Home from our FL/TX vacation! This is loooong....

This is the lighthouse at Sanibel Island, FL.

We had a great trip, saw 2 different sets of cousins and 2 sets of friends, too. First we stopped in Homosassa, FL to have a visit and breakfast with Jim's cousin Peg and her friend, Jimmy, that was wonderful. We had time for a nice chatty visit at their lovely home in their wooded neighborhood and a great brekkie at their favorite local restaurant where everyone knows everyone else, a real fun place.

Then we headed south to Pine Island to visit his other cousin, Joan, and her husband Charlie. Joan and Charlie are an absolute delight and so much fun to be around. They have a lovely home on a waterway where we saw manatees toodling about and a pod/school/swarm of baby manta rays, they were so cute! ( I wasn't quick enough with the camera, darn it!)

We went out in their boat on Friday and went over to Sanibel Island where I BRAVELY went into the (shark infested, in my mind) water and walked on the sand bar looking for shells, up to my armpits at some points. Eeek. Scares me now, just thinking about it. Jim and Joan and Charlie came along to protect me!

Then we scooted over to the Sanibel Harbour Resort/Marriot for a lovely lunch which got funnier and funnier as the time passed. Our waiter, Chris, kept bringing us huge glasses of iced tea with bendy straws. Every time he'd come, one of the straws wouldn't work- there were holes in the bendy parts and you'd be sucking up air instead of tea. Finally, after the 3rd one, Jim told Chris that he would be sure to never buy condoms from him. OMG. We all just died, right there on the table, laughing. Even Chris played along, saying "is that why I have 6 kids?" lol He was a fun, sassy waiter in what could have been a bit of a snooty atmosphere, but he sure made it fun for us. (All four of us were in wet clothes from being in the water earlier and while we ate outside on the balcony, we still didn't feel like we were dressed correctly.) After lunch, and with MORE iced tea in to-go cups, we went back to the island and Joanie and I walked the beach for a while. That was nice, too.

After a nice boat ride back to their house, we swam in the pool, ate more wonderful food, drank nice wine, dinner and dominoes! We played Mexican Train every night- first it was every man for himself, then the next night it was the girls against the guys and then mixed couples. It was riot, we had to learn their rules so we made them conform to some of ours to even it out. It was lively to say the least. :) I think I didn't fall asleep until about 4 AM that next day, all that iced tea really affected me! I don't usually drink caffeinated stuff, wow.

The next day was Saturday and it was my birthday. Joanie took me shopping, I wanted to go to some quilt shops and spend birthday money. :) We went to 2 of them, they were both wonderful, then she treated me to lunch out and then we went to a Joann's and a Beall's to get some shoes for Jim and a shirt to fish in. What a lovely store! Then we headed back to find the boys at the door with glasses of cold adult beverages in their hands, for us! They had worked all day on getting the boat ready to leave for the summer, as they summer up north. They were pooped but not too tired to fix us a lovely shrimp scampi dinner to celebrate. And we had Angel food cake with strawberries and whipped cream for dessert. What a wonderful day!

Here you can see all the fabric I bought over the course of the vacation.

I needed more black and whites after starting that hexagon quilt.

I always need more blues and greens!

I even found some precious Heather Ross tadpoles! Man, that's yummy soft fabric! And I think I'll make a bag out of the mermaid fabric.

The word bubbles and the blah, blah, blah are Maxine fabrics and just above that is some hard to find Laurel Burch rainbow hearts hummingbirds, 4 fat quarters, woot!

And I was getting low on oranges, reds and purples, too.

After a few wonderful days at Pine Island, we headed north a bit to Indian Shores. We had a great brunch of crustless quiche and dandelion salad at Patrick and Katie's townhouse and a fun visit before heading over to the condo they graciously lent us for our visit. It was on the 5th floor and practically across Gulf Blvd from their home. Very convenient. And lovely, it had everything anyone would need there, even a Christmas tree in the closet! This is the view from our balcony, overlooking the beautiful Gulf.

We were only there for about 2.5 days, but it was fun and we ate out some, in some, and out again. The beach was pretty quiet, too, I guess a lot of people canceled their plans thinking of the oil spill. There was NO oil at all, the beach was as wonderful as usual. I think we found about 15 fossilized sharks teeth in one day.

I got to visit a friend for a bit and hit my favorite quilt shop in Dunedin, Rainbow's End, and Jim and I did a few repairs for Pat and Kay at the same time. Jim is such a handy guy! He fixed a leaking water line in their fridge and rehung a broken kitchen cabinet door. None of which was easy, but the man got it done!

Then we headed for TX, after coffee the last morning with Pat and Kay...

to be continued.....