Monkey Puzzle

Paul and I are always on the lookout for really cool vegetation when we visit new cities.  I know we're total dorks but there's something really neat about finding new trees and plants that are indigenous to certain areas.

While we were in Canada, in early August, we came across this really cool tree, and when we walked up to get a closer look we saw that someone had labeled it as a "Monkey Puzzle Tree" (which neither of us had ever heard of):

When we got back to Jacksonville I did a little bit of research (thanks to Wikipedia) and come to find out it's not indigenous to Canada - it's actually native to Chile, Argentina and Brazil. 

Pretty Neat - at least for us dorks it is :)

Anywho...Happy Sunday!!!

Disney World

This past weekend we surprised my mom with a 3 night trip to one of her most favorite places in the whole wide world --- Disney World. 
Since my mom has had such a hard time these past few months with her mom passing away and then Bailey (one of my parents' dogs) passing away we thought she was in great need of a fun trip that was all about her.  We got 3 day hopper passes that worked at all of the Disney Parks (Animal Kingdom, Hollywood Studios, Magic Kingdom and Epcot) so we spent 2 full days visiting all 4 parks.  We were very fortunate in that the longest we had to wait for a ride was 20 minutes - it couldn't have worked out more perfect. 

All of us (mom, dad, Scott, me and Paul) were taking pictures so I didn't take as many as I usually do but here are some that I did get (mostly from the Animal Kingdom):

I'll post more pictures later when everyone sends them to me later this week. 

It was really great having most of the family together in Orlando but we really missed not having Paige with us - things just aren't the same when we're missing one of the members of the family.  We missed you Paige!!!

The Side of Florida You Never Really See

A few weeks ago Paul and I wanted to get away from the craziness of Jacksonville for a night so we decided to visit a town we had driven past many times on the west coast of Florida - it's a very, very, very small town called Cedar Key. 

Cedar Key currently has around 1,000 residents and it's an old-fashioned fishing village with only a few quaint hotels and restaurants.  The best part though is that it's still untouched by resorts and theme parks and all of the other things that most people picture when they think of Florida.  The vegetation is amazing and it's a place that still looks and feels the same way that it did years and years ago.

Here's my adorable husband as we drove into Cedar Key

And here are some other pictures we got while walking around town:

We had a really great time spending a night away from home in Cedar Key, but what made the weekend even better for Paul was that we came back to Jax only to find there was still some surf left from one of the storms in the Atlantic:

I even saw a couple of star fish that made it to the shore:

And then we finished off an already wonderful weekend with a little relaxing on the porch and some yummy dinner on the grill:

It doesn't get much better than that!!!