Everywhere we look, we are reminded of God's promises to us. We see His beauty painted across the sky in an abundance of colors. I wanted to do this because we're inspired by the every day beauty of Him. I hope you like the video. ~Dolphin Dani
When I read the Bible, I am reminded of His promises, His compassion for us, His love for us and His mercy upon us all. I am inspired by many verses in the bible and we wanted to share some of them with you. ~ Jurassic Jake
We hope you enjoy your video. We worked very hard putting it together.
It’s our captain’s 40th birthday tomorrow. It's been a rough month for him full of loss and heartache so I wanted to do something meaningful for him. It’s hard to get a gift for someone like our captain so instead of buying him something, I made him something. I put together a video looking back at his life over the last 40 years. I’ll let the video do the talking but I will say this about Steve: it’s rare to find a man who has lived his life putting others before himself. A man who has loved his children with everything he has, even if their choices take them in different directions. A man who has risked his own life to save others. A man who puts God first in everything he does in his life.
A recent discussion I had was about heroes. What makes a hero? Who are the modern day heroes? Famous coaches, athletes, movie stars, billionaires? These are people who are worshiped like gods and who’s only qualifying trait is they know a sport well, they play a sport well, they are good at pretending and they made lots of money. These same "heroes" live lives full of selfishness, debauchery and sin. Are these the type of people we should be raising up as heroes? Not at all, in my opinion!!! How about the men and women who put other's needs before their own? The ones who risk their own life for others? The ones who sacrifice things they want so others may have it. The ones who serve their country, their community, their family, their Lord God. The ones like my captain. My husband. The father of my children. He is a real hero. A real man. A real father. A real veteran. He is our hero.
I recently came across a poem that hit home for me. I don’t know the author but I share it with you today in honor of my Hero, my Captain, my Steve. HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY!! I love and respect you beyond words.
You are my rock, my anchor, and my sea. I live within you, yet you hold me fast. I breathe your soul. Your thoughts so blend with mine I can’t distinguish a dividing line. Before our love is unimagined past. There is no after – now is all to me.
I love you with a tenderness my past could never fathom. Before your love was mine, the person I remember wasn't me. There was no rope of love to hold me fast to life’s one truth within its restless sea, nor happiness to help me draw a line.
Winds of the world blow wild and free, and fast obliterate the most enchanted line. But there is now a well of love in me well past the wind, the turbulence well past, a serenity within me more than mine, an inner calm more endless that the sea.
Through love we’ve found a love past yours and mine. I will hold fast to what is best in me. Love draws its own shoreline and pounding sea.
May 30, 2012, 1115 Today we said good bye to Captiva. We have lived here for several months and had so much fun but it's time to continue our journey. We left for Fort Myers Beach about 1100. The weather was good, minus a chance of showers. There’s some nasty looking stuff out on the Gulf.
Kids waving as we entered Matanzas Pass, Ft Myers Beach
Cloudy weather
May 30, 2012, 1600 We’re here at Fort Myers Beach! On the other side of the sandbar, there’s an old World War II ship, the USS Mohawk. The skies are clear and it’s going to be a beautiful sunset!!
May 31, 2012, 912 We just left for Marco Island! Pretty cloudy.
May 31, 2012, 1415 The weather’s still cloudy, but, hey- like the Bob Marley once sang,” don’t worry about a thing, ‘cause every little thing’s gonna be alright!” The waves are fun to ride. I got strapped in and sat at the bow, riding the waves felt like a roller coaster. It is so much fun! Plus, we some dolphins ride our bow with us!
Sophie not worrying 'bout a thing
Waves crashing
Me riding the waves–hard to see how big they were but it was AWESOME!
May 31, 2012, about 1830 We’re here at Marco! Our next stop is Indian Key! We are staying off a little beach were we took the dogs for a walk and collected some nice shells.
June 1, 2012, 1230 The trip to Indian Key was canceled by the weather. Oh well, safety first and hey, we are headed to Smokehouse Bay with 2 dolphins leading the way! Smokehouse Bay is really nice place to anchor. We can dinghy to the grocery store’s dinghy dock and walk around Marco Island. Spent 2 days waiting out the weather.
No Mas anchored in Smokehouse bay
The McDonald's was a tiki hut!
Jake really likes chocolate
Pretty sunsets
Pretty flowering trees
June 3, 2012, 730 We hoisted anchor! The weather’s totally clear! Captain said we have a “GO”! Off to Indian Key!!
June 3, 2012, 1330 We just dropped anchor and… is that a bull shark?! Dad just got Bruce (from “Finding Nemo”) on a hook but he broke the line. We saw it from the boat, it was at least 5 1/2 feet! On a prettier note, we took an adventure walk around the island. We found are 6 sea turtle nests! Sadly, 2 had been raided by raccoons. I didn’t know raccoon’s could live all the way out here on a tiny little island! We didn’t even see any but the dogs did. Sophie treed one and started barking to let us know. Then Ralph ran into the trees and came out with a huge raccoon in his mouth!! He was so proud to show us his prize. Oh, I call this “Karma,” or “Turtle’s revenge.”
Indian Key at high tide
Turtle nest
June 4, 2012, 1125 We’re leaving behind Indian Key and Bruce. (Phew!!) We’re headed for New Turkey Key. I’m not the one who names these places! I wonder if there are turkey’s on New Turkey Key? We’ll find out.
We are here
June 4, 2012, unknown time. We’re here, and now we’re hanging! Well, except we’re walking sideways. Let’s just call this incident “The Great Tilt.” Dad cleaned the bottom on one side while we were here. We saw lots of HUGE stingrays and dolphins bow- rode the dinghy!! SO COOL! But no turkeys.
June 4, 2012, 1000 During the middle of the night, Dad and Mom raised anchor and left New Turkey Key behind us. The mosquitoes are terrible! Even with our netting, they find a way in. Traveling at night, we get to sleep and Mom and Dad get to avoid the mosquitoes while out to sea.
June 5, 2012, 0900 We pulled into Little Shark River. Mom and Dad hadn’t slept so once we were safe at anchor, they slept. Jake and I played, our favorite thing to do! Once the sun started going down, the mosquitoes found us again!! They were horrible so Captain said “Onward we go!”, so we had another night voyage ahead of us.
June 6-7, 2012 We found a cool spot by Flamingo. We’re about a mile off shore so we can stay away from those nasty mosquitoes! We’re going to stay here a couple days so we can rest a little and have some fun. While here, we fished A LOT! Dad caught a SHARK! I caught 2 fish at the same time. And once, I even caught a small fish, only to have a shark attack it when I was reeling it in and eat half of it!! It was crazy. We also did our laundry and managed to clean up a ton of trash off the island we were exploring. I wish people would be more aware of all the trash they just throw out. It has to end up somewhere you know!
Blacktip shark
June 8, 2012, 1030 We’ll be in the Keys today! Whoa, that’s a BIG turtle! Sweet.
June 8, 2012, 1750 I can now see the bottom… under 10 feet of water. We’re parallel to the 7 Mile Bridge.
June 8, 2012, 1920 We’re here at Marathon, Florida, home to the Turtle Hospital, the awesome Dolphin Research Center and the (from what I’ve read) only live coral reef in North America, Sombrero Reef. Super cool!
I hope you enjoyed reading about our trip as much as we enjoyed the trip!
