It's been a long road to recovery but I feel like we've finally turned the corner with Sadie's health. Her partial knee tear is healing well and she's more mobile on our hardwood floors and not just walking where the yoga mats are put down.
She's taking the stairs up easily too but still needs a little assistance coming down. I think these Berners are extra cautious (once they slip and fall, they don't want to get back up and try again). But she's slowly gaining her confidence on the stairs and is back to being able to do the stairs to our back deck.
Sadie knows her limitations on the ice outside too and we need to be very careful that she doesn't hurt herself slipping. In fact, she was feeling so good that yesterday as well as this morning I took her for a walk around the block. We haven't walked her that far in months - since she blew out her knee. But she was looking so great and feeling so well that I thought we would give it a try. She did great, however, this morning was a little treacherous for us both with the sidewalks caked in ice. Any unsuspecting walkers would pull a "Fred Flinstone" as my neighbor called it and you'd end up smack on your back. Luckily we made it around the block with no major catastrophes although halfway through our walk I didn't think we were going to make it back home as we navigated around a lot of ice!
Anyway, I'm glad she's on the mend and her vet is now recommending massage for her as well. I think I might just need one myself with all the lugging around of her 100 pound body the last couple of months!
It's not often that just Tom and I get away for a night or even a long weekend without the kids. Their schedules are busy and quite frankly, we don't want to have to ask people to watch them as we don't want to be a burden or call in too many favors. However, we had a wedding to attend in Costa Rica and since it was a family wedding (our nephew/the kids' cousin), we debated bringing them but then decided no since we'd have to pull them from school and it wouldn't be cheap to fly our whole family there for a few days (especially when two months later, we're headed on spring break). So we asked my parents to tag team staying with them and shuttling them around from last Thursday through last night so Tom and I could enjoy the wedding with his family and some time to ourselves too. They agreed so off we went last Thursday after dropping Hailey off at afternoon kindergarten.
We arrived late Thursday night in Liberia and took an hour long shuttle to Guanacaste, Costa Rica. It was beautiful and hot! And oh the stars. It was so dark and they were so bright. We stayed at the W. The rooms were magnificent especially the large bathrooms with two rainfall shower heads and a view out into the lush green vegetation and the sea. We had a small balcony for hanging out and we enjoyed some late night room service before turning in.
Friday, we caught up with family for breakfast and to hang out by the pool and then back to our room for the evening welcome reception and then a dinner after. The sun was really hot and it was humid and windy (which made wearing a short dress challenging!).
Saturday, we woke up early to save a spot at the pool (we knew it would be crowded since one of the pools was closed due to the wedding set up). We feasted on a great breakfast buffet before relaxing for a few hours in the pool with family. We had to be at the wedding on the beach by 3:30pm so about 2:30pm we started heading up to get ready. The wedding took place on the beach with the reception immediately following on the pool deck. It was hot but the breeze provided some much needed reprieve. We sampled some fun Costa Rican cocktails and appetizers and danced the night away to Latin music til almost 1am. We heard the party went til 2:30am but we didn't stay til the very end. It might have just been the longest wedding that I have ever been to and I've been to a lot! To kick off the Costa Rican new year, they brought in dancers too and handed out masks and whistles. It was quite a scene complete with a tequila and gallo (mini tacos) bar at midnight.
Sunday we met up with family again for brunch and relaxed in the pool for a bit before Tom and his brothers went to play golf. It took them all afternoon and into the early evening to navigate the challenging course so my sister in laws and I went for a horseback ride on the beach. And, I'm so glad we did! We saw a beautiful sunset and monkeys as well as some beautiful beaches. Sunday night, Tom and I took some time to ourselves for dinner after having cocktails with family (after all, we needed our time too).
It was a busy but fun long weekend and it's nice to go away with just us every so often too. Thanks mom and dad for holding down the fort! !
Yikes! Where did the time go?? Yesterday, Austen became a teenager. He's officially passed me up in height and now I have to find another spot for my purse when we're driving someplace because he can now sit in the front seat (legally).
He looks fierce!
It was certainly a full day of fun for Austen and I don't know about him but I was exhausted. It started bright and early with opening presents and then breakfast with the family at our favorite (mine and his) breakfast spot. To celebrate his teenage years and thinking about what the day held for him he decided to go for a power breakfast trying out a ham and cheese omelette over his more usual carb-heavy choice of pancakes or waffles. After breakfast, it was on to finish his Xmas returns and then home for a quick change of clothes and rest before trekking more than an hour away to Rockford for some soccer training. Since it was his birthday, our whole family went and lucky for him, one of his best friends was also doing the same training so he got to hang out and train with him too. After practice, his friend's family and ours traveled through a brutal snowstorm home taking a detour on the way to Top Golf to celebrate.
Now for those of you who don't know Top Golf, it's an outside venue but heated and a bit covered. It was still cold but we all had a great time, eating, drinking and taking turns "driving" and showing off our golfing skills or lack thereof. Finally, we called it a night about 10pm and Austen had his buddy come to our house where they continued their fun playing FIFA 20 on Xbox One before they both were so exhausted they had to call it a night. Many of my friends have remarked that when they grow up, they'd like to be Austen. I'm thinking maybe I would want to be too especially if this is the way he's kicking off his teenage years!
We spent about a week up in Michigan after Xmas and we still could have spent another week there. Lots to do and we've barely scratched the surface but we did manage to have a lot of fun.
First, we had family up for two days and we went for a sleigh ride (well okay, there was no snow so it turned into a wagon ride) and had fun catching up while tasting some hard ciders at Virtue Cider in Fennville. The kids could sit by the bonfires and play various games they had on property like giant Jenga and horseshoes so they were happy. That night we had fun making pizzas all together and playing some games too.
After everyone left, we had one day (celebrating Peyton's birthday) and cleaning before our next round of guests arrived for New Year's Eve. It was our second year celebrating New Year's up at the beach house and it has become a fun tradition of lots of wine/champagne, eating and playing games while hanging out with our close friends (and kids).
Once New Year's was over, we had two days to ourselves before heading home. On the first day, we checked out a ski resort about 30 minutes from our place. Now, I hadn't been skiing in 14 years (since I was pregnant with Austen) and Hailey had been complaining for days that she didn't want to go skiing so I wasn't sure how this was going to go. After what was probably 45 minutes of getting geared up (renting equipment and getting it on everyone), we ventured outside to tackle the slopes. We started on the bunny hill and that quickly turned into a nightmare as Peyton (who has had lessons before) started complaining it was too hard and Hailey stood there terrified to let go of Tom. I said, this is why people pay to have their kids in ski school. Tom quickly agreed as he saw how this was going to be miserable for all of us if we didn't so he left the slopes and quickly booked a semi private one hour lesson for Peyton and Hailey. Then Tom, Austen and I took off in a hurry to the other more challenging slopes to see how much we could do in an hour. It wasn't crowded and the weather was beautiful. A balmy 43 degrees or so. My ski legs came quickly back to me and I too enjoyed myself on the runs remembering how much I loved to pass the winter months skiing in the great outdoors.
Once our hour was up, we returned to see Peyton and Hailey skiing on their own and making turns on a green hill. Their progress in one hour was remarkable. And, Hailey was loving skiing! The one who wanted to go home now did not want to get off the slopes and kept insisting we take her to the top of a green hill on the chair lift. She needs to work up to that one as we did take her but she gets too much speed and can't control it so she fell twice. (Once she laid in the snow for a good 5 minutes - so long that ski patrol came by). She was fine though. Got right back up and kept skiing. Peyton quickly grasped skiing again and was working on her turns although she too likes to go straight down with speed. Austen, always the one to listen to a coach, was trying to perfect his technique. Everyone had a great time and we can't wait to go back and ski some more. We just need to find a free weekend with more than 24 hours to do it!
(More about our Day 2 excursion to the famous Michigan Christmas town in my next post.)
