- Last night felt incredibly strange & weird & wrong. With the exception of just TWO Friday nights since May 15th, we have been either packing up to travel or actively traveling every single Friday night for the last 20 weeks. In other words, 18 of the last 20 Friday nights were not spent at home. And so, to all of a sudden be home on a Friday evening felt wrong.
What makes it even more strange is that – it’s the first in a long stretch of Friday nights at home. In other words, those two Friday evenings we were home in the last 20 weeks? We might have been home, but we were looking forward to the next weekend when we’d be traveling again. Whether we were heading out to hit up amusement parks & ride roller coasters, visiting family, or simply going to the Lakehouse – we’ve had a BUSY summer.
And things aren’t slowing down – no-sir-ee. It’s officially wedding season & I am SO excited for all the amazing weddings that I’ll be photographing over the next few weeks!
Just, packing suitcases every single week is no longer part of the busy-ness.
Part of me is excited to finally be home, to not have to constantly pack, & to consistently sleep in my own bed, but part of me is also sad that the “exciting” part of our year is over & now we enter the “not-so-exciting” part of the year. Things are still exciting (don’t get me wrong) – but I will definitely miss our crazy travels. - Last weekend was our last weekend at the Lake – and we stretched it out as far as we possibly could! We stayed until Wednesday! However, it was not quite what we had planned – it was supposed to be me & the kids, my Mom & sister Ruby. Unfortunately, my Grandma (the one we call Meme) fell last week & ended up in the hospital for a short stay. Praise the Lord, she didn’t break or fracture anything, but she did hurt her leg/hip/back in the fall. She was only in the hospital a short period of time, but coming home has been a process. She has nurses, physical therapists, and occupational therapists all coming to the house to help her walk again – which is great! But, my Mom felt like she needed to go home to help. So, on Saturday, she packed up & left the Lake to head home – while Ruby & I & the kids stayed.
We sat down that afternoon & said: “It’s the end of our season at the Lake – what do we want to do? What haven’t we done this year that we still want to do – where do we want to go? What do we want to eat? What do we want to see?” We compiled a list & then packed out the next few days with everything we wanted to do before we had to say goodbye to Deep Creek Lake for the year. We went into town & walked around, we let Leander see the trains that are in downtown Oakland, we went hiking at 2 different state parks (Lostland Run Hiking Trail in the Garrett State Forest & Swallow Falls), we did a little shopping & thrifting, we had a picnic lunch at Swallow Falls, & we got pizza at Brenda’s one last time. We went for long walks every day & played games late into every night. It was delightful & we had so much fun together. - Speaking of Meme – we went to visit her yesterday & she is doing fantastic! She’s had her first physical therapy appointment & it sprang her forward in the right direction. She’s doing so much better than she was just a few days ago & we are all so thankful for that! (I know you read this Meme & Grandpa – we love you both!)
- Can we just all agree that Instacart at Aldi is the best invention man has ever known? Yes? Okay, moving on.
- NEXT Saturday is a pretty exciting day – any guesses what next Saturday is?
- Derrick & I are off to shoot Emily & Bob‘s wedding day today – I absolutely cannot wait! I love second shooting (which is what I’ve done the last 2 weekends) and part of the reason I love it, is because it gives me all of these new ideas & makes me super pumped for my next wedding! It is going to be an incredible day! (Check back on Wednesday next week for a full blog post about how wonderful today is!)