We had to rescue a broken down car that Guy bought at the auction on Friday night and we attempted to take it to Upland on Saturday morning. The car did not make it. Luckily I was following Jackson in his car so I got him off of the side of the road and we headed to God's Country anyway. We find it easier to relax up there sometimes. Also, my folks got a new golf cart and Jackson was itching to test it out. It is the little things, you know?
Jackson took the golf cart to Ivanhoe's to get lunch. It was Taylor move-in weekend so it took him about an hour. Whoops. :) Guy needed picked up across town so we ALL (and I do mean ALL) piled into the new cart and headed over to pick him up. Too funny. Oh small town living!
Addie (big dog), Ella, Mom, Jackson and MacK all waiting on me to go for a ride!
Woooooohooooo
Ella's ears!
Picked up Duckie and all piled in for a ride
Full cart!
Ella and MacK pretending to be friends
We spent the rest of the day just hanging out with my folks before heading to Grains & Grill over in Fairmount. People rave about this place! It was pretty good. I'm not sure it was worth all of the fuss, but to each their own.
Finally getting to try Grains & Grill
Anyway, we had a lovely day hanging in Upland. Sometimes it is just good to go home!
Jackson was SO excited about the eclipse. I did not care. Luckily, he was at work that day and had a ton of folks who were supposed to be working willing to watch with him. Too funny. I hope there were not any emergencies just then...
Jackson's eclipse watching party
Jackson stopped by Heidi's to grab some coffee she didn't want (the nerve!) and send me this adorable photo of Gunner giving him a kiss. I think Gunner knows we don't have kids and maybe wanted to come home with Jackson. I'm joking. Kind of.
A smooch from Gunner
We watch a tv show (Younger on TVLand--such a fun, silly show) on my laptop sometimes and we had a good laugh when MacK appeared to be working hard on the MacBook.
MacK working hard
Finally, I saw this posted the other day and felt all fellow wives could understand the humor.
Heidi told me last week that Jax's football season had kicked off so we made plans to come see him play. He was so good! He was always right in the thick of things and seemed to really enjoy himself. He even got a touchdown. It was called back due to a holding call that was lame, but we were still excited for him.
All suited up!
Go #7!
They look so tiny out there
Jackson got roped into holding the chains for the game!
Jax taking a quick break and getting
some encouragement from his mom!
Porkchop had to work the chains, too!
The parents around us were INTENSE. I am pretty sure they forgot that they were watching 6 & 7 year olds play. CRAZY!
The angry football faee photo
(Andrew missed the memo)
Jocelin watched movies on the sidelines- ha!
Jax greeted us when we arrived and was excited to have people watching him play. It was so sweet. Jocelin spotted me and came running to greet me with a hug. We love these kids! We're so grateful to Heidi and Pork for taking care of them 24/7 so we can enjoy the fun parts of watching kiddos grow up. HA!! :) We do truly adore those kids!
Saturday evening we went to dinner at Mama Carolla's (again) with Susan to celebrate the sale of her house (after less than 24 hours on the market!) and so that she could share stories of her most recent trip to Africa. We got there right when it opened so we got to sit in the garden. It was lovely!
August is kind of a slow month around here. We picked MacKenzie up from her stay with Uncle Aaron and settled back into life at home.
Happy to be back to her sheep and her lookout
Jackson has to get a new license for work due to some new regulations that have been put into place. He has to take the licensing test on August 23rd so he has been studying like a mad man all month.
Studying. Constantly.
We've tried to find nice places to study including Susan's patio on a nice day while she was in Africa. Whatever works!
A delivery for me?! YES!
MacKenzie continued to be adorable. We get all of her pet supplies online now so she really loves deliveries now.
Date night at Mama Carolla's
Jackson took a little study break and we went to our favorite Italian restaurant. We had not been craving much Italian food since coming home from Italy! I didn't think food here would ever compare again. It doesn't, but Mama's is still pretty good!
Little Ella came down one morning for a visit. She is a mess! She recently turned one so now she is ready to learn the art of the ball game. She understands getting the ball, she does not understand bringing it back to you so you can throw it again. She'll come around. Maybe!
Last year we visited Naples in mid-June and it was so quiet and wonderful that we decided we'd visit during the summer again. This year we visited at the end of July through early August and the weather was not as stellar. Boo! The city was a ghost town still, though, so that was awesome. The traffic decreases by about 95% in the summer which makes getting to the beach a super quick trip!
We took a Friday night flight on Allegiant (gag me) to Punta Gorda and drove the hour to Naples in our horrible little Mitsubishi rental car. We did a package deal from Allegiant to get airfare for the both of us plus a rental car for 5 days for like $400. You get what you pay for when sometimes. Oh well. We don't drive much once we're in Naples. Our flight was a bit delayed on Friday night (shocking since Allegiant has like two planes) so we did not get to the condo until it was technically Saturday morning. Oh well, we'd wake up much closer to the beach than we do at home!
Breakfast at Skillet's is a requirement
First, though, we had to visit the newest Skillet's location because it is our favorite breakfast spot. This location had ample outdoor seating so we were quite pleased. After breakfast we made a quick turnaround to get to the beach!
I love this view!
I read a book and Jackson played in the waves and all was well in the world!
The beach pretty much to ourselves
Happy boy!
My beach hat representing the area's airport
After we'd had enough sun and felt crispy, we headed to Publix to grossly overpay for some groceries. Listen, you guys, the groceries in Naples are so darned expensive. I think everything is at least 50% more expensive. It could just be that Publix has kind of a monopoly in the area, but it is always painful to grocery shop there. In the summer all of the restaurants run specials to try to get the few folks in town to dine with them so it is sometimes cheaper to just dine out! This trip we did a little of both.
Sunday morning had a few storms, but it cleared up so we did our beach routine. We fall into such an easy rhythm when we're in Naples.
The view from my chair
Date night!
Then, Monday, Tropical Storm Emily hit. UGH! She came out of nowhere and just dumped rain on us!
Stormy day beach walks
Trying not to blow away
Sunset during a storm
Catchin' sunset
We went to Skillet's again on Tuesday morning. We love it. When we headed back to the condo, all seemed well then the heavens opened and it started to rain again. Bummer. The condo doesn't have internet service during non-season so Jackson left Tuesday morning to go send some work e-mails from Starbucks. He got caught in another storm and couldn't get back to the condo for about three hours! The Starbucks is about 5 minutes away normally. It was insane!
FLOOD!
Remember we had the tiniest rental car ever so he could not risk flooding it out. We didn't want to own that little piece of junk, you know!
Jackson's view trying to get back
to the condo during a storm- it looks like he'd
drive into a river!
There was a finally enough of a break in the storms that some of the water started to soak into the ground and Jackson was able to get out from where he was trapped in the rental car. He kept his spirits up during the whole thing. I just sat at the condo reading a book- ha! Then, as soon as he got safely back to our place, the sky dumped AGAIN! We looked out and realized that the balcony was getting flooded really quickly because the gutters were full! AGH!
Thankfully the downpour didn't last too long and we were able to stop any water from coming into the condo. There are so many trees around that their little twigs and stuff are just hard to keep up with. We made a maintenance call to make sure the gutters were clear once we left and there was no one to sweep out flood waters!
Luckily, the skies cleared for a little bit in the afternoon and we were able to get in a few hours at the beach. We were basically on call for sunshine. As soon as it looked clear, we were beach bound!
The sun came back out- head to the beach!
More storms coming...
We had some more storms Tuesday night and then finally all was clear. We'd made it through a tropical storm. Wednesday, our last day, was gorgeous. We sat out on the beach for as long as we could before it was time to clean up, pack up and head out to the airport.
Finally! A clear day on our last day!
In amazing news, our flight on Allegiant home was on time and we even landed a few minutes early. It was a true miracle! (Can you tell I loathe Allegiant?)
Suntanned and tired--headed home!
We got back around 8:30 so we had time to get unpacked, laundry started and get ready for a busy Thursday. We always seem to land really late so it was kind of nice to be home at a decent hour this time. We've decided we probably won't go back to Naples so late in the summer again. The weather is just too hard to predict. It was still nice to just take a break, though, and fit in as much beach time as we could!
