Great Adoption News

No, not in our immediate family but I am ridiculously overjoyed to announce that my cousin, Karine, and my great Manitoba neighbours, Rhonda and Garth, have both welcomed new additions to their families.

As an adoptee myself I am one of their biggest cheer leaders - but am also over-the-top proud that I was able to write reference letters for both of them during their adoption processes to talk about how they were THE perfect candidates to be adoptive parents.

My cousin Karine has welcomed her first little girl, Beatrice, who arrived in early November from Haiti. She is doing so well with her new mommy - and her grandparents think the world of this little cutie. I am not sure when I will get to meet Beatrice but I am so happy that she has fit into her new life with her new mommy so perfectly!!!!




Rhonda and Garth, my great neighbours in Pinawa MB, welcomed home new little Zoey (their second daughter), also in early November. Big sister Andie looks very proud too! I have not met Zoey yet because I left MB before she arrived - but I am looking forward to meeting her in the spring when I return to MB.



I am SOOO happy for both families and can not express how proud I am that you have found these little girls that were truly meant to be yours.

More big fish from the big Peake boys

Well the boys have started a baracuda competition - who can catch the biggest... Steve is winning as of Nov 20th.

Going out of the canal for a late afternoon fishing foray just out on the reef within a mile of our beach house. Daniel got to sit up top with Uncle Jon.



Jon caught a nice one - tried to hold it in the water to clean it up before a nice picture with the two of them but the fish decided to take off while he could... so no pic of him holding it...



Steve's catch #1



Steve's catch #2 - current competition winner barucuda - estimated to be more than 15 pounds.

Fishing in Florida...

Well the boys (big boys - Steve and Jon) finally figured out how to catch some fish.

This is a sampler of Jon's haul from 19 Nov.

Yellowtail snapper



Grouper



Baracuda - about 15lbs

Florida Booking Calendar

I will repost the calendar so folks don't have to search for it if they need to see it.

Use the arrow buttons to move ahead to future months.

Feeding tarpon off the docks at Robbies

We heard about an Islamorada tradition - feeding the tarpon at Robbies (restaurant and tourist place). So I hooked up the bike trailer the little boys and I rode down there to check it out this morning.

So for those that might now know, tarpon are a BIG fish...

"tarpon are large coastal fish growing up to 8 feet in length. They are large-headed, relatively slender silver-sided fish with extremely large scales."(from Wikipedia)

Make sure to click PLAY on the videos below (2 bottom images).

More FL widlife - BIG iguana

A big iguana up in a tree... I had no clue they had big ones like that down here - it was about 2 feet for just the body and then the long tail - hard to tell up in the tree.



And yes that is Daniel chasing it with a stick when it came down from the tree... gosh where do they learn to be such boys!

Play park extraordinaire - Marathon FL

We found a great play park about 30min from us in the town of Marathon. That is where we go grocery shopping so I went to the park with the little boys while Steve and his brother Jon went shopping around town.

Manatees in the canal!

A neighbour across the road called us over to tell us there were some visitors in the canal. Three manatees - looked like mama, papa, and baby. The neighbour fed them some lettuce but then thought better of it since I think they are near sacred and you should not feed them (wasn't us!).

They like to stick their heads out and drink the freshwater from the hoses by the boat docks.

Here are some still pics of the same animals:

Islamorada FL

Alright - made it to Florida for our sabbatical adventure.

The little boys and Michelle made it late on Nov 3rd and the first day was hot and sunny - since then (this is now Day 5) it has been SUPER windy and now we are expecting to have some effects of Hurricane Ida - so even more wind.

Here are some pics from Day 1.



Gee do you think they are relaxed and enjoying themselves so far??



Daniel enjoyed a nice float around thanks to Dad - Nathan lasted 3min, Daniel lasted about 30min.



Steve helping Nathan with some binoculars to look at Jon (way out in the distance) fishing.