Florida Vibes

When Jonathan left for Angola this time around, Forest and I hit the road the same morning to head to Pensacola, FL for some time with my family.

10 hours solo driving with a 3 year old. Piece of cake (as long as he has the ipad and chocolate milk.)

 Turned out there was going to be some overlap with both my sister and my brother visiting my parents, so we figured we'd join the party too! And then when people heard we would all be there, extended family like my grandpa, two aunts and a cousin also headed to Florida so it ended up being quite the affair. 

With Jonathan's schedule, I've noticed that Forest transitions better if we travel right before or right after Jonathan leaves. Something about getting him out of a routine makes him less likely to have behavioral issues due to daddy leaving. I guess it just takes the focus off of it happening for both of us. 


Anyhoos, we had a great time in Florida and I loved getting to see Forest bond with his cousins. 

My sister's son Andrew is the closest cousin in age to Forest (4 weeks apart) and they definitely bonded.  We call them the twins. They played like best friends and fought like brothers. 

Within a few hours, Forest had shed all of his shy tendencies and jumped right in with my sister's gaggle of boys and he had such a blast. 

It was nice for me not to have to entertain him for once! Other than refereeing occasionally, I mostly just got to sit back and watch them play. It was the first time I thought: hmmmm....maybe having two kids is easier than having one in some ways. Especially two the same age!

Also, with Forest solidly knowing how to swim and with his newfound maturity (in which by some miracle he actually obeys me sometimes), this was the most relaxing trip to the beach I've had since birthing him. Usually he's basically on suicide watch as he takes every moment of my distraction to try to sprint into the ocean waves. We also saw a shark (one of 2 shark sightings during the week) from the beach which helped to curb his fearlessness of darting into the surf. 

It was a great trip and we can't wait to go back, but next time, I think we'll fly.