Vacation

It's been two years since our family has been on a Brasilian vacation together.

That's a long time for a family our size to not be together. Just us. We needed to get out of our city and our routine for a few days to recharge our batteries.

We left Porto Alegre on Saturday at 5:30 in the morning, picked up Ansley about 5 hours later (who was with her friend Laura in Florianopolis) and came to a place called Itajaí.

We've never stayed here before. It's a beach town and it's very, very small.

The name of the beach is Praia Brava which, literally, means Angry Beach.

There are a lot of surfers here and the waves are definitely a little bit angry. You get beat up pretty good but we are having a great time.

We've been playing a lot. We love the beach and our kids are a bunch of fishes. They love to be in any kind of water.

While others swam, some enjoyed beach food while sporting an awesome hairdo.

We are big fans of this little guys toothy smile.

Beach time also leads to lots of "chill" time later. Like napping,

 hanging out in a hamock (she's actually watching a movie on the itouch) cocoon style,

 watching a movie on a computer,

 watching soccer (of course) on tv,

 reading Diary of a Wimpy Kid,

 and reading in a hammock.

Bronwyn, Anderson even recorded a personal video just for you complete with, as usual, him showing his crack and exaggerating.

We all wish you were here with us but since you can't we hope you enjoy your first day back to school (as we all laugh).

Anyway, we leave today for São Paulo state to see some of our best friends.

We'll be there for a week before coming back to this place for a few more days.

We would appreciate your prayers for our safety.