Rosy got sick. I managed to get some Dramamine into Sophie in time, but Rosy had a long day. It take me most of a day to get past my own seasickness, so it shouldn’t have surprised me. The adrenaline, and the easterly swell kept both John and I up most of the first night. Then, on Sunday morning, we lost the wind. It totally, and completely died. We never intended to motor for four days. We don’t carry enough fuel to make that kind of passage under power alone (we do have sails, afterall), and we had no desire to sit and be rocked by the swells while waiting for wind. So, on to Plan B.

By Sunday afternoon, the day felt very normal. Just like motoring up the ICW. I did the dishes, the ladies played with Playdough. Their appetites returned. John took a nap while I took my turn in the sun (oh my, it was HOT). The wind picked up around sunset and we were in for an entirely different ride. We still haven’t figured out quite why- the moon tides, we think- but those last eight hours into St. Mary’s inlet were a rollercoaster down quartering seas. We took turns sleeping (and having been up the night before, we SLEPT despite the rollers). The girls slept in their leecloth like rocks (thank you, Dramamine). The highlight was seeing a pod of tiny porpoises jumping through the waves around us, chasing flying fish, their black bodies all lit up by the moon. Somehow the wind subsided just in time for us to make our grand entrance, past the shrimpers headed out at 5AM. We dropped the hook in the Amelia River just as the moon set.

We’ve spent the last few days in our favorite town in Florida, trying to make sense of the randomness of the weather, and the unexpected swells. We’ve gone back and forth about whether to go inside to Charleston and Beaufort, or to travel up the coast. Whatever we decide, I try to keep John’s mantra of , “Every option is on the table,” handy in my mind. As the ocean clearly abides by that philosophy as well.

You just never know. You plan, you adjust, and you take what you can get. For us, that’s been a nice sojourn in Fernandina Beach. And that’s not much to complain about.

Today it finally happened. We still have a to-do list, but nothing on the list keeps us from the here and now. The blissful breeze that comes down our hatches and keeps us up in the cockpit in the evenings, while the girls tie ropes around our legs and say things like, “It’s booful (beautiful) Mama. So booful.” Nothing that keeps us from preparing to go offshore, weather-permitting (go away, ugly storm!).

The first night we were at anchor we walked out on deck and could see not only the stars, but the Milky Way streaming over the Keys. I hadn’t seen it since the night before our wedding, on the coast of Maine. There are few things more spectacular in the natural world, from our perspective. It was like the universe lined itself up to say, “Welcome back. Welcome back to where you’ve always wanted to be.” This was the life we chose to live together and finally, we are here once again, with no intention of looking back.

As John said last night, standing in the cockpit in this lovely anchorage, “Why would anyone NOT want to live this life?”

Truly. We are thankful, Universe.

That said, the anchorages we’ve managed to discover have been nothing short of lovely. We spent two nights in a nice spot in Miami Beach, two nights on a mooring in Fort Lauderdale, last night off the Lake Worth inlet, and tonight, up in a nice cove at the northern reaches of the lake. The girls were beside themselves with glee when we pulled the dinghy in to go shopping and found a nice, sandy swimming hole under a bridge. They were in the water before we could ponder the question of swimming. Of course we will swim. Of course.

The ladies have been wonderful. The other big downside to the ICW is that there are long stretches where I’m watching for buoys and shoals and John is steering, leaving the girls to manage themselves. They watch Curious George, color and draw, play with Play-dough, sleep, eat, repeat. It’s insufferably hot in the cockpit with a bulky lifejacket, so they bide their time down below. They never complain. Today on our short passage, they played some involved imaginary “Make you into a princess and sell the shark for three quarters” game. I am glad they have each other, and deep down, they are too.

The highlights for them come when the adventures onshore begin. Just riding a bucking dinghy in a chop is fun. Add that to a thunderstorm while waiting for a trolley, and then an impromptu swim in the ocean. Every day is new. Every day is different. For them, that’s enough.

Cross your fingers for the wind to go south, or southeast, or west, or southwest. We might get our chance this weekend. But I shouldn’t have said that.

We’ve been underway two and half days and just like that, we’ve set up temporary housekeeping in Miami Beach. It’s a wonderful and strange thing, to travel from place to place with your home fully intact. Our routines, our possessions, our habits simply follow us. Like a turtle’s shell, John always says.

Spot is frustrating me with it’s odd inability to upload our positions automatically. But I will continue to work out the bugs. For now, here’s our map!

Tomorrow is a day off for some shopping and boat projects, in hope of making a long passage outside the Intracoastal later this week. We need the East winds to abate- universe, send us good vibes!

Speaking of which, we had a big karmic moment on Monday afternoon. We were trying to get off the dock and out to an anchorage, just to set ourselves up for Tuesday’s run. Just after four o’clock John tried to start the dinghy motor and it wouldn’t run. Diagnosis: a clogged carburetor (thank you, Ethanol!). He raced up to the outboard shop owned by a friend of ours, Eric, who we met on our trip south five years ago. We led Eric and his family through Biscayne Bay, and across to the oceanside via Angelfish Creek. As we retraced those same steps today, almost exactly, it reminded me of how the universe had paid us back. Our little bit of help was paid back in spades, as Eric took the carburetor apart and got us back underway in less than an hour. You never know. You just don’t.

Love from Miami Beach, and more soon.

For a while there, I thought the universe might be conspiring to keep us in the Keys, forever. The autopilot parts got delayed. Then after days of rigging the darn thing, with its sensitive and expensive compass, the autopilot wouldn’t steer a steady course. We tried to make the GPS talk to the autopilot and bypass the compass altogether.The GPS doesn’t even speak the same language as the autopilot. And on and on and on.

But today we had success. What had become a monstrosity of a electronics issue, boiled down to two wires being mixed up in a wiring diagram that came with the darn thing. We didn’t need GPS. We didn’t need an expensive technician. We needed to look at things in the simplest way possible. Eliminate one problem at a time. And the biggest lesson of all? Never assume the literature is 100% spot on. Even if you are.

So off we go in a day or two, bound for cooler waters, if not a cooler summer (wow, the hot hot heat is everywhere, it seems). You can follow along if you wish. We have a SPOT on board, which is a nifty little GPS beacon that we will set off every evening at anchor. It sends our position to our SPOT Adventures page, which shows us on Google Maps and has a few boat pics too. I will try to update from our logbook as we go. Thanks to our 5-Mile Wifi, it just might happen!!

That said, while we are more than ready to leave, we have some missing to do. Our dear friends, playmates, babysitters, confidants, the people who threw Sophie a welcome party when she was born, the people who brought me food when Rosy arrived (it was SO good). Many have already left (what a transient place this is), and many we leave behind. Come and visit- stay in touch! Thank you for being a part of this chapter in our lives. We grew a family here, restored a boat, and feel very blessed to be hitting the Gulfstream and heading north, richer than when we arrived.

John and I are avowed humanists, so without traditional religion in her life, Sophie always thanks the Earth for the good things that come her way. “Thank you Earth for this cloudy day that wasn’t so hot and had swimming in it.” There’s something deeply satisfying about taking our girls out on an adventure with us, our boat, “and the Earth.” Send Earth your good vibes for fair winds, following tides and happiness on all fronts. Maybe it wasn’t the universe conspiring against us. It was just Earth telling us to look right under our noses. A good lesson for the days ahead.

But last night was the first fireworks experience we’ve had with kids. They are a bit daunting, and loud, and late. But also quite special. Sophie was alternately mystified (”how do they MAKE those?”) and secretly terrified of the sound. Our friend Joe, who was gracious enough to take us out on his boat, offered his commentary: “Now we’re really getting into it. They’re bringing out the four-color DOUBLE sparkles!!” Rosy was as entranced with the anchor lights all around us as she was with anything else, “Oh mama, there’s STARS!” It was a beautiful night. Simple, sweet, and yes, a little bit loud. One more fireworks experience I won’t soon forget.

Dear Roo-

A few days ago, officially, you turned TWO! Two years old! Your big day was folded into the craziest of months, installing the engine, getting underway for the first time, celebrating with grandparents. But what a week to be TWO! This morning you’re sitting in your usual spot on the settee, legs folded underneath you, your hands crossed on the table, watching Wallace and Gromit with Sophie. I will remember your wild sun-bleached hair, pink tie-dyed shirt. Your constant narration of the movie- “Dat Doggy! Dat Sheep! Dat a white sheepy!” You’ll drink from a sippy cup, which you’ve been relegated to on the boat, due to your insatiable urge to pour water from one container to another. You’re a candidate for Montessori school if there ever was one! But aside from the no-spill cups and the binkies that you horde like candy, there are very few remnants of babyhood in our lives. I can’t remember the last time you rode in a stroller or wore a diaper, or the last time I rocked you to sleep.

We celebrated three times, the first with Tabitha, your first friend, two days older than you. Our water girls played in the pool and dressed up, ate pink cupcakes and gummi worms. You savored the singing and the candles, but took so long to blow them out that you felt the heat of it on your nose. Now you decline all candle-blowing duties. Thankfully, Sophie is here to help!

A week later Goonie and JoePop came down and after swimming, we shuffled you upstairs for a bath while Sophie and I decorated the condo. You were pleased and surprised and approached the present-opening with the utmost seriousness. Your pink cake with weeping M&Ms was truly a work of art. But what we’ll remember most from the weekend was you pulling your trains around the round table in the living room hundreds and hundreds of times. The simplest kind of fun.

Your real birthday was a good old normal day on Rubi. Daddy worked on the running lights. We went for a nice swim, had a long nap, made pizza and surprised you with a donut and two candles. Simple and sweet. Happy TWO!

And now we’re off on a real adventure, Rose! In just a few days we set off for the great white north. We’ll sail from here to Fort Pierce and then on to Beaufort, North Carolina, and eventually to Boston and Maine. This fall will bring your first Transatlantic adventure (by plane, not boat!) and a few stamps in your passport. Then your first real winter! Last night we were out walking after dinner and it started raining- one of those tropical showers that can turn a dry parking lot into a lake in minutes. Suddenly there were puddles everywhere. You were in the very definition of your heaven, splashing and running, “swimming,” trying to catch water on your tongue. You are one for adventuring, never complaining about a fall or scrape suffered in the quest for fun. You are your Daddy through and through- confident, determined, stubborn, wicked smart. If we can keep the adventures coming, and manage your energy (and acrobatics), it will be a very memorable year indeed. John often wonders, looking at you, how his mother managed to raise five kids, and “this” as the youngest! It’s clear to me. I love you fiercely. Our frustrations and challenges are balanced by this crazy love for your happiness, goofiness, the crazy way you just emanate light and life. You glow, Rose. You truly do. You’re a charmer, even as you terrify us.

Thank you for being exactly who you are. So different from our first-born, who loves you so dearly, who says, “Rosy, I’m so glad I have a sister like you.” I know just what she means. A sister full of ideas, of fun, of mischief at times, but most of all, full of enthusiasm, curiosity, and love. You’re a beautiful girl, in so many ways. Holding you in my arms two years ago, I had no idea who I was holding. If I could have only imagined . . .

Happy, happy birthday Roo. We love you!

It’s been over four years in the making, but this baby left the dock!! We went out for a spin! Our boat MOVES under her own power. And gracefully at that! How good it felt to wake up Friday and get out a chart, plug in a GPS, stow the accumulated junk on the table, throw off some lines and GO SOMEWHERE IN OUR BOAT. We took two trips on Friday- the first, for us, while the girls were with a babysitter. And the second, with them. They were totally nonplussed. Sophie read a book in the cockpit and barely looked up, like this was the most normal thing in the world. Rosy relaxed into the motion and nearly fell asleep, even after a two hour nap. While we hollered and high-fived around them, they were simply at home.

And that’s all we’ve wanted for them. We did this for them, but also a little bit for us. One thing parenting has taught me is that they will never understand what we do. There is no way for them to conceive of the hard work involved. The constant meeting of needs. The sleeplessness, the working, the taking of walks when all you want to do is lie down. The four years of boat projects, just to make a floating home.

They won’t understand it, until they have kids of their own, and renovate a house or a boat or an RV or canal barge while parenting two small kids. And when the work is hardest, I have to remind myself that we chose every bit of this. We chose to make this our home, because before there was a Sophie or a Rosy, there was this part of us. In the midst of living with and loving them, we’ve also made something for John and Ellen. This is who we were, who we are, and who we will continue to be. Leaving the dock on Friday, that fact is what I was most thankful for.

Underway!

We told my Dad we were going to dinner, and look where we ended up!
When we arrived, Paul, the pilot greeted us with a mouthful of what were possibly the most disgusting teeth I’d seen in a long time (and mind you, this is not a rare occurence in the Keys. Our last auto mechanic had about one tooth in the front . . .). We were all averting our eyes, wondering in dental issues had any bearing on small plane safety. Paul muttered something about Obama promising dental insurance and out popped the mouthpiece. We were won over.

I love that my dad loves stuff like this- gliders and floatplanes and helicopter rides. I love that occasionally I get to do something like this with him.
Happy Father’s Day, JoePop!

There has been a highlight. Our ladies. Our sisters. They have found each other. Today they were sitting at the table in their usual spots, Sophie surrounded by about six dozen toys and bits of jewelry. Rosy with wild, wild hair and the orbit of cracker crumbs that usually surrounds her. They were sharing watercolors and talking to each other like the Golden Girls. “Oh, I wike that color Sophia. It’s pretty, Sophia.” “Now wash your brush off, Rose. Don’t make them all brown, Rose.” Sophie was endlessly patient, even as Rosy made mud of a few colors. She even praised the concoctions- “That one’s better than the first yellow!” It was so unexpected, so perfect, I just sat and watched.

Whether it’s happenstance that they’ve discovered one another on the boat, whether it has anything to do with the close quarters of the hot months, or the lack of many other playmates- I have no idea. But I do know that they’ve slipped into a rhythm of true appreciation and true friendship. They look out for one another. Sophie puts Rosy’s shoes on when we leave the boat. Rosy, as stubborn as she is, is willing to share most anything in the world with Sophie. These past two years were hard, hard times for all of us. Adjusting to a colicky newborn, then managing the emotions of Sophie’s jealousy. Juggling the praise and “special time” they both needed. But we’ve somehow, on the eve of a second birthday, arrived at the good place. I can send them off together and know they will be a team. Today Sophie was trying to think of something she could play with Rosy. Her eyes got big and she laughed, “I know Rosy, we can MAKE MISCHIEF!!”

It is what I wanted most in the world for them. I hope it lasts. Something tells me that it will.

I read a caption on a photo of a little boy recently. His mom wrote about how fast the time was flying, how she wished she could slow it down. Her husband said something so perfect- “Remember, we made him for him. We didn’t make him for us.” We made them for who they are, and who they will be. We also made them for each other. Rose and Sophia.