I think in one of my last few bogs, I discussed how Hayden was going to be making the move into the office, in order for all the kids to have their own room. Sure, Hayden will have to share with Asa during the week, but his schedule aligns more with Asa, and it'll be mostly his space. And in an effort to make it feel like his, I have big, ambitious plans. We will see how it goes. But, in order to see if I can fullfill those plans, I first needed to empty out half of the office. The closet had already been done, but everything needed to come off the walls, and be put in their new homes (sort of, some of it found a temporary spot in the emptied out closet). Anyway, once that was all done, I realized I never took a "before" picture. And so, I snapped one before we moved out the futon. (The futon by the way is akwardly in front of home school central in the living room- it'll have to find a new home too). Anyway, once that was done, I did some spakle on the walls to fill in holes and and indents from the old chair that used to be in there- and then I taped it off to make way for the new paint.
The idea is that I'm going to make a loft space for Hayden's bed. And Hayden likes the blue color for by his bed- but wanted a beige for the under part of the loft. So, I went and found some mismatched beige paint at Lowes (then you can get it on the cheap), and spent my Friday painting the lower half of the room (I decided to taper it off on the side where his desk will be instead of keeping the line straight across. I was hoping to be able to work on building something out that night, but my miter saw was lost in delivery somewhere! (I'm supposed to be getting it today, though). However, my miter saw bench had already arrived, so I put that in front of the door to keep the doggies out while I painted (for whatever reason, none of them thought they could just walk over it).
While I worked on that, everyone else headed over to Saint Pete to the Mahaffey Theater. It's right along the water, which is lovely. They all had tickets to see the comedian, Brian Regan. It was a Christmas present for Hayden and Calib and they were super excited to go, because they've listed to him for years.
However, this past week we all got colds. Calib was the last to get it, and was feeling slightly under the weather while the rest of us were on the mend. Should Calib have probably gone to the show? Um.. probably not. But, he did. And he loved it. (And then he got more sick as the weekend went on).
Meanwhile, I pulled some of the tape, put the outlet plates back on the wall, and admired my work.
Of course, then it was just me and the pups. And it was storming. Poor Etta, missing her humans AND dealing with thunder? She was not very happy.
Eventually I got her settle down, and she didn't even seem to mind Dipper laying on top of her.
So, I hung out with my couch buddies and started re-watching Scandal. Maybe I'll stop after like season 3 when things started to go downhill.
Saturday, I was up bright and early for my crafting class at the library. As we pulled in, we noticed that not only was the big bilboard sign fixed, but it was promoting me! I'm basically famous. Asa might have the more popular activity in chess club, but he doesn't get his name in lights. Speaking of Asa, he came to be my helper, as always, which was very nice.
This months class we're making paper beads, which is a super easy thing to do out of recycled material. Next month, we're going to be doing Mickey Ears again, just because I had a lot of interest from my newer Crafting with Corinne participants.
After class, we swung by Lowes to pick up the lumber to get to making Hayden's loft bed. At this point, I still had hopes my saw would arrive Saturday. Spoilert Alert: it did not.
Asa and I have since contemplated the idea of going forward, switching mother's day and father's day. Because, the sales match up better with our wants that way. Asa wants all the gardening stuff, on sale on Mother's Day; while I'd prefer power tools, on sale on Father's Day. When you think about it, it really is pretty sexist.
But, for this year, we were celebrating Mother's Day, so I got a few splurge items from my last Kroger delivery: like the stuff to make POG juice!
And, I did get some safety gear as gifts. It'll come in handy when my saw finally gets here!
Saturday night, Asa and I went out to dinner on our way to the next event...
...a Rowdies game! They're the Saint Pete soccer team in the USL League (think minor league- like the Mudhens for you Northerners). Tickets aren't too expensive, and we knew we'd be over in Saint Pete anyway, so we decided to finally give it a go. Let it be known, we're also cramming in the outdoor activities before it gets (and I quote) 'ass hot' out here. You see that building behind us there? That's the backside of the Mahaffey! Asa was here two days in a row.
The stadium is small but cute. There's standing room only tickets for like $15, and that area is rowdy (forgive me for the pun). We had nice seats right about even with the goal line for something like $25. I'd never been to a soccer game before (our kids never played it), so it was fun to see in person.
You can tell I'm a huge Rowdies fan too, because of my shirt. Which, I may or may not have made in an unofficial capacity two days before hand.
As night fell, it got less humid, with a nice breeze off the water. A lovely evening for a soccer game. The first half was pretty exciting. There were yellow cards, corners, and goals. Though, the Rowdies were up so much by the second half, there wasn't much to see, except the loan goal on the half right in front of us.
We did stay till the end though, with a final score of 5-1, the Rowdies came out winners.
After the game, we decided to make the walk down to the new Pier. A couple years ago they demolished the whole old pier and rebuilt it from scratch. We hadn't been there since the new one opened in covid times. I kept meaning to take the cross bay ferry over to it and make a day of it, but we never got around to it and now ferry season is about over (they don't run the tampa to st pete ferry in the summer, because, it's, as I said, 'ass hot'). With no real good option for a time to take the ferry, and since we were right there, I thought it was finally time to check it out. And it did not disappoint. First of all, many of you might not know what the former Pier was like. Basically there was a long cement peir out to an inverted pyramid building full of shops, resturants, and was pretty basic, except for a pelican feeding station (oh my gosh, I cannot even believe I found that blog- look at us! BABIES! We're all babies!) So yea, except for the Pelicans, it was basically just cement. This new pier, man, it is something else (though, it does lack pelican feeding). There's an awesome playground (Layla has to come here next time she visits!) and this fun- I don't even know what you call it- art canopy? I don't know what it looks like during the day, but at night? All lit up? gorgeous!
There's all kinds of cool art work, including mosiacs.
Also lit up: water fountains you can run through. That's over by an outdoor bar and grill, with live music. There's tables and lounge chairs, and even a grassy area if you're so inclined.
And the views are just lovely. There's a little beach acess, and then random little decks going out past the water.
If you keep walking there's all kinds of little nooks and crannies, and instead of being a pier strait out, there's angles, and cutouts, and grass and trees. There's even a little nature center place. It's all so pretty. And at the very end, the inverted pyramid is gone, but you still get this building full of restaurants, and shops, and even a little fish cleaning station out the back.
We made our way all the way out to the end, but it was so dark, you couldn't see much. Back in the other direction, though, Saint Pete was lit up all pretty on a lovely, warm breeze Saturday night.
We walked all the way back to our car, and passed the now empty Rowdies stadium. Fun fact: less than a minute after I took this picture, they flipped the lights off.
Getting home late two nights in a row is very unlike Asa, and Phenom was quite happy to see him back. And, I was up late, so it didn't wake me when the kids came in my room at midnight to scream 'Happy Mother's Day'. Olivia, for her part, sent me a Happy Mother's Day text hours earlier- because it was, after all, Mother's Day in the UK.
Sunday morning we watched the Brentford game (did I tell you we have tickets to see them play in Atlanta in July?!?!) They won, which was nice. But, we also had breakfast tacos. Truth be told, I would have picked something like Tonga Toast, but it's been awhile since we've had breakfast tacos, and I know how much Asa likes them. Since I had my POG juice, and this AWESOME lemon blueberry loaf I got at Costco as a backup because they were out of cinnamon rolls, I didn't feel like I was missing my sweet breakfast items. (Also, I may or may not give the dogs breakfast sausage when I have breakfast tacos. You can't at all tell by the way they're all staring at me).
After the Brentford win, we headed out with a quick stop by Bee Coffee. I just cannot get enough of their strawberry rose water, and Asa finally found an iced coffee from there he enjoys.
The second weekend of the month also meant it was a Beasley Farm Market. They close in the summer, too, so I think there's only one more farm market before we won't be able to go back until the fall. When we arrived we made a beeline for the animal feed. I know what these guys like, ditch the chicken feed and take them the lettuce, that's what they really want.
After the chickens, we made our way over to Bella, the cow. We love Bella! I'm convinced she knows me. She'll even come over if you call her!
Usually there's some greens to feed her, but today, there was extra special treats! She even ate whole corn on the cob! (If you have not seen Asa's video of this, you HAVE to check it out. It's amazing).
We fed some goats after that, and ran into some of the library people we know- so we showed them the ropes. It was their first time at Beasley. After we parted ways, we headed on over for some u-pick green beans. I love when they do $5 a bucket. These freeze easy, and everyone loves them roasted.
In addition to all that, it's sunflower season in Florida. Some of the farms around here have sunflower mazes. But, it's hot, and those farms generally charge admission. I like Beasley because the whole thing is free. Sure it wasn't a sunflower maze per se, but you could walk down lots of sunflower aisles, and that's kind of the same thing. Plus moms got to pick a sunflower for free.
After that, we went through the barn, paid for our green beans and nabbed some other goodies- including a slice of ice cold watermellon. I asked if Bella could have my rind, and they said she loves rind! So, I ate the watermelon, and gave the rest to Bella! We shared a watermelon slice, and it was lovely.
Before we left, we made sure to give Katie, the horse, some pets.
And some snuggles. She likes to nose nudge the people she likes.
And the baby cow, JJ, liked to try and eat Asa's hat strings.
Back at home, I rounded up some board games. Board Games are our traditional Mother's Day activity. I pick out all the ones people stopped playing with me because I'm too good at them, and make everyone play. Usually, this involves Lifeboats. But, Lifeboats is better with more people, so we'll wait for Olivia to get home to play that (she also knows when she's not here on Mother's Day, she owes me).
And per the usual, I was undefeated in all the games we played. I told you, there's a reason they stopped playing these games with me.
The dogs, however, we're super snuggly (we've been gone a lot lately, and they're turning clingy in their old age- Asa calls them 'stage five clingers')
While Asa got to making dinner for me, Hayden and Calib played me in Bananagrams. Usually they give me more of a run for my money....
...but Calib was just not feeling well, at all. Still, I kept telling him to go lay down, and instead, he insisted on playing Bananagrams.
For dinner, Asa made some of my favorites: mashed potatoes, Madagascar Meatloaf, and Calvin Coolidge Carrots. So good.
A garden check on Mother's Day, and my first sunflower was fully opened. I always love this, it's like past Corinne planted them to brighten future Corinne's day.
We have been having trouble with getting pollinators in the yard lately, so we're putting out some fruit to help attract them.
And, I think it's working- my cucumbers are FINALLY getting pollinated.
That evening, the Florida Orchestra was playing their annual 'Pops in the Park', where they set up on the river and play for free. Asa and I debated going, and eventually decided to make the trip (it helped that the route from here to there was green on Google maps, and only took about 30 minutes). We parked at Armature Works and walked over.
We found ourselves a nice spot at the edge of the crowd and plopped our seats down. They were already tuning up when we arrived.
We even had time to swing by Tiffs Treats to get ourselves some brownies so we'd have dessert with us. We're still working off the gift cards we got there when they had their grand opening. It was a perfect edition to an already lovely day.
The start of the Pops was a bit dealyed. They had to wait until the sun had set enough that the musicians didn't have it in their eyes, and could read their music. As soon as it was time to take off our sunglasses, the music began.
It was a lovely concert on the river. A nice breeze, barefeet in the grass, desserts, music, and my favorite person- what more could a girl want.
When it was all over, we took the other way back to the car, making the full loop along the Riverwalk. I'm going to miss these nice nights, because even these are fleeting.
Monday was pretty chill around here. Asa worked, and a shucked a bunch of corn we had gotten from Beasley. We love when they have the whole boxes. 40 ears for $10, and then I just cut it off the cob and freeze it, and we have it forever.
Hayden did also pass his first class: Educational Foundations, so Taco Bell was earned.
Today there's chess club, and supposedly my saw is supposed to arrive, so I'm hoping to get into the office to do some work while everyone is gone. Tomorrow I"ll be too busy to get anything done- and by "busy" I mean, we're hitting up Disney because it's been forever and we need to go before the summer crowds get here.
Next up: Disney Day, Construction, Kitten Yoga, Free Museums, and a possible cousin visit!
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