Florida Day 6: Hanging around the Condo Property (February 13)

Our final day in Key Largo was a pretty great day :) It started with the boys in a big dog pile on Daddy and then some sweet snuggles with a super happy Kendrick and Mama :) And not just one delicious cup of coffee, but two!

The boys were being great! We went down to the little beach again to check out the fishies, then to the park to play again and met some fun people who own a B&B up in Niagara on the Lake with kids just slightly younger than ours.

Mark played a couple rousing rounds of Candy Land with Cashel, and the boys ate great, which meant they also napped great!

And the great napping meant that Mama got to spend a couple hours all by herself...SHOPPING!

Before we knew it, nap time was OVER! ::cue the dramatic music to accompany this adorable picture of Kendrick::

We got ready and headed down to the pool to swim for a while, and we had the whole pool to ourselves!

My friend Jill asked me after I posted this on Facebook how we managed to get a picture without kids in it in the pool, and I have to reassure you that Mark was holding Kendrick, I just didn't get him in the picture. And Cashel was in his little floaty thing (see above).

The rest of the night was fairly uneventful. We made a chaotic trip to Arby's that ended with neither of the kids eating, and an unsuccessful attempt at seeing the sunset over the ocean. The boys conked out earlier than usual and we spent the rest of the night getting our stuff packed up and ready to go for the early morning, since we had to be on the road by 7am.

It was definitely a memorable trip in so many ways, but oh were we just aching to be home at this point. The condo was nice - it really, really was - but there really is just something to be said for sleeping in your own bed and being in your own environment. Having BUTTER to cook with (who buys a whole pound for one week?) and my favorite spices and not worrying about if the boys were going to break something or fall off the balcony or...you get the picture. A week is long enough when it comes to vacationing with toddlers, and it was just time to go home.

Florida Day 5: Theater of the Sea (February 12)

When I was initially planning our big Key Largo trip, I had etched in stone that we were going to the Miami Seaquarium. However, after our two big days already going to Gator Park (in Miami) and Key West, we were just traveled out. We knew the end of the week would bring a very long day home, and we just wanted to stay closer to Key Largo. Theater of the Sea was a wonderful compromise, and it was just a 10 minute drive, which was perfect.

The boys were completely fascinated by the dolphin and sea lion shows.

Mama just absolutely loved the beautiful gardens and gorgeous temps :)

Cashel was OBSESSED with the giant sea turtle and wanted to hang out and visit with him all day.

We had lunch at the cafe there, then explored a little more before the boys were ready for nap time, and we made our way back to the condo for them (and Mama!) to nap. We kept the rest of the day pretty low-key and had supper together at the condo, then were able to catch another gorgeous sunset.

The boys were a little later to bed this night, so we didn't stay up much past they did. Mark was especially wiped, which turns out is because he ended up coming down with a cold the next afternoon.

Florida Day 4: Key Largo and Harris Park (February 11)

After our really long day the previous day, we were feeling pretty content to just hang out around the condo on day 4. Of course, with the boys having spent most of the previous day just hanging out at the beach and then napping the rest of the way to Key West, they were feeling fairly adventurous still, so we started the day with a trip to the park again. Thank goodness this was part of the condo complex!!

We also went to check out the little beach they had on the property and the boys loved checking out the big fish they had in the inlet.

After our disastrous experiences thus far with eating at restaurants, we decided to try a few meals at the condo again, and then the boys had some really good naps (thank goodness!) and we watched more Scandal on Netflix.

When they woke up, we had everything mostly ready to head down the road a few miles to Harris Beach, where we spent a good hour. The condo had some fun sand toys available, which was great for the boys!

We tried our best to do the whole "Key Largo 2015" in the sand thing, but it was just the wrong time of day, and the boys were just too squirmy to get a decent picture. These were our attempts haha

After our time at the beach, we decided to check out a place our condo owners recommended: Chad's Deli Grill Pizzeria. And let me tell you: Our trip to Chad's will go down in history as the most ridiculous restaurant experience we had on the entire trip: Probably ever. The place itself wasn't so awful, the waitresses were sweet and the food came quickly and everything, but the boys were just plain awful. I ended up hauling them out to the car about halfway through the meal one in each arm, kicking and screaming and putting them in their carseats while Mark finished eating, paid and got the leftovers boxed up. I've never had to do that before, but this eating experience called for it. We're thankful that Cashel only *almost* knocked over another customer's pizza.

But after getting back to our condo, we did get to catch one of the two sunsets we actually were able to see the entire trip.

And my babies? They did eventually settle down.

It was one of those rough, rough, rough parenting moments, but we made it through. And then we settled in and watched a couple episodes of Scandal.

Florida Day 3: Bahia Honda and Key West (February 10)

I'll be honest: We didn't stick to our "agenda" at all, and this particular day, we just sort of took off and started driving south. We ended up going all the way to Key West, but were so tired that we didn't even stop once we got there.


We had no idea where we wanted to eat in Marathon on the way to the beach, and ended up going with Burdine's, after looking at reviews online. It ended up not being anything to write home about, and (as usual) the boys were fussy and didn't want to sit still or eat, so we kind of rushed through lunch.

After lunch, we made a stop at Bahia Honda State Park. And the boys LOVED it, although I wasn't too fond of all the nasty seaweed washed up on shore. The Keys are known for their beautiful water and temps, but they are NOT known for their beaches. Once you get away from seaweed mounds, it was alright, but the water still had bits and pieces of the seaweed floating around in it.


The rest of the day kind of ended up going downhill. We decided to head on to Key West, and the boys fought naps until after Big Pine Key. We got to Key West and ended up finding that it just really wasn't our thing. If we had a stroller that we could transfer the boys into, it might have been better, but it was just so crowded and busy and loud and crazy, and while that might have appealed to us 5 years ago before we had little ones in tow, it just wasn't our thing. So after spending 2 hours driving all the way down there, we basically drove around for a bit, let the boys nap longer and then headed back home. I didn't even hardly take any pictures.

We ended up stopping in Marathon at IHOP for supper, knowing that at least the boys would probably eat pancakes (and they did - thank goodness) and then just went back to the condo.

It was a VERY long day. We were both kinda glad that we had pressed on to Key West, however, because we then were able to spend a whole other day at the condo instead of drive that far with the boys again. It freed up another day that we decided to spend swimming and playing at the park, which was a MUCH better decision for us.