Welcome to JULY!

Can you believe we are half way through 2016?  Even though it is HOT outside right now, it will begin to cool off before we know it and Hope will be headed back to school...Middle School!

She is having a great summer with her nanny Ashley!

Joe had several days off around the 4th Holiday, and I was in Florida (details below), which means I DIDN'T have to go to any parades this year!  :)

I usually end up taking Hope, Annie and Ally to 2-3 parades over a 2 day period.  This year it was Dawn and Joe's turn to make sure they got to a parade.  LOL!  They will likely never let me leave town again over the 4th.

This was at the Waukee parade...

...and Ally walked with her gymnastics team.

So while they were having fun at parades, etc...I was enjoying a girls trip to Florida.  IT WAS AWESOME!!!

Evon and I walked down to Crabby Joe's one night for dinner.

Here are the three of us.  Unfortunately Tara had a cold, but we all still managed to have fun!

The condo we stay in is right on Daytona Beach.  So we didn't have to go anywhere to enjoy fireworks. which were shot off right on the beach.  So cool!

Every day the ice cream truck drove down the beach, because Daytona Beach is a beach you can drive on.   I wish I would have had money with me to go get some ice cream just to say I did it once.  I wish we had ice cream trucks around here too.

I love and miss this view.  I got a lot of sun and did a lot of reading by the pool/beach.

Below is Joey the heron, which is a frequent visitor to the restaurant (probably because they feed him shrimp).  We like to go there for the sweet potato tater tots.  They are GOOD!

Now most mornings I slept in (because i was on vacation and I could).  LOL!  But on the last morning I got up to see the sunrise.  And it did NOT disappoint.  We even had a pod of dolphins swimming around too.  You can see one fin in the picture below, on the right of the sun, close to shore.

It was an incredible trip with great friends and was just what I needed to get my mood back on track.  It makes me very thankful for the great friends I have in my life, especially those that I know have my back right now.  Your kindness will never be forgotten (you know who you are).  :)

So in honor of great friends, the 4th of July and yesterday Joe and I celebrated our 21st anniversary (we took no photos-ooops), here are some layouts and cards.

Here's to 21 more years together (and hopefully a lot more than that).  Until next time...

Darla