Hey guys, it's election day in America, and I'm not really celebrating. Because, I live in Florida. And, we all know how that's going to go. I have, however, been wearing my election shirts since November 1st.
Including some I just made last week. I know, it's all just going to be a let down tonight- but let me live in my little pretend world just a little bit longer.
I took a break from election shirt wearing, for pretzel day shirt wearing. A food truck shows up here basically every Wednesday, but the pretzel truck is my favorite (also, besides the Boba Tea truck, is the only ones I go to).
Fall mugs got changed out, too, which means I'm also using my Cat in the Hat for president mug for morning coffee.
Obviously, despite the fact that nothing and nobody we voted for is going to win, we did fill out our mail in ballots. Peyton obviously missed voting, which is sad. But, such is life.
So, I think it's obvious which way I went, and it's not like I was super thrilled to check a box for Charlie Crist, who is like the least exciting candidate ever, but closed primaries create boring candidates.
I do have my shirt all ready to wear tomorrow in my show of protest of the prospect of four more years of Ron DeSantis (lets be honest though, he's running for president in two, and that's just a frightening prospect).
Anyway, with our ballots all filled out...
Asa and I headed off to drop our ballots at the Supervisor of Elections (that shirt is one of my favorites!)
In other sad news, I had to say goodbye to the best mailbox post buddy I've ever had.
T'Ola headed off to start her new job in New Orleans, and I literally wanted to cry. We've never had a neighbor that we just clicked with so well. It gave me shades of college, when you could run over to your neighbors house in bare feet and talk about nothing for hours. She's just the funniest, most thoughtful, most genuine person, and it's just not going to be the same without her. Before she left, she stopped by to take the picture I wanted of us standing between our houses (and the house wasn't even technically her's anymore- the new neighbors had already moved in). I know we'll go visit her in New Orleans and have just the best time, but it won't be the same.
To ease my sorrow, at least Wawa had Schwarberfest to celebrate the Phillies in the World Series (even if they lost to the Astros). I'm not a baseball fan, but I will take a $6 Gobbler anyday.
In fact, I'll have it twice.
We also had free rewards, and ended up with free tea and free coffee. I am just rolling in the free stuff lately!
Not free, but we did also finally make it to the new Culver's over by Publix. Calib has been working the bun station there, and is likely to move up to grill soon.
To burn off all these calories, we had a pool day. But not just any pool day, we FINALLY made it out to Epperson Lagoon, the biggest man made lagoon in America. It's basically like a beach, but it's a pool!
Complete with paddle boards, kyaks, a water obstacle course, a pool bar, cabanas, and a giant slide.
Shockingly enough, we even got Calib to go with us.
I've wanted to go to Epperson since it opened a couple years ago. But, people mostly complain about the ticket prices. Usually it's like $35 to get in, and then you have to pay extra for everything. BUT, since the summer season is about over, they're running a special for a $25 all-inclusive ticket. That means you can do all the things- no extra bookings required. So, we did ALL the things. Asa and I took the paddleboards out, and I even went down the big inflatable slide.
And I went out to the obstacle course and did everything out there. I climbed the rock climbing wall, did the swing where you jump into the water, I jumped off the cliff, I made it over all the obstacles, and basically was super brave (shout out to Nick the lifeguard who was very encouraging!) A group would go out for the alloted time, and then come back in- but you could go in as many groups as you wanted, so Calib and Asa went back out for round number two.
I stayed behind this time, and took some pictures. They had fun, but said it was super exhasuting the second time around. Calib did finally conquer the lily pads though. He just couldn't get the hang of it.
It was a super fun trip, and I highly recommend going out there if you can get the all inclusive ticket for $25. It was totally worth it. Not sure I'd pay for it the other way, then you're just looking at $35 for a glorified pool and a bunch of add ons. Not so great.
After our time at Epperson, we headed over to Krate. We haven't been there in awhile, especially since all the container stores opened, and we were going right past, so we thought we would check it out.
I was most excited to try Flipn' Fries Factory. A whole shipping container for french fries? Yes please!
We got the "Kratewalker", basically fries topped with chicken, steak AND shrimp tossed in this delicious honey chili sauce. I've had A LOT of fries in my day, and these are literally the best fries I have ever had. Yea, they were $20 bucks. But, it's $20 I would pay over and over again.
I was also able to finally check out Bakery X, the new French Bakery. I had decided on two pastries, but then noticed the "Mystery Bag" at the checkout. I saw these on Facebook, basically it's a bunch of yesterdays pastries in a bag for $10. I decided on that, and I was not disappointed.
All in all, there were 7 pastries in my "mystery bag". I brought them home, and everyone enjoyed them for the next couple days. Even Asa really liked them, and said he'd be willing to go to Krate just for the mystery bag.
The Bucs promtion team were also out at Krate giving away prizes, so we all spun the wheel. Asa got a flag, I got a hat, and Calib was the loswer with his foam finger.
Before we headed home, we stopped by King of the Coop to get some Coop Juice, because if you're up that way, Asa wants his Coop Juice! It was a nice outing, and fun that Calib came along. It's rare you get the "kids" to get on board with our outings. We keep joking it's a good thing we like each other, because it's just us all the time, but for real, it's a good thing we do!
I've also been working on some projects around the house. I finally got my outdoor material, and sewed the cover for the first part of the outdoor couch. I quickly realized I needed more for the other section. Luckily, they still had it in stock, so it should be here in the next few days.
In the mean time, I tried to piece together the other part of the couch. Since that section is all the remenents, it needed some help to look like it was one piece, instead of five chopped up pieces. So, I found some scrap wood, and got myself some gorilla spray adhesive and got to work.
I think I'm going to cut that little section of wood off, but it did help keep everything together.
And then I covered it with batting to help cover the seams. Later, I covered the batting with one of those waterproof matress pads. It just looks cleaner, and now I wait for the rest of the material to finish it off.
In Waterstraut kid milestone news, Hayden FINALLY drove a car for the first time ever. Ok, we talked him into it. But, heres the thing- the Fit was my dads car (for reference my dad died when Hayden was 3- and now he's driving my dads car!). Unfortunately, the Fit has a million things wrong with it, especially the fact that the overheating light constantly comes on and it doesn't go above 45 miles per hour. The air conditioning doesn't work, the wheel well is falling apart, and the speakers are blown. It needed to be retired now that we've got a new car. But, before that happened, I wanted Hayden to drive it.
So we took Hayden down to the end of the street, where it dead ends by the park, and had his drive for about 100 yards. That totally counts!
This car has been with us for a long time. It's taken us on countless cross country trips. It took us to our wedding. We drove it to Chicago for our Honeymoon. It moved us into two houses, including the first one we ever bought. It was Calib's first car, and now, the first car that Hayden had driven. There's some good memories wrapped up in this little orange Honda Fit.
I struggled with what to do with it. It's not worth much at all with it's 160,000 miles on it (see above), so I nosed around and finally found a way to donate it. But, not just donate it anywhere: donate it to a Vietnam Veterans Organization. My dad was a Vietnam Vet, and was very proud of his service, so it seemed like a fitting end for his car. They came to pick it up early Monday morning.
And it was loaded onto the truck...
And off it went. So long, fit. You served us well. (I so wish it was in better shape and I could keep that one instead of the Green Accord, but it just wasn't meant to be).
Monday was also a big day, because it was our House Anniversary. That's right, it's been SIX- count em- SIX whole years since we bought our house. To celebrate, I put up a backsplash in the kitchen. It's just one of those peel and stick ones until I turn pro with my power tools and can put up a real one.
But, I do think it looks pretty good.
We also ordered some pizza in honor of the house anniversary (and because I was sick of working and cleaning after the backsplash).
Usually, on our house anniversary, we take an annual picture on the front porch. But, we're missing someone this year.
I took Peyton's usual spot in the picture, and our neighbor, Kyle came down to take the picture. (Thanks, Kyle!)
And, that's it. Polls are about to close, and I'm betting it's almost automatic they call our state for Rubio and DeSantis, so I'm going to drown my sorrows in a nice drink. And, I leave you with some cute Waterstraut dog pictures.
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