The Parrish Family

We had the pleasure of hosting a third set of visitors, Deborah and Lindsay Parrish. My sister, Deborah, had not been to Florida since Mackenzie's First Communion which was over eight years ago.  My niece, Lindsay, had not been back to Florida since the Griffin/Kiefhaber wedding which was four years ago.



While they were here we hit a number of happy hours, viewed a few sunsets and squeezed in a little shopping. However, our best activity was a shelling excursion. The excursion lasted three hours.  It was a public excursion; however we were the only ones to book it that day.  It ended up as a private tour, just us and the boat captain.  We sailed  down the Gordon River through Naples Bay and stopped at Keewaydin Island for shelling.  We had the island to ourselves as far as the eye could see to the north and ...



... far as the eye could see to the south.



There were shells all over the island.  We could have stayed there longer but we had to stay on schedule so we quickly grabbed as many interesting shells as possible.



Mason had decided to tag along with us but I knew he would quickly loose interest in looking for shells so I encouraged him to bring his new cast net.







We were sad to see the Parrishs leave after three short days but we hope this visit set the foundation for more frequent future visits.

Tennessee Guskes

We just said goodbye to the Tennessee Guskes after a week long visit. The boys attended a five-day fishing camp but were also able to squeeze in a midweek excursion to Venice for shark teeth hunting.



And the girls, well, they shopped til they dropped. For a day I was able to convince them to take a break from the malls and attend a matinee at our dinner theater.



What was it like having three teenagers and one pre-teen in the house?  No worries, everyone got along perfectly.





Much thanks to my brother, Derek, for driving his family to Naples. We were sad to see the Tennessee Guskes head back home but we look forward to our next two sets of visitors. More details to come.