one amazing weekend :)

i just got back from a long weekend on the road. it was EXACTLY what i needed...really good time with dave and some unexpected fun with friends :)

i flew into new jersey, where i met up with the guys for the night. we were planning on driving to delaware the next day and staying there until the following night because we had saturday night off. well, we got up in new jersey and made a last minute decision to go to manhatten for the day...i mean, why not? seemed like a good idea. so, dave and i hopped out of the van at bryant park (because it was the start of fashion week and i thought maybe we could figure out who's left in project runway...not really.) we wandered around for a bit, then remembered that our friends, andy and sally young from australia are currently living in nyc. so we ended up taking the subway down to their apartment and when we walked in, lo and behold, there was steve baird (another friend from down under) and john hocutt and jen white, our friends from atlanta. what in the world?? we had no idea! we decided to go grab lunch, then head to chelsea pier to get into some friendly sports competition. we each took turns at the batting cages, then we headed over to the driving range. ok, this was one of those driving ranges out of the movies- where there are several different levels but everyone is hitting on the same range...it was pretty cool. (at least jen and i thought we were pretty special.)

o, and about this time, hannah the hurricane hit, so it was all of a sudden POURING outside. but whats a little rain going to spoil? absolutely nothing. bring it.

once we accepted the fact that we weren't going to get to jump into the foam pit and do some flips on the trampoline, we took off back to the apt to catch the end of the ole miss/wake game...man. that one hurt. but im still hopeful for the rebs. i think we're going to have a good season. i hope we beat auburn.

mckittrick, another friend from atlanta who flew in for the weekend, met up with us and we went to a fabulous dinner. it couldnt have worked out more perfectly. i think sometimes God gives us nights like that to fill up our hearts and remind us that He is faithful and DOES take care of us. these are friends that we 1. NEVER see, and 2. especially never see all together. it would have been like waking up in panama city one morning, deciding to drive to seaside on a whim to just see it and kill some time, and then finding out that ridg, chad, cas, cannada, and emg all just "happened" to be in seaside...or maybe a last minute trip to oxford when ej, whit, sb, mls, trish, stoner, and clare were all there just for the heck of it. thats how random this was! and, as you can imagine, we drove to delaware at midnight after dinner with smiles on our faces and warm fuzzies all over.

on to delaware...wilmington, to be exact. we woke up sunday morning starving and decided to go find somewhere to have a nice, relaxing brunch. hmm...well, you wouldve thought we were in the bible belt because EVERYWHERE was closed! i thought that only places in the south closed on sundays. needless to say, we settled for the only open eating establishment...dunkin donuts. yes. what a treat to add half a dozen donut holes onto your order of coffee and an eggwhite flatbread!

the guys played that night...right now they are opening for the los lonely boys. it was a great show. mango even taught me how to juggle during the intermission. (lets just say there were some VERY rotten apples in the green room by the end of the night.)

after the show, i asked the lonely boys tour manager if i could meet the guys and get their picture (for the blog of course!)...well, he told me that i could go hop on their bus and meet them as long as i was comfortable with a lot of pot smoke in my face. comfortable? hmm...he obviously didnt know me. sorry, but dont have a personal pic of the los lonely boys to share. i do, however, have one of them on stage (apparently the ONLY time they wont be found in their tour bus smoking it up).
the next morning, we woke up and i taught the guys some piloga. im not kidding. we did an hour of yoga/pilates in the hotel workout room. too bad i dont have a pic to document that. they would have killed me. we then headed from wilmington to baltimore and met up with wertz and his boys for a very intimate sushi lunch (we had the whole upstairs to ourselves.) fun times. we wandered around, got some coffee, got some homeade ice cream (oreo peanut butter...it was too good to be true,) and just hung out. it was great to see them. below from left is josh, mango, and lucas from the davebarnes camp, then wertz, hecht, and nathan with wertzie.so...you just got the play by play. it couldnt have been a better weekend. its those fun times that make the distance and the being-at-home-alone thing a little more bearable. i really think im in a season right now of just watching the Lord provide. its a good place to be...