So we slept in a little bit in our stopover hotel and didn’t get out until after 9am (with a 5 hour drive still today).  Then, as I’m pulling out of the hotel parking lot I notice in my rearview that the driver side tire on the trailer is warped out in one place – that thing is gonna blow any minute.  So we had to find a tire place and have it replaced.

All that to say we didn’t get to St. George until right at 4pm and then I had to get the boat in the water, drive it to the house and then walk the 1 3/4 miles back to the ramp to get the car.  So, it was 6pm before that was done, but the kids have been dying to go fishing so, off we went for just a little bit.  I ran over to Bob Sykes cut which is a narrow channel through St. George between the bay and Gulf.  I had heard you could catch reds there.  We pulled up in the midst of several boats who looked very bored from catching nothing, got some shrimp on the hooks and put them down.

About five minutes later Allison yells "I’ve got something!" and the fight ensued.  By the time she got this thing (a 10lb+ red over half her length) to the boat (the first time) the other boats were driving by to see what the little fisher-girl had hooked into.  Everyone cheered as I hauled it over the transom.

Michael and I didn’t catch a thing but we didn’t care .

Last night I got to go out on a date with a true angel.  It was the annual “Princess Date Night” for me and Allison through her Indian Princess Tribe.  We took the girls to a nice venue and had dinner and evening of fun and dancing.

The theme was Hollywood and Allison had the real movie star dress.  It was magic.

We both look forward to this night every year (this is our third one).  Allison started asking me about it somewhere around six months ago.  It was a truly great time – and Daddy even won one of the prizes for craziest dancer (doh!) .

The past few weeks have seen both Sharon and I embarking on some fun activities with the kids. 

First, a couple weeks ago we had a particularly crisp beautiful morning and Sharon (since she was soon leaving for a return trip to England by herself) wanted to take the kids out for a hike.

They headed to Crowder’s Mountain – a small peak about an hour from our house – and had a grand time (including almost getting lost in the dark).

Next, while Sharon was on said trip back to England, I decided to take advantage of the Veteran’s Day holiday (thanks, again, Dad) and take a quick fishing trip with the kids.  We headed to New Smyrna Beach because it was reachable in a day’s drive and had some potential for good fishing.

As it turns out, the fishing wasn’t stellar due to a cold front arriving with us, but the kids and I still had a grand time.  It wasn’t a total bust as we managed to bag a real menagerie of 12 different kinds of fish (but, alas, no reds or trout).  Allison ended up with two of the most interesting – landing a very nice Jack Crevalle and a small Puffer Fish.  Michael landed lots of fish too – having the most fun with the wildly jumping Ladyfish.

And, finally, with the weather blowing us out on the front end of our fishing trip, we stumbled on another activity.

We went ice skating! (in Florida, no less).

Both kids did incredibly well.  It was Allison’s first attempt and Michael had only been on skates a couple times when he was three or four.  Dad even managed to not break anything.

Halloween was a great success.  Michael went to a party and trick-or-treating with his friends (in a Limo!) and Allison went around the neighborhood with me and a bunch of the other kids from our cul-de-sac, including our new next-door neighbors.  They are a really nice family with two kids and the daughter (just a year older) and Allison seem to be becoming fast friends.

The rain gave us just enough of a respite to allow us to get the trick-or-treating in and then it was party time at one of our other new neighbor’s house.  A great time had by all.

Pumpkin carving activities took place during the week before with Allison and I carving a puppy dog face in her classroom with all the other dads and kids and Michael (who opted for the Alien face) did his own pumpkin completely by himself for the first time.

Allison was a “Pretty” Witch and Michael,  well, you decide whatever that is…

Allison and I went on our semi-annual campout with her Indian Princess group last weekend.  As usual, it was a fun time for all and we had great weather.

The activities included:

• Horseback Riding
• Canoeing
• Archery
• BB Guns
• Hiking
• Crafts
• Campfire/S’mores
• Zip lining
• Bouldering

…and staying up late and just plain having fun.  Pictures can be viewed on our Kodak Gallery here.

I’m going to try posting some of my favorite shots to a photo blog to  showcase them a bit better.  It won’t be a huge collection of snapshots – we’ll still use Kodak or Flickr for that.  It’s going to be a place where I can put some of the pictures I’m most proud of and try and make them look nice.

Once you’re in the blog, if you hover your mouse over the picture you will see “Next” and “Prev” buttons appear (Prev will appear if the mouse is on the left side of the photo – Next if on the right).  There will also be links at the top to an archive (which will be more useful when I’ve got more photos out there) and a way to get a random photo.  Its possible to comment on each individual picture as well.

I’ve put a link in the “Other Areas” section down below or, you can just go to http://photos.reedsplace.com.  I only have a few pictures up there right now but will be adding more soon.  Let me know what you think…

Welcome to our new website.  I hope to keep this up to date a little more regularly than the old one…of course, that’s not setting the bar very high .

Anyway, I will be creating new sections on here over the next few days.  There will be an area for Michael and Allison and the home page (right here) will show recent updates.  I’ll also have links to our photos and our travel blog from our big “Out in the World” trip we took this past summer.

Thanks for stopping by.  So you’ll stay up to date, there is a subscription system that will send you an email whenever we update anything out here.   Family members – I’ve added your subscriptions already so you don’t have to do anything except let me know if you want off the list.  If there’s someone out there reading this that would also like to be added, shoot me an email or leave a comment on this post and I’ll sign you up.