Florida Natural Orange Juice!

On our way to Orlando, we stopped by the Florida's Natural Orange Juice Visitor Center for a quick tour. When you are in Florida, you have to learn about oranges, right?!?!?  It was a neat little museum with some displays & a movie detailing the history of the company, and a gift shop.  There were free samples of juices and other products. The boys were thrilled:) There was no cost/admission to visit! I was thrilled:)

Let's toast to free juice!

Yummy!

Caleb liked the orange juice MUCH better than the grapefruit juice!

We learned that Florida's Natural is a cooperative group of citrus growers.  There are more than 1,000 grower members who own more than 50,000 acres of of citrus groves in central Florida. It has a strong history and many of the growers have had their crops in their family for generations.  The organization is very proud that all of their juices are made right here in the U.S.A. Their motto is: "We own the land...We own the trees...We own the company." Nothing is imported and of course...nothing from concentrate!

This was a fun, short and sweet visit:)!!

Blessings to you and yours,

Jill and the boys:)

Sundays...

Since we have been on the road full time, our Sundays feel different than before.  It has been interesting to be on "the other side" of church so to speak.  I realize some of you are just getting to know us through the blog, so let me explain a little.  For the past 6 years, Alan served as the full-time Children's Minister at First Baptist Church of Ellisville, a suburb of St. Louis.  Alan would get up early, work on his computer at home or at church and pretty much run non-stop all morning at church taking care of details, volunteers, teaching children, and sometimes baptisms and announcements.  I would get myself and the boys ready for church and try to leave by 8:50 a.m. (We were usually running out the door closer to 9 or after!  We did just live right behind the church, so it was only a 3 minute walk to get there.) I dropped the boys off to their Sunday School classrooms, and either head to the church service by myself, or fill in wherever needed as a substitute Sunday School teacher.  There were a few Sundays here and there where Alan could slip into church late and catch part of the sermon, but that was pretty rare.  During second service, I would co-teach the children's church for toddlers through pre-Kindergarten.  Then, back to church in the afternoon to get ready for AWANA, (Bible Memory Club for children).  Alan was the commander for AWANA at church as well, so his Sundays were very full...usually 12-14 hour workdays or even longer if there was a special event or summer camp.

So- I want to be clear...I am not listing all of this to brag or complain at all! That is not my intention.  Alan and I truly have enjoyed serving in church, both as paid staff, and as volunteers for many years before going into full time ministry.  I really just want to paint a picture of how different Sundays are for us now that we are on the road.

So- now on Sunday mornings, we get ready together and sometimes we even have extra time before we go! (One Sunday we got ready for church and realized we still had over an hour until the church service started! We didn't know what to do with ourselves! HA!)  After church now we actually have a nice sit down lunch together and then a relaxing afternoon. Another thing that is different is that we go to church and actually get to sit and worship TOGETHER! We LOVE it! Of course, it did take a little adjusting for our two younger sons who typically go to children's church and are not used to sitting in big church.  But- after just a few Sundays, they are doing great.  They have their bags with coloring books and they are learning to stand with us while we sing worship, and then sit quietly during the sermon time.  It is not always picture perfect, but it really has been such a sweet time for our family.
I have to admit that I did feel kind of guilty at first just going to church and not serving anywhere.  I kept feeling like I needed to go back and serve in the nursery or something! :)  I am learning that it is OK to just get some rest for awhile.  This is a season for us to refresh and fill our spiritual cups.  We really see this RV trip as a blessing and opportunity to learn and grow.  There will be a time when we will serve again.  Alan will be speaking at churches soon (starting in February!), so we are enjoying this "mini sabbatical" while we can.

We have enjoyed visiting a variety of churches on the road and meeting lots of wonderful people. We have been to small, country churches with anywhere around 50 to 100 people, a cowboy church, a church service at an RV campground, and we have gone to a couple of large churches that offer 3-6 services on the weekends with thousands of members.

While we were in San Antonio, Texas back in December, we visited Oak Hills Church where Max Lucado was preaching.  He is one of my favorite authors and I have to say that I have really been blessed by his books. God has gifted him with an incredible way with words.  I really appreciate how he shares God's message of hope for all people.  He also has some wonderful childrens' books and videos (Hermie & Friends).  One of our favorite's is The Crippled Lamb.

So-back to Sundays...
The Sunday we visited Oak Hills back in December,  Max Lucado was preaching a series about worship.  It was a great message about how God created humans to worship. Some people may worship material things, for others it may be a person or place.  God intended us to worship HIM only. It was a great reminder, especially during the Christmas season.  After the service, I wanted to get a picture of the boys by a Christmas tree in the hallway.  As we were walking towards one of the beautifully decorated trees, I noticed there was a line for people to talk with Max Lucado personally! To say I was excited would be a total understatement!!! Alan ran out to the van to grab some of his books for him to autograph. After about 20 minutes in line, it was our turn.  We introduced ourselves, and he was so friendly and really interacted with the boys well. I was glad to tell him how much his books had meant to me personally.  We gave him our copy of The Crippled Lamb for him to sign.  (By the way, the lamb in the story is named Joshua - too cool!) We asked for a picture, and he was happy to do it.  He even bent down, scooped up Joshua and held him for the picture. :)

It was so encouraging to see how kind and gracious he was to us and everyone else in line.  This man is so busy preaching for 3 services that day, and 2 services the night before, along with everything else he does, and yet he took the time to speak and encourage people who just wanted to talk to him.  It was a blessing!

Honestly, being on the road and visiting different churches... it really doesn't matter if it is a large church with a big budget for a nice building, music, and lights, or a small church with plain walls and no extras.  We have been blessed every Sunday by the fellowship, teaching, and family worship time at each church we visited. Of course we will always miss our church families in St. Louis and Texas. It was nice to see familiar faces and friends every Sunday.  We have been so incredibly blessed by our church family in Ellisville the past 6 years, and by our church family in Texas 9 years before that as well.  God has always been faithful in providing wonderful friends to love and encourage us and we are grateful for that!

Hope you all have a GREAT Sunday! 

Blessings to you and yours,

Jill and the boys:)

Visit with the Goldens - Times Two! (The Golden Gang and The Goldens from St. Louis!!!)

The Haigoods and The Golden Gang

How neat is it that while we were in Florida, we got the chance to visit with 2 different sets of friends with the same last name, (yet there is no relation at all)...at the same place (none of us are from Florida) and at the same time! FUNNY! After we left the Wildwood area, we headed to Lake Wauchula, Florida to stay at a Thousand Trails park there.  We made plans to meet up with our good friends, Todd & Stephanie Golden and their five children.  If you remember from my earlier posts, we actually bought our Admiral from them! They are still full-time on the road and loving it!  We also enjoyed meeting some of their new friends, the Harpers.  They are a delightful family of 7 from Canada who are traveling on the road around the U.S. We enjoyed getting to know them and we hope to meet up again someday.

The Haigoods and The Goldens

So- our other visit was with Tom and Linda Golden, who we know from St. Louis.  They were down here in Florida for vacation and they were kind enough to drive an hour to come visit us for the afternoon one day.  It was so nice to see them again.  They have always been so kind and encouraging to our family.  

During our visit with the Golden Gang, we did a lot of fun things together.  We found a farm not too far from the RV park to go strawberry picking. It didn't take us long to fill up our buckets, and the cost was only $1 per pound! Also, you could eat as many strawberries as you wanted while you were picking them...for FREE!

Funny story about Caleb:  So- I am walking around with him helping him find strawberries that are ready to be picked.  I told him many times that he could try a few while he was picking them.  He kept telling me, "No...I am going to save them, Mom."  That was OK I thought.  After he filled his bucket, we took all of our strawberries to the scale, paid our money, and all piled into the car.  As soon as Caleb got in the van he said, "Now I want to eat some strawberries!!!" Alan and I both at the same time said, "WHAT?!?! Are you kidding?!?"  We couldn't believe it! If he had just eaten his strawberries in the field a few minutes before he could have been messy with no worries and the strawberries would have been free! But, instead we paid for the full bucket and now he wanted to make a dripping mess in the car! Really?!?!?  We told him he would have to wait until we got back to the RV.  Silly boy! At least the strawberries were not expensive, and they were absolutely DELICIOUS! We ate almost all of them that day! We did manage to save some to make strawberry lemonade and we put some on angel food cake too. Yummy!

I just love the cowboy boots with jean shorts.  That's my Caleb! :)

One night we attended a free magic show at the RV park.  The kids all loved it!

Joshua really became attached to Emily. Very sweet:)

We went swimming several times too. The weather was great! It is hard to believe it is winter when it is 70-80 degrees outside!

Right before we left, Stephanie and I took some of the kids alligator hunting by the river.  We were were disappointed because we didn't find any.  Honestly, I am not sure if I was more disappointed or relieved that we didn't run into one!

I can always count on Nathanael to be silly for the camera! This is his reaction to the sign "DANGER - ALLIGATORS MAY BE PRESENT"

Thank you Goldens and Goldens, for a wonderful time! We appreciate your friendship very much and we look forward to our next visit someday down the road!

Blessings to you and yours,

Jill and the boys:)

Tampa Museum of Science and Industry

During our stay in Wildwood, Florida, we took a day trip into Tampa to visit the Museum of Science and Industry.  With our Evansville Museum Membership Pass, we received free admission for 5 of us, and we only paid one guest admission price of about $11. We saved almost $80!!! Wahoo!

The museum had a children's area called "Kids in Charge".  There were all kinds of puzzles, brain teasers, hands on science exhibits, and a planetarium show.

YIKES! Nathanael's head on a platter!!

There was a "bed of nails" exhibit for anyone who dared to try it! :) So...Alan and I did, but the boys decided to skip it!

First, you lay down on the "bed" and then push the button. 3,000 nails poke through the holes at the same time! It did feel kind of funny, but it didn't hurt.  It did freak me out a little bit though!

The older boys (including Alan) enjoyed working on the brain teaser puzzles. There were a few that we just couldn't figure out, but an employee came by and showed us how to solve them.

Nathanael enjoyed solving this puzzle below. Just read the instructions in the photo. It was a neat trick!

It said to leave 10...Here are the "TEN"!

Caleb really enjoyed the speaker testing exhibit.  He selected some rock music, and just really jammed out to the beat!

Joshua also liked the music area...especially playing the bucket drum set!

Here he is flying an airplane! 

In the main part of the museum was an exhibit called "Disasterville". It had all kinds of interesting facts, activities and displays involving natural disasters and their effects.

Want to know what it feels like to be in a hurricane? Just try out the Hurricane Chamber where the wind speed reaches over 73 miles per hour!!!

"WHEW! It's windy in here!!!"

Caleb wasn't so sure he would like it at first...he held onto Daddy really tight! Then he looked out and gave me a thumbs up!!! So cute!

Nathanael and I were laughing at first...

Then my hair was whipping around so fast, it was hitting and hurting both of us!!! I was trying to lift it away from our faces, but it was SOOO windy in there!!!  Poor Nathanael!!!

WE SURVIVED THROUGH THE HURRICANE...BARELY!

This museum also had a nice outdoor playground and picnic area where we enjoyed our packed lunch.  We had a great time visiting this museum, but I would caution parents to preview the "Amazing Me" exhibit on the top floor before you go there with small children because it goes into some detail about human anatomy and it just seemed more geared for older children/teens.  We decided to skip that area of the museum during our visit.

Overall, it was a great day of fun, learning, and family time!

Blessings to you and yours,

Jill and the boys:)

On the way to Florida!

We decided to take our time driving to Florida from Texas.  After our long 15 hour day trip down from St. Louis to Texas last November, we knew we did not want to drive over 900 miles straight to Florida!  So- we broke up the trip by traveling one day, then staying one day (2 nights) somewhere.  Our first stop was in Breaux Bridge Louisiana (just past Lafayette.) We stayed 2 nights at an RV park that was right by a small lake. The boys loved it!

STATE # 3 - LOUISIANA!

We enjoyed doing some school outside since the weather was nice.

We also had recess at the RV park playground!

The lake had some hungry ducks, so we just had to feed them some crackers:)

What do you get when you put together boys, a lake, rocks, and a slingshot?

Fun times skipping rocks on the water, and in the air of course!

Micah and Nathanael enjoyed slinging the rocks into the air and timing how long they would stay up.  The longest time was for 18 seconds!

We added another sticker to our U.S.A. map on the R.V.  Our rule is we have to stay in the state overnight to add it to our map:)

Missouri was #1, Texas #2, Louisiana #3, and then Florida...

STATE # 4 - FLORIDA!

We stayed at an RV park in Holt, Florida for 2 nights before heading to Wildwood (just north of Tampa) for 4 days.  It was chilly and rainy, so we didn't get to play outside much.  We did go for a short walk with the boys and explored a little bit.  We met a really nice couple from the UK staying at the campsite next to us.  (Hello Paul and Alison!) The boys were thrilled because they had a Holiday Rambler/Admiral like ours! We had a wonderful time visiting with them and learning about their full-time RV adventure in the U.S. Just like us, they sold almost everything and now the R.V. is home. They did however, come to the U.S. with ONLY 2 suitcases of their things-that was it! They bought the R.V., a car, and dolly here in the U.S.  We gave them a tour of our R.V. and exchanged contact information to keep in touch.  Maybe we will meet again on the road somewhere!

Blessings to you and yours!

Jill and the boys:)