FLORIDA VACATION, JOHN, KALEY, THE KIDS AND BUSCH GARDEN

Dear Family,

Mom and I had our break in temple service at the end of January. The Salt Lake Temple shuts down for two weeks for maintenance and everyone takes off to warmer places.

We went down to Tampa Florida to vis John and Kaley and their two boys. John has started in a prestigious law firm in Tampa so was working the long hours required of an associate in the law firm. We saw him in the evening and on weekends.

Here is a shot of John, Kaley, Grant and Garret on their couch in their nice home in Land O Lakes. We went out to dinner in the evenings and just had a good time. They live on a string of small lakes. There are gators thee and one morning, John and Kaley spotted two huge Bobcats on the opposite side of the pond. They put in a fence in the backyard which keeps the gators out.

They live about ten minutes away from Busch Gardens.
We used to visit this place when we lived in Michigan but the park has been expanded with rides and roller coasters. The Southern Belles that sat in the beautiful garden (I had Bryan sit next to them for a photo then) were not to be found.

Mom and I bought a pass and went with Kaley and the kids three times and once with John. The weather was 65 - 72 degrees and was most pleasant.
We took the kids on the train and rode around the Park. Here is a shot of the train and John and Grant having a good time. You could tell the people from Florida.. they were wearing sweat shirts with hoods and the tourists were there in shorts.

The kids loved the little monkey statue. They were like monkeys anyway. Here is Kal;ey, Grant and Garret with the monkeys. There were animals everywhere and it was such fun. The shot at the top shows me getting close and friendly with the Giraffes.

When we went there on Saturday with John, Kaley took a little break by crawling in the stroller and John pushed her around. A kid yelled out, "Look there is a Mom isn a Stroller!" It was a good break for Kaley after pushing the kids around. We feel we got our moneys worth by frequent visits there and the kids had a ball and we wore them out.

On Friday, John took off a day and we travelled to Kissamee to meet Kaley's uncle, Randy L. I wrote about him before when we visited John and hunted on the Church ranch in the middle of Florida. Randy took us to his hunting concession of the K6 section of the ranch. There were cows with new calves is some fields but we hunted in a very primitive portion of the ranch which was native uncleared Florida. We were after wild hogs. Randy took us there in a swamp jeep. We built a ground blind for myself (like in Africa) on a game trail. John went up a palm tree with a climbing deer stand over a game trail. He heard a lot of action but the brush was so thick, he did not get a shot. I heard a lot of rustlng in the brush, leaves crunching, rooting around and it was getting closer, pulse rate went up, got the safety off and there was a huge armadillo rooting around. Randy was not even hunting but stumbled on a large wild hog and shot it so we did bring home some bacon for John. So fun.

We off course looked around for some good sea food. We went to a place that served fresh stone crab which is almost as good as fresh Maine Lobster. It was so good. We then found a sea food shot that sold them and had them at home. Kaley cooked some great meals and it was so much fun!

On Sunday, we gave our Joseph Smith fireside in their ward and it went over well. Monday we left 72 degrees and arrive in Utah to 0 degrees and I managed to come down with the flu but we had such a great time each and every day in Florida. Could be habit forming.

Next family event include several baptisms away from home, we are entertaining a group of Chinese surgeons tomorrow night and there is the family Valentine Family Home Evening soon

Love to all, Mom and Dad