Goodbye, Sunshine State :(

After a fabulous 3 days in Atlanta and a wonderful 3 days in Florida, I sadly had to say goodbye to the South, College Roomie, Brother and Sis-in-law, and even Nephew Dog today.  L  As sad as I am that Older Brother lives so far away (Florida), it sure is nice to be able to have such a great place to visit!  This was College Roomie’s first trip to Florida—hopefully it won’t be her last!  We arrived in Florida on Sunday after a THRILLING 8 hour car ride…to get to Older Brother’s house more quickly, we tried to keep stops to a minimum, but couldn’t resist stopping at the Florida Welcome Center to take this classic picture…

Older Brother and Sis-in-Law are fabulous hosts!  When we got to their house, we went out for yummy sushi and a walk around the little downtown/village area in their town.  

Older Brother works at the Space Center (umm, I know, COOL, right?!?   He is like legit a rocket scientist!), so we of course had to check out the view of the NASA building from across the river on our drive back home.  Did you know that the main room in the main building at Kennedy Space Center is over 500 feet tall?  And it’s NOT divided into separate floors.  Imagine walking into a building and being able to look straight up 500 feet!  Older Brother told us that clouds can form at the top, and it can even rain inside!  CRAZY!

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Monday Older Brother and Sis-in-Law joined us for a BEACH DAY!  Is there anything better?  My current hypochondriac tendency is SKIN CANCER PARANOIA, so you better believe I reapplied sunscreen like 8 times while we were there…Seriously, though, there are few things I love more than spending time by the ocean.

Of course, what vacation would be complete without a shopping day?  Roomie and I trekked to a gigantic outlet mall in central Florida yesterday, where of course I spent too much money at the Nike and Addidas outlets…but come on, how cute are those tempo shorts?

Buying new clothes meant that my already too full suitcase was even MORE full…if I wanted any hope of carrying on my suitcase and saving myself that 25 buck bag check fee, there was no way my bike helmet was going to fit.  Yes, you read that right.  I had to squeeze a BIKE HELMET into my carry on suitcase on the way down for the Muddy Buddy race.  It was a tight squeeze!  Thankfully, Mom and Dad are driving down to Florida in a few weeks to visit Older Brother, so I left the helmet for them to bring back for me.  Overpacking wins again! J

Last but not least, Roomie and I had a wonderful time playing with Nephew Dog (aka Older Brother’s dog), Mario.  How cute is he?

It is totally worth the allergy-induced sneezing to have a cuddle with this cutie!  I'm not a huge dog person, but I love Mario.  He is a bundle of LOVE!!  Mario even joined us for a run while we were there!  (BTW, running in Florida in summer is ROUGH!  That’s all I can even say about that…)  Yesterday we helped give Mario a bath--aka held onto him to keep him from running away while scrubbing him with puppy shampoo…ADORABLE. 

Well, another wonderful vacation is drawing to a close…as I type this I am sitting at the airport at 4:56am waiting to board my flight home and back to reality…BUT there are some exciting things going on at home too—I will keep you in suspense for now, but will post some news later!