Jumping back into things

 (adding a pic...lol...we are a weird bunch sometimes...at least one of us...and one who sneaks treats before he is allowed...as evidenced by chocolate on his face :))


Well, we are home.

And I am tired. Not really in a post-vacation funk...just not ready to start back at the crazy routine of school and activities.  

You'd think after a week of fun in the sun, I'd feel well-rested.  But knowing we have to jump back into school in 2 days is draining to the mind.

It's 10:30pm, and we are sorting school supplies while watching excerpt of the Olympics.  One downfall of Netflix is you don't get to watch the Olympics without paying extra. We are too cheap for that, plus we won't have the time to sit and watch them anyway with school back in session. So we are watching 4 min parts of the Olympics...not real exciting.

I have pics to post, but I am refusing to do blog posts with pics this late at night. It it sucking my sleep time away. And with Hailey home I have less motivation to post anyway.  So pics will come later...of vacation too....might be later in the week once we are back in the school routine.

I will say that I wish we could have had a day off. We did sort of, but not enough.  I had to run to Kroger bright and early bc we were out of milk and eggs and Shelb wanted to make her yummy blueberry muffins for Hays.  We all slept in til 9 or for Hays, it was more like 11am.  Since we hadn't planned to be home til this afternoon, we skipped church.  We needed to not have to get up early today.  We had a couple rounds of bfast. Then dug into unpacking, laundry, dishes and chores.  The usual post-vacation stuff. Then we dove into the school stuff....sorting old un-used school supplies, looking at the new list, making a list for the store....then diving into even more fun of making new chore charts for the school year. Oh yay!  Kids were ecstatic :)  Then we headed to Walmart...not at all where I like to do supply shopping, but it's right down the road, so easier than Target across town.  They were sorely lacking in supplies, so I will need to make a trek across town tomorrow.  Oh joy.  Then we headed home for a yummy dinner. We thought we'd have a Steg family gathering at Kev's aunt and uncle's down the road, but that was canceled, so we were glad to have a nice dinner out back at our own casa...do some grillin' and enjoy having our Hays back in the house.  We went for a nice bike ride/run for Shelb after.  Gotta keep both our older girls in shape!  Then had a special "welcome back from Boston" dessert....Boston Cream Cupcakes. Since we could never get them in Boston (they were always sold out!), I made them. They turned out pretty yummy!  Now we are resorting school supplies and Loggy fell asleep on the couch.  Tomorrow starts a busy schedule of swim lessons for Lo, cross country for Shelb and back to school meetings.  2 more days of summer.  Where did the time go?

Almost home to reality

Well, we are a couple hours from home. Reality is setting in. It wouldn't be so bad but being home means we have only 3 more days of summer and it's back to school.  This stinks. Maybe most moms love their kids going back to school but I dread it. I feel summer is so stinking short and I have really liked have the kids home.  Oh well, at least I have my oldest and youngest home for a little bit. It's part of life and as Pops said last night, "ya can't be on vacation forever!" I guess he's right. Life is not one big vacation and we appreciate wonderful vacations when we weather the toughs of life. And the last week has been wonderful.  A perfect amount of family time, relaxation, laughs, and memories  made. So grateful to have had that before the craziness of life starts back up.

Anyway it's been a long day of driving for poor Kev and will be good to be back in our own beds and take the day off tomorrow.  We had initially planned to take a leisurely trip back today and stay in a hotel and sight see. But the kids voted last night and wanted to come home. We all need a day off recup and wrap our minds around summer being over. One more stop and we should be home. The older girls are neck and neck for winning the license plate game. Hays even caught up from not being with us on the drive down.  That'll teach Shelb to nap on car rides!  Whoever wins gets a special food at the last rest stop! Stegs are highly motivated by treats!! 😉

A rainy last day

Well, the rain finally hit us today and put a damper on any last day beach/fishing plans.  We tried to not let it detour us much but it would have better to have a rainy day midweek than on our last day. The kids really weren't able to play at the beach at all today.  But we did get in some pool time.  Jeff came up with a rip roaring game of water baseball. Pops was umpire and you can imagine the calls made. 😉  But they had fun even playing in the rain. Jeff and Kev were the ocean daredevils and did some kayak surfing amongst the rough waves. I really wanted to do some boogey boarding but the weather was just a little questionable. We laid low most if the day and packed early.  We had a delicious coal fired pizza dinner in town and then finally got in some family pics on the beach when the rain let up. We even got to see Pops show off his dancing skillz by the ocean!  Mighty impressive! 😳  And we ended the night with our shell contest, watching the Olympics and packing up. Oh and Shelb and I just went sea turtle egg hunting on the beach in the dark (with no success) We made the best of a wet stormy day, but still a bummer to end on a blah day.

So many great memories made here at Cape San Blas and so thankful for such wonderful family to spend the week with. Thanks, Nina and Pops for a great vacation!  Can't wait to sort thru pics and post soon!

A cloudy vacation day

Well it stormed all night but by morn it was lovely. Actually for a beach crew who is pretty burned, the overcast sky was a blessing. We had planned to make it sandcastle day but no one seemed real enthused about that. What a bunch of beach party poopers!  So I made the fam takes some beach pics (unsuccessfully I might add).  And then most of the gang headed to the pool. The guys set up shark fishing poles during the afternoon today. Which would have worked perfect with sandcastle making cuz we would have all been in one place. But of course they caught a baby shark while we were at the pool and everyone missed it. And the guys didn't even have phones with them so no pics either. And no proof of their big catch. What a bummer. The gang was pretty lazy the rest of the day. A few of us sat on the beach and hoped for another exciting catch but nothing surfaced. Daddy and Hays and I did help Lo build a sand castle which he named Logantown. And later on Pops and Jeff went out in the boat fishing, and half the gang went gift shopping, while Kev and I went on a hot date to the lighthouse in town.  It was nice to have some peace. The guys didn't catch anything but a crab in their trip out, and we just laid low tonight...parashuting toys off balconies, playing games with Nina, frisbee on the beach at sunset (Kev and I), etc. Only one more day here and then back to reality and back to school. Ugh.

Another lazy day

Yet another beautiful St Joe day!  We seem to get lazier as the days go by. I am certain no one wanted to even leave the house today. We are just tired and sunburned and lazy. Ol Pops and Jeffie went fishing early in the boat without much success. And we sorta slept in which was good since it was a rough night. The kids had left the balcony doors open and half the house heated up. So half of us were up at 3am wondering why we were so hot. But being lazy was nice.  Hays and Shelb got up early and made us blueberry muffins for bfast and the kids played Uno with Nina once she was up. We ventured out to the pool around lunchtime. It's awesome having it right across the street. And we pretty much have been the only ones using it. We didn't even venture home for lunch til 2. And then it was beachtime. The boys set up the shark bait early but the winds were too high for success. But it was a nice breezy night and we made a fire on the beach and had smores.  Looks like another storm is blowing in now, but we are all cozy in our beds. I must say we've had fantastic weather so far but I hate to jinx anything. Two more days here. Getting sad it's almost over but gonna make the most of the time we have. I am enjoying not having much wifi here. It's nice taking a tech break and I'll just update with pics at home. Love waking up to a sunshine and this ocean view and breezes.

The beach life never grows old!

Well, we are day 3 of beach life and loving it. Even if the rain comes or storms are brewing off shore there is just so much beauty and simplicity to this life. We go from pool to beach and repeat the same all day. It's rough. There was no fishing today on boat or land, but Jeff's old friend and fam visited and we had a lovely day on the beach and ocean kayaking, swimming, paddle boarding and just chilling. We even talked Shelb into doing some cross country training on the beach. Pops even ran along with her for a bit. (Impressive, Ol' Pops!). And the latter part of the day was spent in the pool chillin' and playing competitive water volleyball. (My team won of course...I've still got skills!) we are all tanner than all get out and I don't think I've worn shoes all week. This is the life. Tomorrow two boys are off fishing and the rest of us sleep in. Yay for sleep. Surprisingly that is one thing we are still lacking in.  Need some zzzzz's!

Another beautiful beachy day!

Well, it was a slightly lazier FL day for the Gritter Steg clan. The day started off looking lovely but most of the group came running back from the beach as a storm rolled in and brought some crazy winds. We headed to the pool instead. The boys took Shelb out bate fishing in the boat and she caught a cute little 4ft shark.  She was proud!  The rest of the day was spent on the beach or loafing around.  We kayaked a little more and had sand fights (I lost that fight as evidenced by the piles of sand that fell off me in the shower tonight 😉).  After a delicious steak dinner we headed out to cheer the guys on for beach shark fishing again. But alas the Sharks were not biting tonight. One took the bate and ran. And the rest were too smart. The bugs were out biting though so they scared most of us indoors. I didn't even get to chase any crabs down tonight on the beach.  Bummer. But the day was good and we look forward to more of the same tomorrow. I could get used to life on the beachfront!