Vermont

With a brief overnight in New Jersey, we drove on up to Vermont, crossing Lake Champlain via ferry.

Scanning the water for the Lake Champlain Monster.

Oldest granddaughter Isabella playing with youngest grandson Marcus.

High-tech girlies.

But Ruthanne still loves low-tech playtime as well.  While we were relaxing on the deck, she disappeared into her swingset/playloft and came back down with a bucketful of mud for mud-pie making.

And the dress washed up beautifully, by the way.  As did the child.

Bathtime, in fact, was always fun, loud and splashy -- silly-hair-girlies.

We took a morning to visit the Ben & Jerry's factory.

School playground fun.

And best of all, we were able to gather at our dear friends' home in Charlotte for a rather rainy day BBQ.

Evie and Jaycee - Kaye Ellen's daughter.

We sort of forced Kaye's son Kenneth to hold Marcus so we could get a shot of  "the boys." I think Kenneth was afraid he'd get leaked on or something.

Some of the big kids:  Sarah, Josh, Kaye and Adam (Sarah's husband).

Bella, Kenneth, Evie and Jaycee.

Last time these kids were together (Josh and Stephanie's wedding), they looked like this:

Evie was only 4 months old.

The week went by all too quickly, of course.  I'm already planning another gathering, here in Florida perhaps.  --cds

Moving Along

So we decided to motor up to New Jersey and Vermont so that the Utah girls could meet their East Coast relatives, and son Jamie had a wish list of places and people he wanted to visit (mostly involving food spots, we discovered -- Al's!  Handy's!  Magic Hat!  Dippy's!).

Our first stop was Charlotte, North Carolina, because...  you know... NASCAR Hall of Fame. 

I must say it was more impressive than I had anticipated.

 

There were lots of hands-on exhibits for the girls to try though their knowledge of racing isn't much more than the cars are cool and go fast and their Dad and Grandpa yell at the TV a lot.

 

They did a great job as members of the pit crew.

 

 

Their favorite thing was walking up and down this red carpet area in their best Academy-Award-Night manner...

And posing in front of cars...

Jamie and Jim also visited a couple race team garages in the Charlotte vicinity.

Definitely worth the trip for Nascar fans. --cds

Summer Vacation

Beginning in early June, we were lucky to have the Utah clan with us here in Florida for the first three weeks of their summer vacation.  Mostly we hung out here at the house swimming, movie-going, card and game-playing, book reading, biking, and our favorite activity, hopping in the golf cart to hunt for alligators at all the golf course ponds - not many gators, tho - I think they've gone to Michigan for the summer.

Silly girls - deconstructing their lunchtime salads.

Hijacking my camera.

They spent a few days on Anna Maria Island - such a nice beach there.

Bella cracks me up.

Played some Disney mini-golf also.

And we never tire of regular Disney visiting, even in the brutal heat - we powered through.

More on the road trip later.  --cds