Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Florida

I have lots to post about and it is all about Florida.

Friday morning after four hours of sleep because of the fantastic WIN by the Florida Gators, I hopped on a plane to Fort Myers, Florida. I wore my Florida sweatshirt to the Tulsa airport. I was the most popular person in the airport that morning, but not for a good reason. I guess it didn't go over well with the Oklahoma fans. Security told me I had to take it off to get through. Oops.

As you all know, my grandfather (Bompa) passed away on December 21st. His funeral was this Saturday. The service was beautiful. My sister arranged to have veterans at the funeral to perform the 21 Gun Salute, play Taps and present my uncle Reed with the flag. It was amazing. Honestly, I can't really put it into words. It was so special to be there with family to honor not only the most amazing grandfather anyone could ask for, but also an amazing man who served his country for thirty years. Robin is a 1st Lieutenant in the Air Force and she actually presented my uncle with the flag. Pretty cool.

It was bitter sweet being there. It was so wonderful to be with everyone, but so sad for the reason we were all there this time. Our entire family had so much fun together. We spent the evenings eating, laughing, playing games and watching basketball and football. I know Bompa was happy to look down upon us and see us all together having so much fun. I came in second during our mad, furious game of spoons. My cousin Billy cheated...he had outside help. All of the cousins went out to sing karaoke one night. Robin, our cousin Julie, and myself totally impressed the crowd with an amazing rendition of "Shoop" by Salt-n-Pepa. We know how to rock it.

After all the family gathering, Robin and I headed over to Sanibel Island on Sunday with our aunt and uncle. My family used to own 160 acres on Sanibel Island until the 1950's. If we still had that today we would probably be trillionaires...not kidding. For some reason, someone thought it would be a good idea to sell the land for pretty much nothing. At that time there was no mosquito control and no ferry to get to the island. Today is it connected to main land via a highway and it is an very busy, beautiful tourist destination. I guess we are all better people since we aren't rich and snobby, right? We visited the Sanibel Historical Village. We were able to see the first Sanibel Post Office where my great, great grandfather William Reed (my dad and uncle are both named after him) was the postmaster for over twenty years. We also have a family graveyard on the island. I didn't take pictures of it because I thought it would be creepy, but now I wish I had because it is so cool. Here are some of the pictures from our island adventure. Lots of stories to tell, but I don't want to bombard the blog at once.
The Sanibel Lighthouse.


The First Sanibel Post Office. My grandfather made the dedication speech when they moved it to a historical site in the 90's. It was built from scraps from my great, great grandfather's home after the 1926 hurricane which destroyed much of what was on the island.


PS. Tim is coming back. Boo-ya.

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