My Mom came to town!

Whew! We have been busy around here lately! Lots of people have been coming to visit and we just love it! This past weekend it was my Momma who came to stay, and even though it was for the weekend....we jam packed those two and a half days!

Thursday when she came into town we wasted no time heading down to the Potomac. The girls have been waiting to go back down and spend time by the water. So, we slowly made our way down the steep bank and over the rocks and spent the evening throwing rocks in the river and searching for shells. And walking of course. Me and my mom love to walk together.

We found the lone cherry blossom tree still in bloom and made good on getting a picture with it. Darn rain last week knocked those trees dry of petals.

Friday we shopped, another favorite past time. And scored some mega good deals at Target-oh yeah! Gosh, we're really easy to please. Just let us go walking and go to Target and we're happy.
After quite possibly three hours spent in Target we then headed to Old Town Alexandria for dinner at Isaak's favorite little arm pit of a pub. :~)
 

 And then went for some yummy cupcakes and gelato for dessert.

 Saturday was SO fun!

Down at the Mall they were having tons of Cherry Blossom Festival stuff goin' on, one of which happened to be the annual kite flying festival on the lawn at the Washington Monument. So we took Mimi on the metro to go fly ourselves some kites! (Marvelly was pretending to be a board...or something equally awkward looking)

Um, kites are awesome, if you can fly one. Crowds don't bother me. And not only did the rain stay at bay, the sun came out and baked us. It was the perfect morning! Except for that seriously crappy kite I bought that.would.not.fly. Darn thing kept puttering out. That's five dollars not well spent.

 

However, $2.49 well spent were the girls kites that flew like crazy!

My mom's kite flew for all of two seconds and then crashed to the ground repeatedly. But, in true Gerard fashion, all was not lost as she decided to just run around holding it pretending it was flying.

My mom is funny. I love her.

Maybe one of the funnest things we've done since coming to D.C. What a cool memory to say we got to spend a morning chillin' out and flying kites in front of the Washington Monument. That was just too much fun.

My mom hasn't been to D.C. in about 18 years...not since I was around 11 or 12 years old and my Uncle Chris drove us here from Richmond to spend the day. It was fun exploring with her again here, and with my own girls this time too.

 (My mom, me, Marvelly and Sydaleigh-Jefferson Memorial, March 2012)

Lastly we walked down to the Waterfront and checked out the super seriously so fresh market you can see them bringing in the fish off the ships and down to their food stands. You don't get fresher than this.

 For the first time in decades my mom had fresh clams. So fresh she coulda been Tom Hanks in Cast Away and caught them herself with a spear, or net, or however clams are caught. That's how fresh they were. Right outta the water. She was very happy. And we told the girls they were chicken so they ate them too. :~)

That night when we got back home we baked bread (another must do when we're together) and a cake. And then the girls decorated it and we put up streamers and surprised (not really) my mom with an early birthday celebration. She turns the big 6-0 on Saturday and since we're not gonna see her, we thought we'd celebrate a little early here.

Those were two and a half days well lived. We had so much fun, did all our favorite things, even watched a movie in there too. We love my mom round here. God is good to let us live so close for these next few months. We are very blessed and can't wait to see her again in a couple weeks in Richmond! Along with the rest of my family!