Life Updates

First things first: Happy May (rabbit rabbit)! Second of all, my apologies for being so quiet the past month. I have realized that every time some event happens in life that upends my normal daily routine, this little blog suffers the most. I apologize for my long absence, but promise I will be getting back on track this next week. For now, here is a whirlwind recap of the past several weeks:

We went to our first Sunday Norfolk Tides baseball game as Sunday season ticket holders, and it was a blast! It was a little chilly in early April, but the sun was shining, and the Tides won, so we were happy!

One of my childhood friends got married, so we planned a weekend with my family to coincide, which was so much fun! We had a lot of fun with my parents at the wedding, and Lauren, my friend, was a beautiful bride! We also planned it so that Harris took his first vacation since our honeymoon, and we went to go visit his family (who we hadn't seen since last Memorial Day!), and also spend Easter with them!

The morning after the wedding, my Nana had a heart attack. She was in the hospital for several days after that, and I went down to Florence to spend a few days with her, and sent Harris and Lucy on to Greenville, where I met up with them a couple of days later. Nana was sent to rehab a few days after her heart attack, but ended up back in the hospital that very next weekend. There has just been a lot going on with, seemingly, everything - her heart, kidneys, lungs, having an infection, so on and so forth. She has been in the hospital ever since, and I have been back and forth between South Carolina and Virginia spending time with her. I really wish I had answers for the inevitable questions here, but I think we are all just taking it day by day and seeing what happens. We are thankful that she is still with us, and still fighting! We do appreciate all the love and support floating around out there, more than you know.

Our time in Greenville with Harris' family was really great, though, and we loved getting to spend time with everyone! Most of his family comes together for Easter at his granddad's house, which includes the annual Ligon Family Easter Egg Hunt Extravaganza! spoiler alert: I am a really bad Easter egg hunter, apparently!

Harris went to Arkansas on a business trip last week! He is in the early stages of traveling for work, so he is not yet jaded like I was toward the end of my business-travel time. Actually, I hope he never gets that jaded, but, nevertheless, I think he is enjoying it!

This past weekend, Harris was on-call, so he worked a lot, and I played a lot of catch up on things that had fallen by the wayside the past couple weeks. However, we did manage to make time for brunch on Sunday morning before our second baseball game of the season!

This week has been a good, but busy one! We are both really glad that tomorrow is Friday!

Anniversary Weekend!

Sunday, Harris and I celebrated one year of marriage! While it seems absolutely crazy that already a year has passed since we exchanged vows in beautiful Playa Mujeres, it is even crazier to think that this past Friday was the 11th anniversary of our first date! To top it off, we also got some really exciting news on Friday - Harris got a promotion! Now, I know, I know, he just got a promotion a few months ago, but, some changes happened a bit unexpectedly, and he will be moving into a new role, leading a new team with some pretty high-profile business. I am so proud of him, and I know he will do such a great job! It was a weekend of celebration, indeed!

Friday evening we met up with our friends Clay & Whitley and a few other people to try out Vintage Tavern in Suffolk since it was restaurant week. We had such a blast with everyone, and, the food was pretty great too. It had some room for improvement (felt like the pureed butter bean soup - yes, butter bean soup! - was a little salty, among a few small other things), but I would definitely want to go back! Their cheese plate was one of the best I have had in this area, and the creme brulee was ah-mazing!

I was reminded during our jaunt over to Suffolk how much I really enjoy city living. While it was nice to see the wide open spaces (Suffolk is a little bit country, folks), I really do enjoy having most things within walking distance of our condo. I guess it is a give and take, though - we get to have the convenience of having our favorite restaurants, the movies, the mall, and so on, literally, right outside our front door, but we forsake things like a yard and a grill, and space between us and our neighbors. While those latter things are definitely nice, I think we really enjoy the convenience so much more than we would those other things. Plus, without having a commute for Harris, we get to see each other loads more than we would if we were living out in Virginia Beach, or one of the other burbs. Perk!

After hanging with the friends Friday night, we decided to spend Saturday doing things in Norfolk we hadn't done yet, which mostly involved spending a gloriously sunny day flitting in and out of various shops and stores, and walking streets in the Ghent neighborhood. We popped into one of the local bakeries over there and shared the most delicious slice of cake - it was banana, chocolate, something or other, and I swear it was like the best parts of a chocolate cake mated with the best parts of a banana pudding and made this perfect little cake for our enjoyment. Now, of course Harris didn't know this at the time, but we ended up eating a lot of cake over the weekend! Since we couldn't bring back the top tier of our wedding cake from Mexico last year, I had a local bakery recreate it for us to enjoy! While it wasn't quite as delectable as the original, it was still a darn good cake!

Now, I don't know if you know this or not, but the first year anniversary present is, traditionally, supposed to be paper. I don't know why, but I have always wanted to find some creative way to honor this tradition, and, because of this, have had Harris' anniversary present planned for months! I decided to get us Sunday season tickets to the Norfolk Tides baseball games! I knew he would love it because 1. he loves baseball, and 2. it would be a fun activity for us to do together. There are 11 Sunday games, plus we get vouchers for 2 more games. This seemed much more reasonable than the 72-game full-season tickets! I mean, seriously, that is a commitment! As expected, he loved his gift. Now, for my anniversary present...we are still in suspense over here! With the whole Lucy situation that has been going on lately, we decided to postpone making any serious plans for our anniversary, but, unbeknownst to me, the hubs already has some surprise trip planned, and apparently my gift shall not be given till that time...I love it! He did, however, get me a few little things over the weekend, because he is just nice like that!

Our actual anniversary day was a rainy, yucky, cold mess of a day. So, it was the perfect day for laying in bed, watching our wedding video, snuggling, watching tv, and ordering takeout! No complaints from Team Ligon on that one.

This week has already gotten off with a bang. Yesterday morning, bright and early, Harris took off for a business trip to Mexico! He will be back on Thursday, and Lucy and I miss him desperately, but know he is having a blast. I am writing up a storm, which is great, and I am getting so many things checked off my to-do list. Lucy had a recheck with the ophthalmologist  this morning - her graft is completely healed, but she has had a bit of retinal degeneration because of all the inflammation in her eye. But, we will keep giving drops for the next couple months, and hoping for the best! Overall, she is really doing great, though! I also gave her a totally botched homemade haircut the other day / finished up and gave her a bath today. She looks ridiculous, but I am a nervous Nellie about sending her to the groomers right now, and she needed a little help (although, I am not sure if I helped or hurt, but whatever). She was actually pretty good about the whole thing (and dangit, I just remembered I never gave her a treat when I finished! This is why she is poorly trained - all my fault!), but she probably does hate me a little more than usual now. Ah well.

Off to do some more writing, and try to not let this cold gloominess take over my soul. And by take over my soul I mean coerce me into taking a nap.