Short Long Weekend

I don’t feel quite as drained as I usually do after a long weekend. We definitely packed a lot into the weekend, but somehow I must have gotten just enough sleep to get by.
On Friday morning, we headed up to Wolf Trap to watch some flamenco dancers, which was pretty cool. We also went shopping to get me some sandals. Who knew it would be so hard to find a freaking pair of comfortable sandals? I tried on literally a dozen pairs and found none that I liked. More on that later.
Saturday we got up early and went to the farmers market for breakfast and shopping. Then we headed up to Fairfax to watch their parade. Parking was easier than I expected, but finding a spot to sit even 30 minutes before the parade was trickier. We eventually found a spot which turned out to be a great spot to watch. Later on, we went to the pool, had some root beer floats, went back to the pool, and had BBQ beef for dinner. The town fireworks this year were right down the street from our house, but we had a friend who lives right across the river from where the big DC fireworks go off, so we decided to try that for a change. And now we can say we’ve done it and never do it again. I should mention that the view of the fireworks was freaking spectacular (you can see my blurry cell phone pic here, the Washington Monument is that whitish blur just below and to the left of the fireworks), and we were far enough away that the noise didn’t freak the kids out. But getting out of Rosslyn was another story. Our first mistake was trying to wait out the crowds getting back to the Metro. When we got to the station, they were holding people outside the station because the platform was too crowded. Our second mistake was not taking the bus to East Falls Church that was pulling out as we arrived. If we had done that, we would have gotten to the relatively empty East Falls Church station and gotten on easily. Instead, we ended up walking up to Court House, which was further and more uphill than we had expected. We got into the station without problem, but the trains were all still full! We got lucky and a few people got off one of the trains, and we squeezed on and finally got home around 11:30.
We slept in on Sunday, which ended up being a very cool gray day, totally unlike what you would expect for July 5th. We went miniature golfing, which with a 5 and 2 year old is really quite entertaining. Afterward, we stopped by Hudson Trail Outfitters to look for sandals again. This time, I found some Keen Newport H2 sandals that I liked and bought. I was torn between those and the open toed ones, but went with the versatility of the closed toe, thinking I might take short hikes with them. They felt really comfortable at the store too. But when I got home, they weren’t as comfy. My toes felt pinched, so I might have gotten a size too small. Regardless, they’re going back to the store for a bigger size, or maybe the open toed ones.
Finally, the coup de grace. Evan woke up from his nap acting very cranky, so we had to drag him to his buddy’s birthday party. Five minutes in, we found out why he was cranky as he threw up all over the floor. Ugh. I took him back home and we snuggled and watched Tiger win his tournament, and he seemed to be feeling better by the time Lisa and Ellie got back home. Still, not exactly a great way to end the day, but at least he managed to miss the brand new sandals!
There’s only a few more days to help me win a Madsen, so click on the link and help me out!