it's 5 o'clock somewhere

Wasting away again in margaritaville.....looking for my lost shaker of salt. Oh sorry, I was just singing the Jimmy Buffet tune that was the theme to my WONDERFUL, AMAZING, FANTASTIC spring break. My amazing parents treated my brother, brandon and I to another tremendous family vacation. I really do have the best parents in the world. They love to travel. And when they travel it's a MUST that they tote their amazing children and son-in-law with them. It's only natural. Since Brandon and I have been together ( it will be 5 years this July ) we have vacationed to several places as a family. In no particular order, we have all ventured to the Texas Hill Country, Chicago, New York and Florida. Like I said, I have the most amazing parents in the world. They are so generous to us and we are very thankful for that.

This spring break we ALL set flight ( haha ) to Florida. Every year my dad as a big convention in Orlando and my mom and dad usually make a little vacay out of it together. This year, they invited the kids ( that'd be my brother, brandon and myself ). We had 4 destinations to go to, so needless to say, this was going to be a very busy trip.

My parents flew out Thursday and us kids flew out Friday. Funny story - our original flight wit Airtran was CANCELLED! There was bad weather in Atlanta which was where our stop was before we got into Orlando. So Airtran said they would refund our money or get us on the next flight which was TUESDAY of spring break. Mind you, we were flying out Friday the 12th of March. All the other airlines were booked due to spring break. We started to panic. I whipped out my laptop, Brandon was on my iphone and my brother was running from airline to airline checking to see if they could get us on a flight ANYWHERE to Florida. Luckily, jetblue let us know that where was a flight on continental airlines heading to Orlanda at 7:30pm on Friday. So my brother called the airline, booked our flight ( there were only 5 seats left when we called and we needed 3....talk about God looking out for us). Sidenote : For the airlines that were not booked, tickets were going for $1,500 or more.

We only needed a one way flight b/c we were coming back on Southwest. So needless to say, Continental airlines ADDED the flight we were on due to booked flights and cancelled flights. We were at hobby airport and then found ourselves at Bush Int'l airport. Our one way tickets were $500 a piece. CRAZY! Like I said above...... my parents are amazing and they were determined to get their kids to Florida ( plus we would of missed visiting with my grandparents if we didn't leave till Tuesday). There is a moral to the story...

1. DON'T FLY AIRTRAN - EVEN IF THE FLIGHT IS A TAD CHEAPER

2. CONTINENTAL AIRLINES WERE AMAZING

3. SOUTHWEST AIRLINES ARE AMAZING TOO, HAHA!

So our flight to orlando was delayed several times and we ended up not getting in till 1am, BUT IT WAS TOTALLY WORTH IT!

Now our first leg of the trip was in Orlando where my dad's company were on their last leg of the convention. Brandon, my brother and I just hung out and bummed around town from Saturday - Sunday. We stayed at the Gaylord Palms hotel which is AMAZING. I'll be posting pictures of it. From there we headed to Summerfield, Fla which is where my grandparents live. We stayed there from Monday - Tuesday. We just relaxed and visited with my g-parents and my aunt and her baby Shayn. It was a good time of catching up and relaxing. After Summerfield we ventured down to Jupiter, Fla, where I grew up in my early childhood. We visited several places like the softball fields ( which was a must ), the beaches we grew up going to, our condo we used to live in, my FAVORITE icecream shop, and my aunt chrissy. We did a lot more but that was the jist of that destination. Once we wrapped up our activities in Jupiter we were now on the last leg of our trip which was to KEY WEST, FLORIDA!

We drove to Key West, which any native Key Westerner would recommend driving to the Keys. We went through 29 islands and over 42 bridges which one of those bridges was 7 miles long. The drive was breath taking. We were surrounded by water on both sides. Not just water, but mesmerizing water. The bluest of blues. Let's just say that galveston has NOTHING on these beaches, haha. The first keys we went through was Key Largo and the last keys we went through as Key West, our final destination.

Key West is amazing. I don't know how else to explain it. It's like no other island I have been to. You don't feel like you are in Florida anymore. Key West is about 4 miles long. So all you have to do is make one loop around the perimeter and everything is at your finger tips. It's clean, sunny, beautiful and relaxing. We were there from Wednesday- late Friday night. I really could go into detail about KW but I will let the pictures tell the story.

This trip was definitely what everyone needed. We all came back more relaxed and sun kissed.

Tomorrow we are all back to the grind. I am excited to see my kids and get back into a routine. 6:30 am will definitely be a struggle to get used to, but getting back to work is one step closer to summer, wahoo!

I will post pictures on my next post :)

So if you read all of this.... YOU ARE A CHAMP! :)