My 3 Day Weekend Without Kids (Or Husband.)

I just got back from a three day weekend in which I visited family and friends in Oregon all. by. myself!! Remember when I talked about the possibility of making this trip earlier this Fall? Fear and “what if’s” were weighing me down but many of you encouraged me to go, and to make the trip alone. {Thank you!} The main purpose for going was to throw my friend a baby shower. Even though the shower took up a lot of my tip (or, at least that’s what it felt like between running errands to get stuff for it and thinking/stressing about it the whole time) I was able to relax a little and go to two Oregon State sporting events which hasn’t happened in a while.

I’ve been trying to think of a better adjective all morning, but the best word I can use to describe what it’s like to travel out of state as just you – a single person, not attached to a husband or child – is weird. When I first got to the airport, I didn’t know what the heck was going on. Who am I? What planet am I on? Is this a dream? It was just so so weird to be by myself.

I took the redeye flight and landed in Oregon at 5:30am. My friend picked me up and we went back to her place for a little cat nap before making the trip to Corvallis.  One of the first things that I did when I got into town was go to Jamba Juice (looooove) and TJMAXX. (also loooooove.)

No kids in my cart! Weird. I was a little overwhelmed shopping by myself. I know that sounds strange. Like, seize the opportunity woman. It was as if I just had too much free time and too much of an awesome store in front of me I didn’t know what to do with it. You know?

I went to an OSU basketball game Friday night, after dinner. I miss these games a lot.

Fun fact: Michelle Obamas brother is the coach for the basketball team. He lives near my dad and, I guess Michelle was visiting her brother the other day and there were helicopters hovering his house and tons of cars parked out front. The whole house was patrolled the the max. I can understand the cars, but helicopters hovering? They really think someone in Corvallis is out to get Michelle Obama?

I ran into an old friend at the game.

The next day was OSU football.

It was raining.

People do not understand. Football is so much better in the rain. That is the way football is suppose to be. Everyone complains about the weather and the rain and I’m like, clearly you have not done your research otherwise you would know that football and rain are only one of the best combinations ever.

That is, right behind Diet Coke and popcorn.

We went to a few tailgaters before the game started. I ended up drinking hot chocolate with some sort of vodka alcoholic thing in it. I don’t remember the name of it, nor would I know how to spell it. Apparently alcohol warms your body up from the inside? I don’t know, there were too many people telling me things who had been drinking since 6am. Those people were the only ones not complaining about the rain because they were in sweats and a light jacket that, hey, it might not keep me warm but it sure does make me look cool!

Yo. Stupid is not cool.

I’ve known these girls for something like 10 years. I’ve been friends with Jacquelyn (on my left in the black – she’s pregnant. Her angle and black shirt really hides her beautiful bump!) since the 4th grade.

Craaazy.

I think besides the added 25 pounds, brown -need- a – highlight hair, aging wrinkles and red tom shoes, I look exactly the same. We all do, actually. The friend on my right in the flower-y top is also pregnant!

Not me. I am not pregnant.

After the shower I cleaned up and headed back up to Portland!

We went to Ikea on the way up to get spice racks. You know how they’ve been floating around blog/internet land to get ikea spice racks, paint them and then use them as kid bookshelves? Well, I go inside to get a few (I knew they would be easy to carry on the plane) and they are all out of spice racks!! I told them I flew all the way from Alaska to get a spice rack and you are out of spice racks!!

So I ended up buying a set of wooden cars.

Because my poor boys don’t have enough cars in my house and I’m concerned they might grow up not knowing what a car looks like or that it has four wheels.

At one point, it feels like the weekend was long and I was gone longer than three days. On the other hand, it went by so fast. I came home and, just like that, life returned to normal. It was almost as if I never even left. The boys were totally normal today. I was like, “did you miss me???”

Now I’m making dinner for tonight and folding laundry. Back to the real world. 🙂