christmas vacation

I’m not the best at remembering to blog about my family vacation to the Keys. Sorry.
I promise that even though it took me so long to blog about it, it WAS really fun. Mostly because it was warm. Like Nike shorts and a tshirt kind of warm.
It was pretty depressing to fly back into Atlanta where it was cold.
I didn’t bring my camera on the trip, so all photos were taken by my mom. She’s pretty much the best.
We didn’t take many pictures because we were busy relaxing. But, Mom did bring the camera when we drove down to Key West.
  
These are some pictures from the Southernmost Point. Interesting fact. At this point in Key West, you are closer to Cuba than Miami. I tried to talk Desmond into going for a little swim- I mean, 90 miles isn’t THAT far- but he wasn’t interested.

There were chickens everywhere in Key West. Apparently they are native or special or something, so the people that live there aren’t allowed to remove them or anything. Desmond decided to go run out in the street and chase one around a bit.

We couldn’t go to Key West without having some Key Lime Pie! We visited a little shop that Bobby Flaw did a throwdown at one time. Can you tell that we are huge Food Network fans in our house?

We saw a pretty sunset.

And we saw some street performers. Let me just say- Key West is crazy. Like voodoo lady and drag show kind of crazy. Not exactly family friendly. But, it was fun to go on an adventure.

We stayed at a little place called Hawk’s Cay.

Desmond did a SNUBA lesson the morning we left. He thought it was the coolest, even though it was just in swimming pool.
  
Then, we drove back to Miami so that we could catch our flight out in the morning!

Overall, I’d say it was a good vacation. I mean, it was warm. It’s hard to eat gluten-free on vacation though, so I ended up sick a few times. We flew back on Christmas Eve, so the Miami airport was crazy. The culture of entitlement at resorts isn’t something I’m fond of. I missed southern accents. Fun? Yes.

How do you balance things though? How do you deal with watching African-American and Latino workers board a bus to Miami every night (in a scene that looked eerily like “The Help”?) How do you deal with seeing all the strip clubs as you drive down the road knowing that it is likely that sex slaves are trapped there? Girls that have been promised a future in America that were tricked? It’s hard to look at people spending so much money on vacations knowing that there are children starving across the street. It’s hard when you know what you ought to be doing conflicts with what you are doing. How do you find balance in your life?