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We're back from our trip to Florida. We spent the last week helping David and Margaret move into their new home in St. Cloud and babysitting little Julia, age 17 mos, while Margaret did her last two days as a working mom. Their next baby is due in December and she is now officially a stay-at-home mom. It was hot but worthwhile. For the last night's dinner I made Sandie's Awesome Lasagna and it was a great hit. We had fun with Julia who is clearly going to be a naturalist like her dad; they spend lots of time naming all the animals in the books and around their new home. Sandhill cranes walk through their yard regularly, horses graze across the street, and there are bullfrogs and pigfrogs and, yes, alligators in the pond on their property.
David puts Julia in the kayak with him as they skim across the water looking for the resident otter, too. Pictures to follow.

Going south of the Mason-Dixon line is always interesting; clearly the South has it's unique qualities and one of those is it's rednecks. Now I'm not being judgemental or trying to stereotype - at least I don't think so. I'm just stating a fact. I got lots of chuckles out of the signs I read on this trip. To wit: on a license plate on a big red pickup truck in the Carolinas...."MUHTRUCK". When I took Julia for a walk along her new road there was another pickup truck parked in front of one of the houses, this one was black and had those huge wheels.
A sticker on the side of the driver's door read, "BOYS LIE". I guessed it belonged to a girl but the next day I saw a blond woman about 40ish get in it and drive away! Further along the road was a ranch with a sign on the gate. The sign had a sillouhette of a large dog and it read, "I can get to this gate in one second, can you?" Hmmm, I walked quickly past that one! It reminded me of the sign and cross we saw in a very rural area of Utah at the gate to a ranch, it read, "Here lies the last guy who trespassed." Lastly, on the trip home, still south of the line, a bumpersticker aside a Confederate flag sticker read, "Fighting Terrorism since 1861". That's all, folks!