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My Non-Reality Weekend

June 14, 2010 in Bloggable Moments, Food, Friends, Travel by Sara | 3 comments

This weekend caught me several times shaking my head and wondering, “How in the world did I wind up having these experiences?”

My dear friend Julie from Virginia asked me about 6 weeks ago to join her and a few friends for a weekend in Philadelphia. I didn’t give it much serious thought because it was the first weekend after the girls were out of school, Katie has softball games EVERY FRIDAY night, etc., etc., etc.

But my dear husband said, “Why don’t you go? I can handle things here.”

So Friday found me boarding a plane from Dayton heading to Philly. I really hate the taking off part of flying but I thought perhaps this time would be okay since there was a nun boarding my flight and I just couldn’t imagine God letting a plane crash with a nun on board. I have actually been known to hold the hand of a complete stranger while taking off and this time it looked like I was in luck. A very handsome man sat down next to me. But it was not to be. A few minutes later a woman who smelled very much like stale popcorn booted him right out of that seat and took his place. So I settled for putting my ear buds in and listening to the Jayhawks and praying without ceasing.

Because Julie works in the hotel business, we were able to stay at the Ritz-Carlton without taking out a personal loan. It was mighty fancy, I tell ya. There were about six layers of sheets on the bed that were a bit of a puzzle to me at first. Finally I just slipped in between two of them and called it done.

We were also fortunate enough to get to see the final performance of the Pennsylvania Ballet’s performance of Romeo and Juliet. Now, previous to this weekend my sole experience with the ballet had been a couple of performances of the Nutcracker at the community theater. So I was pretty much prepared to dislike the ballet. I was really wrong. It was so beautiful. The costumes were beautiful, the dancers were beautiful, the set was amazing. Best of all, Julie knew (because Julie knows EVERYBODY) the conductor, Beatrice Affron, from music school. They met when they were 6 and 7 years old, went to music school together for many years, lost touch for a bit and then in a very cool way reconnected. She was lovely and smart and was kind enough to take us backstage during one of the intermissions. There we were able to see the dancers close up. They were warming up for the next act and let me just say that if you or I attempted some of those stretches they were doing we would be in traction for the next six months. It was painful just to watch them. And the ballet guys in their tights up close. I felt vaguely like I should avert my eyes.

We were able to eat some amazing food. The food at Alma De Cuba was nothing short of spectacular. The flavors were out of this world. The downtown market provided breakfast the next morning with a variety of egg dishes, po boys, apple fritters and mac and cheese (I think it should be made an official breakfast food). We topped if off Saturday night with dinner at the Ritz whose chef just happens to be Jennifer from last season’s Top Chef. I had some baked halibut that came out of the kitchen looking like two fluffy marshmallows and tasted like nothing I’ve ever had in my life. (This was the only part of my trip that impressed Elena andyou should have seen how big her eyes got when I told her.) I have clearly passed my love for reality TV on to my youngest daughter.

So you can see why I call this my Non-reality weekend. It was about as far from my normal life as I could have possibly imagined. And I didn’t even tell you about the the Comic Con convention that made for unusually entertaining people watching, the part where one of our party crashed one of the many wedding receptions going on in the hotel and brought us all back pretzels to eat, the hostess that may or may not have been a man in woman’s clothing, or the Egyptian cabbie that I will be friends with forever.

Maybe it really was just a dream.

Ah, The 70’s

April 13, 2010 in Good Ole Days, Time Goes By, Travel by Sara | 1 comment

The museum we went to this past weekend was really fantastic. In fact, the girls said it was their favorite thing of the whole weekend. It had all kinds of stuff. Cars and planes and trains and furniture. I’m not sure where the furniture fit in exactly, but still, it had A LOT of stuff. However, the things I was most taken with were things that I had forgotten about completely but was transported straight back into the 1970s the instant I saw them.

The first one was this

Did you have one of these?! I’m sure the one I’m remembering was my brother’s but I could play that thing like nobody’s business. Forget about your fancy DS thingamagigs with their fancy graphics. All you needed where those green dashes marching down the field while you maneuvered like mad with your right thumb to advance the ball. I’ll bet you can even remember the sound it made when you scored a touchdown, can’t you?

The other was this beauty.

All together now.

“OH I wish I were an Oscar Myer Weiner! That is what I’d truly like to be-e-e. Cause if I were an Oscar Meyer Weiner, everyone would be in love with me!”

We ate some Oscar Meyers at my house growing up. We ate them cut up in kraut and grilled and cooked quick in that new fangled thing called a microwave oven. But my favorite way was just boiled in plain old water until hot through and through and plopped on a bun with mustard and ketchup. Yum.

Oh, the 1970s. When technology was just getting started and we didn’t know the perils of too many nitrites.

Those were the days.

Our Weekend In, Make That At, The Hamptons

April 12, 2010 in Friends, Travel by Sara | 2 comments

I know that for many people the very pinnacle of everything wonderful is a weekend in the Hamptons. I mean, it’s where all the gals from “Sex and the City” hung out on summer weekends. It’s where all the “Real Housewives of NYC” (not that I’ve ever watched it, ahem) gather to see and be seen. And fight.

One of my favorite cooks of all times lives and works there.

It’s probably a really nice place.

But I wouldn’t have traded one second of our weekend in Michigan with these Hamptons for anything.

Elena, Tessa, Katie, and Sophie

You may recall that these are the friends we met a couple of years ago on a cruise. We’ve remained close and although all in all we’ve spent less than a month together, you would never know it. The girls are thick as thieves with nary a cross word between them. Paula and George feel like the kind of friends you’ve had forever. So comfortable to be around with never an awkward pause in conversation.

So I’d say those other Hamptons have nothing on the ones we know.

Recreation?

Sophie giving it a try

Tessa at bat

Elena sliding into first

Katie taking a swing

Coach Hampton and Coach Whitlock

We had a rousing game of baseball between the daddies and daughters that had everybody laughing and sporting grass stains on their knees.

Important people?

The Henry Ford Museum

The bus where Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat

Yes, so our famous people where all dead. Made not one whit of difference. By the way, this museum was really, really fun. We spend about 4 hours there and there wasn’t one whine from any of the kids. (Except for the neglecting to buy a crazy straw, but that doesn’t really count). They even had the car President Kennedy was riding in when he was shot. That was both fascinating and creepy all at the same time.

Add to that all the good food, good drink, good conversation, a viewing of “The Blind Side” , and a beautiful bike ride through the park on Sunday afternoon and that’s gotta be one of the most perfect weekends ever.

Thank you, Paula and George, Tessa and Sophie for letting us descend on you. Your home was welcoming and comfortable and beautiful. We can’t wait to return the favor.

And we wouldn’t have traded our weekend AT the Hamptons for any number of weekends IN the Hamptons.

Home Again

February 22, 2010 in Friends, Time Goes By, Travel by Sara | 1 comment

Once upon a time, I wrote a little piece about time passing by in my old neighborhood. We were soon to be moving from DC to Ohio and I was feeling nostalgic and in a reflective mood.

I’ve moved enough to know that time does not stop just because we have moved away. Life keeps moving and the space that you once occupied is filled with new people and new commitments.

But if you are very lucky, (and we are), you can return to the places that you lived and for a short time it feels as if you never left. Friends welcome you back with open arms and cleared calendars. Dinners are planned and lovingly prepared. Children are gathered close and kissed on top of the head. Girlfriends gather and talk resumes as if it had just stopped the day before. Babies that were born just days to weeks after we left are cuddled and tickled. Beloved teachers are visited with and old school friends become reacquainted in no time at all.

We had a wonderful week (and yes, the snow DC had was just as crazy as you heard). We look forward to our next visit with great anticipation.

But a nice thing happened when we drove back into our neighborhood here. Each of us was glad to be home. The girls anxious to go back to school and see their friends, JD and I ready to go back to work and for life to resume it’s familiar routine. For while we would gladly gather up each and everyone of our friends from our time in DC and move them right next door, we were not feeling the pull to live there again. It was a wonderful experience, but the traffic and congestion are things that we gladly leave behind. It seemed like another affirmation that we made the right move by coming here.

We’ll keep talking it up to our friends left behind. Who knows, we may talk one or two of them into trying out the midwest.

Or at least coming out for a long weekend.

The Dog Whisperer Has Got Nothing On Him

November 24, 2009 in Family, Travel by Sara | 2 comments

If this whole healthcare information technology thing doesn’t work out for JD, I think he may have found a second calling

Just call him the “Turtle Whisperer”

I’m sure a Discovery Channel Program is just around the corner.

Maybe with a cute little blond assistant?

As for me, all I could think was,

“SALMONELLA! WE’RE ALL GOING TO HAVE SALMONELLA!”

Obviously, wildlife wrangling is not my calling.

A True Gift

November 23, 2009 in Family, Friends, Travel by Sara | 4 comments

Friendships are funny things. Some come easily and quickly with little effort. Some require more work to get going but once established, do well and flourish. Some start off well and then fizzle out. Some are born of circumstance and don’t last once those circumstances change.

Two years ago we went on a vacation and met Paula and George. We chatted one evening in the hotel lobby and then again the next morning waiting on the shuttle bus to pick us up. We both thought that would be the end of it as we were on a big ship with lots of people. But we just kept running into each other and ended up becoming good friends. Our girls got along so well and Paula and I bonded over the fact that we both loved Beth Moore and her Bible studies. As for George? As JD said, “There’s just nothing to not like about George.”

He’s right.

It might have been easy to just say good-bye after that vacation and months later say, “Remember those nice people we met on that vacation? Wonder how they are doing?”.

But that’s not what happened. Instead they came to visit D.C. and stayed with us. Again, it could have gone either way. Sometimes spending that much time together reveals things that don’t endear you to one another.

Instead, we found them even more lovely than we had remembered and our children were deliriously happy to be together again.

Our families seem to have that rare combination that makes us excellent traveling partners.

And that’s what we did this past week. We sailed away again with our dear friends and their children.

George, Paula, a redheaded me, and JD

Once again, we never tired of each others company, our children were inseparable and we were reminded once again of the true gift of friendship. We are now planning an exchange program for the summer tentatively called Camp Whitlock/Camp Hampton.

Thanks, Hamptons. We miss you already and love you all.

Summer can’t come quickly enough.

The youngest pirates, Sophie and Elena

Katie and Tessa with Chip

Is There A Doctor In The House?

August 4, 2009 in Family, Health, Travel by Sara | No comments

I don’t know if it is the multiple applications of sunscreen and bug spray that I’ve doused the girls with over the last couple of weeks, but they are a dermatological mess. Elena’s skin feels like sandpaper and both girls have some sort of pigmentation problem going on on their faces. Elena also has some sort of mysterious rash that kind of comes and goes.

Yes, I am a nurse practitioner. No, I have no idea what’s going on with them.

That’s what dermatologists are for.

We are headed back east today. I’m hoping that returning to our native land will remedy all our skin aliments.

And if you hear a giant sucking noise this afternoon about 2pm, that will be my skin attempting to pull some moisture back into itself. Lord have mercy it is dry out here.

For the first time in recorded history, I am actually looking forward to some humidity.

A Study In Contrasts

July 30, 2009 in Family, Marriage, Travel by Sara | 3 comments

The following two pictures pretty much sum up the contrast between spending a week at a rustic cabin in Wyoming and spending a week at a resort hotel in Park City,Utah.

Exhibit One:

My feet as of last Friday

Let’s forget the fact that JD says that I have monkey toes and he jokes that they are my beauty downfall. I’d like you to notice the dirt that has settled into every crevice of my toes and even imbedded itself into the skin of my feet. Right after this picture I tried to scrub the dirt away. No could do. I knew then how mechanics feel when they try to get the grease from under their nails. This is what happens when you have spent the week doing things which do not promote cleanliness such as horseback riding, rodeos, and hiking. The fact that we were only bathing every other day didn’t help either.

May I also mention the terrible choice of nail polish I chose when I had painted my toes about a month ago? While a pale color may work well on someone with a dark skin tone, on me with my skin-which-refuses-to-tan, it just made me look like a corpse. Lesson learned.

Exhibit Two:

My toes today

No dirt. No bad polish color. Just smooth and silky skin. Daily baths have been taken as well as lots of swimming. There’s not a horse or rodeo within miles of us.

Too bad I still have monkey toes.

When Wild Animals Attack!

July 30, 2009 in Family, Travel by Sara | 4 comments

So on the day that we traveled from Wyoming to Utah, we drove through the Grand Tetons. This was our view for a large part of the drive.

Amazing, huh?

Though we didn’t have time to really tarry for long, JD wanted to stop at Coulter Bay and take a little two mile hike around the lake so that we could get some good shots of the mountains.

It was lovely. The water was clear and not quite as cold as the lakes in Yellowstone. The girls went in up to the bottom of their shorts and had a grand time. It was nice to be in a place where we weren’t worried about a bear or a moose charging out of the woods and eating or stomping us to death.

The only downside was the fact that I forgot the bug spray and we were very nearly carried off by biting flies and mosquitoes.

Then it happened.

Right after this picture was taken we heard Elena say to Katie:

“Sissie, what’s that on your leg?”

Katie: “Oh, it’s just some mud.” Long pause. “Hmmmmm, it won’t come off.” Another long pause.

“IT’S A LEECH! IT’S A LEECH!” IT’S A LEECH!”

And she starts running toward me with her arms flailing about and doing this sort of half crying, half screaming thing.

“THE LEECH IS EATED ME! THE LEECH IS EATED ME!”

Poor girl. Like her southern mama, stress causes some strange grammatical configurations to come out of her mouth.

And I had to grab that slimy horrible thing and pull it off my child while she did the St. Vitus dance all over the beach. All the while the scene in “The African Queen” where Katharine Hepburn pulls off all those leeches off of Humphrey Bogart is running through my head.

Let me just say that sucker had quite a grip on my child’s leg. Luckily it hadn’t been there long enough to get all big and fat. That might have meant large therapy bills for Katie. And possibly for me.

In all the excitement, we didn’t get a picture. How cruel would that have been to make her pose with the leech still attached!

But just a few minutes later she felt something in her shoe and we found another of the little pests in her shoe. We decided that he was not the smartest leech in the lake as he was sucking on her shoe rather than on her succulent little foot.

Here’s the little sucker.

Maybe we should have kept it and added it to the other jibitz!

She had a little hickey on her leg for a while but has recovered without incident and is now working on a dramatic presentation for her friends back home.

And I have a hankering to watch The African Queen.

It’s All Fun And Games Until Someone Gets Hurt

July 29, 2009 in Family, Travel by Sara | 7 comments

As a mommy, I’m always looking out for things that could cause harm to my children. I taught them to look both ways before they cross the street, not to talk to strangers, and not to run with sharp objects.

However, I’ve never before had to worry about wild animals eating them. Or goring them. Or otherwise causing great bodily harm.

Until we came to Wyoming.

There are signs everywhere warning of the dangers of getting too close to the WILD animals that roam these parts.

The week we were here there was a man attacked by a grizzly and another that fought off a mountain lion with a chain saw. Both survived. Barely. These attacks took place very close to where we were staying.

The lodge even had a bear dog. Cedar never barks until she smells a bear and then she goes crazy. She goes on all the trail rides to act as an early warning system.

This is a picture of me on our breakfast ride just after Cedar went nuts and tore off after something. And one of the wranglers said, “Ah shoot, that’s right where we’ll be going this morning. We’ll probably see that rascal.”

GULP

All of these warning signs did nothing to keep this little lady from getting her picture taken with a bull elk that walked up on us.

"Here, Elky, Elky!"

Then she decided that she wasn’t quite close enough.

Just a LITTLE closer

Look closely at the top picture and you’ll notice that her friend is getting the whole thing on video. At least her family will have the comfort of her last moments on tape.

Then there were the people that wouldn’t get out of a bison’s way as he strolled down the boardwalk around some of the geysers.

Outta my way!

This despite a sign that said “Several visitors where GORED by bison during the 2008 summer season. Please stay away from these wild animals.”

Didn’t keep a whole group from just barely stepping out of his way. We didn’t get a picture because we were too busy climbing the tallest hill around to give this guy lots of space.

Very quickly you learn that great crowds of people standing on the side of the road means that there is probably a big animal there. Unless you are the French family staying at our lodge. Then you just think those Americans sure are a friendly bunch and you wave back and keep on driving. You then hit a bison. The bison appears unfazed but your rental van is now missing it’s front bumper.

We managed to stay safe and avoid bodily injury.

Almost.

That story tomorrow.

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