Spring Break

Its beginning to look like spring around here and we are greeting it happily!   Still chilly some days, but there are afternoons when it feels and looks just gorgeous outside.

In preparation for the spring, we spent last weekend working on our patio.   By 'working on' I mean some retail therapy.   Most of the patio furniture we have is pretty old (its moved houses at least once, in some cases twice) and was showing a lot of wear and tear.  We got some new pieces, and accents for some old pieces and it looks like a new space!

It took trips to FOUR different stores, but we finally got what we wanted:

- new umbrella - with built-in solar powered lights (no more stringing up Christmas lights for us) - red - Home Depot
- two new chairs -- anti-gravity...sooo comfortable!  -- green - Sams
- an outdoor rug -- red and gold - Lowe's
- cushions for the chairs we did keep - multicolored to tie it all together - Lowe's
(we'd also gone to Ace looking for some equipment for the grill, had to order it)

Some of the pieces we didn't keep - a loveseat and table - will get a new home with brother-in-law.

The space is very relaxing and we'll be spending a LOT of time out there.

To kick off the season, we even ate dinner out there today!   We treated it as sort of a picnic, and I felt like I was playing hooky since we ate before I would get off work.   I wasn't playing hooky - we actually had a holiday on the work calendar!   Very nice to get a one day spring break from the university, faculty and students were off all week (read: ghost town).  K also had spring break this week - he relaxed and did a lot of grading!!

We really celebrated our spring break last night with a happy hour with some of my coworkers and their husbands.   It was our first time to all hang out, and won't be our last.   We started off at a tapas restaurant downtown, Batanga, and had so much fun we continued the evening next door, at Okra Charity saloon.  What is a charity bar?   I don't fully understand it, but part of their proceeds go to charity - and we get a say in which charity by voting with tickets we receive with each drink purchase.    The evening sped by, and when we finally did leave we were surprised to realize it was after 11 (we'd met up about 6)!