Florida Day #11: Goodbye!
[Photos taken on 02-03 March 2019, posted online 24 August 2019. The leaves are starting to change color, and every now and then fall is in the air.]
Too quickly, our last day in Florida dawned. We had to clear the airbnb house by 10 am, but happily didn’t have to actually clean it. Ever since The-Very-Sweaty-Very-Stressful-Exit-Cleaning-of-the-Airbnb-house-in-Lyon, I’ve tried to rent tidy-only properties.
We piled all our stuff into the two cars, and then went to do a bit of shopping as we moved in hops closer to the airport. Our flight didn’t leave until close to dinner-time, so we had plenty of time to kill.
We arrived in Iceland on the Sunday morning, and spent the day recovering, and making cream-puffs! (40-ish photos total)
Saturday 02 March 2019
Florida Day #10: Dresses & My 42nd Birthday
[Photos taken on 01 March 2019, posted online 17 August 2019. After a few days of fall-preview-weather we’re back to the pretty good stuff. I predict wood staining this weekend!]
Our very last full day in Florida was spent recovering after the Disney World trip the day before, taking the teenagers to the mall, and having a nice birthday celebration (mine!). (25-ish images total)
Friday 01 March 2019
Florida Day #8: Cat Cafe
[Photos from 27 February 2019, posted online 08 August 2019. Tonight Anna and I are going to see Ed Sheeran play here in Iceland!]
After all the excitement of the previous days, and an upcoming visit to Disney World the next day, this day was designated ‘relaxation day’.
We hung out at ‘home’ for the majority of the day, but towards the end I took the older girls to a cat-cafe nearby, where they played with cats while I did a bit of blogging. (11 photos total)
Wednesday 27 February 2019
Florida Days #6-7: Fun Spot & Universal Studios
[Photos from 25-26 February 2019, posted online 07 08 August 2019. Tomorrow Today we started work after four weeks of summer vacation. I’m I was not ready!]
We’d decided that one day would be enough for our kiddos at Universal Studios (we were advised against taking Emma there, is it would go over her head), but our fellow travelers decided they’d go there for two days.
On the first Universal day, we therefore opted to visit a local amusement park instead called Fun Spot. There were VERY few people there, so we went on tons of rides as there were no lines whatsoever.
On the second Universal day, Finnur took our big kids there, while I took Emma to the second Fun Spot park, a hop and a skip away from Universal Studios. That Fun Spot park was even emptier than the previous one (!!!), so Emma and I again went on tons of rides! The others got to see all the cool Universal stuff though, so in the end I think it was about equal. 🙂 (60-ish images total)
Monday 25 February 2019
Florida Days #4-5: Go-Kart & Tree-Climbing
[Photos from 23-24 February 2019, posted online 06 August 2019. The weather keeps being amazing.]
We made a conscious decision to not go to any of the big parks over the weekend, instead going to smaller venues to avoid people-traffic. (I really dislike crowds, and try avoid them as much as I can!)
Instead we visited a small go-kart place that also had an alligator pit, and an arcade, and somehow managed to spend most of the day there.
The day after that we had an ‘early’ rise and went to a tree-climbing adventure park. We had a late lunch at Denny’s, and then the older females went and got manicures and pedicures! (40-ish photos total)
Saturday 23 February 2019
Florida Days #2-3: Aquatica & Outlet Shopping
[Photos taken on 21-22 February 2019, posted online 06 August 2019. Our summer vacation will be over soon, sigh.]
The weather forecast was good (surprise!) so we decided to spend the day at a water park. We apparently picked a good day since according to one of the guards, there were about 5000 people in the park that day, but they can go up to 18000 or so, and then it’s quite full.
The day after that was designated “shopping day”. This meant Finnur got to entertain the younger ones, while the rest of us walked around an outlet mall for an entire day. Eeeek! (20 images total)
Thursday 21 February 2019
Florida Days #0-1: Travel & Acclimatizing
[Photos taken on 19 – 20 February 2019, posted online 05 August 2019. We’ve spent the long weekend in Finnur’s parents’ summer house. The weather is amazing. Yay, climate change!]
Sometime last year, our friends Adda and Halli approached us with the idea to go visit Orlando, Florida, with them before the kids got ‘too old’. Since we’d managed to not visit Disneyland while we lived in California, we said yes. We decided to go during the two-day long school February winter-break, as the weather would be most tolerable.
As it happened, our flight to Florida got changed TWICE by Icelandair, so we ended up going out a day earlier than planned. (35-ish images total.)
Tuesday 19 February 2019
Influenza, Flooring & Apples
[Photos from 01 – 19 February 2019, posted online 28 July 2019. We’ve just spent a week at House #2, but are back in town.]
For the first time ever, we had planned to take a long winter vacation around the 2-day-long school winter vacation. We chose Florida as the destination, 19 February as the departure date.
February was thus spent waiting for 19 February to arrive, but in the meantime … Finnur visited House #2 twice, and even managed to get started on finishing the guesthouse, I visited an art museum, the northern lights made a showing, birds got apples, hair was cut, and parent-teacher conferences were attended.
Most but mostly Emma was felled by influenza, and thus her 6th birthday was super quiet, and all partying was postponed to post-Florida. Poor girl! Here are 75-ish photos to celebrate that we survived!
Friday 01 February 2019
Soccer, Snow-Play & Icicles
[Photos taken on 14 – 30 January 2019, posted online 19 July 2019. I seem to be entering perimenopause: insomnia after sleeping for 20-40 minutes is my new nemesis. This is written on three hours of sleep.]
The latter half of January sported enough snow that the sleds got pulled out on a regular basis. Emma also decided that she’d like to start going to football practice, in part because all of her friends seemed to be going to one practice or another on Tuesday afternoons, so there was nobody to play with! Remarkably, Anna also started a new sport, “gymnastics for all”, which she thoroughly enjoyed.
The latter half of January also turned into the exciting icicle watch, as the snow slowly made its way off of our roof! (60-ish photos total)
Monday 14 January 2019
2019 Begins, Yule Ends & People (Un)Socialize
[Photos taken 01-13 January 2019, posted online 18 July 2019. Lovely weather today, warm by Icelandic standards. Happily there’s been enough rain lately that the plants have mostly recovered from the 6-week drought earlier this summer.]
January began with lots of people gatherings, but I was also pretty good about ungathering. We went back to work, the kids back to school, sport practices restarted, and the gingerbread house was demolished and devoured as Yule came to a close. (35-ish images total)
Tuesday 01 January 2019
