Downtime Downtown

This past year, my husband started a new job. In most ways, it has been an amazing thing for our family. The company is great, his job is secure and the benefits are wonderful. The only negative is that he is working 2nd shift and putting in a lot of overtime. This means, two things: Less sleep for him. And less family time. This has been a big adjustment for us. For me, it means juggling the perils of kids, homework, activities, dinner and bedtime alone. For him, it means missing those things which he loves and working himself into exhaustion. During this time, he also began the process of going back to school. And is currently enrolled and taking classes online.

Despite this crazy and seemingly impossible schedule, our family is thriving. I am so thankful for these new challenges and opportunities, because in the end, they are all positive and beneficial to our family and our future.

This past week, for the first time since starting this new job, Andrew was able to take a couple of days off, yielding him a four day weekend! It was a huge blessing to us all. And we were able to spend some refreshing quality time together. We were able to do a couple of very special things like going on a day date to Olive Garden while the kids were in school. And on Saturday we were able to take the big kids out for a day of fun and ice skating which is something they have been wanting to do for a long time. But the real joy and blessing came from the simple time we were able to spend laughing, snuggling, eating family dinners and playing board games together. Those are the things, I have always cherished the most. And it was so nice to just enjoy being together and feel the deep love and special connection we share. Priceless.

Here are some highlights of our four day weekend.

Olive Garden Date

(Is it still a date, if you bring your one year old?)

 Amelia is usually hit or miss when it comes to outings. But she did good, as long as we kept food in her mouth. :)

Baby's first bread stick. :)

Apparently Olive Garden was just too much and baby girl slept the whole way home.

There is an awesome ice skating rink in Charlottesville. It is right on the downtown outdoor mall. It is the perfect place to spend the day. There are tons of fun shops, restaurants and even a children's museum on the strip. But we spent most of our time ice skating! They have buckets to stack up for kids so they can steady themselves on the ice. Brilliant.

 Elliot was hardcore. Fearless. He would just race full force until he fell. It was awesome.

 Kadence was cautious, but finally decided to try without her bucket, and did great.

 We had so much fun!

 Elliot did some heavy duty sweating. Look at his hair! :)

 After ice skating, we went to dinner on the strip at a lovely little diner called, "The Nook". It was delicious! I am so thankful for this long weekend, the special things we got to do together and the sweet memories we are constantly building with our kids. We ended the weekend with a wonderful church service, a lazy afternoon at home and ice cream cones. :)