The Bunnel family organized a block party on Mantengo circle, and we attended along with many other families in the neighborhood. They blocked off the road, and had a band and bounce houses. The kids had fun playing with everyone, and it was cute to see Paige recognizing other friends from school. She and Connor both know so many people now from their school, they see someone they know everywhere we go. We didn't stay too late, it got very dark on the street once the sun went down, but it was nice to catch up with some friends we hadn't seen in a while.
Paige was being silly at lunch, so I took a picture of her with two spoons in her mouth. The two kids have been so good at meals out lately. Just today our waitress commented on the fact that they both had the best manners. It's becoming natural for them, and it's so much more relaxing to take them places.
Connor's back in to NASCAR racing again. I've been thinking of taking him to the Daytona 500 every year we've been in Florida, but he is in to certain things and then out of them at odd times and he never cares about NASCAR racing when it's actually on TV or happening. Anyways, he's been doing his racing some more recently and he likes it when he moves the cars and I do an "announcer's" voice and narrate the action.
This past Wednesday was my 36th birthday. On Tuesday, we did our family pictures up in the Amelia Island area, and then afterwards Grandma Alice and Grandpa Rick took us out for dinner at Cantina Laredo. Unfortunately, I forgot to get a picture on Tuesday.
My birthday was Wednesday, and I played tennis with a friend in the morning and then worked all day. The kids were home from school since it was Veteran's day, and we'd planned to take them to tennis in the afternoon like usual, but I was feeling restless since I hadn't gone to lunch and we decided to skip tennis. We went to the Cheesecake Factory, ate some dinner, and then ordered strawberry shortcake for dessert. Paige had been quick to mention to the server that it was my birthday, so she wrote happy birthday on the plate and a few of the servers sang Happy Birthday to me. I think Paige liked it more than anyone.
Paige made a cute birthday picture for me as well. It showed me standing next to a cake with three candles, and Paige next to me in a beautiful purple dress. We are both very hungry for the cake and our tongues are sticking out. It was very thoughtful of her, and nobody had even prompted her to make anything for me.
This weekend we went up to Amelia Island as a family to spend the weekend playing some tennis and having some family fun together. Andrea and I have been a few times, but it's the first time we brought the kids with us. We got up fairly early on Saturday morning and drove up and went straight to the tennis courts. The kids relaxed on a blanket while Andrea and I did a couple tennis clinics and then we had lunch.
After lunch at Marche Burette deli, we had a little time before the family tennis clinic, so we went to the nature center on property. We were expecting it to be fairly small and didn't have very high expectations. We were surprised it was actually fairly well stocked with all kinds of local creatures including snakes, turtles, fish, and a beautiful parrot named Buddy. The kids fed some of the turtles in the nearby pond.
In the afternoon, we all did a family tennis clinic. It turned out we were the only family signed up, so Andrea and I did a bunch of high intensity drills on one court while Paige and Connor worked on tennis strokes on another court.
After tennis we were pretty exhausted and we went to our courtside tennis villa to relax. We washed up, then got dressed and ate at the Marche Burette restaurant again, where they were grilling delicious steaks for dinner.
After dinner we went and made some S'mores by a firepit.
Mini-golf was a lot of fun, especially watching the kids. Connor has an expectation that he'll get a hole-in-one or maybe two at the most per hole. He gets very frustrated if he doesn't hit a perfect shot, and we still don't keep score, or he'll get upset. Paige is a good sport and it's a cardio activity for her. She runs around each hole and smacks her ball at least a dozen times. I took one video of Paige golfing and we all cracked up when she hit her ball way too hard and bonked poor Connor in the head. Thankfully it didn't hit him very hard and thankfully not in the eyeball!
On Sunday, we were planning to do more tennis, but a storm blew through and we just relaxed and then ate lunch before heading home. It was a fun weekend, and I'm thankful Andrea thought to plan it for me!
This year we were lucky that Halloween fell on a Saturday. In the morning, Andrea and I participated in a Halloween tennis mixer at PVIC, then we had lunch at Cantina Laredo and relaxed until around 5. Before we put the costumes on the kids, we took a pic of them with the Halloween decorations on the front porch.
Connor went as an "Evil Minion" this year. Andrea and I came across a really cute Pterodactyl costume at Pottery Barn Kids, and it looked cute on Connor, however it was maybe a little bit of a little kid costume and Connor really wanted to pick one out this year himself. We took him to a Halloween store and he really liked the purple Minion costume. We found it online for sale for $10. It was a little sad that we weren't able to dress up our little man this year the way we wanted, but we were happy he got to express himself with a costume he picked, and it was nice that it was definitely cheaper than the Pterodactyl costume as well.
Paige went as a kitty cat this year. We found her costume at Pottery Barn kids, and it was super cute on her. Thankfully she didn't have any other ideas for a costume and was more than happy to be a kitty. She was cute posing with her hand out like a cat claw in some of the pics.
Grandma and Grandpa came by and met up with us before we set out on our trick-or-treating.
We all went over to Gina and Mark's house beforehand and the kids got to play with their friends for a while as everyone arrived.
Before we set off trick-or-treating, Mark tried to wrangle all the kids together for a group photo. It kind of worked, but most of the kids aren't good at looking at cameras. Thankfully Connor and Paige are used to it and always cooperate.
Grandpa Rick took a pic of the kids and a few of the adults as well.
Once we set off, it was an insane mad dash as the kids sprinted between houses. It was almost impossible to keep up and before we knew it, we were stuck with a bunch of children and almost no other parents.
The kids were having a great time until Paige tripped in the grass and landed on a concrete slab. She scraped up one knee and her hands. Thankfully she didn't hit her face on it. We cleaned her up and then continued on.
We stopped at the elaborately decorated house across from Anna's house on the way down the boulevard and took some pics with the scary decorations.
We ran in to a bunch of people we knew and Paige was very happy to pose with a couple of her classmates Ava and Kennedy.
Eventually it got pretty dark and we crossed the boulevard and then headed back to Anna and Kevin's house.
At Anna's house, they rented a cotton candy machine and had already gone through a couple hundred sticks. Thankfully they found a few more and the kids and Andrea all enjoyed some yummy cotton candy.
We eventually went back to Gina and Mark's house and caught up with a bunch of our friends we hadn't seen in a long time. It was awesome to have Halloween on a Saturday night and we stayed up very late and the kids enjoyed playing with their friends.
On Friday, the day before Halloween, the Kindergartners all came to school dressed as community helpers. Paige went as a veterinarian. Andrea got Paige a set of pink scrubs, a pink stethoscope, and Paige brought a little stuffed wolf with her. The LPA mascot is a wolf, and Paige thought to bring the wolf herself.
We got a cute picture of Paige in the morning before school and went to her school to see her in the parade.
