Creativity Tag!

The first five people to respond to this post will receive something made by me. HOMEMADE! The item will be my choice made just for you!

Restrictions and Limitations:
1. I have complete creative freedom
2. What I create will be just for you
3. It will be done within the next 3 months
4. You have no clue what it will be. It may be personalized note cards. I might bake something. I might not think of anything until 3 months from now...

The catch?You must re-post this on your own blog and offer the same giveaway to 5 people who comment. The first 5 people to leave a comment telling me they are in, will win a FAB-U-LOUS homemade gift from me! Be sure to post a picture of what you get!

Here's to creativity!

Backpacking the Florida Trail part 1

Ok so I know everyone knows how much we love being outside and camping etc. But did you know how crazy we were to try backpacking with 3 little kids? Well we are. This particular trip was to North Florida to the Osceola National Forest. We were going to trek along a portion of the Florida Trail for 3 days..2 nights. The whole reason for doing this is because we are taking a family trip up to the mountains in North Carolina in May. We are going to hike a portion of the Appalachian trail. It is the same trail that a few of you will remember from our Laurel High Adventure. Anyway so this trip is a practice trip to see how prepared we are.

We left very early in the morning because it was a 3 hour drive and we still had to hike in when we got there.
These are the kids in the van that morning.



Breakfast at DENNYS!!Yummy!



Right across the street from Denny's just happened to be a Gander store. That is a huge camping store similar to Bass Pro shops. Mom still needed a pair of Hiking boots so we decided to stop. Amazingly my mom actually found a pair she liked so she did not have to take her old stinky shoes on the trail..Lets just say dad made sure those old shoes hit the can before we left the parking lot.



Keeping busy on our drive.



Me and My love!!



When we got to the forest we had to stop at the rangers station and let them know where we were going to be. Inside the station they had several animals on display. The kids loved seeing the animals and touching them. The neatest was knowing we could possibly see these animals alive in the wild.









Near where we were going to be there was a historical train depot. This picture is of the front room/entrance of the depot.



This is a basket of cotton like what the slaves would work all day in the fields to retrieve.



The railroad like most southern historical sites has its grim past...This set of tracks was built mainly by slaves whose masters loaned them for a price to the railroad.



These were examples of money they had in the south and the North during the mid to late 1800's.











These are pictures of us getting all our gear on. The Orange shirts were required to hike in the forest so we did not get shot. It was hunting season!!It definitely made it easy to spot us on the trail.









Shaylyn and uncle Chris walking the trail hand in hand!!So cute!



After walking about a mile or so we came across a hikers refuge. It was a covered pavilion area. We were hoping to walk further before stopping but we wanted to take advantage of the shelter so we decided to go ahead and stop for lunch.



When we stopped about midway through our lunch some bad weather decided to come through so we just decided to stay. It was a good decision because a storm came through just after deciding to stay. We set up our hammocks and the kids tent right there under the cover of the pavilion. It was definitely convenient.











Ok so the best story of our whole trip was that my dad could not get his hammock under the pavilion. He decided to go ahead and use a couple of trees just beside the pavilion and put his tarp over him. About 45 minutes after going to bed.. in pitch black we here an earsplitting crash!! Of course we are all freaking out because it is black outside and we don't know what it was. I thought it had been thunder and that it had been right over us. As I turned my flashlight on and started looking around I noticed my dad's hammock had fallen to the ground. Daddy was fine so I was panning around when my mom screamed STOP...I stopped moving the flashlight and what did we see?........My dad actually broke the tree.. The huge bang was the tree splitting and hitting the covered roof of the pavilion. Talk about scary and funny at the same time.




We are packing up and getting our packs on , Ready to hit the trail again. We had heard even worse weather was on its way so we decided to leave early and head south to the Ocala National Forest.









BYE Osceola National Forest.



It was lunch time and since we were en route to a new location we decided to stop at TEXAS ROADHOUSE for lunch. Talk about scrumptious.Peanuts anyone?













When we reached the Ocala forest we decided to hike the 5 mile trail to a campground. If we could find a place to camp along the trail we would, if not we would hike the whole trail and just go ahead and drive home that evening. The trail was so narrow.( look at the pictures below) That there was no place to camp for the night so we just hiked our miles and we drove home late that night. I have to admit that after hiking that much I was happy to be in Air conditioning and a real bed. The trip overall was a great success though because we proved we could walk the miles that will be required of us in North Carolina. The best was that noone quit or complained and Shaylyn was amazing..That 3 and a half year old trekked with the best of us that day. She was amazing and loved being with the family. I love introducing her to nature and the outdoors at such a young age. I hope all the kids grow to love nature and desire to protect it.