Matt had 2 weeks off recently after returning home from deployment.  We didn’t go on any cruises or fancy vacations, but enjoyed being home with movies and video games, working out together, walks and woods, good meals and tasty drinks, shopping, touring, and a whole lot of fishing.  Matt discovered that fishing has the potential to be a fun and successful hobby here in this place that is filled with water and life, so we gathered supplies and went adventuring to different local fishing spots.  There seems to be a lot more to learn about the sport to be successful at it, but it got us out exploring new places and learning about our area in a whole new way.  Hopefully there will be more time in our life for hours of chilling with fishing poles now that Matt is back to work.

Cedar joined a tee-ball team a couple months ago.  He has a cute uniform, a glove, and even a pair of cleats to wear with his orange knee socks.  He’s so cute.  He has been excited about it, about being on a team, learning to throw and catch, wearing a uniform.  Tee-ball– being the kind of team sport in which the majority of what happens is a lot of standing around waiting until that brief moment of running the bases, and then more standing around waiting– may not be the chosen pursuit of our guy, but it is a start.  Right now we’re dreaming of soccer for both kids when it starts in the Fall.

We said good-bye to the ocean with Jean on her last night here.  We went at sunset to watch the magic of the water and sky, and it was very good indeed.  I want to remember to get out of my house and witness the sunset more often, because it’s worth it.

We will surely miss you, Mama Jean.

Just some photos today of our little back-together family and Matt’s mom during her visit, checking out Jacksonville tourist spots.  No photos of the spot themselves, I’m sorry to say!  I guess I love those faces more than the places.

It’s nicknamed Boneyard Beach, and it is truly spectacular.  I can’t wait to go back.

Us, together again at the beach.  Thanks to Matt’s mom for capturing us while we played.

Matt’s mom, Jean, during her visit here in late March, loved being at the beach, even on the chilly days that happened while she was here.  She came here for rest and recovery, and I hope in ways the beach offered it to her.  At the very end of her visit she finally got that shark’s tooth she was constantly hunting for, thanks to Matt’s luck and good eye.  I kept bringing her to different parts of the shoreline, to the part where the shells are, the part where the jetty is, the part where the sand goes up into dunes and where it goes down into ponds, the part with the fancy houses, and the one with the driftwood.

There are several random photos in this post, as you can see.  Jean took some of those and I wanted to share them– the pelicans are everywhere around here and I thought it was a cool photo, and I like that one of me because it looks like she captured how I was feeling at the time– anxious, frustrated, and tense while waiting impatiently for Matt to return home.

Matt’s mom, Jean, came to visit at the end of March.  We went to the beach, more beach, the woods, several historic forts, St. Augustine, the thrift store, her sister’s house a few hours south of us, and several more days at the beach.  You’ll be seeing photos here over the next few posts of her visit, as I did bring my camera on our adventures as much as I could.  On this particular evening, after a nice day at the beach, we decided to head to the river to watch the sunset (our ocean offers breathtaking view of the sunrise, but for the sunset we head west to the river).  It was a gorgeous night with lots of water play– by the way, there is water EVERYWHERE here in Jacksonville, people fishing all over the place, and it is just so beautiful.