Alabama & Mississippi

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We are making our way along the Gulf Coast, a stretch of America we are familiar with. These two states are going to be combined into one post as we were in both of them a short time and stayed right on the border of the two places. One place we have not made a stop was Orange, Alabama. Having heard it has beaches as beautiful as Destin, plus two new Hilton's...this was a definite we must check out! Boy are we glad we did...this is gonna be a new beach trip for us! Closer than the Florida coast, just as pretty and so much fun stuff to do!!! We spent a day doing our favorite...school on the beach! My kids have been so spoiled on this trip with school in exotic places and I fear for them struggling in a classroom setting next year. They had better figure it out though cause the homeschool train is nearing an end!

Our second super fun place was a restaurant we had seen signs for multiple times on our trips to Florida...Lambert's Cafe. This super fun, down home cooking place literally chucks rolls the size of softballs across the restaurant. My guys ate their weight in rolls as it was too fun to resist having them pelted at us! On top of rolls, this place comes around with pushcarts of free sides that are mouthwatering yumminess...fried okra, beans, fried potatoes/onions, apples...too many to list. Drinks bigger than Luke's head for kids made this the ultimate hit :) We seriously had to roll ourselves out of this place!

Our final activity was swimming. We do a lot of this in real life and have kept that up on this trip. After years on swimteam, my crew loves to be in the water and does not get bored with it. I try to find a fun pool in every city in the one in Biloxi did not disappoint! We spent the better part of a day on waterslides, a water structure, floating the lazy river, playing basketball and of course...doing our laps :)

Florida

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Holy cow...there is so much to tell you about Florida! We spent just over 3 weeks there covering the state in all directions!!! We had so much fun doing so many things we have never experienced before. We spent Christmas in true paradise. Seriously...this is gonna be a long post so stop now if you don't have the time!

Florida started with a visit with The Williby Family. Beth and I met teaching 15 years ago and forged a friendship that is still going strong. We have been through life's ups and down together, had 7 kids between us and still talk on the phone multiple times a week even though we don't actually get to see each other more than every two years or so. Our boys all fine in line like dominos and had the best 2 days playing together!

Stop #2 was a pitstop to break up our drive on the way to the FL Keys. Imagine our surprise when we arrived and it was a 55+ community!!!! Craig was not finding it as amusing as I was...I was hysterical! I clearly had no idea when I booked it and lucky for us they welcomed us with open arms. We were invited to the golf cart Christmas parade and even given the weekly schedule of events to participate in! I went to BINGO and even won $7!!!! When it was time to go, we bid farewell to all our new friends (Albert) and left in true Rose fashion...I somehow managed to not see the water pipes in the ground sticking up and drove the Jeep right over them, causing an eight foot geyser to erupt from the ground in my rearview mirror. All our nice new friends came running out with death glares yelling that I broke the water. Craig was in the RV in front of me and witnessed this whole event in the rear camera. Let me just tell you how well that went over! Fortunately the maintenance man was much much more sympathetic and told us not to worry, he would take over and fix it. I'm guessing I'm still the talk of town as water had to be shut off. Wonder if they will still welcome under age travelers anymore?!?!?!

Stop #3 was the home of Rose Family Christmas...RV style. And man did we do it in style...a private island in the FL Keys where the RV park was the only thing on it and we were looking right at the ocean out our front window! What an amazing way to celebrate making it as far south as we could literally go in our home on wheels. We snorkeled, we fished (Matt caught a nurse shark and hasn't stopped smiling!), we played horseshoes and football, we rode bike, we swam, we (I) laid on the beach with a great book and a margarita and Santa even found us!!! We drove down to Key West one day to explore the tiny island and literally had the BEST week vacation! While I know it seems like we are on a year long vacation, in reality we are living very similar to how we did at home...minus the permanent aspect. I still cook, clean, do laundry and have added tour guide, travel agent and full time teacher to my hat. Craig still works and pays the bills. This week in the Keys we did NONE of it! We acted like we were on a true vacation and enjoyed every minute of it!!! We even finished off our tropical vacation with a night at the Hilton. We used some of our Hilton points to take advantage of all of the super awesome amenities this beautiful resort had to offer and ended our beach vacation in style ;)

Stop #4 was Miami...specifically the RV park at Gator park. You know its a doozey when they tell you at check in to be aware for stray gators...OMG!!! This piece of heaven got even more special when we discovered we were parked right smack next door to "Gator Dan", a 20 year resident and star of the Gator show at the park. gator Dan became even more special when we discovered he had 6 gators living in his RV with him and invited Craig and the boys over to visit!!! UUUmmmmmmm...NO THANKS FOR ME!!!! I happily stayed home, with the door locked tight and had no part of that! Our fun didn't end there...because we were now friends of the park star, we got "extra special" attention during the Gator Show (NOT GOOD ATTENTION!) and were shown all the animals up close and in our faces. Again, 4 of us thought this was great, 1 not so much! It got even better when he handed Luke a gator and Luke came running at me, yelling "Mommy we are gonna get you!" much to the delight of Dan and the whole audience!

Another amazing adventure in Miami was slated for our Matt. We discovered his beloved OU was playing in the Orange Bowl, less than 10 minutes from us on New Years Eve. Mom once again rocks and managed to score tickets for Craig, Brian and Matt! We got even luckier when the kids and I went to South beach the day before the game to ride bikes and stumbled on the ESPN Beach Bash promoting the big game!!! Aunt Key managed to be able to use her magic and score us VIP admission (way to be a Capital One Customer!) and we were literally the very first people in the OU tent! Matt got to get his game day apparel early, the boys got to play all the games and activities and we were literally exiting before the line of over 5000 people was barely getting through security!!! What an unexpected awesome surprise this turned out to be! Gameday was everything Matt could've hoped for (minus the loss for OU!). they had such a fun time and loved their 40 yard line seats! Go Mom! Luke and I celebrated New Years ourselves with a date. We poked around multiple toy stores, had dinner at Pei Wei and ended with 150 token at Chuck E Cheese! A great New Year's Eve for this family!

Stop #5 was just outside of Ft. Meyers to spend time with my family. My Aunt and Uncle (my Dad's brother) live there, and my cousin, her husband and kids were all in town. Keely and I grew up together and unfortunately are no longer able to see each other very often. Getting to spend this time with our family was such a great stop and we had so much fun! The boys lovevd the feeling of being at Gaga & Papa's (probably because my Aunt and Uncle are pretty close molds of my parents!) and this was definitely a great stop!

Stop #6 was Tampa...another amazing stop! First we got to spend time with my cousin Jackie (my Mom's brother's daughter!), her husband and her 3 boys!!! Except hers are itty bitty and oh so sweet! (Unlike my sassy mouth, eye rolling heathens!) She has a 2 year old and 4 month old twins...I was in pure heaven! We got to spend the day playing with babies, enjoyed a great dinner and really had the best time seeing each other. Jackie and I extended the fun when I snuck over for another afternoon of baby holding minus my crazies!!! We are so happy we got to see all these wonderful people we love in Florida and don't see often enough!

Tampa was also home to one of the coolest adventures so far...swimming with manatees! What amazing gentle giants these are! They are vegetarians and have no known predators. They adore people and will swim right up to you, poke you and want you to rub their bellies. Our day started with a 5am wake up call in 49 degree weather...complete with pouring rain. Not the best mood setter for the kids but holy cow did attitudes change! The boys literally had the time of their lives. Getting to swim with these jumbo creatures was a once in a lifetime experience and one we will not forget!

Stop #7 was Clearwater Beach...home to one of our favorite movie(s)...Dolphin Tale and Dolphin Tale 2. We absolutely loved this place. Getting to go to the aquarium and see Hope and Winter, plus touring the facility, meeting many other animals, seeing the prop house for the movie and holding the actual prosthetic that Winter wore was the coolest thing!

Stop #8 was Orlando, our final Florida destination and Craig's bachelor pad for a weekend! The kids and I had a very quick trip to Houston to spend a very quick belated Christmas with Gaga & Papa. Did I mention it was quick?!?! We had a great time seeing Aunts, Uncles and cousins, got to be at Annie's Birthday party, and got spoiled rotten by Gaga & Papa! I even managed to squeeze in a few hours with my two best buddies who spent their day making a very long drive to come see me for just a little bit of time!

We have now finally left Florida feeling refreshed, very blessed and fortunate to have spent time with friends and family we might have not otherwise seen without this RV trip and ready to complete the second half of this crazy adventure!!!!

South Carolina

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South Carolina was home to some lazy days for this nonstop crew. We based ourselves in Hilton Head, a place I have heard of all my life but not actually been to. What a neat beach town...although completely different than the images in my head had always produced! It much bigger than I expected, complete with two separate roads around the island and every store imaginable. I was surprised by how many of these uber-expensive resorts (even Disney!) are not actually beachfront but in love with the way the city has made the beach entrances their own tourist attraction. We did school on the beach and seriously...how many people don't want to do that in December?!?!?! The kids and I also had our own mad science day...we took the m's off of m&m's, we made our own Borax icicles and turned volcano making into blowing up the vinegar jug instead!

Georgia

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What fun we had in Georgia! We hit a huge milestone for this theme park loving family...our 5th Six Flags in 2015! To say we made good use of our season passes is an understatement...I feel like Six Flags needs to give us an award of some kind :) Being December, this one was celebrating Christmas in the Park which is an event we go to every year and seeing it at new parks is always a neat thing.

We found so much to do in Atlanta that we ended up buying the City Pass. It's a great way to get admission to all the top attractions for one price and for a family of 5...definitely a great deal! Most of the attractions are all within walking distance of Olympic Park (which itself is such a neat place to see!). First stop...Atlanta Aquarium. Matt has been waiting to go here for years. It is the worlds largest aquarium and home of a whale shark! Luke's day was sealed when Scuba Santa swam right up to him and touch hands through the glass!!! My overall, honest opinion of Atlanta Aquarium...yes it is a massive building but they have a ton of wasted space. For the price of admission (which I found crazy high for an aquarium) there could be more to do. I expected to spend the day here and we were done in less than 3 hours. Would I come back...probably not. But would I recommend it to others...probably. If your kids like aquariums it is definitely a neat place to spend a few hours... but try to find a coupon :)

Stop 2...World of Coke...Now this was a hit! It started with everyone receiving scavenger hunt booklets to complete throughout our visit, complete with a prize at the end! The kids had an absolute blast in this place. We met the Coca Cola Polar Bear, watched a 4D video, sat on the American Idol couch, amazed ourselves with all of the creations made out of Coke bottles and cans, saw the actual bottling process, drank ourselves silly at the tasting bar (where they have all of the products Coke makes worldwide on soda fountains for you to drink as much as you want!) and even managed to set off the alarms around the vault housing the original Coke recipe (Thank you Luke for being THAT kid!).

Stop 3...CNN. Now this very Conservative family is Fox News fans (I say we...I mean Craig and we all have to listen to it by default!) and NOT liberal media fans. But...touring CNN Headquarters was definitely a fun thing that the kids really enjoyed! Seeing the news being anchored live, looking the the 1000's of tv's (literally) and riding the world's longest freestanding escalator made this stop another hit ;)

Stop 4...College Football Hall of Fame...this just screams my peoples names! We are big 'ol Hall of Fame fans having been to quite a few so far. Now we can check off College as well! This one was extremely interactive and catered to kids. There was so much to do and the newest technology enabled the whole experience to be personalized. Definitely a come back to on our family fun list!

Last stop...Savannah. I was the only one excited to come here as it has always been on my bucket list of places. Of course we picked the only nasty, rainy day we had seen in weeks to come to the city where you are supposed to walk around under the big 'ol trees and enjoy the scenery...grrrrrrrr! Once we arrived, my whole crew thought it looked like a neat place to explore...and then the skies opened up changing our plans. We did manage to squeeze in lunch at Paula Deen's "Lady & Sons" which was every bit as delicious as you'd imagine. Savannah will for sure be a city I come back to and actually get to enjoy (I just might not drag my people along with me!)

North Carolina

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North Carolina was the most relaxing, enjoyable stop for us...it was the cousin state! My cousin Shannon (on my Dad's side) and my cousin Natalie (on my Mom's side) both live there. We spent the better part of a week just hanging out and spending quality time together.

First stop was Seymour Johnson Airforce Base...home of Shannon, Nate, Brynn, & Keelynn. Nate is a pilot in the Airforce and arranged for us to stay on base in family camp. The boys thought this was so fun! Riding bikes and seeing jets take off all day long was such a memorable experience for us all. We had such a great visit...multiple dinners together, a visit to see Santa, shopping, tons of playtime and getting to see Uncle Nate take off in his F15 (which was the highlight of our visit!)

Next stop was Charlotte...home of Natalie, Gary, Tyler and Derek. The boys have been counting the seconds till we got here as Derek & Tyler are the exact ages as my three. Brian and Derek are actually only 7 days apart. Tyler is right between Matt & Luke...5 boys ranging from 8-11 ensured that lots of fun was to be had! We got to see hockey practice (so fun! Derek is an assistant captain for his team is Tyler is a goalie!), spent time outside playing, and had tons of wrestling, yelling, chasing, giggles and fun! We had such a great 2 days with The Pritchard's and cannot wait for them to make a trip to Texas to see us!

The only activity we actually did in Charlotte was a pretty cool one...we drove on the NASCAR track in the Jeep! The speedway put on a drive thru Christmas lights display every year. It was so cool to get to drive around the track and up the curves (Craig got to live out a fantasy...complete with his family in tow! Ha!)  We definitely consider North Carolina to be a HUGE SUCCESS!

Virginia

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Virginia was a quick stop for us as unfortunately it was Winter. Jamestown and Williamsburg were "closed" for the season (the reenactments) and we had just done Mt. Vernon this Summer. Having just left DC for the second time in less than 6 months, this kids were kind of over historical buildings so we opted for somewhere fun...The Air and Space Museum. This is actually the second Smithsonian Air and Space Museum...the first being in DC. This one is 3x bigger and has so many more planes and interactive things to do! Craig took the boys for the first part while I ran around finishing up last minute Christmas stuff WITHOUT MY PEOPLE! When I joined them, I was sure they'd be ready to go...wishful thinking ;) All said in done...this was a fun pitstop with some learning thrown in for good measure!

Washington DC

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Well we were here in June and we are back again! This time rather than sightseeing, we were on a mission. Luke is a history obsessed 8 year old and memorized the President's all on his own. His dream has been to say them in order in front of the White House! We actually forgot when we were here this summer and he has been begging to come back and do them so here we are! Little man ended up getting all nerved up being filmed but the end result is precious and he was so proud of himself!

Time for my rant...I was SO disappointed in the White House at Christmas. As the national, most well-known landmark in America, one strand of greenery across the balcony was a pathetic attempt at celebrating a National Holiday in this country. It was like a slap in the face and would've honestly looked better completely undecorated. And then there was the National Tree...this was even WORSE! There were no actual decoration on the tree instead throwing some ribbon down the sides with stars representing a Jewish star, completed by a GIANT menorah behind it. I truly left Pennsylvania Ave. with a bitter taste in my mouth and even more disgust than I already had for our President.

Ok...rant over...our other stop in DC was a surprise for the kids. We spent the afternoon at the Gaylord National at "ICE", their winter wonderland ice spectacular! Oh my goodness...this is one of the neatest (and coldest) things we have ever done at Christmas! We have contemplated it a few times in Dallas but Great Wolf Lodge always wins and let me tell you, now that we know how amazing it is, we will be adding it to our to do list back home! A massive winter walk through, set at negative 4 degrees, with everything you can see made solely out of ice! You truly felt like you were walking through the North Pole! At the end was a two story ice castle with ice chutes coming out of it that you can play on as long as you can tolerate the cold! Every year the theme is different and this year's happened to be "Santa Claus is Coming To Town" which really enhanced the North Pole effect! If there is a Gaylord Hotel near you, make a point to go to ICE!!!! It is worth every penny!

Maryland

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We made it to Maryland! While we spent time in various locations in Maryland, the main city we visited was Annapolis. I have been her a few times, as has Craig  and the kids were excited to see it based on our reviews :) The highlight for the boys was seeing the Naval Academy and a boy they know from home who is a freshman there! His younger brother is one of Matt's good friends and seeing "Dale" was such a special treat! Especially seeing him looking all official in his uniform :)

Another fun activity in Maryland was the 6 LB Milkshake Challenge the kids did! Yes, you read that correct, 6 LBS of ice cream!!! Their eyes about popped out of their heads when the cup bigger than Luke arrived and they spent well over an hour getting through 4 LBS of it. Sadly they didn't finish but they sire had fun trying!!!

Delaware

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Surely I am not the only person who when I think of Delaware, I do NOT think "beach vacation"?!?!? I don't know what I pictured when I think actually do think of Delaware (but in all reality, does ANYONE actually think about Delaware? I mean, they are kind of the forgotten state!), but the gorgeous beaches we stumbled on were certainly not it! Rehoboth Beach is a beach town with so much to do! There are boardwalks, outlet malls, waterparks, mini golf courses and the prettiest, cleanest beach I have seen in awhile! I would definitely come back here for a beach vacation as crazy as that sounds! We didn't do much in Delaware thanks to the never ending rain. We did get to see the monument depicting Delaware as the very first state which is a very fun history lesson in itself, went to the movies and of course felt the freezing water of the Atlantic in December! Oh yeah, we also managed to somehow end up with 3 hermit crabs, ugh!!!! According to the kids, "you can't go to the beach without bringing home hermit crab pets!"

New Jersey, Part 2

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I told you earlier...we liked New Jersey so much we were gonna come back someday! Well...we're back!!!! Ha! Our original plans had us heading to NYC for five days after Thanksgiving. Thanks to ISIS and Obama (not really fans of either!), we decided to forgo NYC this trip. While I was  disappointed (I had Rockette's tickets from Craig & boys for Christmas), this was actually my decision. Craig and I have worked hard to shelter our kids from the harsh realities of the sad state of America right now and felt it was in the best interest of keeping the kids in this bubble that we skip NYC right now. Seeing police and snipers armed with machine guns, causing unnecessary fear for our kids was not something we were willing to do right now. Plus...we all know how much my kids enjoyed "Filthadelphia" so they were perfectly fine with this decision. We will definitely return to NYC in the near future with our kids to show them all the city has to offer, but know at least we still saw New York this summer and feel like we didn't really miss anything :)

Back to New Jersey...we decided to make use once again of our Six Flags season passes and visit for Holiday in the Park. This has been a yearly tradition for us for the past 5 years in Texas at both parks and we were so excited to see how the east coast compared! We had an amazing two days seeing shows, riding rides and enjoying the millions of lights! The boys were completely disappointed that the 1 coaster they were dying to ride, the one they have wanted to ride for years and is only in NJ, was CLOSED for the winter! UGH....talk about a let down...now we have to come back to New Jersey for Round 3 at some point in time ;)