December 12th-17th Harbortown Marina, Merritt Island, FL

We've been here nearly two weeks and really feel at home. We've "decorated" for Christmas, planned for traditional Christmas cookie making with my sister-in-law, Patty, purchased and made a nice assortment of gifts and put Christmas lights on the boat rails. That last item was so much easier to do than it would have been on our house.

The weather has not been Florida's best. We've had some record breaking low temperatures and it wasn't until today that we had an entire day of typical Florida winter warmth. We are both hoping that it keeps up for a while. Wayne has managed to pick up a cold which I think he plans to give me for a Christmas gift. I might have to return that one.

A few boat notes - we decided to get the broken bow thruster repaired while we were in port. The forward berth is dismantled for the repairman to get to the bow thruster and we thought it would be returned by today but it turns out we won't get it back until midweek next week. Oh, well, we're not going anywhere yet. Don't plan to come and spend the night with us yet unless you're willing to sleep on the dinette, which does make up into a bed.

We also thought we had a heater problem in the aft cabin. We called a repairman to check that and when he came the heater worked perfectly. Maybe it was temporarily traumatized by the super cold weather.

Another issue was the sump pump for the aft shower. Mr. Mechanical, the captain, got up from his sick bed to diagnose that and thinks he's got it solved. Yippee! I don't want to give up daily showers just yet.

We're looking forward to seeing two of the grandgirls next week as our daughter-in-law, Maria, will be visiting her dad in Orlando with Jackie and Kate. We'll also be catching up with Wayne's youngest brother, Harlan, and his wife, Patty, and seeing our friends Peggy and John and Jim and Shaula while we're in the Orlando area.

So we show up in Florida just in time for a record breaking cold snap. We LIVED in Orlando in '89. We do not need to relive that particular cold weather.

This is very cool. It's a live salad bowl from Rockledge Gardens, a wonderful plant nursery a little bit south. You pick the assorted lettuce leaves to make your very fresh salad and then it grows back.