sea cow.

A large alligator spotted from our boat.

A shot from our return trip in the boat.

Some birds.

Chris

Peace, Love, and CarCar

Chris

Saint Valentine's Day

Who better to wish everyone a Happy Valentine's Day than the Hoff.

The Critters got to experience two Valentine's Days this year, I guess the one at their mom's morning out was unofficial, but oh well. The Critters did get some nice goody bags which Dad insisted they were much too young to eat the contents. (i.e. it had Reese's Peanut Butter Cups in it.)

On the Official Valentine's Day the Critters got to open their presents from us and Grandma Barbara. As usual they made out like bandits. Mom and Dad also did pretty well this year from each other. Mom finally got her "Happy Everything" plate from Coton Colors. (Yes, I know there is only one 't' in 'Coton' but I didn't misspell it, promise.)

Later in the day Aunt Donna came over to hang out with the Critters. I got off a little bit early and headed home to cook dinner for us. This is where the fun started. I was making a red velvet cake from scratch and the recipe called for three 9" pans, well I only have two. Rian had gone to Publix and all they had was three 8" inch pans. I thought, no problem, it will just take a little longer to cook. NOT THE CASE. After putting them in the oven I noticed that they were baking over and dripping all over the bottom of the oven. My attempts at stopping this with aluminum foil was also thwarted. You can imagine what happened next, yep FIRE. The cake batter dripped onto the heating coil, which in turn created fire. This was not a happy fire moment, this was a damn the oven is on fire freak out moment.

I was able to stomp out the burning cake batter with some tongs. I also was able to carefully dump the remaining non-fire batter from the three 8" pans into two 9" pans. Unfortunately in my rush I only greased one pan. Lets just say that that section of the cake decided to stay in the pan after cooking. So the envisioned three layer red velvet cake chocked full of awesomeness was reduced to a one layer sad sight of a red velvet cake. Hey, at least it tasted good.

The rest of dinner preparation went relatively uneventful after that fiasco. I guess the only thing that could have topped it would have been some sort of small explosion. Rian, Aunt Donna and I dined on salmon, gnocchi, and broccoli w/ hazelnuts.

All in all it was a great Valentine's Day. (especially after the fire)

The Critters did not have a special meal but Aunt Donna brought them over strawberry ice cream for dessert. They each got their own little cup of Haagen Dazs. As you can imaging they scarfed it down. I mean, who doesn't love strawberry ice cream.

Here are a few shots. (No there are not any pictures of the fire.)

Aunt Donna and Brother.

Peach approves of strawberry ice cream.

Peach showing you how much she likes strawberry ice cream.

Chris

Keep it Sassy CarCar

CarCar is doin' her best.

Well its no secret that CarCar is Miss Sassafras. Strangely enough sassafras is a type of tree. I really don't see the connection between trees and attitude.

That argument aside here are few sassy pictures.

CarCar wants you to notice the boots.

The look.

The look part deux.

Chris

Supporting the Troops (Literally)

We do two stories a night, Your Personal Penguin and Goodnight Moon. Usually we rotate which Critter gets held during the story. As you can see on this particular night they all demanded to be held.

I did stumble on one creative way to stop their screaming during story time. I happened to be holding CarCar this particular night and when Peach or Brother would let out a scream I would mimic their scream. They thought this was the funniest thing in the world. After a few go arounds of screaming they just decided to sit down. We had a nice rest of story time that night, although I was a little horse afterwards.

Chris

Fun (for them) With Yogurt

I had to do it. How often do you get to insert a Spaceballs reference? This is Yogurt the Great if anyone hasn't seen the movie.

Rian thought it was about time the Critters eat their yogurt themselves. They obviously had use of their paws and could easily hold a yogurt container. The Critters have also been developing an affinity for utensils. They have come to love the fork, notice I didn't say they have become skilled at using said fork. They are competent when it comes to using a fork but I will not get carried away and say that they have mastered it.

So before they have mastered one utensil we (Rian) thought it would be fun to throw another one in the mix. Before you think that I am throwing Rian under the bus, I think that they are old enough to use multiple utensils. Hey they need to start exercising that intelligence if they want to go to college.

The montage that follows is the outcome of the spoon test:

This is what I walked into.

Brother was certainly enjoying it.

Mustn't leave any behind.

I think I got it all.

CarCar approves.

Chris

ps. If you click on the pics now you should be able to get larger versions. It was getting hard to see what was going on in the pics.

A Little Bit of Rest

CarCar was pretty sacked. (Click pic to make bigger.)

Chris

An Affair, er Ruffle to Remember

The cover of the mix cd that I busted out like it was 1994.

I am still alive, very busy, but alive. This will be a picture heavy post, as I am posting about an event that I did not attend.

Rian and her girlfriends (the Ruffles as they call themselves) headed to Birmingham, Alabama over MLK weekend, for a little eating, drinking, and all around debauchery. That is about the extent of my knowledge of the weekend. My weekend was filled with frozen pizzas, college basketball and the Critters.

Here are some pics from the weekend:

The restaurant that they dined at on Friday. Oh yea, it's owned by a James Beard award winner. My dinner was by an award winner too, DiGiorno.

The Ruffles as they are known in these parts.

Another shot.

Some place called Yogurt Mountain.

Apparently they love Brother in Birmingham.

Chris

I have quite a few posts I need to do. I will try to get them out by the end of the weekend.