Life looks a little different when I’m on vacation and I’m so grateful for all of the happiness I found this past week. Here’s a glimpse back at what my life looks like on vacation:

Monday | Roger William’s Zoo

My friend Laura was visiting from NYC. She and I met up with Kris, Will and Aila to go to the zoo for the day! The giraffes are by far my favorite animals.This one in particular was just stunning. Look at those colors!

Aila is just like her Auntie Jen in her love for giraffes! She willingly did about a zillion poses in front of them.The kids got to go inside the goat enclosure to see them and brush them.

There were lots of great interactive things for the kids. Including “milking” these wooden cows.

The colors on the animals always leaves me in awe.

Monday | Ice Cream at Hornstra Farms

After the zoo it was time for homemade, local ice cream. We tried to go to Hornstra Farms’ new ice cream stand in June but their summer hours hadn’t started and they were closed.

The ice cream was delicious! Worth the wait.The farm is beautiful. Had to capture this light:

Will’s smile with his one “grown-up” tooth just slays me!

Laura and I enjoyed the ice cream just as much as the kids!!

After we ate, we walked around to see the cows and take in the whole farm experience.

Monday | Kris took the kids home and Laura and I headed to the movies. We saw Boyhood. It was good, not great. A little long, but that’s what knitting is for.There’s something terribly cliche and fantastic about summer movie watching, curled up in big comfy sweatshirts, digging into buttery popcorn that just makes my heart happy. And sharing that with a good friend makes it all the better!

Tuesday | Running After all the ice cream it was time to burn a few calories on Tuesday morning.

Tuesday | Laura & I spent the morning being a bit lazy, then did some shopping before she had to leave. I got a cute new dress at TJ Maxx.

Tuesday | Dan and I had date night after Laura headed back to NYC.It was a perfect night to eat outside on the deck overlooking the ocean.Love this guy!

Wednesday | Dan had the day off too and we enjoyed a lazy morning. Knitting (her). Crossword puzzles (him). Golden Girls reruns (both)! I spent the TV time finishing my grandmother’s shawl (on her actual 80th birthday). Good timing. Dan and I called Gram shortly after to wish her a Happy Birthday in advance of her big party this weekend.

Thursday | Running at the TrackLearned that running at the track is probably not for me. I found it terribly boring. As it happened, a bunch of sports team started practicing right as I hit the 1 mile mark and I was getting in the way so I bailed. Lousy work out. Good learning experience.

Thursday | iPhone replacement.

My camera was broken. Brought it to the Apple Store. He didn’t even check to what was broken, they replaced it with practically no questions asked! Thank you Apple!

Thursday | We picked up our niece Aila and our nephew Will around 4p for a sleepover. I knit in the car while Uncle Dan drove……on the way to a surprise adventure to Pump & Jump for some play time!

They jumped for awhile and ran around giggling their heads off. Priceless. Then Dan bought a card with credits on it to play video games. I think he enjoys playing as much as they do. Though I have to say I did a lot of the heavy lifting, winning 4 stuffed animals in 1 try on the Claw Game! 

Thursday | DinnerDinner with kids= color books + tic tac toe competitions. Because they were so good, we let them bring their newly won stuffed animals in with us to play before dinner.

Thursday | Vintage Toy Fun

At home Will finally got to see Uncle Dan’s boyhood Star Wars collection (which he can appreciate now that he too has seen 2 of the movies). Got in some sorting and a little playing before bed.Aila was only interested in determining who were “good guys” versus “bad guys” and then set about the task of cleaning them because they were “filthy.”

Friday| PlaytimeAfter grocery shopping and breakfast, Aila and Will did some coloring while I cleaned up the kitchen and got ready for our friends to arrive for the weekend.

Friday | ChoresThen it was the kids’ turn to do some work. They don’t particularly like it, but they’re perfectly capable of helping out with the composting. It’s fun to watch them dump it and run!

Friday | Friend Time

My friend Christine, her husband Seamus and their beautiful twin girls Teaghan & Rhiannon came for a visit!

Friday | Swimming

Friday | PlayingWill is 7. Riley is 6. They spent a good hour playing music for each other. They remind me of teenagers already. Scary!

The little ones played in the “sandbox” (my Dad’s horseshoe pits)

Friday | Nighttime cookie making

Christine & Seamus, their twins, and I all stayed at Mom & Dad’s house for the weekend. As it turns out, my brother’s 2 daughters Riley and Millie were sleeping over too! Once Will and Aila went home and the little ones went to bed, Riley made some cookies for Gram’s party the next day. She’s a decorating extraordinare!

Saturday | Baby ShowerSaturday morning I snuck away from my friends and family to go to my good friend Erika’s baby shower. It was great to see friends and celebrate this soon-to-be-baby boy!

Erika loved the blanket I knit for her baby boy. It was a lovely party!

Saturday | Gram’s 80th Birthday Party

On Saturday we celebrated my grandmother’s 80th birthday and also my Aunt Milly’s birthday! It was a great celebration. Swimming, great food, beer + pina coladas. Fun for the whole family.

Kids + Cake + Smiles + Snuggles!

Quality time with my cousins!

Gotta have presents! Gram LOVED her shawl!

And of course there’s the CAKE!

Sunday | Post Party Chaos

My brother’s buck (affectionately called Bucko) lives at my parents’ house now. He was all festive for the party on Saturday…

But this was him come Sunday morning. Guess this means this party was literally off the hook? I don’t know, but I sure had a good time!

Sunday | Pool Day Fun

Sunday was the last day of the visit with our friends. It was the perfect pool day. Finally. Not a cloud in the sky. I swam a whole bunch of times. Will and Aila came back for the day to play with Teaghan and Rhiannon. It was the perfect end to an awesome vacation!

Another great week behind me! A less hectic work schedule than usual.

Date Night: Dan’s truck was in the shop so we were a little outside our normal routine this week. Having been away all weekend, I gladly said “yes” when Dan picked me up on Monday night and asked if I wanted to go out to dinner.

Running: Tuesday, Thursday & Sunday. I completed Week 7 of the #c25k app. I’m consistently running the time listed in the program. My pace is still slow, but I’m happy with my progress.

Knitting: I’m working almost exclusively on the shawl for my grandmother. Her 80th birthday is next weekend so the clock is ticking.

Work: It was my last week at work before vacation which was a lovely feeling. It’s always great knowing there’s an end in sight.

Technology:  my iPhone camera is having issues. Need to get it looked at. If I’ve been sparse in my Instagram posts- that’s why.

Play: Friday night I hit Whole Foods to stock up groceries for Saturday’s pool day! Tried this delicious sample of local, organic products and was happily enabled into purchasing the ingredients.

Friday night I kicked off vacation with dinner at my best friend’s house, including some pre-dinner entertainment from Aila.

She and I headed out after dinner for a special date (while her brother, Will, watched the second Star Wars movie with the rest of the adults). We went to the arcade, which Aila calls the “arcave” and to Friendly’s for ice cream!

For $2 we made these photo stickers in a photo booth at the arcade! Aila picked the layout! Too cute! She says she’s going to make “valentimes” for Uncle Danny because “he’ll just love it!”

She had a blast with $5 worth of tokens at the arcave and we both agreed that our night was way more fun than watching a stupid movie.

Saturday was the real vacation kick off!

A whole day at the pool with family, great food and good beer!

Uncle Dan finally got in the pool in the afternoon, splashing all the kids. This was his payback!

The kids swam and jumped off the diving board all day, and there was even some poolside knitting. Priceless.

Looking forward to another great, relaxing, fun-filled week ahead!

Hope you had a good week!

 

 

 

Monday I left home to start the work week but not before a kiss goodbye… which landed the tips of half my hair in Dan’s freshly brewed coconut coffee. #awesome (hair still smelled like coffee on Tuesday because apparently even that won’t get me to wash my hair more often)

When I got home from work I edited Episode 50 of the podcast and pushed that live.  I can’t believe I’ve gotten through 50 episodes already. Time flies when you’re having fun, right?

When I finished that up, I hopped on a Virtual Knit Night (VKN) with friends! I knit a little but also used the time to cut up coupons to give out at Stitches Midwest! [ I can’t wait to meet new people & give out goodies!] Busy week, gotta multitask.

On Tuesday I commuted to work with Dan because his truck is in the shop. I knew after taking a longer train ride home I’d ruin my mojo to get out and run so I brought my gear to work and took advantage of a beautiful summer afternoon in Boston and ran along the Charles River.
I was a little worried after not having run for a few days, but as it turns out, I had my best run yet! I didn’t realize until I got out there that the program for that day was a 5 minute warm up, 22 minutes running and a 5 minute cool down. Before that, the longest run in the c25k program was 20 minutes and I tried a few times but wasn’t able to complete that without quick (30-60 second) pause to walk. This time I ran the whole way! I was a bit tired by the end, but I did it!

I’m still short on mileage for where the program says I should be, but I’m not focusing on that for now! #babysteps! Overall it was a miserable workout week. I WILL get back on track next week!

Made the most of that longer train ride to get some gift knitting progress in!

I ate a lot of salads and am enjoying using a new planner to plan out blog posts, podcast episodes etc. While bullet journaling works great for my personal to-do list, managing a lot of creative content has me on overload and I can’t keep it all straight. I’m still experimenting with this new approach and will let you know more about that soon!

Wednesday night I got stuck at work late, but got to Knit Night to enjoy the evening with friends.

Thursday night I got home from work late and packed up my stuff for Stitches Midwest! Then I failed to follow my own advice and Dan and I proceeded to stay up until after 11p watching Season 4 of The Killing. We did exercise a small bit of self control and stopped right before the last episode so we could function as some semblance of humans on Friday.

Friday morning I got on a flight to Chicago to meet up with friends at Stitches Midwest.

I’m going to share all of the glorious details about Stitches Midwest in a series of upcoming posts so stay tuned this week to hear more about my fibery fun in the midwest!

Hope you had a great week too!