My favorite weekends are always the ones where we don’t really have anything planned, but we just hang out with each other and enjoy the company.

1. My weekend got started a little early when Hudson and I drove down to Georgia on Thursday afternoon to visit Lyndsey, her little Addison, and Amy. The purpose for the trip was to visit Amy’s business, FitLab, Inc., so she could do the metabolic testing on me to help me get in the best shape of my life. I cannot wait to share more of this process with all of you, but it was amazing and so informative. I now know how many calories my body needs every day to function. I found out that I wasn’t eating enough, so that’s why I haven’t been losing the way I need to and I was still feeling hungry all the time. I found out how to work out to maximize my workouts and really customize them to my heart rate and body so that I am burning fat and really giving my heart and body a good workout. I’m so thankful to Amy for taking the time to let me test with her.

More importantly, I got to spend such great time with two women who have become such dear friends to me. We had just spent time together at the Beth Moore conference, so it hadn’t been too long since I’d seen them. But I now know that there are two other girls who feel the same way I do about friendships and family. And they’re not that far away!

Hudson and ALM couldn’t be more different, but they were so sweet together and I know they’ll grow up to be pals. You could just tell they were trying to figure each other out. I knew that Hudson was a little rowdy, but I didn’t realize just how wild he is until I saw ALM. She is just the sweetest, most content, little girl I’ve ever met. I promise that if anyone could just handpick their child’s temperament, this is what they’d want. She is a dream child! (Now, please don’t misunderstand. I adore Hudson’s personality. He just keeps me on my toes!)

By the time I was ready to be tested, I was worn out from wrestling with Hudson all day.

Lyndsey was so sweet to “babysit” Hudson while I was on the treadmill. He did surprisingly well, but I think  she got a little taste of what’s to come as soon as Addison takes off crawling. She had her hands full with two babies.

Go read Lyndsey’s blog to see exactly what we did on Thursday and Friday. It includes lots of laughter and lots of trips on a golf cart. But Amy telling the waiter at the Mexican restaurant why we couldn’t eat there is the best part.

2. I got back to Columbia on Friday night just in time for Todd and me to put Hudson to bed and watch Dateline. Honestly, our favorite thing about Friday nights is watching Dateline. And if Keith Morrison is the reporter, then it’s even better! I just love him.

The only problem is that I always fall asleep with about twenty minutes left to watch and end up having to ask Todd what happened. Did the killer get convicted? Did they really do it?

3. On Saturday, Todd played golf all day and Hudson and I just hung out around the house waiting for him to get home. It was honestly pretty boring and we were eager for him to get back to entertain us!

We made these Cooking Light Black Bean and Corn-Topped Potatoes that we both love so much and watched The Hangover.

4. Sunday morning is always so hectic around our house. It is a miracle if we make it to church on time. We always forget to make Hudson’s bottles the night before and I’m always rushed to get dressed. We were only about five minutes late yesterday and Hudson didn’t even cry when we dropped him off. That made the morning much easier.

We went to Sunday school and church and sang in the choir. I’m going to be planning the end of the year celebration luau for our choir in a couple of weeks, so I’ve got that on my mind. After church we had lunch with our friends to celebrate a birthday and I was so thankful that our friends were able to help us keep Hudson entertained. He always struggles on Sundays because he doesn’t nap in the nursery and ends up getting his nap a couple of hours late. We rarely go out to eat after church because we’re never sure how he’s going to do. But our friends kept him entertained and played with him through lunch.

We came home and it started raining and thundering, which is perfect for nap weather. I slept for about two hours and Hudson slept for almost four hours. Todd’s parents are always so sweet to babysit when we need it, and they offered to babysit so we could go to a movie last night.

Todd and I went to see Iron Man 2. I have a weird obsession with Robert Downey, Jr. and have since I was a kid. The movie was entertaining and full of talented actors. I don’t need to see it again, but we did like it a lot.

What did you do this weekend?

Last night I wrote out our summer calendar and it looks like we’re going to be busier than I thought. Fortunately, we’ll be in town for most of it, though. We’ve got three weddings, Hudson’s birthday, BlogHer in NYC, Hudson’s swim lessons, and I’m working with Vacation Bible School and Music Camp at our church.

What are your plans for this summer? Any exciting vacations?

Hudson and I just returned from a fun 36 hours visiting friends in Georgia. More on that later, but I wanted to get these winners announced on Friday like I promised!

Good news: The giveaway response was so great (with 335 entries!) that Tracy Negoshian decided that I should select three winners! I selected the winners via the Random.org Integer Generator.

The winners should contact me via email {eeakin11@gmail.com} by the end of the day on Monday or I’ll move on to the next person.

Congratulations to the following three commenters! You will win your choice of one of the beautiful pieces by Tracy Negoshian!

NOTE: I’m told that my blog is feeling much better and that it is now safe to pay it a visit. If you see anything wonky, please please please let me know! Be sure to clear out your cache and cookies if you did visit my blog while it was infected.

NOTE 2: This is an extra long post!

I know I should have posted this last week, but there were so many other things I wanted to blog about, and it always takes me a while to recap a trip!

Todd and I had a great anniversary trip in New York City. We wanted a relaxing trip where we could just explore at our own pace and not feel pressure to do any tours. We had both already been to the top of the Empire State Building and had both been out to Ellis Island and to the Statue of Liberty. We wanted to see Greenwich Village, the Chelsea Market, and wander around SoHo. I am so bad about taking pictures when Todd and I go on vacation, so I really don’t have enough pictures of everything.

It was H-O-T in NYC for the days that we were there. We realized as soon as we got off the plane that we hadn’t packed appropriately.

Sunday

We arrived in NYC at 11:00 a.m. on Sunday, May 2. We went straight to our hotel to check in. We stayed at the Waldorf Astoria and it was wonderful. We got a great rate and the service was impeccable. We were hardly there, but the staff really was so friendly and accommodating.

I had made reservations for us to eat lunch at Bar Americain which is one of celebrity chef, Bobby Flay’s restaurants. Because it was Sunday, there was the option to have brunch, so Todd had brunch and I had a cheeseburger. I had heard great things about the burger and fries at Bar Americain so I couldn’t pass it up.

Here we are eating at Bar Americain. I highly recommend it!

After lunch, we had about an hour to kill before our first Broadway show began. We were seeing a matinee of The Lion King, which was really wonderful. There is truly nothing like it. The music is familiar if you’ve seen the movie, but the costumes were incredible. The dancers and performers were mesmerizing. There isn’t much of a set and the actors take on the role of the jungle in some scenes.

This photo was actually taken on our third day there because the crowds were too big to take a picture the day we actually saw The Lion King. We just stopped back by to grab a photo!

On Sunday evening, we went to The Stanton Social for dinner and we both loved it. It was a tapas style meal and we tried so many different things that we couldn’t get enough of. But the portions were so small and everything was shared, so we were glad that we were able to try a lot of things. We had short rib tacos, macaroni and cheese, edamame, risotto cakes, and grilled shrimp. Then we ended the night with donuts dipped in chocolate. We sat next to a really fun couple from Mississippi. Our tables were so close together that we ended up talking to them a while. The conversation was mostly about SEC football, but that’s okay!

Monday

On Monday morning, we got up early and went to have breakfast at Balthazar. I had hoped we’d be able to have enough nights to eat at so many amazing restaurants, but we didn’t. So I was thrilled when I found out that Balthazar was open for breakfast– and it was a fantastic breakfast. Todd had sour cream pancakes and I had scrambled eggs with asparagus and mushrooms in a puff pastry. So yummy and so French!

Here’s TC at Balthazar! Happy to be there! I wanted to make it back to Balthazar for lunch one day just to try their French fries, but we didn’t make it. Balthazar is located in SoHo, so we were able to wander around SoHo when we were there.

It was raining when we left Balthazar, but we walked and walked and walked. We made our way to Bleecker and walked until we got to Magnolia Bakery where we stopped and picked up a few cupcakes. Then we went to a little store called Pumpkin, where I picked up some toys to bring back for Hudson. I got him this little ball set by Edushape, which is apparently sold at Toys R Us. Who knew?

After our two hour walk in the rain, we took a cab to Rockeller Center to sit and people watch. And eat Magnolia Bakery cupcakes. (and there happens to be another Magnolia Bakery near Rockefeller Center.) This cupcake picture is for Nina! (Can you tell how humid it was?)

Then we wandered around the flagship Saks Fifth Avenue store for a while and I didn’t buy a thing! If you’re proud of me, say, “Amen!”

My dear TC doesn’t ask for much. His only request for this trip was to go to Ground Zero. I had been in early 2002 and haven’t been back during any of my NYC trips since then. TC had never been. We stopped by the information kiosk to get a pamphlet to find out what the memorial plans are. We walked across the bridge that goes over the construction of the memorial site. Then we walked back to the 9/11 Memorial Preview Site. They have done a great job of setting up a temporary memorial site and giving people a preview of what the final memorial will be like. It was a very emotional feeling to be in there listening to stories and remembering the day.

We had a little bit of time to kill before getting to our next show and we had to take a cab from Ground Zero back to our hotel. We had the cab driver stop off at Serendipity 3 so we could get a frozen treat. I hadn’t planned on going back to Serendipity on this trip. I had been before and the crowds made it a little hectic. But when we got there, there wasn’t a line and we were able to get in and get our frozen hot chocolate very quickly!

We went back to the Waldorf to clean up because we were going to see Mary Poppins that night! It was a fantastic show. The kids were so talented. There was lots of dancing and terrific voices. And the sets were so impressive! It was truly wonderful. I’m a huge musical theater fan and most of my favorite shows were produced by Cameron Mackintosh, so when I saw that he produced Mary Poppins I knew that it was going to be something to see!

After Mary Poppins, we went to Babbo, Mario Batali’s restaurant, for dinner. This may just be my favorite dining experience of all time. TC and I got the pasta tasting menu. We had Blck Tagliatelle with Peas and Castelmagno, Casunzei with Poppy Seeds, Garganelli with Funghi Trifolati, Papperdelle Bolognese, Frittelle d’ Ananas with Ricotta Salata (little fried pieces of pineapple!), and lots more! We weren’t even sure what we were getting into, but we both love pasta and we both devoured every single tasting.

Tuesday

I have an entire day that is missing because I forgot to charge my camera battery. I was able to take a few pictures with my Blackberry camera and then I tweeted them, so the quality isn’t great, but they’ll have to do.

On Tuesday, we slept in a little bit and then headed out! We walked to Fifth Avenue and made our way down to FAO Schwarz where we explored for a long time. It was so hard not to snatch up everything for Hudson!

We had lunch reservations at the Central Park Boathouse that day, so we took off heading for the restaurant. But we found out we were going the wrong way and had been going the wrong way for at least 15 minutes. So we went the correct way and made our way through the park on a gorgeous day to have lunch.

A fantastic view of the city from Central Park!

After lunch, we didn’t have any plans, so we decided to enjoy the gorgeous day and take a carriage ride through the park. We were looking for just the right driver that would entertain us and we found him! I so wish my camera had been working, but our carriage driver was wonderful. He is the President of the horse and carriage association and just got a bill passed that requires all horses to get five weeks of vacation every year. How wonderful is that? You always wonder how much those horses have to work and pull people around, and this great guy is working to protect them.

He knew everything about the city and Central Park. His father started driving a carriage in the 1960s and then he started driving one, too. Our driver has been driving the carriage for 25 years. We talked about his family, about Seinfeld, about New York’s professional sports teams. It was a great afternoon!

We headed back to the Waldorf to rest for a little while and then headed out to see Jersey Boys. Of course I don’t have any pictures outside the August Wilson Theatre, but I have to say that Jersey Boys was our favorite show of the three. It was funny, the music was wonderful, and it moved quickly. The actors were so talented and fun to watch. We’ve been singing some of the Four Seasons’ songs for days!

After Jersey Boys, we headed down the street to eat at Carmine’s in the Theater District. We were worn out from all of our fabulous meals. Carmine’s was wonderful and relaxing. Again, we split a big bowl of pasta and then headed back to sleep it off!

Wednesday

Wednesday was our last day in NYC. Our only plans for Wednesday were breakfast at Pastis in the meatpacking district. It was another fun breakfast on a gorgeous morning. When we left Pastis, a delivery truck driver started verbally accosting our cab driver, which was lots of fun. I always get so uncomfortable in those situations because I’m not sure if we’re supposed to say anything to our cab driver when it finally ends. But he broke the ice and started talking about how stupid the truck driver was. Then it just became funny.

We checked out of our hotel and decided to go visit the Shops at Columbus Center at the Time Warner Center, which neither of us had ever visited. Then we went back to Rockefeller Center because we decided that we wanted to do the Top of the Rock experience and get a great view of the city before leaving to come home.  It was absolutely beautiful and a nice stranger even offered to take our picture together!

At this point, we were actually ready to come home. We missed Hudson and missed our bed. We missed the ease of getting around at home. But New York in the spring time was absolutely wonderful!

We headed to the airport and we headed home to see our precious boy and our sweet dogs.

If you read the whole post, bless your heart!

It was brought to my attention last week that a scary website pops up when you try to open my blog. If you read using Google Reader or another reader site, things are fine. But if you actually click on my blog you will see the scary site.

I have a Mac, so I still haven’t seen it for myself, but others have told me all about it, and my hosting company is working to correct it….hopefully this will happen soon.

I’m sorry if this has adversely affected you at all. This is apparently a problem that is common for WordPress users right now and, honestly, it makes me upset that I ever left Blogger for WordPress.

I hope things will be back to normal very soon. In the meantime, don’t worry about emailing me to let me know that something is the matter with my blog. Thanks for hanging in there with me!