Florida or BUST!

In March we took a family vacation to Florida. We had wanted to go to Florida for some time now (since we had a niece we hadn’t met and FREE lodging while we were there), but we just never seemed to get around to doing it.


But this year we started to plan early, and actually did it! We left on March 10th (from a friend’s house in the Cities) and drove for 30 hours (through the night) to Orlando in our little Honda with 2 small children. Yup, we left the minivan (and all that extra room) at home and crammed everything into our little go-cart, I mean Civic. I wasn’t too keen on this idea either, especially since we BOUGHT our Odyssey because we wanted more space, but our Civic gets between 36-38 miles to the gallon and it saved us a TON. (We actually only spent about $200 in gas the ENTIRE 3,500 miles we dove there and back!) And I am also married to a master packer, and since he got everything to fit, I really couldn’t complain or put up a fight.

The kids actually did really well in the car. Sammy, at 3 ½, was the perfect little passenger. She took naps and went to sleep when she was supposed to, and as long as I had more colors, stickers, books or Dora videos, she was happy as a lark. Caleb, on the other hand, took to being confined in his car seat as sheer punishment. Praise God for relaxing ocean music at 3:00 a.m. and A LOT of McDonald’s, Burger King, and Chick-Fil-A play lands along the way. But in spite of the MANY fits, we had to give our little guy some grace. It would have been hard for me too, if I was used to sleeping on my tummy with my head smashed in the corner of my crib and NOW was being forced to sleep on my back locked in a car seat!

But once we got to Florida, the kids were GREAT! We all four slept in the same room for eight days, and had a GREAT time with family.


And you couldn’t beat the wonderful weather we had….around 75 degrees every day! Within an hour of getting to Brad’s brother’s house, Sammy was COMPLETELY filthy. We had dinner outside in the back yard, and Sammy couldn’t resist playing in the dirt. She actually said to me, “Mommy, they have DIRT here!” To which I said, “We have dirt in Minnesota too, it’s just buried under three feet of snow right now.”

Our Aust family vacations are known for being WAY too crazy and packed, but this one was just right. We spent a lot of time hanging out at the house and a local park/splash pad. We had a birthday party one night and went to see a model railroad. We got to see the space shuttle launch and hang out at Cocoa Beach. (Notice what you get when you cross a runny nose with one sand eating little boy!)

We spent a day at Sea World, and Sammy is STILL obsessed with Shamu…wonder where she gets that from! We hung out in the pool, and stayed up late almost every night talking and laughing.


It was truly a wonderful and completely relaxing time.

As I’ve organized the pictures and written down all that we had done, I’m still trying to figure out what was my favorite part of our trip. Was it the trip down and back…spending all that time listening to really good sermons and driving through seven states with Brad? Was it watching the girls have a “cousin” tea party?


Was it cooking with my sister-in-laws and spending some quality time with them? Was it spending only $404 on the ENTIRE trip? Was it the warmth of the sun and the beautiful weather? Was it watching Brad and his brothers be extremely silly and turn into teenagers again?

I think it’s probably all those things.

I know that I want to make family (and extended family) a priority. I want to spend time playing and relaxing together. I want to go on adventures. I want to figure out how to travel and vacation for CHEAP! I want to take a break from the stresses of life and full time ministry. I want to enjoy God’s nature and His many blessings. I want to make time to rest and play and laugh, and I want to do it with those I love.