Chip is a Good Patient

Chip is having a medical procedure done this afternoon, so we volunteered to pick Dylan up from school after tennis.  The procedure went well, and Chip felt chipper (haha) afterwards, so they asked us over for pizza.

Laurie and I watched Downton Abbey - she hadn't seen it on Sunday.  Such a good show.  While we were watching, Grandpa picked Dylan up solo.

Caching Rocky

Laurie called to see if we wanted to drive with her to Target to return some items.  Sure thing!   Comcast is right behind Target, and we had some dealings to do there, so it all worked out.
After the errands, a couple of caches were found not too far away.  A good time was had by all.

01/14/2014	You found Fungus Amungus		Visit Log
Out doing some shopping and waiting at Comcast. This was the closest cache when we finished. The hint led us astray and the cache is well guarded by the local resident. He watched us and followed us until we made the find, then he disappeared. Signed log and replaced as found. TFTC Rocky guarding the cache and keeping a close eye on the cachers!
01/14/2014	You found Where the Wild Things Are		Visit Log
It's always fun to erase a DNF. We didn't plan it this way but our DNF was exactly one year ago today. Updating the cords did the trick for us. The log is sodden and nearly impossible to sign. It should be replaced and inserted in a baggie.

Barbara's Birthday

Our next door neighbor, Barbara, is 80 years old today.  Her children gave a super birthday party for her at the East Ocean Bistro in Stuart.  There was a huge cake, there were many, many balloons,  there were leis to wear, and there was a three course meal for everyone.

We sat at a table with other residents of 3624 Quail Meadow.   At our table were Ron and Joanne, and Tony and Dorothy.  It was a perfect chance to meet our new neighbors and have a nice three hours getting to know them.  It was a lovely party, and we had a great time.  We are so glad to have been included :)

The meal was delicious, especially the creme brûlée !

Dick and Ron enjoying it all :)

Pictures to Remember

The blog has kind of fallen into disrepair during the past few weeks.  There are so many other things to do in South Florida.  Maybe one of these days I'll get around to trying to remember what we have done.  There has been a small amount of geocaching, and a large amount of shopping for the condo - just things like a dust buster, hot pads, and dishcloths - necessary things that are easy to forget!  There has been a fun amount of spending time on Saint Creek Drive, especially watching Downton Abbey.
It was also a very fun day when we all went to see Frozen,  met up with Andie and Lainie, and then went to Laurie's for pizza.  I'll try to remember which day that was!

Right now, Chip is at training in Dallas, Laurie and Dylan went to a get-together at Peyton's on Friday night, yesterday Laurie and Dick and I went to Tradition shopping for a birthday gift for our neighbor, and then did a little caching while Dylan was at his tennis clinic.  Afterwards, Dick did great burgers on the grill for all of us.

This week we've also had a torrential rainfall -  hundred year event they say - which caused much flooding, but not by us, thank goodness.

New Year's Eve Day on the fishing pier in Fort Pierce

Father/son togetherness on dirt bikes in the dirt :)

Our very own Man from Mars

The view from our condo office, including sand trap and screen!

A Few South Florida Finds

Your Geocaching Details

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01/11/2014	You couldn't find Happy Birthday Monkey Girl: Redux		Visit Log
Out with Mrs Sharkie on a shopping run. Drew a blank. The hide is too much for us today.
01/11/2014	You found Jabba the Hut		Visit Log
Out with Mrs Sharkie buying a birthday present for our 80 year old neighbor. The log is damp. Look out for fire ants.
01/08/2014	You found August 3rd		Visit Log
We completed the August Challenge and got the souvenir while still up in Michigan. It was a nice gesture to place these here for those seeking the same down here. We were out for a ride exploring the routes to the Tradition area from our new condo. We pulled into the WalMart parking lot and Nuvi said there is a cache here. In fact, more than one. We did two before shopping. A quick peek and Zap! Signed log and replaced as found. TFTC
01/08/2014	You found August 2nd		Visit Log
We were out for a ride exploring the routes to the Tradition area from our new condo. We pulled into the WalMart parking lot and Nuvi said there is a cache here. A quick peek and Zap! Signed log and replaced as found. TFTC
01/04/2014	You found Who knows?		Visit Log
The magnetic nano was laying on the ground in the dirt under the yellow thing. Log was soaked and too wet to sign. Replaced with scrap of paper, signed and replaced where we think it fell from.
01/04/2014	You will attend Tower Flash (mob) and Dash		Visit Log
We are looking forward to it
01/01/2014	You found Hidden Pond		Visit Log
Happy New Year! We've been down here for two weeks and hadn't even looked for a cache. When I saw that yesterday our friend Goldfinch completed his goal of finding at least 10 caches each of the 366 days of the year, I decided to get off my butt and extend my morning walk south to the nearest cache. Made the find, signed the log and replaced as found. TFTC

Bye Bye Tom

Jana is back home in D.C., Chip is at work.

 The rest of us went to Stuart and had lunch at Mulligan's.

 We walked along the river and spent some time at the charming and interesting Stuart Heritage Museum.

 It was really enjoyable and fun.  I especially enjoyed the Seminole clothing - so intricately sewn and so colorful with such intricate patterns.

Then Laurie and Tom headed off to the Palm Beach airport for his flight back home to San Diego.  Bye bye Tom!

Dick and I stayed up to watch Michigan lose their bowl game.  Heavy sigh!

Bye Bye Jana

Jana boards the plane tonight at 9:15 at Ft. Lauderdale.

The Movies With Mom Project continued today - the whole family went to see The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.  We thought that it was tons of fun, and I'm almost positive that everyone enjoyed it - Dick even liked it!  My favorite part was the trip to Greenland and Iceland - the scenery, the culture, the people - priceless.  It's a good story, understated and sweet.

After the movie we had dinner at Hurricane - fun, friendly,  delicious and loud!

Laurie and Jana left at six for the drive to Ft. Lauderdale and Jana's flight home.  Bye bye Jana - Happy New Year!

My family humored me and everybody joined in this group shot yesterday on Boxing Day:

DOWN WITH LIVER CANCER!
The seven of us taking a stand :)

Boxing Day, Busch, Duffy's, and The Game With No Name

Our first stop today was the  Busch Wildlife Sanctuary in Jupiter.  It's a small, friendly animal rescue operation where you can see all kinds of native Florida wildlife.  My favorites today were the river otters and the bald eagles.  They also have panthers, bears, snakes, armadillos, etc.

 Dylan used to volunteer here as a presenter when he was in elementary school.  Every day they have a brief animal presentation giving the audience a chance to pet the animals and learn about each one.  He was the skunk presenter and bird enclosure cleaner-upper!

A possum. 6 months old

Great Horned Owl

The Amphitheater

Some attendees !

You almost feel like saluting this regal bird.

Florida Panthers

Watching the foxes.

After the animals, Dylan was a good sport and we went to eat at Duffy's, which is his least favorite place.  The food was good, we had fun, and the family at the next table was very entertaining!

Back at Laurie's house we did a reprise of the Game With No Name - it's basically like charades without the acting out - just guessing from sometimes obscure clues!

HatBoy, just for fun!

Christmas Day 2013

Christmas Tree of Gillespie 2013

Joyous Christmas of Steiger

Happy dinner prep of Laurie

How to make Grandpa happy - Christmas with family!

How to make Dylan happy - a Honda Dirt Bike (DRF 250 L).   Santa really did come.

Happy dinner prep of Chip

Joyous Christmas of Jana

Christmas Elves
Best Uncle and Best Nephew

My favorite 2013 Christmas Picture
Hooray for Christmas!




My three kids took me to the movies this afternoon - it was very special.  We saw Philomena, which, it turns out, is a true story of Irish babies sold for adoption by nuns.  Philomena is the Mom of one of those adopted babies, and she has been obsessed for 50 years with finding him or at least finding out what has become of him.  It's an interesting search with kind of a surprise ending.  I was totally absorbed by it, and everyone seemed to enjoy it as well.