pre-grad celebration and visit to the sunshine state

the cohort got together for a pre-graduation get together at an amazing italian pizza restaurant. here are "the girls" (minus Beta who now lives in FL and is featured later in this blog:) with sweet baby Camilla. we love being surrogate aunties!

the next day i traveled to florida to visit Beta and her lil fam. her little guy, felipe is sooo adorable and full of energy. here they are at the beach. i'm shocked felipe doesn't have sand dripping out of his mouth. he insisted on eating it. he would try to find hiding places where he could eat the sand. it was super cute. felipe and i spent the weekend learning from each other. he taught me portuguese, while i taught him english. and you know the saying "that's my name, don't wear it out"? well, i'm pretty sure he wore my name out that weekend. i can't even count how many times he said my name. check out that grin:)

i'm thinking this is a dead jelly fish. i've never seen one in the wild, dead or alive. it was kinda cool. i'm glad it was dead.

we drove to st. augustine which is like the oldest city in the US or something. the spanish conquistadors discovered it (ponce de leon to be exact) and preceeded to fight with england and portugal for dibs. i think anyways...and i'm too lazy to wikipedia it so i'm going to go with it. now, it's a wonderful tourist trap and very loverly. they even have ghost tours and hearse rides. of course they also have horse-drawn carriages if riding in a hearse creeps you out like it does me!

this old building is a modern day college. i can't believe people actually go to school at such a beautiful and historic place.

the rotunda inside the college.

beautiful stained glass. such intricate details.

the old governor's mansion.

an old catholic church. i couldn't get in because they were having mass but i'm sure it's beautiful inside.

old mill. many of the buildings are very old but it's great to see such history. america is a relatively young country, especially the west so you it's not every day that you see stuff like this.

castillo de san marcos. the spanish fort to fight the enemies off.

such an interesting place.

st. augustine houses the fountain of youth. i was super disappointed that they were closed by the time we got there. i would have liked to have had some of that water! i remember learning about ponce de leon and the fountain of youth when i was in elementary school. so amazing for me to be in the places that i once learned about as a kid. makes me want to travel more to see the places that make up history. i loved it! the rest of my trip went wonderfully and it was so nice to see my friend and catch up. although i did miss my husband. and i think he missed me.