Gone Fishin' and Shoppin'

The guys went fishing this morning!  It took a little bit to outfit Jeremy and Caeden with "fitting" and fishing-appropriate clothes.

Cousin buddies

I tried out the fishing hat.

Now these are some of my most favorite dudes!

We ladies went to Glenbrook Mall in Fort Wayne.  I had promised Annah for her birthday (8 months ago!!!) she could get her ears triple pierced, so I finally made good on it today.

She is pretty happy with the results.

Always fun to shop with Aunt Erin and cousin Tess!!!

Jeremy and Travis were playing Wii Mario Kart when we returned.

Gram was making us tacos for supper!!!

6 grandkids on the porch

Storytime with Jeremy

We decided to check out the new ice cream place in 'Busco!  Tess went with us, and Caeden went with Travis and Erin and the boys.

We played with Snapchat filters on the way!  Toooooo funny!

Apparently it only filters 1 or 2 faces at a time, not 3.

So many choices of hard ice cream at Otto's!

Caeden ordered a lemon poppyseed shake!

I see some birthday cake ice cream there!

3 sweet treats with their sweet treats

Kids table!

This place is so cute!!

More Snapchat filter fun!

What a wonderful full and fun day!

The kids all had youth group sleepovers tonight, so Jeremy and I planned to finally go see Endgame before it's out of the theater. However, we didn't get Caeden dropped off at his sleepover until 7:15, and we were too tired to even think about seeing a 7:45 movie--especially one that's more than 3 hours long.  We are officially old.

Instead, Jeremy said we had to get some ice cream.  We went for Oberweiss.  

They have some yummy summer berry flavors!

We went home and were going to watch a movie there, but couldn't decide on anything and fell asleep.  I think our kids' teenage summer schedule is exhausting us!  They stay up into the wee hours, which keeps us from sleeping well, but we get up early and then feel like zombies all day while they sleep til late morning!

19 Years

This evening, we attended a funeral visitation for a friend we had gone to church with when we first moved here.  We hadn't even known she was ill, and are so sad for her family.  It was also a harsh reminder of how quickly time passes and how much we take life for granted.

 Since today is our anniversary, we decided to go out for dinner while we were in town, and let the kids fend for themselves for supper!  We had dinner at Chili's, then went next-door to Oberweiss for ice cream.  It was the first time we've been in since it opened over a year ago.

We foolishly ordered 2 scoops each, and were so full we could barely walk out!

But maaaaaaaaannnnnn, was it goooood!!!!!!

When we got home, all 3 kids were singing together, practicing for Sylvia's and Caeden's auditions for the vocal jazz ensemble tomorrow!  Music to our ears--and hearts!

It is amazing how quickly 19 years have passed.  I'm sure I probably said the same thing last year about 18 years, but it is true.  I don't know how we got here already, but I wouldn't want to walk through all the craziness of life with anyone else but Jeremy Lopshire!  How blessed we are.

After we dropped the girls off, we drove around until we found somewhere we wanted to eat. We stopped at Texas Roadhouse--always a favorite!

Cora and I were messaging back and forth, and decided we would all meet up back at Cap in the Conservatory in the fishbowl!  She and Josh were SO kind to drive  up from Jackson to spend a little time with us while their girls were competing in a writing competition today.

OHHHH, it did my heart good to see and hug these guys!!!

Since our decision to get to Columbus was pretty last minute, and we knew we wouldn't even be around for 24 hours, Cora and Josh were the only people I contacted to see if they would be around.  It turned out, it had been a few years since they'd been on campus too.

We actually just stayed in the fishbowl (lobby) and just talked and talked for a couple hours!  Then we all went into watch the end of the choral workshop.

Afterwards, we walked across the street to Graeter's!

The world's best ice cream, and some of the world's best friends!

These guys were tired, but pretty happy about the ice cream!  

We sat and chatted for a couple more hours after we finished our ice cream, and I think it was about 6:30 when we finally said goodbye to Cora and Josh and headed out.  

Jeremy decided we would try to make it all the way back home tonight, rather than spend another $150 for a hotel room.  We reached Indiana just before 8:15.  It was still raining, as it had been all weekend.

About 10 minutes later, the rain turned to sleet, then snow!  Big snow flakes, falling fast!

It started sticking to the roads and everything else!  We started seeing cars, pickups, and even horse trailer that had gone off the interstate in the snow, and I started looking online for the closest hotel we could book!  

I booked a room in Greenfield, Indiana, about half an hour east yet of Indianapolis, but we still had half an hour to get there in the snow and mess that was accumulating!

Hello Country Inn and Suites.

We stopped at Culver's, basically across the road from the hotel for a quick late supper.  The storm was so bad, the power kept going off in the restaurant. Many times their generator kicked in while we tried to finish eating quickly!

We stopped at Walmart quickly so Jeremy could "run in" and get something, and his shoes got ruined in the snow and slush that covered the parking lot!  

We went back to the hotel and crashed for the night.  It was a bummer not to make it home, but we were grateful to be safe and off the road!!!