A Quick Thaw

The boys and I had a wonderful time thawing out in Florida last week. My parents are spending their third winter down there, and it is the second time we have traveled down to see them. They found a great place to rent during the three worst months of northern wintery unhappiness and are having a lot of fun jet-setting all over the state visiting other retired types at their warm weather getaways. The boys were great little travelers. We had no problems getting there or coming home (many flights were canceled due to the huge east coast storm). During our stay we explored several beautiful beaches and collected an insane amount of shells and shark teeth. Okay, really just a few sandwich bags worth, but it seemed like a lot when they were being stuffed into pockets during every beach outing. The boys worked on their swimming skills at the neighborhood pool, and I worked on my social skills by making small talk with other temporary residents and their visitors. We opted to skip Disney this year as it is over two hours away from where my parents are staying, and CJ is hoping to take a full fledged Disney resort vacation when the boys get a little older. Instead we ventured to Legoland. It is a great park for little kids, and the boys had a blast building with Legos and riding the rides. Sadly, I couldn't convince P to ride a roller coaster, even though he was tall enough to ride with me on all of them. He said he "didn't want to get sick going upside down" which was silly because none of the rides went upside down. CJ was disappointed to hear about the lack of roller coaster riding (he stayed home due to no accumulated vacation days at the new job) and has promised to force P onto every roller coaster once he hits the magical height of 48". Which probably won't be for another two summers at his current rate of growth. Facing one's fear of roller coasters is a bit of a rite of passage with my husband. He forced me to do it, laughing hysterically at my high-pitched screams. He forced our nephew to do it, and we were all rewarded with his enthusiastic shout of "THIS IS AWESOME!!!!!" on the most feared coaster. When the day comes, hopefully P will be thankful his father made him face his fear rather than filing away the experience as yet another thing he will discuss in therapy someday.

Back home, we immediately began to re-freeze, with temperatures plummeting into the single digits again later this week. I know I am not alone when I say that this winter has been brutal. But the small dose of sun helped me gain back some energy, and I am very much looking forward to the warm happiness of spring.