Week in Review: Camping Yay and Nay, Countdown to Opening Day, and Create Your Own Sundae

Gotta love when your 20 year old sends you a text like this:

And then follows it up with a ton of pictures a couple of days later.  

Firstborns, amiright?  Such goodies.

Meanwhile, since I am more of a glamper than a camper, Phil and I escaped for a 24 hour getaway to celebrate our 21st anniversary early.  It's not until May 17th, but the shop will be open and getting away will be impossible.  We went to Gloucester, MA, setting of The Perfect Storm and pronounced Gloss-ta.

You know the hotel is fancy when they give you robes and slippers :)  We didn't think there was any way that the standard slippers would fit both Phil's size 14s and my size 8s...but we made it work.  I sent this photo to my mom who had told us about The Beauport Hotel.

The weather was rainy and gross, but we still swam in the rooftop pool and jacuzzed, went for a nice dinner and took a long walk by the ocean the next morning.  

Those two guys were amazed I was getting in the pool in that weather!

This statue was very moving, a wife and children looking out to sea, waiting for the fishermen to come back home.  Gloucester is America's oldest seaport.

Cheers to 21 years!

This week also brought the terrible news that Haley's mom passed away way too young from stupid cancer.  She was the friend who received the hospice package that I had asked your advice on.  We attended her funeral Mass on Monday and then did a lot of cleaning and setting up at The Ice Cream Cottage:

That dipping cabinet on the right...that cost $8000 and was brand new...and required the use of a bobcat to get it off the delivery truck...and four grown men to lift it inside...DIED!  Also the fridge that you can kind of see next to it, which came with the shop, is also not working.  While I am so stressed about stuff like this, I also know that it's better it happened NOW and not LATER when it was full of ice cream and food products.  But still.

Friday night lights are saving our sanity:

Declan and Brendan have been asking to go on runs lately, so Phil took them (plus Xander who will run for gatorade) on a mile run to the park to play and then back again.  Declan (age 9) has decided that he is going to run with Phil in the Father's Day 5k this year.

While they were off running/playing, I took Andrew to the men's store to get him his graduation present, a suit, that he will also wear to the prom in two weeks.  

Have I mentioned that spring fever must be going around because all three of my boys are currently dating?  Spoiler alert to all of the Moms, they grow up and get twitterpated!

We found ourselves home with only the three littles one night (Eamon was working, Andrew was playing volleyball...did I mention that Andrew and Eamon joined the new boys volleyball club team at the high school?...and Maggie had Open Gym Volleyball) so we took them out for pizza.

Photo by Brendan

It was a very fun dinner, spent talking about the special sundaes they are going to have named after them.  Declan's Dream Cone, Xander's X Marks the Spot, and Brendan's Bubble Blast.  I don't want to spill their secret recipes, but I don't think you can read their crayon scribble very well anyway ;)

Brendan really wanted to eat the lemon that came with the water:

Then we went to an ice cream shop for "research".  Heehee whatever gives us the excuse to eat ice cream on a random weeknight.

Next week is opening day *fingers and toes crossed* and JP comes home with his second year of college in the books.  Eamon has his Driver's License test, Andrew is taking AP exams, Phil has First Communion and I just can't believe we are at this point of the year already.  Like the cupola shining in the night, triumphing over the darkness, I have hope it will all work out.

Have a wonderful weekend everybody!  Happy Cinco de Mayo!  And remember when this month gets so crazy busy...it's not you, it's MAY.