Fort Clinch

At the northern tip of Amelia Island is an old military installation called Fort Clinch. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Clinch It has not been used in more than 100 years, but is now operated as a park. In my opinion, this place is crazy haunted. Anyway, this is a tiny, tiny, tiny military base....maybe a couple of acres space inside the walls. (and I thought Brooks was small).

Entrance to the Fort
Outer walls.

Building inside.

Tattooing commences promply at 2200 hrs.

Coat rack inside one of the barracks

Kitchen. True to form, one of the park employees/actors told me that as a woman,

I should feel at home in the kitchen. Hee!

Spooky hallway.

The Brig!

Cumberland Island Tour

Not far off from Amelia Island is Cumberland Island, GA. You can read more about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumberland_Island It is a privately owned island that is now 90% occupied by the National Park Service. It has an interesting history. On Saturday, we took a tour of the Cumberland Sound to see the island and it's wild horses.

Bathroom on the ferry. I really had to go or I wouldn't have subjected myself to hearing my fellow travelers talk while I peed. Or having them hear me pee while they talk.
Me and Chan on the ferry. This picture was funny because I asked the lady half of this elderly couple to take it, and the husband kept barking orders to the wife on how to take the picture.

Fort Clinch from the ferry. More on that later

Cumberland Island's famous wild horses.

This is one handsome shark.

Something from my childhood

We were driving to the Fernandina Beach Farmer's Market on Saturday, and I was giving Chan directions to the location, when I saw this on the map:

Uh....what? Really? The Pippi Longstocking House? I lurved Pippi Longstocking when I was a kid. I mean, a girl with keen fashion sense, wild hair, that lives alone with her horse and monkey? Sweet. So we drove to the location on the map, which was not exactly clear, and I found the house through memory alone. And here it is!

Villa Villekula! Chan had no idea who Pippi was, so I took it upon myself to skool her in the ways of the daughter of a sailor lost at sea, with the wild hair. It turns out that this is where the American version of the movie was filmed. Awesome. Pippi rules. Can I get a witness?

Sunrise on Amelia Island

So after spending 3 hours hunting for shark's teeth on Friday, we researched the tide charts and decided that since we had found a bunch of teeth at low tide on friday afternoon, we would wake up early enough for low tide at 0630 on sunday morning. For those that don't know, there are 2 low and 2 high tides daily. And waking up at 0630 on a Saturday is no problem on the island because you will have spend all day friday in the sun, and if you are like us, in addition to searching for teeth, you will have walked from shell bed to shell bed doing lunges, so you will be exhausted from the exercise and the sun.

Amelia Island

Ok, so when faced with a 2 week trip to Jacksonville, FL...one must make the decision on what to do over the weekend, which is especially vital when presented with a 3 day weekend. My coworker and I agreed to go to Amelia Island, FL. I mean, who wouldn't? It is a small island in the Atlantic off northern FL that is apparently a big vacation spot. I never thought I would find a place that I liked as much as Oahu, but I have. I want to bring Austin and Amelia here and live here forever!

Chan and I were searching for seashells, when we saw a couple of people staring at the sand. We were like, "I wonder if those people know something we don't." She walks over, and yells for me to come over. Turns out that Amelia Island is like the #2 place in the US to find shark's teeth, and these people are finding tons of them. A lady showed us the ones she had found...like 20 of them, and was kind enough to scatter a few on the ground so that we could "find" them, and even let us keep them. From then on, we were obsessed with finding shark's teeth. A few locals saw us throughout the weekend and would stop by to check on our progress. In the end, we found maybe 30-35 total. We sat in the wet sand for hours each day, just digging, and getting excited like eight year olds when we would find some. In the last pic are the first 4 that I found.

View from the parking lot of our beachfront hotel, Seaside Amelia Inn
A handful of seashells scooped from the sand

Me pretending to be amazed while I take my own picture.

Chan looking for shark's teeth

Houses on Amelia Island

Shark's teeth that I found the first day.

St Augustine, FL

Is there a person in the world who doesn't love lighthouses? Before visiting this one, I have only been inside one other one, in Door County, WI, when visiting my aunt and uncle in Fish Creek. This one is in St. Augustine, FL, the oldest continuously settled city in America (I think?). Anyway, this is their lighthouse. Fortunately, on this trip, I am accompanied by my coworker Chandra, a young (32) sprightly chicky who is up for anything. She is even afraid of heights but is such a trooper that she did not disclose this potential lighthouse climbing deal breaker until we were halfway up the 200+ stairs. Whatta gal! Anyway, we made it up (seems less stairs than 200+), and were treated to an awesome view of the city:

The actual lighthouse, from the path
Looking up from the bottom

View from the top

Chan the Super Trooper

We totally did not eat at this restaurant

This one is for Mimi since she is obsessed with pirates. Arrrrr!

New Playground Pics

Some people would say that having a playground right behind their house is awesome. In our house, we call it "never being able to go in our backyard" because Amelia ALWAYS wants to go there, and sometimes we just don't have time....like we are unloading groceries or whatever. But we do try to take her there at least once a week. Here she is, on Saturday, on a girls' (Mimi and Mommy) trip to the playground. Amelia can now officially climb up to the top and go down the twisty slide by herself!

A new artist in the family

My grandma Betty is a pretty awesome artist. She's painted a ton of cool pictures, and even used to make dolls for me when I was little. I will admit I had nightmares from this one doll, who had long candy cane striped arms, and my name sewn in cursive on its butt. I would dream that the arms would pull me under my bed like the clown doll from Poltergeist. I think my mom eventually put it in the basement and I could sleep again. I digress. I'm hoping Amelia inherited some of her great-grandmother Betty's talent. Here she is, painting with watercolors in her Wonder Pets coloring book.

The New Swimsuit

Since Amelia really can't wear the same suit she did as a baby, and we can't find her pink swimsuit since we moved, Austin bought her a new one. He did a pretty good job. We are pretty dead-set against little girls wearing bikinis, so Amelia wears only 1-pieces. Here she is pouting, then trying to spray me with water, then stealing my diet coke, and then pouting again.

St Patrick's Day

Last week, I kind of forgot about St Patrick's Day. I went to work, and the only way to avoid being pinched for not wearing green was to disclose to my coworkers that I was indeed wearing green, in the form of glitter on my underpants. Not like that's embarrassing or anything. Hey, I bruise easily. I don't want to be pinched.

We wouldn't pinch Amelia anyway, but she's modeling some of her green in these pics. If that swimsuit looks familiar, it is because it is the same one as she wore when she was 9 months old!

Beer Cap Pasta

I've had a homemade pasta recipe for a while, and I got a chance to try it out about 2 weeks ago while Austin was in Las Vegas. I rolled out a bunch of pasta by hand. People....pasta dough is really, really hard to roll out by hand. But I rolled it out, and then cut it in strips with a pizza wheel. With the leftover dough, I thought I would try to make Amelia a fun pasta shape to eat. Since all my cookie cutters were just too big and I had nothing to cut the pasta into a cute shape, I decided to use a beer bottle cap. But I didn't have any spare bottle caps laying around, so I decided to take one for the team and open a beer so I could use the cap. Of, of course I drank it.

Sam Adam's springtime White Ale.

Cutting out the cap shapes

Trying to take pics like Deb from the Smitten Kitchen but failing miserably because I have a dark kitchen.

Boiling the pastas. In the end, Amelia wouldn 't eat the pasta, so I did.

THIS is what she ate.....yes that is what you think it is. Ramen and M&Ms.

Stale Like Old Bread

I have a friend who told me last night that my blog is stale. Stale like old bread. Whateva. So I called her a few names while we were chatting online, and then decided to do something about it.

So some new posts are coming.

It's a snake...no, a worm....no, definitely a snake

Austin was away in Las Vegas this past weekend, so Amelia and I had a girls' weekend...fun! I was sitting on the sofa, crocheting, and Amelia was playing on the floor with some toys near me. I realize she is having more fun than necessary, and look down to see a baby snake slithering around, and Amelia is really enjoying watching it...laughing, and trying to poke it.

I have no problem with snakes. Or bugs. Or spiders or anything. But I have a HUGE problem with snakes in my house. So I grab this one, put it in a bowl, and take some pictures of it. Then i search my house and find another one, nearly dead, on the other side of the living room. I am really, really freaking out. So I drown them and run copious amounts of water down the drain to flush them away. Then I find another one in my kitchen, later that night, and my neighbor kills it for me, and confirms that it's a snake. Then the next day, I find one on the bathroom counter, and I kill it.

By this time...I am practically hysterical. I am picturing a momma snake ready to pounce, with an army of babies close behind. I mean...my house is INFESTED with snakes. Yesterday, I took my camera and found the entomologist that works in my building, and he identifies them as Texas Blind Snakes (or TX Thread Snakes). Blind, harmless, non-venomous, can't bite, and don't grow larger than 10 inches or so. No, they are not worms.

So I feel a little better, knowing that they aren't going to kill us in our sleep, but still really creeped out. Now that Austin is back from Vegas, he is in charge of snake removal. He found one last night, and if we find anymore, we will just put them outside for the birds to eat. Yum.

You want to see some pictures? No? Tough. It's just a picture...I had to pick them up from inside my house. Enjoy. Sweet dreams.

Playdate!

I have known my friend Neicy for years, since I started working at Brooks back in 2000. We traveled together for work, and have been all over the place...stomped all over London, shopped in Korea, and hung out in various states in the US. Neicy has a teenage son, and since she refuses to have another baby to hang out with Mimi, she has the next best thing...her brother's daughter, Kamryn, who is the same age as Mimi.

Since we moved back to San Antonio 1 1/2 years ago, Neicy and I have tried to organize a play date with the girls...with no luck. Either she was traveling, or I was, or she was sick, or her son had a basketball tournament, or I was sick, or one of the girls were sick. But finally, they came over this past weekend.

The girls had a great time...first they hugged (Amelia wouldn't let go), then they played outside with Mimi's playhouse, and then with bubbles, then at the playground behind our backyard, then they ate fudgesicles, then they danced together to Beyonce before Neicy and Kami left. We can't wait for the next time!

Amelia and Kami in the longest hug in the history of the world Playing House

Bubbles!

Getting soaked

At the playground

The aftermath of a fudgesicle

Neicy and Kami

Check it out!

If you are a big fan of the 80's and 90's, and all that comes with them, from food to clothes to toys, go check out Austin's blog, "Retro Fluff." There's a link to it under "my blog list" on the right (scroll down a bit), or just to http://80sfluff.blogspot.com/. It's awesome, and if you ever want Austin to research and feature your favorite piece of 80's nostalgia, send him a message.