Aubrey's second birthday

When we started this journey mid February, it was to attend our grandaughter's second birthday party and we intended to be on the road 3 weeks.  6 weeks later we are still on the road and having fun!  I just wanted to share some of Aubrey's 2nd birthday with all of you!

Aubrey and dad, Chaz, playing with Aubrey's new castle!

Aubrey and mom with new doll

A woman's home is her castle!

Two! Whoopee!

 

Happy birthday Aubrey!

Birthday's are so much fun! Glorianne with the birthday girl!

Annesley and her Princess crown!

Chaz and RyanGrandpa Chuck

birthday backrub ok Dad ???

Big bro Kyle tossing the football!

I love having a new family complete with grandkids! Thanks to all of you for accepting me into the family! Chuck and I are proud of all of you! 

Blue Spring State Park & Manatees!

Blue Spring State Park is located near Deland, FL. It is beautiful! The manatee come to Blue Spring to escape the cold winter waters of the St. Johns River. The campgrounds were very nice and very private. Each camp site was carved out of the scrub oaks and palmettos enough to give you lots of space along with all the privacy. We saw a wide variety of birds here also, cardinals, scrub jays, osprey, great blue heron, and many I wasn't familar with.

The tall, graceful sabal palm is all over Florida, but it is a main feature here in Blue Spring. This sign explains why it is Florida's State Tree! You can click on the photo to enlarge the photo!

As you can see, the graceful sabal palms grow to towering heights

This is a manatee in distress. It was just rescued from the river and is wearing a monitoring device attached to the tail.  If you look carefully under the bushes, you will see other manatee resting in the shadows.

This is the second manatee we saw with a monitoring device attached to it's tail. If you look in the upper middle of the photo, you will see another manatee resting.

The manatee are odd looking creatures. Very gentle, even friendly.  Their only enemy is man with his speedboats. Manatee have to surface frequently for air, speeding boat can shred the manatee with the boats propellers usually resulting in death or long rehab periods to regain health. We saw several badly scarred bodies while we were there.

This is a great Blue Heron, surveying the area for lunch and also watching the parade of manatee swim by.  The manatee leave the warmth of the spring to re-enter the St. John's River in search for food. They can stay only a short time because prolonged temperatures of 60 degrees and colder will result in the death of these gentle mammals. The Great Blue Heron is a beautiful addition to the river.

When I took the photo below, the wind was blowing hard, causing ripples to distort the images of the manatee below the surface of the water. But there is a pod there of about a dozen or more manatee.

This slit in the earth is the "boil" of Blue Spring! Here hundreds of gallons of water come out with so much force, it sometimes makes the water look like it's boiling!
Many of the manatee hang out here near the vent or boil, because this is where the warmer water enters the stream that flows into the St. John's River.  During the summer months, divers come to this park to explore the cave system down under the vent. Divers are not allowed during the winter migration of the manatee.

At Blue Spring, viewing the manatee is easy. The park has built several veiwing stations out over the river. Everyone gets a good photo to take home! On the far left, you see a mom and her calf
and one other adult heading to the river. The manatee in the lowest portion of the frame is headed back to the spring now that his/her tummy is full from feeding in the river.

Blue Spring State Park is a wonderful place to visit for the day or for a week! We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves! For more information google FLORIDA STATE PARKS and then search for Blue Spring!

More Wedding Photos

Champagne toast!

dancing! I didn't even know Chuck could dance! Didn't know I could dance either!

Chuck, Geri and our good friend from Texas Pete Marks! Pete really believed we meant tie dye and did it better than anybody! His hat even has a fake ponytail on the back! Pete played the Native American flute for family and friends on the beach while Chuck and I got up the nerve to walk down the aisle.

Getting prettified! Stacy did my hair for the wedding! Here she is placing the flower hairpiece circlet on my head! I loved it! Thank you Stacy! My friend Sandy Collier made my hair piece and my bouquet!

Family gather for a photo! I went from almost no family to now I have a sister, Patty Jo, a daughter Glorianne, a son in law, Chaz and 4 grandkids Kyle, Ryan, Annesley and Aubrey. I have a new niece Dawn, her husband Dan and daughter Danea.

Family and friends showed up despite chilly weather to watch Chuck and I make it legal!

Geri and girlfriends showing a bit of leg at the beach. Most of these ladies have been my dear friends for more than 30 years!

We are listening to Tom and Karen Whaley sing a song they wrote just for us! It was wonderful!

Karen and Tom Whaley came from record snowfall in VA to be with us at our wedding and to share record freezing Florida weather when we all went camping after our wedding! Karen plays dulcimer and Tom plays mandolin. the song was wonderful!

Thank you both so much for bringing so much joy to our wedding!

Our Wedding

CHUCK AND GERI SAY "WE DO!"

Friends showed up with cameras and good wishes to watch Chuck and I get married. It was a sunny day but a chilly 59 degrees when we started the I do's, just a few short minutes later when we left.... the temp on the bank time and temp sign said 49! It dropped right after the ceremony! All of these photos were taken by my good friend Ed Tiley of Apalachicola, FL. Thanks Ed!
MMMMMMMMMmmmmmmm! The wedding kiss!

Getting married is so much fun!

I love this old man!

Mesa Cole performing the legalities!

I really wish all of you could have been here with us!

Our camping friends, Larryand Mary Dormer.

Chuck's daughter and family from left to right:

Aubrey. Kyle, Chaz, Annesley, Ryan and Glorianne.

Pete Marks, our good friend came here from Texas to play the flute for us!

We had asked everybody to wear tie dye to the wedding and Pete outdid himself! Even wore a hat with a fake ponytail! hahahaha! Sooooo much fun !

January 1st, 2010 at 3 PM Chuck and I said the I do's! The ceremony was short and sweet and as follows word for word:

Mesa: (the daughter of very good friends and notary public): We have all come together to celebrate the joy and love that Geri and Chuck share.

 

Geri to Chuck: You are my best friend and the love of my life. I promise to cherish you, to respect you, to love you for the rest of our days together.

Chuck to Geri: Ditto

Mesa: Now you will feel no rain, for each of you will be shelter for the othe

Now you will feel no cold, for each of you is warmth for the other

Now there will be no more loneliness, for each of you will be companion for the other.

Now you are two persons, but there is only one life before you.

May beauty surround you both in the journey ahead and through all the years.

May happiness be your companion and your days together be good and long upon the

earth.

Chuck, do you take Geri as your loving wife?

Chuck: I do

Geri, do you take Chuck as your loving husband?

Geri: I do

Mesa: I now pronounce you husband and wife. Chuck you may kiss your beautiful bride.

It was great to have so many friends and family there. For those of you that couldn't make it for the wedding, these are the first of the wedding pictures we want to share.

HOME!

Tonight we will be in Florida! I think we are going to spend a night at the state park in Port St. Joe at Cape San Blas. The plumber won't be able to fix our water problem until Tuesday, so no sense going home until we have water to wash and flush with! The trip has been great. We left Truth or Consequences 2 weeks ago today! We got to spend time with Pete and Oscar and with John both in Texas. We might go straight home too, and just stay in our camper until plumbing gets fixed, but one more adventure sounds tempting at St. Joseph Penisular State Park!


ewwwwwwwwww ugly perm, but it has loosened up some now.... not quite the brillo pad it was!
Happy Trails!

Pete and Oscar the smiley dog!

While we were in Texas, we got to visit with Pete and his furkid Oscar! Pete barbequed us some bodacious, delicious baby back ribs! WOW! They were good! Thanks Pete!

San Antonio's Riverwalk

Yesterday John took us to downtown San Antonio's famous riverwalk. It really was beautiful! A lot of the old buildings have been restored and some are undergoing renovation now. I would love to show you photo's but as I was about to take a photo of John feeding the duck's, a passing gentleman (whom I love with all my heart) accidentally hit my hand at the same time the camera was coming out of my jeans pocket..... we stood there dumbfounded as the camera clattered to the ground and gracefully slid into the water. :-( Nobody's fault and sh** happens.

The riverwalk is lined with some of the largest cypress trees I have ever seen! There are flowers everywhere! The area reminds me of St. Augustine with all the old same style buildings.
We ate lunch on the waterfront and walked for quite a distance before I pooped out and we headed back. The restaurants were amazing! They all smelled delicious! I was a bit disappointed in the shops along the riverfront, not one of them was even interesting. Saved me some $$$. Well, for a few hours anyway, because after riverwalk, John took me to Best Buy where I bought a new camera.
A smaller camera, an Olympus Stylus 7010 with 12 megapixels and 7x zoom. Sheeeeesh! My big Nikon is only 5-something megapixels! So I promise more photos on my next post! I just gotta learn this new fangled camera! Grin!
Happy Trails!