Ho Ho Ho!

We hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and Santa treated you well!  We are really enjoying Stuart - there is a charming downtown area within close walking distance that has some fun restaurants and shops.  There are also lots of bigger stores (Target, Publix, etc) all within a mile or two.  It's a very pretty area - not terribly over-developed.  On Christmas Day, we spent the morning catching up with our dear family via the phone and then met up with our friends Don & Susan and rode bikes to the beach.  Bikes are available at the marina at no charge and we had a great ride.  Overall it was pretty flat, but we did go over two big bridges.  The beach was beautiful - the water was that lovely Caribbean blue and although a bit breezy, it was very comfortable in the sun.   We did dip our toes in the water and it was pretty chilly, but it felt good to have our feet in the sand.  We enjoyed a picnic lunch and just hung out for a while - then in the evening - we went to Mulligan's - a fun pub - for dinner. 

Today it has been sunny, but the wind has been blowing like crazy - up to 35 mph.  We're very glad we're in a protected dock area - because the gusts have been pretty intense. We had a delightful lunch with our friend Amy Roskilly - who is from Cleveland, but visiting her Mom who lives in Jensen Beach (about 15 minutes away).  Amy was joined by her Mom, her sister Mary, Mary's husband Chuck and their beautiful daughter Rory.  It was wonderful to see them and a very fun lunch! 

It's supposed to get down in the 30's tonight, but it will slowly warm up in the days to come.  We will probably stay at this marina until Wednesday - then head down to the Keys for a few days, then return to Stuart to a different marina in early January - the plan is still a little fluid.  Tomorrow, we plan to grab bikes and ride over to the marina where we will spend the winter and check it out.  We've heard great things about it, so are looking forward to seeing it first hand!




Thanks to Amy Coffey, we had these fun Santa hats for the photo op - can't you see that Paul is thrilled?!  Here we are on one of the bridges overlooking the St. Lucie River - on Thursday, we went under this bridge to get to the marina.

We will be in touch again soon - Ho Ho Ho!  Lots of love, Jen & Paul

Today's Quote:
"And now let us welcome the new year--full of things that have never been."
                                                                                                                                                                           --Rainer Maria Rilke