February summer

This winter has confirmed to me that I do not love cold weather. I lived in Utah and Kentucky for a total of 11 years, so you would think I would be used to it, but I guess the last 5 years have spoiled me so much that I have come to really not love it.  I've been trying to get out, even when it's cold with the kids, but no matter how hard I try, it's really just not as enjoyable. So, when I saw that there were two days in the forecast where it was supposed to be sunny and in the 70s, I got SO excited and started making mental plans of what I wanted to do.

Tuesday we were up early, ran to Trader Joe's, dropped groceries off at home and then drove down to the Georgetown Waterfront. I knew I wanted to be near water with this warm weather. The Potomac obviously isn't like the ocean, but having a waterfront to walk down just makes everything a little more fun regardless. We wore short sleeves, basked in the sun and had a great time. We packed some snacks and sandwiches and just leisurely strolled around. I planned this so last minute that we didn't invite anyone to go with us, but we'd love to go back with friends.

 Rowan and Boden's very favorite thing to do was drive their monster trucks down these ramps that were all down the path. I was so glad they brought their trucks because it provided so much entertainment! (Rowan has asked to go back to the waterfront park several times already in the 2 days since we've been there to drive his truck down the ramps).

 Another cool thing is that the park lies on the flight path, so there were tons of planes coming in to land, so we got to see them up close and personal, as well as a helicopter that continued to fly super low back and forth over us.

There was a huge group of birds that some people were feeding...so when they finished, we threw the portion of Boden's sandwich that he had dropped at them. One of my very favorite things that Boden says right now is, "Look! It's a gaggle of the geese!" It's so cute.

Rowan (who had gone to bed with a fever the night before but seemed to feel fine that morning) started not feeling well, so we headed home around lunch time. We got home and he asked for some Tylenol so that he could feel well enough to play outside, haha. So we Tylenol'd him up and headed to the back yard to play around. I drank a diet Coke, painted my toenails and soaked up every ounce of sun that I could while the boys ran around and Dylan laid on the blanket next to me. Then, Laura texted to see if we wanted to go for a walk and to the park, so we did that until dark. We were literally outside all day long. It was perfect.

Wednesday morning, Rowan had a fever again during the night, so I felt like I shouldn't send him to school, even though I was pretty certain he was fine (but didn't want to be that jerk parent that got everyone else at school sick), so we played at home all morning and prepared to head to Annapolis with Alexa when she got off work. 

The boys all napped on the way there (about an hour) so they were rested and ready to play (since we had been too busy playing the day before to nap!) 

First stop was the Naval Academy where we rode bikes and climbed trees along the harbor on base. The campus was beautiful and the weather perfect.

Rowan for some reason REALLY wanted Taco Bell (we haven't had it since we moved to Maryland, and he asked if there was one in Annapolis, so I obliged and got them cheesy roll-ups (apparently one of Rowan's favorite foods along with shrimp and mac n cheese) and we ate them at the harbor downtown. Annapolis is such a cute little city, I would love to go back and explore again soon!

We finished the night with some amazing ice cream from a little place on the harbor before heading home.

It was such a fun few days. Rowan has asked to go back and recreate our Annapolis day also. My favorite comment of this day was when he put his hands in his hoodie pockets and felt sand and said, "There's sand in here! That means I wore this at the beach! I love the beach." Made me so happy to see his excitement for that. Kind of like when I see little bits of sand in my car. That might drive some people crazy but I love the little parts of our beach life that I'm continued to be reminded of. Maybe we'll get back there again some day :)

We were happy to have a little February staycation!