I'm Back!

 I just returned from a week in St. Petersburg and boy, re-entry is difficult! I had such a great time. If we weren't off just having fun, I was tagging along with my daughter to some of her design clients or shopping for her clients (or ourselves) or just helping her finish her new design studio...it was all so much fun! And, it is never a trip to St. Pete without lots of walking, laughing and eating. I like to think that all of the walking counteracts all of the eating. Lol

My first full day down there we went to the Van Gogh Live exhibit at the Dali Museum. It was quite the experience. All of the rooms in the one area were saturated with one painting at a time - some the full painting, others were close ups of parts of the painting. Then, when you least expected it, parts of the painting would come to life. It was very hard to take pictures of because, #1, the images were huge and projected everywhere and #2, you didn't want to miss anything by looking through a camera lens. It was really beautiful and I managed a few shots.

After the exhibit, we headed to The Library - a restaurant in downtown St. Pete. It is the first time I was there and it was delicious!

We had the most delicious roasted brussel sprouts as an appetizer and then I had a Fried Green Tomato BLT...minus the B. Lol I let them put it on but then gave it to my grand daughter as I am not much of a meat eater.

I was having so much fun that I didn't get many other pictures until daughter #3 and grand daughter #5 arrived on Friday afternoon for the rest of the weekend. We spent Friday sitting on the porch, talking and ordering in food from one of our favorite restaurants... gotta love Uber Eats! I will say that we were soooo lucky with the weather! The temps were in the 80s but there was very little humidity and the wind was enough to not only keep everything cool but to also keep the mosquitoes at bay. It was the PERFECT porch sitting weather and we did a lot of it! 

Saturday morning we started walking. My daughter lives in the historic district so there are so many pretty things to see as we walk and, it is only a short distance to downtown. It was wonderful to see a bit of the return to normalcy. It took us a while to decide on a restaurant for lunch but we made a great choice. We decided on The Park Shore Grill. Kris eats there often but it was, again, new to me.

After a long, leisurely lunch, we walked to one of Presley's favorite places, Sweet Divas. And of course, we had to get one of almost everything! Lol

Armed with our bag of goodies, we strolled through the park and made our way to another favorite destination - the veranda at the beautiful Vinoy Hotel. There is just something about sitting on the veranda, having a glass of wine (or two), looking at all of the beautiful boats docked across the street and wiling away an afternoon. 

Presley had never been here before and she was actually very excited to learn about the history of the hotel. She found a "tour" to listen to on her phone and then set off to see the halls, gardens, grand ballrooms, etc. in person.

We hopped on the trolley for a few blocks and then made it home right as grand daughter #4 was getting home from work.

We did a bit of a smorgasbord for dinner...a bit of charcuterie and then lots of air fried veggies with a delicious aoli that Olivia made for us! And, we ate as we played games...for the rest of the evening. 

And, after milking as much breakfast time on the porch as we could, we headed home. It is always so much fun down there and always so hard to leave! But, I am back and getting back to reality. I have a few appointments this week but then I think I will start my 4th of July decorating. We are supposed to have a scorcher of a week so the idea of staying in doesn't bother me at all. My grandson does have his spring football game Friday night and it is supposed to be HOT but I'm hoping we can set up a tailgate in some shade and manage to get through the evening. And then, I am dog sitting for the holiday weekend...should be fun!

I have a quick little 4th of July craft I will try to fit in as well so I'll be back. Stay safe and stay tuned.