Happy 33%

This weekend Dan and I celebrated our 5-year wedding anniversary, and the fact that we have been together for 10 years. TEN. I told him, "I've wasted, er, spent 1/3 of my life with you!"

We dropped Jack and doggies off with my parents (sorry Mom!) and drove down to Wrightsville to lay on the beach in utter quietude. It was amazing, and it was only 4 hours and 12 minutes into our little vacation before we dropped the J-bomb (a conversation about Jack). You know how people joke about how the minute you get away from your kids you start talking about them? Well that's not funny.

The beach was all of my dreams come true, breezy and warm. There were some little kids running around near the water and squealing, and it was so nice to hear it from far away and know that it required NONE of our attention. Ah bliss.

We checked into an amazing bed and breakfast, The Graystone Inn, and were instantly transported back to 1905 where houses were beautiful and showers were small. Dan and I both used the early 20th century claw-foot tub with trepidation (some of us because we are rounder than usual and some of us because we are round). Then, down the cobble-stone streets of old town Wilmington to the Pilot House where we ate right on the river! It was glorious and the wind blew my hair out of my face all evening with what I imagined to be a romantic effect, and hopefully distracted Dan from my upper-belly crumb-collecting as we ate oysters, low-country seafood and amazing desserts. I would highly recommend both of these places for anyone with taste-buds and a love of comfortable beds.

Then off to tour the 25-some small bars and bistros throughout the town...OR, in reality, back to the B&B for an early bedtime because we were stuffed and old. As we lay on our huge four-poster fancy bed, Dan asked, "Is it even nine o'clock yet??" I cringed as I told him the time...8:28pm! I can't tell you how lovely it was to relax without having to corral children and animals, without having to give baths, feed, clean, clothe and coax to bed the small creatures of my life.

I was up early to give Dan lessons on how to open shades (I'm resisting the urge to make a joke about quick tugs here) and we had breakfast in the enormous dining room of our Clue-mansion-like vacation home. Legitimate French toast stuffed with cream-cheese with a hint of lime. Fresh fruit, fresh pastries, their own brand of coffee and fresh OJ. We sat with a lovely couple from California who couldn't get over how lush and green North Carolina was. It was fun to revel in the things that we take for granted with them.

So we left gorgeous Wilmington with only minor casualties--a sunburned shoulder (me) and a sunburned belly-button (Dan) because WHO DOESN'T PUT SUNSCREEN IN THEIR BELLY-BUTTON? As we made our way home to rescue my parents, Dan couldn't stop talking about Jack. Personally I could have used another day and night of vacation from my critters, but it was killing Dan to be away from them...he clearly needs mental help.