Annapolis, Baltimore, and Washington DC: Trifecta complete

One of the reasons the hubs and I bought a house where we did is because we live in the little triangle between Annapolis, Baltimore, and Washington, DC.  We're 15 minutes from Camden Yards, 25 minutes from the Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium, and 45 minutes from Verizon Center.  We can get our sports fix in under an hour for every major sporting event Maryland/DC can offer!

Saturday I went for the trifecta and spent some time in each city.  Started off bright and early for a 13 mile run in Annapolis where it absolutely poured for the last five miles.  Honestly, running in a downpour was such a relief after running in ridiculously hot temperatures the week before.

Then in the afternoon the hubs and I met up with friends for a brewery tour at Heavy Seas on the south side of Baltimore. Learning about the beer making process while sampling on locally brewed beers was a 90 minutes well spent in my book.

Finally, the hubs and I ended our night at Verizon Center catching the Michael Jackson "The Immortal World Tour" by Cirque Du Soleil.  The hubs is not only a huge Michael Jackson fan, but he's seen almost every Cirque Du Soleil show in Las Vegas.  It was the perfect end to a Saturday night to cap off a late birthday celebration.

So yes, on Saturday I hit up all the major cities in the Maryland area.

And on Sunday I was lazy and watched the hubs pitch a hell of a game.  I came thisclose to getting absolutely DRILLED by a foul ball and I'm still not sure how I got the heck out of the way.  The hubs was pitching and the umpire said, "wow, that could have hurt and that lady looks pissed."  The hubs responded, "that's my wife."  I told the people I was sitting with, "just watch as soon as this game is over he (the hubs) is going to give me hell about not catching that foul ball."  Sure enough, that's what happened.  Although in privacy later he told me that I probably would have broken a few fingers if I tried to catch that thing because it was moving!

Overall: a great weekend!

What did you get into this weekend?

Storms, Heat, Humidity, and the weekend

Don't you hate when there's bad weather on the weekend?  Especially when the weather turns violent at the beginning of the weekend like it did in the Baltimore/DC area on Friday night.  Mother Nature tried to break up a major heat wave with a nasty summer storm and all that happened was a lot of destruction.

Our house was spared from any major damage, but my stomach was churning on Friday night because we had a new roof put on our house last week. The hubs thought it was silly because, "this is the one time we're good to go ... it's all under warranty at this point!" Thankfully, we only had bunch of smaller tree branches and one decent sized limb that came down.  Others in the area weren't quite so fortunate and it's expected that some folks will be without power for close to a week!

So yes, we spent a lot of time this weekend inside and as far away from the heat as possible! The pups, well let's just say they wanted to pick up sticks in the yard any time they could!

We started up some home renovation projects inside and venture out to the mall for a bit on Saturday.  I think the highlight of that trip was watching the fish feeding at Bass Pro Shop.  I know the hubs wasn't psyched for my awesome score at the Nike store, but I wasn't thrilled that he was checking out a smoker either.  Sure I got a weird look at the Nike store for buying running capris in 100 degree heat, but come on, they were $17 a pair!

I think these sunflowers sum up the weekend perfectly: red hot!

What did you get into over the weekend?

Happy Birthday Jewels!

Catching a late flight home from Phoenix on Friday night.  

Our little baby girl, Jewels, turned seven over the weekend.  At some point I know we'll have to stop referring to her as a puppy, but I just don't know how we'll ever get this image of her out of our heads:

Baby Jewels on her very first day with us.  Poor girl had never even been out of a house before and then we snatched her away from her mom and everything she knew. Holy crap we sound like horrible people!

It's okay, we spoiled her our love over the past seven years. 

This past weekend was rough.  I didn't get home until close to 2am on Saturday morning (or late Friday night depending on your perspective) and the hubs didn't get home from Louisiana until 6pm on Sunday.  It was a pretty low-key weekend filled with unpacking, laundry, re-organizing the linen closet, shopping, cooking, reading, and lots of puppy time.

What did you get into over the weekend?

Thank you History Channel

It was another scorching hot weekend in Baltimore.  It's not the heat, it's the humidity that really gets me.  The hubs and I cooled off by looking for a couch in almost every furniture store the Baltimore area has to offer.  However, we think we found a couch! Even better it is under budget!!!

Weekend highlights included: yummy goodness at Thai Yum in Federal Hill, watching the Germany/Portugal game at The Phoenix Emporium in Historic Ellicott City,  cheering on the hubs at a baseball game (I was protected by the blessed shade of a giant tree!), enjoying the backyard with the dogs, and finally watching the Hatfields & McCoys.

Seriously, if you haven't watched the Hatfields & McCoys three part miniseries done on the History Chanel you're missing out.  I don't know if it's our ties to West Virginia or my inner-history buff, but it was amazing.  The hubs started to fall asleep during the first few minutes of it and the next thing I know it's almost midnight and we're debating starting the next part or waiting until Sunday to finish the series.

In a nut shell: the hubs picked finishing the series over watching a bit of the O's game.  That should say something.  After every few murders we would vocally go over the death count tally to see which family was outgunning the other family.

Kevin Costner, I have officially forgiven you for Waterworld.  You gave the hubs Bull Durham and For Love of the Game, so you can do no wrong in his mind, but I still have Rumor Has It stuck in the back of my head and you still owe me for that one!

What did everyone else get into this weekend?

Happy (Belated) Birthday Grandma!

My sweet grandma turned 80 this past February.  Normally, planning a large family gathering in the middle of winter would be a logistical nightmare, so my aunt decided to post-pone the big formal party until the summer time when travel would be easier. Don't worry, there was still a party for grandma in February! She's so cool she gets TWO parties for her birthday.

This weekend my brother and I road tripped back up to NY and NJ for a quick weekend with the family and lots of laughter.  Mother nature threw a monkey wrench into our plans with a tornado and hail filled storm on Friday night, so we didn't depart until early Saturday morning.  Two authentic NY pizzas later we arrived in style for lunch on Saturday. Throw in a black and white cookie later and I was good to go.  Oh, my sister and I baking mini German Chocolate Cupcakes for grandma's party certainly didn't damper the mood.

Being in a red head majority was awesome :)

Sunday morning my dad, sister, nephew, and I ran a local 5k. Full post on that coming tomorrow.

Then, it was down to NJ to meet up with crazy family members from as far as Colorado and Texas to celebrate grandma's 80th birthday.  It was hilarious to hear the five remaining kids, out of ten,  argue about who came next in birth order. I think I yelled at one point, "everyone pick a number and stick with it!"

TEN KIDS! My hips hurt just thinking about it. Whew, my great-grandma must have been a crazy broad.  Looks like it runs in the family.  Add in some good food, adorable little kids, a whole lot of family members and it was an amazing weekend.  I hadn't seen some of my far-flung family members since I was a little kid and it was kind of funny to hear, "which one are you?"  My sister, cousin, and I all have red hair, yet my sister and cousin looked like the sister pairing, so I usually get mistaken for my cousin! It's all good, no worries.

One of the perks of spending 10+ combined hours in a car with one's brother is you get to ask him the really uncomfortable questions. Like, why haven't you and your on- and off-again girlfriend of three years been able to figure it out yet?  He was trapped in my Prius and knew he had to answer that question!

Anyone else meet up with family over the weekend? Run any races? Road trip anywhere?

Memorial Day Weekend

All those happy moments that I absolutely treasure on the weekends I get to enjoy because of the sacrifices of our military brothers and sisters.  To those family members who memorialized their fallen blood for giving this country the ultimate sacrifice - I salute you. 

I thank you for your service. I live in a country where I have freedoms many in the world could not fathom. I have rights and responsibilities that are envied by others. 

People die for this country. People die trying to get here and people die protecting this great nation.  That says something about this country. I am proud to be an American. 

Carefree weekend

You know those weekends that you can't remember everything that you did, but you know it was a lot of fun?  My cheeks are sore from laughing and giggling so much over the weekend and it's a wonderful feeling.  Laugh lines are about the only thing that show my age.

Stocking up on bright colored running gear - Check!

Quality times with the hubs - Check!

Grilling outside - Check!

Silly Boston Terriers - Check!

Gorgeous flowers - Check!

Pinkness overload - Check!

Monday came too soon - CHECK!!!