Ben’s Preschool Parade

We don’t really take part in Halloween activities, but the past few years we have let the kids dress up for the preschool parade. It’s really all that they do for the holiday (yet they still acquire ridiculous amounts of candy) and both Ben and Rosemary look forward to it every year.

Early on, Ben had said he wanted to be Woody again this year. I’d given him the option of being Mater, Lightning McQueen’s driver, or Woody (all costumes we already had on hand) and he’d finally chosen Woody. But a few days before the parade, Rosemary and Ben were playing Magic Tree House and he changed his mind and wanted to be Jack. Since Jack’s costume is quite possibly the easiest boys costume to do ever, we went ahead and let him switch.

Ben as Jack from the Magic Tree House books

Jack wears glasses, has dark hair (Ben’s was sprayed black)…

Always has his backpack with him…

And he carries his journal, reference book, pencil, and Magic Librarian card. All of which were tucked safely inside Ben’s bag.

Rosemary dressed as Queen Lucy from the Chronicles of Narnia.

Attached to her belt she carried her dagger and cordial vial.

She wanted to wear a crown. I offered to let her wear my tiara from our wedding and she jumped at the chance. I think the necklace she’s wearing was from my senior prom.

Striking a regal pose

All three little ones. Since it was so cold, we just kept Charlotte in her regular clothes and didn’t dress up.

Ready to load up and head to the parade.

Once we dropped Ben off, we made our way over to get our spots along the parade route.

He had the most adorable little face as he walked. He kept his nose scrunched up, I think in an effort to keep his glasses on, but it was too cute.

His dark hair kept throwing me off!

One of the best parts of Ben’s costume was that he was nice and warm. It was 50 degrees when we left the house that morning so it was chilly for a parade.

Hi, Jack!

A picture of Ben’s class

From there, we headed home to do some school.

Rosemary did her work in her costume.

And a perfect score on her fact sheet for the day! It was a super big deal and she was VERY excited!

So that was it as far as dressing up for Halloween for our kids. And it cost a whopping $7.50 (for the hairspray and glasses). Everything else we already had. They still thought it was great.

Cedar Key–10 Year Engagement Anniversary Trip

On October 26, 2002, Jonathan and I went to Cedar Key to watch the sunset and have dinner at the Island Hotel and Restaurant. Before getting ready to head back to Gainesville after our meal, we went up on the veranda and Jonathan proposed. Ever since that night we talked about how sometime we would have to go back and actually stay at the hotel. Well, we finally did that to celebrate the 10th anniversary of our engagement.

Jonathan’s parents came up for the weekend so that we could sneak away for the night. We had lunch all together before Jonathan and I loaded up our bags (packing just my stuff and not the kids’ made things go so much faster!) and our bikes and set off for the west coast.

Our first stop was Shell Mound, a prehistoric Indian mound. We walked a bit on the trail then went out by the water. It was insanely windy that day, the result of Hurricane Sandy that was barreling through the Atlantic at the time.

The mound is 28 feet tall and compromised primarily of shell and bones. It’s hard to fathom that amount of time that it took to reach that height.

From Shell Mound, we headed into town to check in at the hotel (it’s really more like a B&B).

The hotel was built in 1859 and originally was a general store that was later converted to a hotel.

We stayed in room 34. The large windows opened right onto the veranda. The painted pine wood floors were wonderfully creaky and dangerously sloped. The place was certainly chock-full of character.

The walls had no insulation, so in the guest book they asked that guests keep that in mind while “enjoying the privacy of their rooms.” We could hear the conversations of the people on the veranda quite easily.

We had a private bathroom connected to the room. This is worth noting because some other rooms had private bathrooms, they were just across the hall. We had a claw foot tub, which made for a somewhat interesting shower experience. But the place was just so cool.

After checking in, we walked through the town then came back to change for a run. (We just started the C25K program). From the run we headed down to the water to watch the sunset.

Looking down Dock Street

We headed back to our room to get ready for dinner. It was a beautiful night so we ate out on the porch of the restaurant.

I left our camera in the room so we didn’t take pics of the food, but it was so good. Our meal consisted of:

Appetizer: Hearts of Palm Salad (a twist on a fruit salad with lettuce, strawberries, grapes, star fruit, peaches, and other fruit, topped with hearts of palm and a strangely amazing dressing of crunchy peanut butter, pineapple juice, mayonnaise, and vanilla ice cream, sprinkled with sugared dates)

Salad

Entrée: Jonathan – Herb and Butter Grouper; Julie – Grouper Piccata

Dessert: Pecan Pie with macadamia nuts and chocolate

It was delicious.

After dinner, we got a quick photo in the lobby. We had one taken when we got engaged, although the furniture is different now, we were in about the same spot. :-)

We headed up to the veranda after that. It was pretty full of people that night. The night we got engaged, we were the only ones up there.

The common area on the second floor. None of the rooms have televisions, so this room had lots of books, games, and magazines to grab.

In the morning, we got up and got ready then headed down to breakfast.

We ate in the dining room this time and enjoyed the perfectly crispy French toast.

We decided to go ahead and check out since we didn’t know if we’d be back by later in the day.

We walked down to the museum, but were early, so we walked back to the car then headed over to the Cedar Key Museum State Park.

Happy 10 Year Engagement Anniversary!

Interestingly, Cedar Key was the end of the line for the Florida Railroad which connected the east coast to the west. For our anniversary this year, we stayed at the other end of the line in Fernandina. At the Cedar Key Museum State Park, we learned a little bit about that as well as about the various people and industries that used to call Cedar Key home.

A huge salt kettle used to extract the salt from sea water to be used by the confederates to preserve meat.

Across the way from the museum building was the St. Clair Whitman house.

We were never far from the water while on the island.

From the museum, we headed back to the main part of town then rode our bikes pretty much over the entire island. It didn’t take too long.

For lunch, we stopped in at the Seabreeze Restaurant. I love their clams. We always eat here when we go to Cedar Key.

A bit of a gray day, but a very good day. I am thankful that we were able to finally stay at the hotel and enjoy the time away together.

Mummy “Wrap Up”

As you may remember, in the summer we started making a chicken mummy to go along with our study of the ancient Egyptians. Well, a couple weeks ago we were learning about the Egyptians again (this time about King Tutankhamen) and decided it was time to finish up our mummy project. We coordinated a time with Evan to come over with Mystery Mummy so we could “wrap” this project up.

First, we had to clean off the mummies. King Klucky and Mystery Mummy had been sitting in salt for the last 2+ months. Wet paper towels weren’t working, so I finally just rinsed them under running water then had the kids dry them off.

Here’s the best photo I got of the mummified chicken before he was oiled, spiced, and wrapped. He (or she??) was considerably darker and much more shriveled up. And there definitely was a smell, although it was not particularly strong. I thought that the smell would be worse as it was drying out in the salt, but really, the main thing I smelled then was the rubbing alcohol it had soaked in prior to starting the mummification process. In the end, they had a very strange smell. It wasn’t super strong, but when I got too close it was pretty bad, as in, it's-good-I-don’t-throw-up-easily bad. But really, in the sealed container while drying, no smell. And once back in a sealed container, there’s been no smell.

Patting Mystery Mummy dry.

The next step was to apply oil (we used baby oil) and spices (we used cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, and ground allspice because that’s what we had, not because they are particularly historically accurate). The mummy still smelled funny, but now also was dark from the spices.

Finally, the kids wrapped their mummies with strips of old sheets that I’d ripped up. They dipped the strips in a mixture of white glue and water then started wrapping. Both were ready to play at this point so I finished them up.

Wrapped and drying.

I spray painted the containers gold so that they could be the sarcophaguses for the mummies.

King Klucky ready for his burial.

Rosemary has now decorated his sarcophagus, we just need to get him in the ground. Jonathan teased her that we should put him in the attic because “it’s hot there and it was hot in Egypt.” Rosemary, however, told him that it’s cooler in the ground, just as it was cooler in the depths of the pyramids and tombs. She’s a smart girl.

While this project was a little more involved than others that we’ve done, I’ve got to say that is was really pretty easy and exceptionally memorable. I can see us saying years from now, “Do you remember when we mummified that chicken?” It was really pretty inexpensive since I bought the supplies in bulk, the smell wasn’t noticeable as long as things were sealed up, and it was just really cool to do. I’m not sure what our big spring project will be, but it will be hard to top this one.