SUMMER FUN!

As the saying goes, time flies when you are having fun. And FUN is what we've been having all summer. Jackson and I had a great visit home to Mville in celebration of Uncle Don's 60th birthday. Way to go Aunt Jo for pulling off a fantastic surprise party!

Upon our return, Eleanor, Jackson, and I celebrated Father's Day for Jason with breakfast at one of our favorite spots in Carytown, Can-Can.














When July arrived, we celebrated the July Birthdays with Jackson's pals, his included. I just love this one photo of us preparing to eat those yummy Elmo cupcakes made by Li. The combination of a 2 year old, a cupcake and a lit candle will certainly put you into a trance. Or as my friend Petra (in the green) said, it makes us look like some kind of cult. Another friend Morgan (in the red striped shirt) added "Every birthday we light tiny fires and offer cake to the Mighty Elmo, God of Toddlers..."




Later in July, Eleanor, Jackson, Jason and I traveled to NC to celebrate Jackson's 2nd and Poppy's 95th birthday. What a real treat it was to have a party for the 2 of them together.

We then headed further south to Pawleys Island for a week. Gosh, our trip to Pawleys was fantastic. We heard that the area is often referred to as "shabby chic", which is so appropriate. Our house was right on the beach which was a treat. Jackson absolutely LOVED the ocean and the beach. We all spent many hours driving dump trucks and digging holes in the sand together. Here are few of our favorite pictures. Be sure to check out Jason's surfing too! Pretty cool, huh!

The Move is Coming Soon, But First...A Vacation for ONE of us in the Carlyon House

I enjoyed a fun and fabulous trip out to San Francisco and the California Wine Country at the end of September with my UVA college roommates Jenn, Kelly, Danielle and Lauren. One of us (Kelly) left her newlywed husband for the long weekend while the other four of us left our babies at home with the husbands and headed for some much-needed girl time and R&R (In my case, make that my oh-so-wonderful mother-in-law AND husband). Every minute was a joy with these ladies. I wish we could all pick a city and a street to live on so we could be together all of the time. But alas, I will continue to enjoy the times we are able to get together. Here is my longwinded recap:

We all met up in San Francisco from all over the country: DC, Denver, Seattle, Park City and Lexington. Danielle and I, the east-coasters arrived in the early-afternoon so we took some time to tour around and have lunch (MarketBar...YUMMY!) before heading to Fisherman's Warf and Ghiradelhi Square. Once Kelly and Lauren arrived, we walked around the city and had a bite to eat. Jenn arrived just as we were getting in bed. So at the end of the day, all of us had finally made it to this long weekend that we'd been planning for months. The next morning, we had breakfast at Buena Vista, home to the famous Buena Vista Irish Coffee, before heading up Highway 101 towards the Sonoma Valley. We stopped at several wineries and vineyards on the way up to our final destination, sipping and laughing all along the way. Our stops included Schug, Domain Chandon and St. Stupery. It was a nice mix of boutique-type wineries as well as the big brand power places like Domain Chandon. After crossing over the mountains from Calistoga, we arrived (just in time) to check into our rental.

Jenn had found us a place to rent through VRBO.com back in the spring. It was a great price, right in Healdsburg, could accomodate 5 people, etc. Well about 1 week before our trip, the women managing this particular property informed Jenn that the property owner's had decided that they wanted it for the weekend. AND SO...she "thinks" she can find us something. This goes on for the better part of a week, with Jenn mainly leaving messages for a woman who won't return her calls. So on Wednesday, two days prior to our arrival, I randomly and virtually stumble onto a Rental Property Company with rentals available.


YEAH - so we didn't have to sleep in the car. It was a great house that overlooked the Dry Creek Valley and was about 5 miles up a dirt and gravel road.

Once we checked in, we headed out to the town of Healdsburg to walk around and have a delicious dinner at Ravenous. We've come a long way from college days too as we were all happy to say our good nights and get in bed around 11pm, which remember for me was 2am! The next morning, we had breakfast at this great bakery Costeaux before heading over to our Spa Morning. I had never been to a spa before but I now understand why they are so popular. Wow - what a treat. I had a volcanic mud bath, followed by a massage and facial. Everyone was glowing afterwards from all of our pampering. We did some shopping and stopped by 2 tastings rooms (Toad Hollow and Thumbprint) before heading to lunch. Afterwards, we stopped by Dry Creek Winery before settling back into our home away from home to have dinner and enjoy our last evening together.






Cheers to an amazing trip!






As much as I enjoyed myself, I have to say I was missing the JRC so much! I knew he was in good hands but I wanted to hug and kiss him everyday. This was just the trip I needed to rejuvenate my mind, body and spirits so that I can try to be the best mom to Jackson. Plus it was a heck of a way to celebrate turning 30!

Now it is on to Richmond!

Beach Trip #2, More Birthday Cake & Of Course More Fun!

After a fabulous week in HHI, we headed up the coast to meet Emmy in Emerald Isle, NC (part of the NC Crystal Coast in the Lower Outer Banks). We stayed in a great beach house --- oceanfront! It was so fun to walk right out of the house down our own private walkway to the beach. There were rocking chairs on our porch that we made much use of to enjoy the sights and sounds of the ocean. Jackson calmed down a little this week and didn't run quite so much at the beach. We think one reason is that the beach was pretty narrow in comparison to the SC beach. Plus he wasn't so overwhelmed with people because it was much more private than in SC. But he still loved running into the water! We found a great seafood market just a few miles away so we dined everynight on local, fresh seafood. YUMMY! We made cioppino for the first time too --- DOUBLE YUMMY - and drank lots of great wine, some from our CA adventures last year (Coppola Sofia, Pisoni)! Emmy made Jackson a dinosaur cake too for his official July 16th birthday which tasted so good. And he's quite intrigued with his new activity cube that Emmy, Jason and I gave him for his birthday, especially the bead maze and fun gears.