The Day the Music Died

Ok, so that might be a bit of a dramatic Title ;-) But I can assure you that Jeff feels like its accurate...

So, apparently my husband has found his identity in his hair. I never knew this... that he thought that it was his hair that made him so handsome. But alas, its true.

So you can only imagine his horror to realize that he's.... shhh....whisper it... thinning on top.

He decided that it was time. That he's been trying long enough to hold on, so to speak. So... he shaved it!

The "Before" pics

And, the "After" (with our neice, Avery)

Hmmmm....

I encouraged him to "hold on" a little longer adn let it grow back out. I mean, I still think he's handsome when it was shaved but why give up so easily, right?! HA!

We looked into hair replacement (not b/c i care about it but b/c i swear, he talks about it a ton... super self conscious about it... soooooo, he might hate me for blogging about it... LOL!) but its SO expensive! Like 10K at a minimum! Wow...

So, if anyone has any miracle treatments that wont make him sterile or have any other funky side effects, please share! ;-)

Parents Trip: Day 4 (going home)

So, after a wonderful time of not being on a schedule, soaking up one another and relaxing... our last day started pretty much the way I thought it would... with me ready to get home to our babies ;-) 

Before we left, we watched this beautiful sunrise one more time...

We were packed and on our way around 8am. We headed to Victorias (from day 2) for breakfast. We were not as impressed on day 2, but it was just fine.

On the way home, I took advantage of Jeff being a captive audience and read a few chapters of "Shepherding a Childs Heart" to him. He was thrilled. HA! We did have some good discussion, though... until it looked like he would voluntarily run under the next tractor trailer if I started to read another chapter. I thought maybe I should stop at that point. ;-)

So I took a nap. And made him promise that when we got to Thompson, he would stop for me to get some sausage.

Well, lets just say, he woke me at Madison. My words to him were "Thompson is about 30-45 min BEFORE we get to madison... I"m not sure exactly... just keep your eyes out and let me know". And all he heard was Madison. I swear... he has such selective hearing! Grrrr....

We ended up only stopping once on the way home... and it was about 5 min from home ONLY because I thought my bladder was absolutely going to explode and I couldnt go another minute. I'm telling you, I was ready to see my babies!!! We made it from Myrtle Beach to our house in 5 hours flat. Wow.

The kids were napping when we got home (at 2pm) so we thanked my mom (who had kept them Sunday-Monday) and got unpacked, grabbed a bite for lunch (but I wasnt that hungry b/c i ate my leftover crabcake from dinner the night before on the way home!) and rested up before the kids got up.

And oh, were they surprised and HAPPY to see us! The feeling was mutual!

It was a beautiful day, so we played outside, with our neighbors little grandaughter (who they are raising).

How cute are these babies?!

My little climbing boy!

I ADORE my husband. He's pretty great! And I love our time alone! But I just cant get enough of these sweet babies of mine! (I'll remind myself of that when I'm ready for another escape in a few months! HA!)

Thank you to our fabulous parents who took great care of Rhyan and Mack while we were gone. We are truly blessed to be able to spend time alone and not worry about our kids having a great time!

Parents Trip: Day 3

RACE DAY!!! 

Meaning: Jeff had to get up WAY before ANYONE should EVER be up so he could get prepped for his run. And meaning that I ended up WAY too early to drive his toosh to where the race started.

The upside: getting back to the hotel in time to watch the sun rise over this beautiful ocean!

I cranked up the hotel coffee pot and made myself a cup, had some quiet time with Gods Word and soaked it all in... wow... it was so quiet and peaceful. Perfection. I adore my children, of course, but I am NOT a morning person. I prefer to have my quiet time in the morning but they already wake so early that I just cant bring myself to get up any earlier. Besides, everyone talks about how Jesus spent time with his father "in the morning" and uses this as a reason that we should do the same, however, in the jewish calendar, a new day starts at sun SET, not sun rise... so "technically" my night time devotionals ARE "in the morning". Follow? ;-)

I got ready and just HAD to take a pic of the fact that it IS possible for me to have decent hair while at the beach. There is almost NO humidity in october at the beach. Its perfect!

I was worried about finding a parking spot near the end of the race to pick up Jeff, but I didnt have a problem at all! In fact, I came to this cross walk area JUST as Jeff ran past!! Awesome!

And this is how I found him when he was all done :-) Wiped out! haha!

This guy was juggling all kinds of stuff. Jeff can actually juggle quite well (random coolness!) but not different objects I dont think!

We decided to grab some breakfast at a nearby pancake house and then got tickets to ride THIS BEAST!

I'm not afraid of heights. At all. But being in a glass case THIS high was a bit breath taking :-) It was INCREDIBLE!!!! And since it was early in the morning, still, and they werent busy, they gave us an extra cycle. YAY!

We went back to the hotel and just relaxed for a while. We actually swam for a long while in the indoor pool and hot tub (great for Jeff's sore legs!) and just talked and had fun. Then, we decided to watch a movie. We almost never watch movies at home (in a movie theater). We typically have grandparents as sitters (grateful!!) and we dont want to take advantage or leave them too long. So we typically opt for dinner OR a movie, but not both. And we usually go for dinner b/c i hate to cook :-) We saw Taken 2. It was good! I love Liam though and am easy to please in the movie department.

We walked around the area for a while and sat on a swing by this little pond near a recreational area. The kids would have LOVED it! (reminder to self next time we go as a family). There were these geese there that the kids would have loved, too! I got some video of them... I wanted to touch them but they hiss and scared me :-)

I worked hard to talk Jeff into eating at my personal favorite: The Captains Boathouse. Omg. They have the BEST crab cakes I've ever had. And the shrimp and grits are incredible. So I get an appetizer of both :-)

We decided to go find something for the 'rents as a thank you for taking care of the kids for us so we headed to Barefoot Landing. We totally didnt realize/think about the fact that it was a sunday.... the whole place was practically shut down! Just a reminder that there are still some conservative areas in the south :-) One store was open, though, so we found a gift for them... but we had to laugh at our lack of planning!

We finished off the evening with an icecream at DQ and a trip to Wal-mart. Livin on the wild side, I tell ya!

Back to the hotel and in bed by 10, 90% packed and ready to head home to see our babies the next morning!

Parents Trip: Day 2

I woke around 8am... to Jeff sitting on the couch saying "about time you woke up! I've been trying to be quiet since 6:30". LOL! I guess his internal clock doesnt understand what vacation means :-) 

Luckily, I get ready really quickly! So we headed out to find some breakfast. And ended up at some little hole in the wall place (well, after a quick stop by the verizon store so Jeff could get a case for his new smart phone). It was kind of shocking to me that there were people smoking inside... I get so used to GA's/Gwinnett's no smoking laws... it made me really, really grateful for those laws! But the food was yum-o, so we could get past the smoke for this once :-) I mean, who cant appreciate a menu like this?

Ahhh... some of my favorite things :-)

After breakfast, we headed to the mall area where Jeff's half marathon would start and did a little window shopping. Jeff was a little bored :-)

I couldnt help but to take a pic of these owls for Linsay!

We headed out from there to pick up Jeff's number for the race and then back to the hotel for some relaxation! I couldnt help but to giggle at how girls are always swooning over "pool boys"... ours, nice as he was, didnt really fit that sterotype! haha

We sat by the pool and read and just relaxed. It was warm! Not warm enough for me to get in the pool (regardless of how warm jeff swore it was!) but nice enough to enjoy the sun :-)

 

 I couldnt help but to be excited to try to get a touch of sun! lol! PALE GIRL ALERT!

Jeff headed up to the hotel room to take a nap and I decided to take a short stroll on the beach. It really was beautiful. And quiet. October is a GREAT month to hit the beach!

But the water was COLD! So this is as far as these little piggies went :-)

Jeff has complained for a solid year now that last year we did not hit up an all you can eat seafood buffet. So this year, we made sure to revisit a favorite of ours..

My joke for the night: While Jeff was "carb loading" for the race, I was "crab loading" HA!

Seriously, it was delicious! We LOVE crab!

After diner, we decided to play a round of putt-putt. We havent done that in AGES! Like, since we were dating, maybe?! Anyhoo... this is a pic of ONE of my THREE hole in ones :-) I took Jeff to putt-putt school!

Tabulating his pitiful score and shedding tears over the fact that i WON...

He of course challenged me to a second game... where I started off strong but ended up losing by 10? I give up when I see that i'm losing. Yes, i'm competitive. To a point that I become a bit of a brat. Sore loser. I know. :-( But we really did have fun!

We had bought some bread for Jeff to have some peanut butter toast before the race the next morning so we decided to share with the ducks. There were tons of them! All we kept saying is "Rhyan and Mack would LOVE THIS!" We took video and pics for them :-)

We headed back to the hotel and were in bed by 10pm I think?! Jeff had an early day for the race the next day and I'll just admit it... we're OLD and like our sleep.

Day 2=success :-)