Friday, June 28, 2013

Where Did June Go?

I seriously can't believe that June is almost over. We have been pretty busy, but still I'm not ready for July.
We had some overnight visitors this month and we took a long weekend trip to North Carolina and Virginia, Time does just fly when you're having fun.

Alan's brother Paul and his wife Lisa stayed the night on their way to a reunion in West Virginia. We had a nice visit, but forgot to take any pictures. We will be seeing them again over the 4th of July, so I'll try and remember to get some photos.

Our next visitor was Daphne, one of my long time best friends from South Carolina. She was here grading high school AP English exams (to each his own...) for money which she will be using to pay for her sons wedding rehearsal dinner in September. Daphne, her husband Paul and their kids were neighbors of ours when we lived in Mt. Pleasant SC. FYI, when you put an English teacher and a speech pathologist together you get a whole lot of talking. We almost talked non stop for 24 hours. There was a little sleeping break, but it was little. By the time we took her to the airport, my throat was so sore but it was worth every minute. I told Alan that I was in need of a day of silence to rest my voice. Ha, ha, right?

 Last weekend we headed off to Norfolk to help David move from his luxury high rise apartment to something a little more affordable. He will be sharing a two bedroom apartment with one of his medical school buddies for the next 2 years and hopefully saving a whole lot of money.
 After spending most of Friday moving and cleaning we headed to Virginia Beach Saturday morning for breakfast. We went to the  Pocahontas Pancake House which had been mentioned in Southern Living magazine as being a local favorite. We got there early and had the best pancakes I've ever eaten. I am not kidding. The restaurant is right on the beach, so after breakfast we walked down the board walk a ways enjoying the sunshine, ocean breeze and beautiful scenery. I wish that we had had a little more time to actually walk in the sand and water, but we were on a schedule, and you know how that is.



 David did not want me taking pictures of the inside of his "new" apartment. His actual words were,  "Mom, it will make you vomit". Really, it wasn't that bad. I told him that it had great potential. With a little bit or maybe a lot of cleaning I think it will be very liveable.
 I did get this picture of Alan and David installing the new window air conditioner 
that we picked up at the Home Depot. You can tell that his room is pretty small. 
It fits a bed, desk, dresser and bookshelf and that is all


The outside is quite nice and it's in a cute little part of town just a few blocks from his school. 
Those are his windows on the second floor.
So there you have it. That was June. Grace is still enjoying every minute of Italy. She will be home July 16th, so she can enjoy it for another 2 weeks or so. Can't wait to have her home and hear all of the details.
We have 4th of July family reunion plans and more company to look forward to in July. My posting will probably be sparse, but it is summer after all..
Hope you are enjoying it!
Sally

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Bad Blogger

I was going to call this the post with no pictures, but then I decided to add the pretty flowers above, just because. I am so sorry that I left you hanging with Grace's situation in Rome. All is good. She finally got there and met up with her program people and she is having the most fun ever. She is blogging about it here in English and here in Italian. Last weekend she went to Venice and now I think I need to go too....

I think I mentioned that she took my camera with her. I would like to be able to use that as an excuse for my lack of blogging, but I've already told you that my phone takes better pictures than my camera, so I don't think that will fly. Things have been happening and we have been busy, I guess I have just been taking a break. Yep, let's call it a break. There may be a few more breaks to come, but those will be do to a few out of town trips. Our first trip will be to visit David and help him move into a new apartment. Speaking of David, he is going to be taking his first big Board Exam this Saturday. He has been studying like a mad man for the past 6 weeks, so I am hopeful that he will do just fine, but if you all wouldn't mind saying a little prayer for him, keeping your fingers crossed, or just throwing good wishes his way out into the universe I'm sure every little bit will help.

It's crazy how your kids grow up and move out and you still continue to worry about them, maybe even more than  you did when you knew where they were each waking moment. Does everyone else feel that way too? It's kind of exhausting.
Have a Great Wednesday!
Sally

Saturday, June 1, 2013

Off To Italy

 Grace left for Italy yesterday. She made it as far as Cleveland. It seems that the weather decided to get ugly so her connecting flight to Montreal was cancelled. Apparently United Airlines could not get her on any plane out of Cleveland last night, so they put her up at the Sheraton Hotel and gave her $30.00 for dinner.
She had a glass of wine and a sandwich and they didn't even card her. I know she's 21, but don't you think she looks about 15?
She seems to be dealing with it all in her usual good spirit. She will get to Rome a day late and miss her bus to Arezzo where she will be spending the next 6 weeks, but she's just going to figure it all out once she actually makes it to Italy. I know that I'll be feeling a lot better once I know she's met up with the rest of her program folks from the University of Kentucky. She says she's going to be blogging about the trip, so if you want to try and keep up with her visit her blog . She took my camera with her, so hopefully there will be beautiful pictures of Italy that will make us all wish that we where there with her.
Sally