happy birthday to me

My day started with breakfast on Emmy's birthday plate, ha!

We seem to be buying more drinks during quarantine than we usually do.  Because of this, we have had more drinks in our fridge than food recently.  We've talked about getting a garage fridge but we didn't really have space for one.  Jason and the kids found a dorm size fridge that was pretty spacious and surprised me with it for my birthday.

It really is spacious!

We were out running errands and I needed gas.  Bryce said he'd pump it so I wouldn't have to! 

I picked up sushi for a yummy birthday lunch.

I enjoyed a little me time in the pool.  A book and a cold drink and my float!

We went out for a yummy dinner with my mom and then everyone came back to her house for dessert.  I have had the same cake for my birthday for the past 30 years and this year I mixed it up a bit.  It was so good!

Here's to year 38!

slow week, fun weekend

Jason has had an intern this summer who has had to do all of her work remotely.  He got permission for her to come to Virginia this past week so we entertained her in the evenings after work.  Jason has been working form home for months so it was weird for him to be gone all day everyday, but we had fun in the evenings.  We tried to show his intern Richmond and the surrounding areas in case she ends up moving here.  We took her to Short Pump one night and we enjoyed dinner at Casa Del Barco.  The jalapeno margarita was spicy and delicious!

His intern had never heard of Trader Joes so we had to take her and stock up on all our favorites while we were there.  These chocolate coconut almonds are amazing!

Emmy and I went to the school playground to play one night while the boys were at baseball.  We've had very little rain and really need some.  It didn't rain at our house this night, but we saw this pretty rainbow on the way to the playground.

Our little league hosted a home run derby on Friday night.  It was fun to get out and do something different.  

The mascot of our local double a team came out for the event.  Jason had fun with him getting the pitching machine warmed up for Bryce's age group.

Unfortunately a storm popped up delaying and eventually cancelling the event for Bryce's age.  It was a bummer, but they are rescheduling for next Friday.

Date night!

They called this white sangria!  It was good!

We had a great time trying a new restaurant Saturday night for an early birthday dinner for me.

Fun birthday goodies!

Bryce's team had another tournament today.  We won the first two games but came up just a little short in the championship game.

We've got some fun things planned coming up this week!

a change in plans

We were scheduled to hop on a plane with Jason's family on Friday and head to Nashville to visit friends.  We ended up cancelling at the last minute because too many signs said now wasn't the right time to go.  The kids were bummed because they were going to fly on an airplane and spend the weekend with their cousins.  We tried to plan some fun things at home in lieu of the trip.

We decided to have a beach day on Friday.  I wanted to take Jason to our favorite day trip beach since he doesn't get to join us each summer when we go with friends.  When we arrived, we found that the jellyfish were really bad so we got back in the car and found a new beach. 

This spot was on the bay and the water was perfect.  The waves were very small, the water had a good slope and there was a sandbar which the kids love to play on.

It was a perfect day for the beach.

We enjoyed playing in the water and on the sand and just enjoyed a relaxing day.

The original beach we had planned to go to has a small town with restaurants and ice cream.  This beach had none of that.  Luckily we had enough snacks to get us through the day and then we found a seafood restaurant nearby and had dinner before heading home.

Yummy and healthy!  We made a stop in Williamsburg for dessert at a new favorite spot!

On Saturday morning we took the kids rock climbing.  The kids enjoyed it when they went for Emmy's birthday and couldn't wait to go back.  Our local indoor climbing place has reopened so we booked some slots.  It was very clean and not crowded.  The only down side is that they are mostly set up for experienced climbers so the kids had to auto belay.  There weren't many beginner climbs set up for this, but they did well and had fun!

Since it was going to be a weekend full of time with their cousins, we got them together after lunch on Saturday.  They had a rice krispy treat competition at MeMa's.

Emmy stayed at the Caddell's and Bryce came home so he could play baseball today.  I guess it was too hot (101) to take pictures because I don't have any!  His team won both of their games, but it was a tight competition today and they gave up too many runs to make it to the championship.  It was a long day of waiting to find out we were going home, but Bryce was excited for Chase to come home with us to swim and spend the night.  Hopefully their non Nashville weekend was still exciting!

a quiet quarantine week

I like the structure and routine that the school year brings, but I also like our down time in the summer.  However, since we've been out of school since March and no sense of normalcy, I'm ready for some structure back.  Emmy has gymnastics 3 days a week and Bryce has baseball 2 days a week so that helps, but since there are so many things we can't do, I've gotten lazy finding things we can do!

Kelly took the kids to play Putt Putt one day.

Bryce got a hole in one.

Each summer Emmy has a blood draw to check up on her peanut allergy.  The doctor has always been hopeful that she'll grow out of it, but I'm not getting my hopes up.  She is always so brave when we have it done.  Maybe this will be the year we get some good news!  

We have friends who breed labs.  They had a litter that was ready for visitors so we took the kids over for a puppy play date.  We've found Emmy is allergic to longer haired dogs and animals in general so we loaded her up on Benadryl before we went and made sure she didn't touch her face and she washed her hands as soon as she was done.  They were the cutest things.

The kids were in heaven.  They're not used to a dog that is always nice!

There were 10 puppies in this litter and they are all sold already.  It was fun to visit, but we won't be getting a new dog anytime soon!

We had a full day of baseball yesterday!  Bryce's team won their first game and lost their second game.  We finished pretty early in the day so we ended up sitting at the fields for almost 3 hours waiting to see if we'd play again.  There were a lot of moving parts and it came down to the wire but we made it to the championship game!

We ended up getting to replay the team we lost to and we beat them this time!

A win always makes a full day at the field a little better!

The kids spent the night with Jason's parents last night so we had a breakfast date this morning.  I had a smores waffle and it was amazing.  Quarantine life may be crazy but I have loved the extra time it has afforded us with Jason!

Happy Monday!

4th of July

We got home from the beach yesterday with no scheduled plans for the 4th.  We typically go to our friends the Shipleys but the quarantine life didn't allow for that this year.  

We still dressed the part and made a festive snack.

We typically have a stash of "real" fireworks that we pick up on vacations when we travel south but we haven't been south in a while and we were all out.  We took the kids to the local fireworks stand and they picked out some fun things.  

Bryce liked the tanks.  We even let the kids light some this year!

Sparklers are always a fan favorite.

These sparklers were 3ft long!

While they didn't shoot high or make a loud boom, they were pretty and the kids loved them just as much!

The last firework we did left this glowing smiley face when it was all done.  It was our favorite!

Happy birthday, America!