It is by far my favorite time of the year. Anyone who knows me knows that from the minute Christmas ends I check my app that tells me how many sleeps until Christmas. It is just such a magical time of the year and being with family means everything to us. This year despite being on the loop was just as special as ever. We took the boat to Tampa, Florida where we would leave it for a week while we traveled back to Ohio and Michigan for Christmas. This was our easiest most hassle free Christmas to date. We had a two hour non-stop flight from Tampa to Detroit and we got pre-check to boot. Easy breezy. We arrived in Detroit at 2:30pm on December 21st and made our way to Aunt Brenda’s house our annual Christmas tradition. We didn't have a whole lot of time once we arrived at her house because we were going to Buddy’s Pizza with Brenda, The Mindell Cousins and The Handler Family. We all love Buddy’s. Maybe me more then anybody. When we arrived Michael and family were already there and shortly after everyone arrived 20 something of us. It’s so nice that every year when we come to town one of the Mindell cousins (this year it was Seth) organizes and pays for this large gathering. It’s defiantly one of the highlights of coming to Detroit. After stuffing ourselves with pie we went over the Handler’s house with Brenda to hang out and play games. Jeff played ping pong with Jake and I played ball in a cup with Nicolette. It was a great night.
We woke up the next morning had breakfast with Brenda then hit the road for Lima. Fortunately from Brenda’s house to mom and dad’s house is only 2.5 hours and a very easy short ride. When we arrived mom had a huge plate of christmas cookies waiting for us and we quickly settled in. Ju arrived within the hour and we were all home together and ready for Christmas. That night we got together with some old friends from high school and drank, laughed and reminisced until the wee hours of the morning.
The next day we slept in until almost lunch time. A few days prior my cousin Ben reached out to all of the cousins and asked if we would be interested in surprising my grandma for lunch. Of course everyone was excited and appreciative of the idea. It was all arranged that my cousins Rachael and Tyler would pick up Grandma and bring her to the restaurant. She thought she was only going to lunch with the two of them. Little did she know that 13 more of us would be there waiting to surprise her. She looked thoroughly surprised as she walked through the door and started noticing all of us sitting at the table. Fortunately I got to sit across from her and talked with her throughout the whole lunch. It was a really nice lunch and everybody was so glad that Ben had planned it.
The next day was Christmas Eve and the official begging of Christmas. We spent the day in p.j’s watching all the classic Christmas movies - It’s a Wonderful Life, Christmas Vacation, Christmas Story until the evening. Mom, Dad, Ju and Grandma went to church and we waited at home for their return. Grandma stayed for dinner and we our traditional lasagna Christmas Eve dinner which was excellent. We all ate too much and were feeling full and sleepy when we were finished. Dad drove Grandma home and we settled in for late night present opening.
We woke up at our leisure on Christmas morning and ate our traditional Christmas morning breakfast but with a twist this year. This year Hanukkah fell on Christmas day so Jeff volunteered to make latkes to have with our breakfast. We had Hungarian coffee cake, hobogrits and latkes. Everything was great and it was fun having latkas. Mom, Dad and Ju liked them too. It was their first time eating latkas. We eventually got dressed and headed over to Aunt Barb and Uncle Mike’s house for Christmas day. Barb had outdone herself this year with tons of great food, drinks and speciality Christmas shots. One of them you could even eat the shot glass. There was a lot of Euchre playing, pool playing, basketball watching and a ping pong tournament with brackets and everything.
The day after Christmas for years has been the annual RJS (Richard Joseph Stolly) memorial bowling tournament put on by my cousins Jason and Eric. After my Grandpa died my cousins thought it would be a nice way to get together and pay tribute to him. You would think that my Grandpa was a big bowler but after speaking to Uncle Mark I learned that that wasn’t the case. He said Grandpa occasional would take them (Mark, Tim and Bill) bowling but once Kevin was born he stopped bowling all together. The RJS is just a nice get together with lots of laughs and a fun time to think about Grandpa. This year Uncle Mark and Joel were the big winners.
That evening was our annual cousins night hosted by cousins Jason and Kim. For the past 5 or 6 years (nobody seems to remember) all of the Stolly cousins who are of drinking age have been getting together around Christmas for cousins night in Jason and Kim’s basement. There is drinking, pool, darts, cards, karaoke and the famous Whales Tales (Nah, Who…). We all love this get together and let loose and just get to be cousins with nobody else around. Fortunately almost everybody was able to attend this year. The only cousins missing were Rachael, Ju, Adam and Ethan. Jeff and I stayed until late in the evening then got to experience The Lima Cab Company. Always an adventure.
The next morning we work up, ate breakfast then headed back to the airport on Detroit for our evening flight back to The Tidings of Joy in Tampa. So easy this year. We were both anxious to get back to our boat and to get moving again.
We provisioned the next day then made our way to an anchorage in Bradenton, Florida. That evening things got real interesting. There was a small craft warning and gale force winds of 25-31 mph. I was a bit nervous about being at anchor in these kind of conditions and didn’t sleep most of the night constantly checking the positioning of the boat, watching the AGLCA flag whip around and studying the anchor alarm. The boat did great and never up anchored despite these wild conditions. The next morning despite the small craft advisory we made our way towards Sarasota where were would spend NYE. The winds were wild so much so that Jeff told me to get off deck and not to hose the anchor chain and anchor off as we raised it. It wasn’t safe to be out there. When we hit Tampa Bay we went for a wild ride. We had beam seas (waves hitting the side of the boat) that actually were breaking into the cockpit. The contents of the drinks refrigerator and freezer emptied twice all over the kitchen and salon floors of which I had the joy of cleaning up. Glass beer bottles broke all over the floor and our poor Christmas tree got dumped upside down. It was not a pleasant ride and I was less then thrilled about our decision to leave Bradenton. Luckily once we hit the GICW things smoothed out but the wind persisted. Finally we arrived in Sarasota at Marina Jack. The marina was right downtown an offered a shuttle to anywhere we wanted to go, had two nice restaurants and bars, laundry and everything we would need for the next few days. After the boat was secure we walked into downtown which is adorable with lots of cute shops, nice restaurants and fun cool bars. There are some brick streets and everything is walkable from the boat. We ate a nice lunch at Duval’s then took a much needed nap after being up half the night. We then spent a quiet evening on the boat in anticipation of New Years Eve.
New Years Eve day we took the free shuttle to the Ringling Museum which is on the campus of Florida State University. The Ringling is a combo circus museum, art museum and their historic house all on 70 acres of beautiful GICW property. The circus part of the museum was fascinating. Neither Jeff or I realized how elaborate the circus used to be and what a production it was. We learned a lot. The art museum was less impressive to me. We have been to serval art museums on the Loop (the best being in Chicago) and this one to me was just okay. Overall it was a nice day and something totally unique we never would have done if not for the loop. That evening we had reservations at the marina restaurant for New Years Eve. We put on our nice clothes and enjoyed a very leisurely dinner. Afterwards we walked into downtown which was all blocked off and had several stages with bands playing, a carnival with rides, games and food. It was such a nice party of all ages and people dressed from fancy clothes to sweat pants. Quite a site and great place to be for NYE. In Sarasota at midnight they have the annual pineapple drop which is their equivalent to the ball dropping in time square and then at midnight they have fireworks off of the pier. Before midnight we made our way back to the boat after listening to music for awhile and had front row seats for the fireworks. We wished each other happy new year and went to bed.
New Years day we took full advantage of the free marina shuttle and went to St. Armands Circle. This is defiantly an upscale area of Sarasota. We saw numerous high end cars and the shops were all very nice. We did a leisurely loop around the town and ended up at Columbia for lunch. This is a famous cuban restaurant in St. Armands that’s been operating since 1905. We had good white sangria which was prepared table side and delicious food. I had paella and Jeff had tapas - octopus and calamari. From there we went bak to the boat and settled in to watch the last week of regular season football. The charges lost of course and we wondered if it would be there last game in San Diego.
We left Sarasota this morning and will be slowly making our way to the keys stopping in Boca Grande, Punta Gorda, Cabbage Key, Fort Meyers, Naples, Everglade City and Little Shark River. We are really enjoying the west coast of Florida and all of the towns here.
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