it's official: #newhobbyalert

this past week was the actual birthday week-monday i received many warm wishes throughout the day as i traveled to texas for a training. it was good to be able to meet work with julie k in leander again. we had birthday dinner at chuys, a sweet card with some starbucks love, great conversation, and an early night!

the training was fun because we got to work with many of the educators we'd previously worked with, presenting small group formation and goal setting! they were super attentive and appreciative of the information!

when i got home, i had a couple cards in the mail, and something i'd ordered. and while it's alright to get shout-outs on social media, it doesn't quite beat the good ol' fashioned in-hand card! (although..video/ pic montages from friends are also very high on the list!! ICYMI: hurricane memoires)

warm fuzzies!

saturday we took advantage of the weather, as it was forecast to rain sunday. we went out to mixon farms (thanks, groupon!) because before you can take anyone out to see a new place, you want to personally check it out and give it your seal of approval, right? right! when we got there, we went in to check out the store which was full of all sorts of chachkies...then presented the groupon for a pass-sticker, and coupon for ice creams!

once we got out on the tram, the tour guide, kayla, asked everyone where they were from. this spurred me to talk to the people in front of us because the older woman was from ohio (most people were locals)...so me (who says i don't like small talk...and to be fair, i don't, but i think it's in my blood-thanks dad-and it just comes out like word-vomit. and every time i do it, i think i roll my eyes...when i blink so no one else can tell). ugh.

the small grove

because everybody needs a little vitamin c!

brings new meaning to the good, the bad and the ugly...

we splurged and got them chocolate dipped! 

making oklahomans everywhere proud! (smudge pot is not a drug)

i was shocked at how incredibly soft his skin was! 

well, we finally got off on our tour, and kayla from oklahoma drove us slower than most of us could probably walk. they had several different types of fruit in the little orchard, and she explained that this was just a small plot of land they kept for the tours, but their bigger plot of land was further out east. after several explanations, the smudge pot, and the creek, and several trees that had been damaged in the hurricane, we finally came to the 'exotic animals.' one of the local wildlife education and rehabilitation centers partners with their farm because they have the land and are on the outskirts of town, so they are able to house these animals that can never be released back into the wild. did not realize that there is an animal hospital on anna maria island, but the young man who works with them did a great job telling us all about the animals and their stories-all about being able to tell a great story!

on the way back, pulling around the building, kayla said, "and if you're interested in the self-guided tour, go through this door and back to the black double doors and the tour begins." shea and i looked to the left, and there were several doors on the outside of the building. so when we got off the tram, we went up to figure out which door it was....i looked in a double glass door, and there was an arrangement for some sort of meeting/reception...not the correct door. we checked another that looked like a tunnel leading down some stairs...then shea went to check another and i saw our tour guide walking toward the store, and called out to her to ask where the fruit factory tour was and she said at the back of the store.  OHHHHH! so what we both heard as: through this door was actually THROUGH THE STORE! hahaha!

i'm pretty sure shea tried all of the possible freebie-taster test things...twice (orange juice 4X)- i was about to have to start telling people she was diabetic and just needed to get her insulin. (?) the orange and vanilla swirl ice cream cones were like the creamcicles from kamp-yummers!

after all was said and done, we decided it might be wise to take a walk, so we headed over to robinson preserve, as it's always a pretty good walk, plus there were some geo-caches out there. i learned quickly that i am not as big a fan of the earth-caches, although they would be especially good if you were a science teacher with students, or something of that nature. lots of questions, lots of recording information...i couldn't remember the questions before trying to answer them in the app...

the preserve really has some beautiful areas!

one of the caches disguised as an electrical box-the hint: IT'S ELECTRIC! BOOGIE WOOGIE! (sneakies!)

when we got back from the fairly full day, shea disappeared for a couple minutes, then entered the kitchen with a beautiful 'woods-inspired' box (aka: Christmas trees), which got quickly upgraded when she saw a gift bag hangin' out on the table. i had no clue what to expect, but i was NOT disappointed!! fun gear!!! AND DONUTS!!! (the two go together!) the best kinds of gifts, if we're all honest with ourselves, are the gifts in which we can share in the enjoyment! am i right? duh!

forest themed...

gift-bag-upgrade...

it's official! #newhobby

and this morning we went to find a cache in our neighborhood, then off to lowes to find some ways to create our own...it's about time to take this adventure to the next level and share in the creation! we also made it over to target where i indulged in my other hobby and may have spent the majority of my time in the card section! it had already begun to rain sprinkle, so after 1/2 price sonic drinks, we returned to our separate abodes and i then spent the remainder of the afternoon creating cache-hiding-things, and watching netflix...good times!

let the games begin! did you see the spider? 'bout to be sneaky!!

if you don't have one, get a hobby!
julie

hiking in florida is actually just walking...but hey, still nature.

i arrived home from the baby shower last sunday just before noon, so i came home and took a short nap, and then shea agreed to go out to anna maria island to do some more geocache adventuring...

it was actually pretty cool, there are several out there. the first one we went to  had a beautiful little bay-side view with a park and benches, tennis courts, bball courts, etc. i 'm fairly certain i never would have ventured in to see it, had we not been pointed in that direction. and the cache itself was super creative!

from there we walked to the next one, which was merely .5 mile, i think. not too hard of a find, but no real beauty to speak of, just a little water-logged treasure box.

then we drove to the north part of the island, if you ever visit me here, this is one of the areas we would certainly visit! parked on pine, then walked to the museun...which was closed. boo. so was the dounut shop...double whammy...we then walked up the way and found our first geo-tour 'taking-flight' cache. it was actually pretty cool, because there was a story tucked inside. 2 letters, one was like a date letter, the other an engagement letter, they also left pictures from their wedding, came back and left a picture of the positive on the preggers test-having a baby! we kinda felt like we knew them...very neat! and being a 'taking flight' cache, there was information about the native birds and how to protect them. good cache.

we then had one last one in the area to check out near the beach. it was still too cool to really enjoy the beach, but beautiful views are hard to ignore. so was the burger joint...we smelled them as we walked by, and i hadn't gone shopping for food, so... just gonna' have to put off that complete healthy eating for a minute.

fast forward--nothing major happened this week, since it's the weekend before my birthday, and i have to travel on my birthday for work, shea made sure we did something for the bday weekend- kudos to having friends!! friday night we grabbed dinner at zoe's and then decided to try to find this rolled-ice cream place in the mall...it was somewhat of a scavenger hunt, but we found it! the flavor was fabulous, but it seemed that for the price you didn't receive as much as perhaps a coldstone or a kilwins...

so glad we have one fairly close-by!

great looking presentation, just hard to get started and get the spoon through the roll to eat it...

hmm.. on the board it said: LIKE YOU A LATTE....please note the more appropriate name for my ice cream choice: LIKE THE WAY YOUR (you're) LATE (proof reading is never a bad thing). and please note the name of the shop-it reminds me of the isosceles triangle bit from geometry class.

also, i did finally get my first glimpse of our hurricane video that shea edited and put together, and it's a lot of fun! we watched it yesterday before exploring little manatee river state park, one of the state parks that's nearby. we took the 6 mile 'hike' and of course, i pulled up the app and there were geocaches here as well...so what should have taken far less time took a little longer..oops. at least the weather was fabulous, and the caches were different and interesting! not much wild-life, we saw an armadillo toward the beginning of the hike, then again at the very end back at the trail-head. apparently there was also a dead wild boar near a bridge that we missed (a mom and daughter on the trail told us about it); we figured it must have been recently killed, as there were no vultures, flies, no smell, etc. there were a couple of times the app on the phone didn't go off, so we backtracked to find the sign-in-logs...i think we may have confused some of the other trail-walkers, so we of course did our best to explain.

but first...donuts!! weren't sure about the sausage and gravy donuts, but wow!

found an orange tree in the rough....

found the spikes on the tree...

just shea playing on the furniture

this tree fell during irma, and they had to cut branches to make the trail passable

cache 1 off the beaten trail

cache 2 looked like it was in a mini toolbox

cache 3 was hidden in a hole in the rock...

cache 4 was just a dangler

"amazing the change of vegetation that even a few feet in elevation will produce" said a blogger...umm..could it the land closer to the river have different vegetation than the land further away?

 my knees were feeling the 6 miles-mostly because it wasn't regular flat sidewalk. it was a good hike, i probably out to do this more often than i do, but most of the good state parks in florida seem to be a bit further north, requiring a full day at least to not feel exhausted by the drive to and from. planning. these will require planning.

i felt it this morning, so i lounged for a bit, but the weather got way too nice out to just sit around inside...although i did sit around in my pajamas a little longer than i should have before finally talking shea into getting outdoors too! in tomorrow's edition!

julie

the case of pooh. or pooh in the globe in the case...

last weekend was a whirlwind...i blinked and it was over! i left for katy, tx on saturday morning, as they were having a baby shower for one of my dear friends. i was looking forward to an easy flight... i had originally planned to check a bag, but decided last minute that if i could fit everything into a carryon, that would be the new plan. and so it was.

unfortunately, as i was going through tsa and they pulled my bag off the conveyor, i remembered WHY i was going to check my bag!! ugh. so i watched her open it, and unfortunately the gift was wrapped. she was trying so meticulously to get the tape off, and to not tear anything, so i told her, "look, don't worry, just rip it off, at this point i'd rather just re-wrap it, but i need to to get down to the counter to check it and back up through security..." basically i kept looking at my clock and hoping she'd get the hint.

the most frustrating part of it all is that i had just read a story on fb about a couple that had to throw their snowglobe away because it was too big and they didn't have time to get down to check it -it had their pictures for an adopted grandchild, etc and a lady saw the whole thing, fished the snowglobe out and found them a month later to return it to them... all the feels...

(i'm thankful i got my tsa pre!) but seriously, c'mon, now tsa...a freakin' winnie the pooh snowglobe? this seems like overkill to me...

finally when this tsa lady was done, she walked me out and i took monorail to the terminal and the elevator down to the ticket counter to check my bag. as i got off the elevator, i realized that my phone stylus was missing! ugh. i use it a lot!

no time to back track, i got my bag checked and made my way back through security, and remembered that my phone had fallen while i was waiting for the tsa person. i breathed a sigh of relief when i went back to that table and the stylus was there near a power cord! yay, me!

fairly uneventful flight, the dallas layover was short, and when i got to the houston airport, i went to pick up the rental car. as i pulled around to exit, the lady asked for my license. i couldn't find it, so i backed out and went through EVERYTHING! purse (small) pocket by pocket, card by card, backpack-same, no dice. after about 10 minutes of looking and re-looking, i drove back to the parking lot (she had already called the front desk to make sure they hadn't accidentally forgotten to give it back). i was getting frustrated, as i was going to need that to fly home! so i parked the car back in the lot and got out of the car, and i think i must be the luckiest person alive, as it was on the ground behind the car next to me...whew!

so now i'd wasted about 30 minutes, and felt rather silly being frustrated, thinking in the back of my mind that the id was at the front desk and they just couldn't find it... so i was off. i'd been craving whataburger pretty much since i moved to florida, so i had planned to make that stop once i got to katy. and it was worth it!

then i remembered that i had to stop for gift-wrap! once i found some, let the wrapping games begin! i purchased a small exacto knife instead of scissors-cheaper, but not necessarily as brilliant... so i cut the first piece, which was plenty large, but sitting in the car gave me some difficulty-and it was looked pretty rough. i had to rip tape off, because i cut my finger with the exacto knife (a tiny cut, but it bled, nonetheless!) so i taped my finger to avoid messing up more paper, and cut off another large piece...this time, i pulled up a video i had seen of a really cool wrapping job, and tried that-on the trunk of the car. this was difficult, as it was breezy out, and the sun was bright, making it difficult to see what the guy in the video was doing...and then i realized the paper was not quite large enough...not about to do a patch-job! so i cut off one more large piece, and used the tried and true wrapping format. at one point someone pulled up nearby and i thought the kids might be filming the crazy lady wrapping gifts in the parking lot, struggling.

i don't recommend trying to wrap in a car

impromptu-make-do bandage

originally i was supposed to have plenty of time. such was not the case. i was a little late. boo. but i arrived and got to meet some of the family and friends, and stayed for a bit to chit chat afterward. i love seeing friends, and especially on such a joyous occasion! she was certainly showered with love!

but this little girl was there!!

i'd share pictures of the shower, but i forgot to ask for permission, but it was super sweet!

i traveled home the sunday, and it went much better than the previous day!

this was the only downer....i asked for the panini, and they gave me cibatta..ugh. if i'm going to have bread, at least give me the kind i like!!

 fortunately all was on time, and i got home at a decent hour and there was time for shea and me to go out and find a few more caches to add to our geocache tally!! more about that in the next posting, because it was pretty cool!!

great day!
julie

manatee geotours, thanksgiving meatballs in jan, and a firearm (not a flaming body part)

after my first adventure in geo-chaching, i started to look around (on the app), trying to find out a little more about certain caches called geo-tour: TAKING FLIGHT. it piqued my curiosity. so i went to the website and found out that this is a special geotour series in manatee county, the first (and currently only, i believe) geotour in florida featuring native birds! note: i am NOT a bird-watcher, but i have enjoyed and been quite fascinated by the birds here, not to mention all the migratory birds.

so i guess i'll be exploring birds over the course of the next few months! i had to stop at g.t. bray park to pick up my passport, and while there, i asked the guy-aiden- who might i contact when i am ready to begin participating in creating my own caches? he said it would be him for any of the parks in manatee county....that was easier than i expected! although it will be awhile before i create my own, as they suggest finding at least 20 in order to understand and see a variety.

also while at the parks office, i may or may not have picked up a calendar- hopefully it was complimentary... and if not, i will offer some compliments right now- GREAT PICS!!! and interesting information! we're all good now!

if we go to 12 of the 17 geotours, they will give us a free geotracker (basically a tracker you hide in a cache and other people find it and it begins traveling...reminds me a little of a flat stanley!)

 i also received my books... i decided to check out the series, because a radio talk host had mentioned reading it to his son every summer. what grabbed my attention is that the main character, the hero if you will, has tourettes (not severe), and is a young teenager. if you have teenagers, or pre-teens, this might be a fun book for them. super easy read, and they can learn some great trivial information along the way!

book 3

 in other news, i had some ground pork i purchased this week that i needed to cook up before i take off for the weekend! so i made some italian meatballs, a cranberry dipping sauce (from my favorite paleo cookbook), and i had a hard time putting them down and putting them away!! ugh. i had also baked some blueberry lemon muffins (same cookbook) and they are great without, but also taste great with the cranberry sauce!

last night i got a text from shea, who was expecting a lady to go over to pick up a dresser. it's always somewhat of a wild-card having someone come to your home to buy a large piece of furniture, so it's good to have back-up. i was inside checking something on my phone when she went out to get the dresser ready. when i walked out, she said, "it's all good, i have a can of spray paint and a tennis racket within arm's reach, just in case." i smiled and told her i brought my gun... good to be prepared...just in case. her response was, "at least let me give it my best shot first, then step in if i need it!" smile.

it was a really nice little brazilian family, unfortunately the dresser dimensions were a little too big for the suv, and they had to reschedule to borrow family's truck. but it was fun listening to them speak in portuguese, and the daughter was a little bilingual whiz! #translator #bilingualisabenefit

speaking of guns, i need to go down to the shooting range in sarasota and renew get a florida permit... learn the laws of this new land.

this morning i had a good pre-planning session for some trainings that will be coming up in february. it's always fun working with people we don't usually get to play with, because that is the best way to get ideas and share insights!

there you have it, looking forward to a fun, whirlwind weekend- hang in there, it's almost here!
julie

s'more fun & games...cache me if you canister!

the remainder of Christmas break was excellent. the drive was long, but worth it. once i got home, i rested a bit, went to the beach for a hammock day, but i had to get a towel and fleece from the car because it was a bit breezy, so my hammock became more of a cocoon! yes, florida got a bit of a cold snap like the rest of the country- it dipped about 15 degrees lower than normal for this time.

for new years eve, i ran some errands, then met friends at the old salty dog for an early dinner. later that evening i met up with shea and jason for s'mores and an early countdown!

 and then the next few days i spent with the hot hands in my pockets and the heating pad on my lap and finally gave in and turned the heat up, i set up the mini-travel humidifier that my brother and sister-in-law got for me-which will be especially nice when i travel, and then watched the sandal wind-chime my mom got for me, not realizing that it changes colors and is solar powered! i'm the coolest kid on the block!

life saver!

if you look carefully you can see the air!

see the color change?!

i also got to do my first webinar last week, and it went well-fortunately it was a small crowd- good way to ease back into work!

this weekend we were trying to think of something different to do, so we stopped at the sea haag-a shop where they have some fun trinkets, art, all things nautical/mermaid, and outdoors it's mostly salvage-yard of the sea-goods.

from there we went to find the peacocks on longboat key! we may have spent more time than necessary taking way more pictures than required...but they were just so beautiful! as we were leaving, i stopped an older gentleman walking his dog and asked him about these birds. so he gave me the history. apparently, they have been in the neighborhood since about 1912, when perhaps some circus-folk brought them down (all the exotic animals weathering in florida), and the 1 male and 3 females multiplied and at times the flock was overwhelming, so from time to time they ship birds up to sanctuaries in atlanta and i'm sure elsewhere.

surely the homeowners were like, 'please, get off our lawn already!'

this doesn't even do justice to the neon greens and blue!!

since we were down in that area, and it was too cold to go to the beach, i had downloaded the geocache app, because i have been wanting to try out this little adventure they call GEOCACHE! a very fun little treasure hunt! if i had a family, it would be one of our favorite things to do!! so i talked shea into trying our hand at it! first off, geo because the caches are hidden in fun, pretty areas, or areas with special intrigue that you may not notice if you weren't looking for it! the park we ended up at was a community park, and we really didn't know exactly how to use the app, so we were going in the wrong direction, and once we turned around and started to figure it out, things went fairly smoothly! we found all three caches in the park, and the park was bigger than expected-took us right out to the bay and looped back around!

one of the cool things about geocache-ing is that if you find a cache with little treasures, you can take a treasure and etiquette is that you replace it with an object of equal value, sign the log, and put it back in place carefully!

contents and logs, this one had logs back to 2014

one of our treasures!

these are some fun treasures i plan to use...i created little boxes because it makes the treasures even more fun! but i also have some small trinkets that will be box-less.

so, our first adventure was a success, they suggest finding at least 20 before creating your own cache so that you can get ideas and create long-lasting caches that can be visited for years to come. now i just need to start saving up canisters to use as caches! if you are looking for something fun to do, and have a nancy drew, encyclopedia brown mind, you should definitely check into it, because it is great fun, and it will expose you to beautiful areas that you may not notice otherwise!! www.geocaching.com so yeah, check it out!

have an adventure!
julie