First Part of March

March is off to an interesting start, so I am breaking my monthly writing pattern and dropping a mid-month post.

 

The boys and I went to a Spring Training game. I visited with my dad beforehand. Unfortunately, he is not doing great. He was in the hospital for a bit and is now in the nursing home section of his facility (as opposed to assisted living). He is pretty miserable but can’t move back upstairs until he gains some strength. He also developed a severe infection, and they have him in isolation. On the positive side, the antibiotics have cleared up some of his confusion.

 

The game was super fun, we saw Scherzer pitch and some of our favorites that we followed from the Flying Tigers (Clark, Anderson, and McGonigle). Luke got a ball, and we had great seats—a good time was had by all!

Kara is still nursing her sprained ankle. Her lacrosse coach was giving her a hard time and made her go see the school’s athletic trainer for another opinion. The visit got her coach to accept her injury and she is off the field until after our Spring Break. Fortunately, her ankle is doing better and she is walking without crutches. She had to call out of two shifts at Wawa and she thinks they are silently firing her, as she is not scheduled at all in the next month.

 

Anna and I went to a presentation Monday night by Western Carolina University. It is one of her top choices and she got some swag and enjoyed learning more about the school. She still isn’t sure she is ready to move away, but we shall see.

 

Senior skip day was Friday. Anna asked Thomas and I to take her to Magic Kingdom. We took the day off, but Luke was sick on Thursday…again. He has been sick a lot lately, so even though the symptoms were not serious (low grade fever, general aches and pains) we took him to the doctor Friday morning. He was feeling better, but again, we were concerned that he seems to keep getting sick, then better for a week or so, then sick again. They diagnosed him with mono, which explained quite a bit. With Luke’s consent, we left him at home and went to Disney. We had a fun visit, but the park got crowded, so were home by 2.

I call this one "Bougie Anna"

In the meantime, Jack went to school to take a test and then skipped out to go to SkyZone with a friend. He was also home early and was playing Axis and Allies with Luke when we got home. That night, Thomas and Luke went to a UCF baseball game. Luke’s coach is a former Knight and still holds the school record for most homeruns. He is in the UCF baseball Hall of Fame and was throwing out the first pitch. They announced Luke and his teammates and let them stand on the field with the college players before the game. (Luke had the doctor’s permission to do whatever he felt up to, just cautioned not to share drinks.) 

Luke and the record setting Coach Duffy.

I would have gone to the UCF game, but I was at Jack’s band’s MPA. It was sad knowing it was the last one. They played very well, in fact, two of the three judges gave them a standing ovation. I enjoy the MPA, the kids play their chosen songs and then have to sight-read two pieces. I find the sight-reading part fascinating. I took video, but no pictures. And, even if I did take pictures, you wouldn't be able to find Jack.

 

Over the weekend, Luke played in a baseball tournament. His team finished second, so they got rings. Luke pitched a complete game and did really well hitting. He was tired but had a good time. Kara went to a sleepover at a huge Disney-themed AirBnB, the perks of living in Orlando. Jack and Anna hung out with friends. I did some shopping and cleaning. 

Mismatched uniforms because the new ones haven't come in. 

The week has past uneventfully. Spring Break officially starts tomorrow (Friday the 13th) but none of the kids went to school today. Grades are final for the quarter, so all of them swore there was no work to be done. Kara went to the beach with friends. Jack and Anna went to lunch at Chick-Fil-A. Luke just hung out at home. It was a peaceful start to their week off.

February

Another month has come and gone. If I keep up my once-a-month-writing-trend, this year will produce the fewest blogs since I started blogging in 2011. April will mark my 15th anniversary of blogging! Maybe it is time to quit?

So, big news for February: Kara turned 17! I look at the 3 oldest kids and sometimes wonder how we got here. When the kids were little, I definitely agreed with the adage that the days were long and the years were short. Now, it just seems like everything is short! Anyway, she turned 17 and didn't want to have a party. The lacrosse season is in full swing, so timing was difficult. Instead, we did lots of mini celebrating. We had a few chosen meals. On the day after her birthday, she and Anna skipped school and Thomas and I took a vacation day and went to Hollywood Studios. It was stupidly crowded, even StarTours had a decent wait. But, we walked around, had lunch and then walked to the Boardwalk. We had never walked there before (always taken boat or Skyliner) but it was a beautiful day to be outside. We walked around the Boardwalk and had a reservation for dessert at Beaches and Cream. For gifts, she got a giftcard to Ross and a needoh from her siblings. Thomas and I got her the internet and drink package for our upcoming cruise. The girls and I also went to the Cheesecake Factory and the Mall at Millenia. Hopefully, she felt well celebrated.

At Beaches n Cream

Thomas and Jack went to a Spring Training game and had fun. The only thing Thomas consistently likes about Florida is Spring Training, so I hope he can get to a few games this year. Unfortunately, they had a mishap on the drive down when a piece of metal flew out from (maybe) the car in front of them and did $2300 worth of damage to the van. We are thankful it wasn't worse and that no one was hurt. 

Jack did not get in to the Honors College at FSU. He still got into UF, FSU, UCF, and USF. So, plenty of great options, but he is feeling a little let down by his prospects for the future. He believes that AI makes college fairly pointless and is having a hard time finding something he is excited about. He lamented again how he wishes he could join the miliary. But, as I've written--his food allergies are too severe and disqualifying. He's had two track meets so far. In one he ran the Steeple Chase, which was pretty entertaining. 

the water element is pretty fun in the Steeple Chase

In more  Kara news, she sprained her ankle and missed a couple of days of school. It was super swollen and bruised. 

Hmm, I don't have many pictures for the month, so I guess this will have to do for the highlight reel. Anna is staying consistent with her daily walks, she does 4 miles every day after school. Luke is enjoying baseball. The team switched locations and we had hoped it would be closer, but alas it is not. School is going well for everybody. 

We enjoyed watching the Olympics this month. We watched live whenever we could and replays of some events we were interested in. Thomas was fascinated by curling. I loved mountaineering and ski jumping. We watched the men's hockey team beat Russia live and watched the women's gold medal victory on replay (we were at work when it was live). And, in between, we caught bits and pieces of other events. I am sad it is over!

January

I’m not sure why I’ve lost my motivation to blog. But, I just haven’t felt like it lately. So, this will be a quick recap of the month of the January.

Jack got accepted into UF! They are ranked 7^th in the country for public universities (30^th overall), so even with his amazing stats, it didn’t feel like a given that he would be admitted. Now, he is waiting to hear if he got into FSU’s honor college. That decision will come next week. Then, he should have all the information he needs to make a choice. He only applied to Florida colleges, so we know he won’t be too far no matter which one he picks. In other news, he joined the track team, which forced him to give up tutoring. I don’t think he misses it.

 

Anna is looking forward to the end of senior year. The last day for seniors is less than a hundred days away. I still remember the project they did on the hundredth day of kindergarten. Thirteen years sure went by quickly! I don’t like it.

 

Most of us (Kara was at work) went to Animal Kingdom for one last ride on Dinosaur (well, two last rides since we rode twice). It has always been one of our favorite rides and I am sad to see it close. Unfortunately, the camera wasn’t working, so we didn’t get a last ride picture. It is too bad, because Thomas and Jack recreated the photo from our first Disney trip. It was one of Jack’s first ‘scary’ rides and going on with him as an 18-year-old and remembering him as a little 5-year-old was another reminder on the quickening passage of time.

Little scared Jack in 2013. 

And now, at Animal Kingdom on our last Dinosaur day.

Some other highlights: We went to Hollywood Studios one night. They still had the Christmas decorations up, which was fun. 

We were there on January 14th, so the lights surprised us.

We also went to the Orlando Wetlands. It hadn’t rained in a while, but we did a back trail that was super muddy. We walked about 5 miles, it was a beautiful day and we enjoyed it. From there we went to Steak-n-Shake. That was a fun day. 

walking on branches and trying to avoid mud

being silly at the bat house

Luke went to a birthday party at a trampoline place for his best elementary school friend. They are at different schools now and don’t get to see each other very often so it was nice to get them together. 

Luke, Anna, Thomas and I went to Aquatica’s Illuminate event. It was really pretty and they had cool bubble machines. When you touched one of the bubbles they turned into smoke. I felt like I was in Harry Potter! 

Anna got a third ear piercing. She is 18 so not parent permission was required. Lacrosse started up for Kara. The team practices every day after school. They have something like 16 games this season, so she is going to be very busy. 

Thomas and I celebrated our half birthdays. It started as a joke, Thomas kept talking about how his half-birthday was approaching and it was the same day as UF admissions were announced, so would be a true day of celebration. It took me far longer than I'd like to admit to realize that if his half-birthday was coming, that meant mine was as well. So, I told him that he could set the tone and however he celebrated for me would be how I celebrated for him. It was just us being silly, but the kids took it to heart. 

I came home from work to this fun surprise. Cookies, a present and balloons!

 

Other than that, it has been work, school and sports. The early part of the month was pretty quiet and it was great having everyone home for dinner every night. Now, we are back in the thick of opposing schedules.  It is nice having Jack and Kara driving—there is far less transport required of Thomas and me. Anna has her permit and hopes to get her license soon. She’s not in a hurry, but does want to have it before starting college.

2025: Year in Review

Another year has come and gone! The highlights are often the vacations, this year we had two Caribbean cruises (a 4-night for Kara’s birthday and a 4-night over Spring Break). We also spent Thanksgiving week in Tennessee. And, there was a weekend trip with just the boys to see the Tigers play the Rays. All of that was amazing, but my favorite vacation this year was the 2-weeks we spent at home around Christmas and New Years. We didn’t travel anywhere and it was low-key and relaxing. I spent a lot of time reading, puzzling, and playing games and it was incredibly hard to go back to work. I even bought a lottery ticket in the hopes of making that my everyday reality, but alas, did not strike it rich.

 

Anna got her first job as a camp counselor at Elks. She did not like it. It was hard to be away from home and she struggled with the work ethic of some of her fellow counselors. She did love the kids and many other aspects of the job.  She turned 18 in October and vacillates between wanting to be treated like an adult and reaping the benefits and low-responsibility life of childhood. Unfortunately, she doesn’t really enjoy her classes this year. She was accepted to several colleges but decided to stay home and attend the local community college. She is not sure what she wants to study and hopes to find something that strikes a passion. She did well on the SAT and has a high GPA, qualifying for Bright Futures, so by staying at home, she can get her associates degree for free.

 

Jack had a great year. He did amazing on the SAT, including a perfect score on English and an overall superscore of 1560. He only applied to the Florida state colleges (FSU, UF, UCF, and USF). He won’t hear from UF until next week but has gotten into the others with scholarship offers. I wish he had tried for some reach schools but I am also happy to have him closer to home. Right now, he is leaning toward attending FSU. He had fun being in the band and enjoyed his last marching season. He is still tutoring and is in a few clubs at school. He has lots of friends and seems to always have somewhere to be. He did not run cross-country this year but is maybe going to do track.

 

Kara also worked as a camp counselor. She loved it! She also loved making her own money, so much so that she got a job at Wawa. It has been a great first job. She only works about 8 hours a week (usually on Sunday mornings), which gives her spending money, but still allows her to keep up with her friends, schoolwork, and other activities. She enjoys playing lacrosse and is excited for the new season to start. She got her driver’s license and has been driving everywhere. She is doing great in school, despite taking 6 AP/AICE  classes.

 

Luke started middle school. His longstanding baseball team disbanded. He is playing on another team, but they are a lot less experienced as a whole.  However, the coaching is really good and we expect that Luke will grow as a player. He likes the coaches and the kids and their families all seem nice, so everyone is happy enough. He is taking piano and theater as his electives and enjoys both. He cleaned up at the 5^th grade graduation ceremony, winning many academic awards.

 

Overall, the kids are doing well. I wish that they were closer friends with each other, especially the older ones. They are all in different friend groups and never include each other in activities with their friends. And, if one of them has friends over, the others seem to actively avoid the situation (except Luke).  One of my brothers and I were a year apart in school and while we didn’t always hang out with each other, it wasn’t unusual for us to do so and many of our friends were mutual. Of course, we aren’t very close now, so maybe it doesn’t mean anything at all. But, it makes me sad to think of my kids growing up and not being close and with Jack leaving home soon, it is at the forefront of my mind right now.

 

Thomas and I are back in the office. It has been a very stressful year. I honestly believed I was going to lose my job and it was terrible to have that hanging over my head for 8ish months. As the most junior attorney in my office (even with 14.5 years of Government experience) I still don’t feel completely secure, but at least it feels less inevitable than it did last February. It was a crappy way to live, always feeling like any day could bring notice of unemployment. But, almost a year later, we both are still employed and for that I am thankful. Of course, I miss telework, but I am happy to have kept my job.

 

I think that about summarizes everyone in 2025. As always, I am most thankful that everyone is healthy and doing well. At the end of the day, that is all that really matters.

 

Favorite thing this year:

Thomas: TN trip

Kori: the two weeks of vacation around Christmas

Anna: TN trip

Jack: Spring Break (band trip and cruise)

Kara: TN trip

Luke: Spring Break cruise

 

Most looking forward to in 2026:

Thomas: seeing what happens with all the kids' big changes

Kori: hopefully 2 restful weeks of vacation in Dec/Jan

Anna: traveling

Jack: mountains

Kara: Spring Break cruise

Luke: finally trying Mardi Gras (cruise ship)

Christmas

Thomas and I love the Clint Black Christmas album. I legit love every song on the album (Looking for Christmas) and we listen to it every  year. It has a good mix of song types and I personally believe it is criminally underrated. One of the songs is called Slow as Christmas and has the lyrics: Every Christmas day makes every other day seem long; And what seemed would never get here; Has so quickly come and gone.

That is how I am feeling today, December 31st. I can't believe another Christmas has come and gone. I spend all year looking forward to December. Thomas and I take two weeks off from work, the kids are off from school and it is a quiet, reflective, fun, relaxing, time. 

So, what have we done? Of course, theme parks. But, they are usually too crowded for us to go the weeks of Christmas and New Years. Kim and her family and Kevin came over on New Years Eve. We did a white elephant exchange and had a good time. We haven't been to see my dad yet (well, I saw him, but the whole family will go down there soon to deliver his Christmas gifts). We went to see the first Harry Potter in the theaters. We've watched movies and played games. Yesterday, we went to Fort Christmas and Steak n Shake. There was last minute shopping and holiday baking. We also upgraded our phones. It's been a really nice break. I'm glad it is not quite over. 

Christmas Day was nice. I thank Alecia every year for giving us the idea of having our big meal on Christmas Eve and then taking it easy on Christmas Day. I do make a breakfast casserole, but that's it. I basically take close to a week off from cooking. 

Christmas Eve

Christmas Morning

I was happy our teens still wanted to get up early. Anna pushed for 6, everyone else was good with a later start, and we settled on 630. We are an open gifts one at a time family. I didn't realize that wasn't how everyone did it, but that's always been our method. I like to see what everyone gets and what they think. We try and make things relatively equal, both in amount and money, but we aren't crazy rigid about it. However, this year, I thought we had actually done it and gotten all the kids the exact same number of gifts. But, somehow some people still had presents when others were out. It's not a big deal to anyone, I don't think the kids care, but to me it is always funny how it works out. I think the number and what we spend is a little above average (at least according to my impromptu Google Search right now) but it's nothing crazy and we don't really do gifts otherwise. Even for birthdays, we are more of an experience family. All that to say, we enjoy buying gifts for Christmas and seeing reactions. 

Everyone was happy with what they received. I got some fun surprises this year. Thomas got us tickets to go hang out with goats, which we did on Monday. And, Kara got us tickets to see Legally Blonde in April. So, my Christmas won't be over for a few more months. 

To end, some pictures from our goat experience.

The Goat Whisperer

Month 'O (mostly) Fun!

I feel like we have been going nonstop since we got home from Tennessee. I LOVE the theme parks in December and we have been visiting as often as we can. There have been lots of Friday nights at Sea World and lots of random Disney days. We've only made it to Universal once, but hopefully we'll get back there again before the end of the year. 

Friday was our last chance to go to Disney before we are blocked out for the remainder of the year. Thomas and I took the day off from work and went to Epcot. I like listening to the various world storytellers speak about holiday traditions in their countries. We heard Father Christmas in England, Pere Noelle in France, a Hannukah singer, the Daruma Storyteller in Japan, and we caught two different sets with the Voices of Liberty. It was super fun. We also rode Guardians, which was kind of a mess. When we got to Epcot, it said it was a 45-minute wait. 75 minutes later, we were right at the merge point when ride operations suspended. I complained (nicely) to guest services and got a fast pass to return. So, we did.

We went to Jack's last Prism concert and the show was amazing as always. There is literally no down-time, they just move around the theater from act-to-act. Our whole family loved it.

Jack got his wisdom teeth out on Monday, the 15th. He was funny coming out of anesthesia, all he wanted to do was talk. I kept telling him to keep the gauze in and not talk and then he would tell me okay, then ask when he could talk; twenty seconds later he'd try and talk and the cycle repeated. His recovery is going well, although he is still a bit swollen. 

Speaking of Jack, he's heard from 3 Florida colleges--UCF, FSU and USF. UF will release results in late January. He never ended up applying to any out-of-state schools. He is hoping to get into FSU's honor college, but won't know until February if he made it. We are really proud of him regardless!

Today (the 20th), I took Anna, Kara and Luke to Marta's to build their traditional gingerbread manger scenes. Marta makes amazing gingerbread! She had lots of treats prepared for them to use and they had a great time making their mangers. I joined them for a bit and then went and had lunch with my sister, which was really nice. Then, I went back to Marta's; Elizabeth was there and we played a really fun game (Exploding Pigeons) and chatted more. We hadn't seen them in a while and it was good to catch-up.

I'm not sure who's manger this, but it is a fun tradition the kids have with Marta.

Hmm, guess I didn't have as much to say as I thought. I had lunch one Monday with my friend Sunshine (we try and meet on the first Monday of the month). We had a work Christmas party, I got mad when I didn't win the party games (it was a three-way tie and they drew names to pick the winner--it wasn't me).  I visited with my dad. Luke had his first piano recital, but it was during the school day and parents weren't invited. However, the teacher sent a recording and we heard Luke practice (a lot). We will be able to attend the end of the year recital. 

It has been a fun, busy month so far. Still more to come, of course.  A few more photos from the theme parks to conclude:

One of our Friday nights at SeaWorld. I think we've gone 3 or 4 times. All of the kids have gone at one point or another, although I don't think we've had a night with everyone together.

Hollywood Studios. Kara was here too, just not in the picture. We got rained out and missed the lights on the Tower of Terror.

So, we went back another night. This time only Anna joined.

This was an unusual occurrence--only Jack wanted to go to Magic Kingdom. I think we left too early for Anna and Luke and Kara was working.

Rest of TN/I Almost Killed Jack

Tennessee Tuesday: We started our day with a visit to the Relic Room. Jack was able to find a very old Roman coin that he used his birthday money to purchase. We had lunch at Freddy’s, which we had not heard of but are everywhere in Tennessee. It was like a Steak-n-Shake and it was fine. Then, we went to Dollywood. It was empty compared to Sunday.  We rode the newest ride, Big Bear Mountain, 5 times and never waited more than 10 minutes. Virtually everything was a walk-on, which was super fun. We rode all the rides, ate more cinnamon bread, and browsed the shops. The emptiness was attributable to the weather—it rained on and off all day, but nothing we couldn’t handle and there was no lightning, so (almost all) the rides remained open. We kept an eye on the forecast and left just before the heaviest rain was imminently forecasted, I think around 730.

Wednesday: We went to Forbidden Caverns in the morning. We all thought it was pretty awesome. 

From there, we went to a small general store. Then, it was lunch and off to pick up our ready-to-heat Thanksgiving meal from Publix. Then, we went to world’s largest Bu-cee’s. 

We headed back to the rental and Kara did some senior photos of Anna with the lake and mountain views. That evening, we went to Bass Pro Shops and then stopped at Food City and picked up dinner and discounted donuts for Thursday’s breakfast. One of them was labeled as “Maple and Bacon” which I thought sounded like something Jack would like (this is foreshadowing…). We had an early night, this may be when we watched the Weird Al movie (or maybe the boys watched Planes Trains and Automobiles, both were watched at some point during our week). 

Behind the scenes

Bass Pro had an awesome fireplace

Thanksgiving Thursday. People ate the discounted donuts for breakfast. Jack took one bite of the Maple and Bacon and said it tasted awful and like something was wrong with it. He also said his throat felt funny. He told Anna to try and she immediately realized it tasted like nuts. I took a look and realized it was covered in walnuts!!! What I thought were little pieces of bacon were actually walnuts, aka death to Jack! Ugh, we definitely should have paid more attention, but donuts are a treat we frequently buy and they rarely have nuts (sometimes peanut butter, but those have pb in the name). He ended up using both epi-pens and to make a long story short—is fine. But, I was stressed out about it all day Thursday and Friday (worried about an additional delayed reaction). I felt super guilty and couldn’t sleep. It was awful. We still had our Thanksgiving dinner, it was fine. And the boys went to a park in the afternoon to play football.
 
Friday: We were supposed to do horseback riding and a petting zoo. But, it was cold, like below-freezing. So, we decided to go into town and browse the local stores. We bought a few things and enjoyed a really cool antique store. We also climbed up a dyke and I got a fun picture of Jack (trying to encourage him to do his pictures with Kara too).

We had leftovers for lunch and went to Perkins for dinner and then stopped at Food City for road trip snacks. Kara and I went in the hot tub. Then, we packed up. We left at 5AM Friday and had a mostly good drive, lots of traffic, but we still made it home by 330.

 

Other than the last-minute house snafu and almost killing Jack, we had a great trip. Everyone wants to go back in the summer and do some warm-weather activities. 

To conclude, some of Kara's photos of Anna: