High School Reunion + Mother’s Day

Hey, hey everyone! Did this weekend fly by for anybody else?

I am over here downing my coffee, trying to finish up some things before a lunch date today. The weekend was packed with a lot of fun and catching up, which had me sleep an extra hour this morning. Oops!

The first thing I need to address is that I attended my 10 Year High School Reunion! What a whirlwind. That followed by Mother’s Day, produced plenty of stories to share with you today.

Ready friends? Go!

Saturday

I could not think of a better way to start off my reunion day than another run around our neighborhood lake with my mom. From our side, you can actually see my old high school campus if you look hard enough.

It was a HOT five Florida miles, but we pushed through it and enjoyed the kick-start to the weekend.

(Water bottles and I become great friends down here.)

After allowing a considerable amount of time to cool off and eat a healthy breakfast (coming to you as part of this week’s WIAW!), I worked up another sweat with mom by helping her clean the house. It was her weekend after all.

Before I knew it, it was time to hop in the shower and get ready for a fun night.

My 10 Year High School Reunion

Oh boy… the 10 Year Reunion (dun dun dunnn).

Some people loathe the idea, while others fill with excitement and anticipation to see their friends and frenemies ten years after graduation. I was somewhere in the middle.

Some of you longer HWG readers might remember me sharing my thoughts surrounding the reunion in my 1 Year ’til my 10 Year post last year. Nothing has really changed!

I was not overly excited, nor was I dreading it. High school was just high school, and it was neither an awesome or bad experience for me to revisit. I guess you could say I was more of the “college bloomer” who loved every second of those school years instead.

With Scott currently half way across the world, I decided to go with a few of my girlfriends from high school and make a night of it. We started by meeting at Katie’s house (who also happened to be my college roommate!) and when we were ready, we headed out for dinner at one of my favorite Vegan restaurants in town: Infusion Tea in College Park.

I will share more of what I ate with you later this week (again, for WIAW). What I can tell you now is it was delicious and the place is just as adorable as I remember it since my last visit seven months ago. And guys… don’t worry, I spotted a few men enjoying dinner as well.

Just about the time a small wind storm picked up, it was time to drive downtown and walk into our reunion.

I am still not quite sure how I got elected to become involved, but I guess you could say the entire planning of our reunion ultimately fell on two people: our Vice President of our class (Hi, Nancy!), and me.

After a few struggles and venue disappointments, we took it upon ourselves to hold the reunion at a very casual, laid back, cost-effective (FREE if we had the numbers) environment. After much debate, we settled on Monkey Bar, located in Wall Street Plaza downtown.

Scott had hosted a party here a few years ago, and I knew it was the perfect welcoming and non-committal place to hold ours. Nancy put together a Facebook Event page, and I posted all of the details and information on a blog page that passed as “our class website.”

When telling my parents about our plans, they couldn’t believe how unstructured everything was. No embarrassing photos? No speeches? No slide show? No sit down dinner?

Nope.

Our reunion had a “come anytime to hang out with old friends” type of feel, which allowed anyone with any price and time budget to join the party. Not quite the reunion we all picture, but it totally worked.

I was one of the first to show up with my friends, and it was fun to keep turning my head to whoever walked through the door next. Luckily, there were name tags to help those of us who are awful at names and better with faces (ME).

We had a few balloons set up, the name tags, and a “Brantley Soda” drink special. That was pretty much it!

After talking to a few spouses who also recently had their high school reunions, it turns out that our type of casual planning is not that out of the ordinary these days.

Everyone seemed to have a great time mingling around, and I would say the night was a great success.

As I expected, almost everyone looks and acts exactly the same as they did in high school. Of course there were a few surprises, and it made me smile when I saw a few of the once less than popular folks show up looking amazing. I love that!

See you in another ten, Class of ’03!

Mother’s Day

I am so glad I was able to be home for Mother’s Day. Since moving up north, Scott and I have both missed opportunities we once had to hang with family during holidays, so I am soaking every minute of being down here in.

I had already planned on spending the night with my girlfriends, and started the morning going to Scott and I’s home church with Katie. It was so good to be back and hear Pastor Dave preach. I made sure to stay a little longer and say hi to him, and he was excited to see me and ask about Scott’s whereabouts.

After church, Katie brought me home and it was time to celebrate my mother! Unfortunately, on my way there I found out that we would not be seeing my sister since my nephew woke up with a horrible flu-like stomach bug.

We felt awful, and ended up putting together a care package of food, pie, and flowers to send over to her.

Today also happens to be my sister’s birthday, and we wanted to make sure she knew we were thinking about her. Happy Birthday, Trish!

As we loaded the car up, I was really looking forward for a drive in my mom’s convertible. Until I moved up north, I really took the sunshine and warm afternoons for granted. Yesterday’s drive over and back was a little hot, but so great.

On the way, we made sure to stop for one of my favorite frozen treats I haven’t gotten since I moved away… a 7-Eleven slurpee. If you have one around you, look for the Pina Colada flavor. It tastes like you’re just at the beach!

We made a quick drop off, exchanged some presents, and headed right back home for a barbeque lunch.

We had pulled chicken with sweet peppers (BBQ sauce is not pictured), homemade baked beans, potato salad, edamame, and watermelon, and I for sure went back for seconds.

To top it all off, we cut into my grandmother’s homemade lemon meringue pie. Growing up, I craved her home made pie crusts and this one did not disappoint. With fresh lemons picked from her garden here, the refreshing and lemon-y taste was out of this world!

Before sunset, we took my parent’s puppy out to play in the backyard. Let me formally introduce you guys to Magic!

He is a full-bred Picardy Shepherd, also known as a Berger Picard, and is quite the handful weighing in at eighty pounds of all puppy.

This is one of his calmer moments, but I assure you he is a bundle of fun to play with! My brother and dad spent a good hour chasing him around the backyard, getting him all rallied up.

 It was hilarious!

Just like most play times, it was all fun and games until someone’s toy ends up in the trees. Sorry, Mr. Mag!

He is just over a year old, and is slowly working his way into my heart. Being around him makes me miss our Roadie, but it is nice to have him here to soften the blow.

Whether you were at home or away from family, I hope you had a wonderful weekend. If you were lucky enough to be around your mother, or any mother-type of yours I hope you made her feel appreciated!

Wishing all of the mothers out there a very special Mother’s Day Week!

Questions of the Day

• Have you attended or do you plan on attending any of your High School Reunions?

• If you have been to one, was it more formal or casual? Do tell any fun stories!