4th of July part 1

We love the 4th of July! Growing up my family always went up to Idaho Falls to celebrate with my grandma because it's her birthday. She used to tell us when she was little she felt so lucky to get fireworks just for her! Keith's family always has a large presence in the Inkom candy parade making it a fun celebration! After we met we convinced our families to celebrate together. Keith and I even got to be in the parade together last year! So when we realized we would be in Florida for the 4th this year we were a little upset to say the least! We didn't have too high of hopes because Keith had to work. He left about 5 and around 10:30 I got a text asking if I wanted a surprise. I knew what it was right away! I was so excited!

To celebrate his workless day we decided to head to the beach! We went to Melbourne beach which is the closest one.

We played in the water for awhile. After, I relaxed and read Keith fell asleep...

Next time his hand won't be on his belly and maybe we'll remember to put on more sunscreen. For now, aloe is his friend.

We spent a few hours there before we were ready to head out. Our timing was impeccable. On the drive home the sky started to look a little gloomy. 

 And by the time we got home it was POURING. We were a little worried the firework show that evening would be rained out!

To be continued.

Busch Gardens

I have a little bit of catch up to do. We've been busy having fun! This past weekend we went to Busch Gardens in Tampa Bay. It was little over a two hour drive there so we woke up early and headed out. I'm not sure we'd get anywhere without our GPS.

Much like Sea World there was a lot to do and see only a whole lot more land to cover. There were some crazy roller coasters--some that go from 0-60 mph and one with a 90 degree drop. They put the Sea World roller coasters to shame! We saw a few shows, beautiful gardens, and a lot of animals!

Sunbathing at its finest!

As we walked around I spied a funnel cake stop. I couldn't help myself! I may have felt sick after but it was so worth it.

We came home exhausted but it was fun!  

Gone Fishin'

Coming to the ranch we had no idea what a big deal fishing is. But it's a BIG deal. After a lot of begging our neighbors got us to go with them one night after they borrowed fishing reels for us. We ended up having a blast! 

While we weren't having much luck in the fish department, we were still having fun. I can't tell you how many times my line got caught in the weeds at the bottom of the river and at least half a dozen times Keith had to come save me. During one of those times he had already cast his line and asked me to hold his pole. After he finally got my line untangled I reeled in his line and much to our surprise we got a bite! Neither of us could take the glory of catching it by ourselves so we shared the limelight.

After another 20 minutes or so I was able to get one more bite before we called it a night.

I was okay with the catching bit but let Keith handle the release. I don't think either of us had been fishing since we were little. Going reminded me of when I used to go fishing with my dad as a little girl. Being the professional fishermen that he is I still like to tease him about the time we went and were even, fish count:10-10 so we decided to call it a day. We reeled in and I got one last bite bringing our final count 11-Maurie 10-Dad. Oh the bragging rights. Good times.

It was a lot of fun, we'll be going back and hopefully have a bit more luck next time!

Sea World

After a lot of research I finally found the best deal on Sea World tickets. Lucky for us the passes are good for the rest of 2012 and into Busch Garden's too. We were really excited, neither of us had been to either park. We packed up our lunch and frozen water bottles, applied a little SPF, and we were on our way! We got about 20 mins down the road when we both realized we forgot the cameras. We were pretty bummed but luckily in today's day we have cell phone cameras. While they aren't top quality they aren't too shabby either. So this post is brought to you via cell phone pictures.

Our visit started out small, and it's a good thing. We weren't exactly sure where we were going or where anything was. Luckily we have this mentality (thanks to our fun passes) that we don't have to stress about seeing it ALL this time, we'll see it next time, or some other time after that!  We stopped by a little dolphin nursery and got excited seeing a few dolphins swim around. Even the flamingos seemed exciting.

That was until we decided to go to see the dolphin and acrobat show. It was so neat! There were birds flying over the audience and people skiing on dolphins. It was a good thing we started small with the dolphin nursery because we would have been disappointed after seeing this! Then it was off to a 3D movie about a sea turtle and to see the manatees.

After a little persuasion we went on one of the roller coasters called The Manta. I love roller coasters but even I was a little nervous. I had never been on one quite like this. You sit in your seat and pull a chest harness over yourself while an ankle harness comes to keep your legs in the "sitting" position. The next thing you know they are tilting you forward so your back is now parallel to the ground, face looking down at the cement! The whole ride you are in this position through loops and twists. We LOVED it. After the first stomach-wrenching loop I heard Keith start to laugh, and he laughed until it stopped. There was NO line so we decided to go for round two. We finished just in time to make it to see the Shamu Show (as I like to call it). It wasn't a let down, that's for sure!

We were wise enough to sit above the first 15 rows dubbed "The Soak Zone". It was fun to watch everyone else get soaked though!

Who knew this little tail...

could make a splash like this?

All in all we had a really fun time and can't wait to go back. We still have 2/3 of the park to see! And this time we'll remember to bring our real camera.

The Commander's Club

When we got accepted for this internship dreams of fun weekends filled my mind.  Growing up my parents took us on vacation here (mostly to Disney World) pretty often. Often enough that when I think of Florida I instantly think of FUN. Knowing that Disney World is just a tinsy part of all the fun things to do here, I got really excited. Rigby Lake and the Riot zone just don't compare to the Atlantic ocean, and miles of endless beaches. Not to mention Universal Studios, Busch Gardens, Sea World, just to name a few... And the best part is we're about an hour or two from everything FUN. While we won't be able to do everything Florida has to offer ($$$) we are going to make the most of our stay. 

First up, The Kennedy Space Center. 

When we decided to go there was only a few dollar difference between a once time entry and an annual pass aka, The Commander's Club. Living close, we decided to become members of The Commander's Club and get neat badges, 20% off any food, 10% gift store stuff, get our free coins (totally worth it just for these bad boys), and revisit as often as we wanted. It was a blast! We watched one of the IMAX movies, saw about half of the sites, and ended with some Alien Vanilla Crunch Space Dots: the ice cream of the future! Yum. We'll be going back no doubt. 

There was a lot of facts and figures that I can't remember about all things space. One neat thing I do remember is the details about this building and flag:

The building is the tallest one story building ever built. It's where they build the space shuttles! The flag is painted on and it's HUGE. To give you an idea the blue area behind the stars is the size of a basketball court. Each star is the size of a king size bed, and you could drive a bus up each stripe. They repainted it about a year ago and it took over 700 gallons and almost a year to paint! 

This is one of the pads they launch space shuttles off. We're hoping to get to see one take off in August! We'll keep our distance though. Within 400' the heat of the take off will kill you and within 800' the sound will kill you! They pour 300,000 gallons of water on the pad during take off to help muffle the sound. Crazy. 

I won't bore you with anymore details but you should come visit us and we'll take you! We'll even get you $10 off your admission (perks of being apart of the Commander's Club!)

We had a really fun time and can't wait until our next visit.