Florida trip part 2: St Augustine

It has been several years since we have traveled down to St Augustine from Jacksonville.

The kids don't even remember the last time that we went,

so we decided to take them on a ghost tour--

it was right before Halloween after all.

We also took them on a scenic boat cruise that we've taken in the past.

And we visited the Castillo de San Marcos fort, which was new for all of us.

At the St Augustine visitor's center

At the Castillo de San Marcos fort


At the fort they reenact the soldier's march to the cannons
and they actually shoot the cannons too.
It is SO loud, but we didn't take Chase near the cannons.

Chase with Grandma Susan

Shooting the cannon

Leaving the fort

The scenic cruise was just a few blocks up the street from the fort.
Julia and Grandpa Buzz waiting to board the boat


Ethan and Grandpa Buzz on the upper floor of the boat


This is how Chase spent the boat cruise


Right in front of the lighthouse, from the top floor of the boat

The captain actually let Julia steer the boat for about 15 minutes.

She was so excited!

She had to do some tricky turns too,

but he told her which way to steer and she did it.



That night we went on our ghost tour.
Ethan wasn't really looking forward to it
but he ended up having a lot of fun.

They basically take a walking group around town
and show you lots of the historic buildings
and tell you stories of ghosts visiting each spot.

We stopped by the cemetary of course.
The headstones are really old,
and look extra spooky.

Chase thought the ghost tour was very exciting:

Happy Halloween!

I promise to continue my posts about our trip, but wanted to wish you all a Happy Halloween and share our costume pictures.

As usual we had some costume changes again this year. The kids used stuff from our dress up chest, I didn't even have to buy a thing! This first shot is from the ward Trunk Or Treat. Ethan went as Harry Potter and Julia went as a Jedi.

I didn't get a picture of the kids at school, but Ethan decided to dress up as a professional soccer player in his Salt Lake Real shirt and soccer gear, and Julia was Harry Potter.

And here they are right before trick-or-treating, this time Ethan went as a soldier in all camo, and Julia was again Harry Potter:

They had lots of fun going trick-or-treating with friends this year and ended up with a ton of candy.

Hope you all had a great Halloween!

Florida trip part 1: First beach day

Our trip to Florida was so fun!
Chase had lots of firsts this trip.
It was his first plane trip and I was a little worried about how he would do.
But he ended up being a great traveler and was really good on the plane
until the last 10 minutes of our last flight.
By that point he was just tired of being stuck on a plane
and ready to be done traveling.
He screamed in the car all the way from the airport to Derek's parents' house.
We were so glad when we finally made it!

This was Chase's first trip to the beach:

He wasn't too sure about the waves crashing into his little legs. He seemed much happier on the sand under an umbrella. He did love kicking his feet in the sand, and digging his fingers into the sand too. We managed to keep most of the sand out of his mouth.




Kicking back and relaxing.

I love how Chase crosses his legs like this!

I thought we were going to have to leave because Chase started getting fussy, but I stuck him in the water sling and he went right to sleep. That bought us an extra hour.




Ethan and Julia really enjoyed swimming in the waves a lot more this trip, I guess they're getting a little more adventurous.

The kids loved having Derek pull them out in this raft, the "SS Borsky."
They would ride over the waves,
and then he'd let go and the waves would carry them back to shore.

We even had enough time for building a sand castle.

Chase enjoyed his bath after the beach without his bath seat from home.
He kept laughing and kicking his legs-- he was so excited.

That night we enjoyed some Southern cuisine from Sonny's BBQ.
We had never tried fried corn on the cobb before,
but it was actually really good.


Chase even cooperated during dinner so we could all eat together.


We finished up the night with birthday pie for Grandpa Buzz and Ethan,
since both of their birthdays are in October.


To be continued...

6 month stats

I know I've said this before, but Chase is growing so fast,
I can't believe that he is 6 months old already!

He is now 28 inches long (90th percentile),

and weighs 18 pounds (75th percentile).

He has such a cute laugh and smile, and thankfully we see them often!

This past month has been full of changes.

Chase started on solid foods and is still getting used to eating them.

So far he's not a big fan of anything,

but he will tolerate sweet potatoes and butternut squash.

(We're doing homemade baby food-- it is super easy to make

and saves a ton of money!)

Chase is getting really close to crawling.

Right after he turned 5 months old he started rolling

from his front to back (he was already rolling back to front).

Now he rolls all over the place,

can change directions by pushing with his arms,

and has started rocking back and forth on all fours for short periods of time.

We can't leave him on the bed alone for longer than 2 seconds

because he is so fast!

His favorite toy is our remote.

The second we sit down on the bed he looks around and dives for the remote.

The phone is second best.

And his feet are a close third.

We switched Chase to his crib right after he turned 5 months old

because he started rolling over the sides of his sleep positioner.

He did great for the first few nights,

and then he started rolling onto his tummy

and just couldn't sleep that way.

Thankfully he now sleeps on his tummy just fine.

And hopefully one of these days he'll start sleeping through the night!

We all just adore this cute little guy!

It's a wrap

Yes, we just wrapped up another soccer season.
Sadly I didn't get any great pictures,
I'll have to try to do better in the spring.

Ethan plays for the Phantoms,

and has some good friends on his team.

Ethan's favorite position is the goalie.
He used to hate being goalie,
but he has practiced tons with some friends this past year
and now he really loves it
and he's good at it too!

Derek and our friend Ty are the coaches for Ethan's team

and he has really enjoyed that.

(Ethan's team's shirts are actually black, but he prefers to wear his goalie shirt when he's the goalie-- it has padded elbows and has saved him several times already.)

Julia plays for the Blue Moonberries
or the Blue Lightning.
I think they haven't really decided which is their official team name.

Julia's game has dramatically improved as well
since she frequently plays against Ethan and his friends.
One game she scored 6 goals all by herself!

Yes, we are definitely a soccer family!