Galveston Daycation :)

This past Saturday was one of the best days Landon and I have spent together in a long time.  The previous week had been just exhausting in a lot of ways and as the week came to a close we joked about canceling everything we had to do on Saturday and just staying in bed all day!  I can't tell you how appealing that sounded. :)  But, we had workouts and obligations and things to do, so I knew that would never happen, as nice as it sounded.  And, everything we had to do was fun, we were just plain worn out.

The weekend began officially on Friday night, as we met up after work to have dinner with some good friends, Matt and Rachel, at Maggiano's by the Galleria.  We've been talking about going there with them for probably a couple of years now, because they love it and Matt kept telling me they have the best eggplant parmesan in town, which is one of my favorite foods ever.  Then, for Christmas and our birthday's this year, Landon's grandparents gave us some Chili's giftcards, which we found out we could use at Maggiano's, so we jumped at the chance.  It was such a fun night--the food was awesome and we had fun just spending some low key time with friends.  

Then, while we were heading out of the restaurant, Landon got a phone call from the woman we bought our crib from, asking if we wanted to come and pick up the mattress that went with the crib that night, as opposed to the following morning, like we had planned.  Since we were out already, we headed over to get it and then went home and crashed, with plans to sleep in a little, go look at bedding at Pottery Barn Kids and then head home to get everything done we had on the calendar for that day.

Which is (kind of) just what we did. :)  Since I've been pregnant, I seem to have lost the ability to really sleep in, so by about 8am I was wide awake, which was sad because I woke Landon up and he couldn't go back to sleep either.  So a little while later, we were up and getting ready to head over to look at bedding.  In hindsight, the fact that Landon came out of the bedroom dressed in his hawaiian shirt and jeans does seem a little odd to me, but at the time when I asked him about it and he told me it was just that kind of day, it didn't seem that weird.  And, I knew we probably wouldn't see anyone we knew at PBK, so I just went with it.

We had a fun morning hanging out and talking and dreaming about baby nursery things (though PBK didn't have the bedding we wanted to see, which was a bummer) and then Landon told me he was going to take me home a different way, to show me a back way into our part of town.  I guess if he was really trying to show me a new way to our neighborhood, I probably should have been paying more attention to how we were going, but obviously I wasn't because the first time I really looked around me (aside from when we were nearing U of H and I thought it was a little weird that we were on that part of town) was when I looked up and saw the sign that said Stewart Beach and realized we were in Galveston and not anywhere close to home!  He had driven us all the way across town, over the bridge with ocean on either side of us, without me even realizing where we were.  I felt crazy--I must have been really into what we were talking about, ha!

After I realized we really were in Galveston, I freaked out a little because it dawned on me that I was supposed to be having lunch with a friend in 30 minutes.  And that's when he told me that he was skipping his long workout that day and had basically cleared our schedules, and rescheduled my lunch with my college roommate for the next day.  It was an awesome feeling to think that we suddenly had a day away to do whatever we wanted!

We pulled in to a little parking lot across the street and he opened the trunk and showed me all he had packed the night before (all after I went to sleep!).  He had a change of clothes and workout clothes and snacks and towels and reading materials and the camera and basically everything we could possibly need.  It was perfect.

We decided to grab some lunch first and then he told me he would do my 10 mile walk with me, since that was what was on my training plan that day for my half marathon.  So, after a sandwich at McAllister's Deli, we changed into our workout clothes and headed down the seawall.  It was wonderful.  Because of some crazy fog that had rolled in to town, the weather was actually nice and cool and it wasn't super crowded.  We just walked and talked the whole way down the seawall (and didn't talk about any of the craziness that had been going on this last week!) and it was absolutely perfect. Three hours just to talk to him, without anything else going on--I was in heaven, ha! :)

After our walk, we grabbed a little Frosty at Wendy's to reward ourselves and then headed down to the beach--which we basically had to ourselves.  It was awesome.  We spread out our towels and pulled out our books and magazines (and the Girl Scout cookies Landon surprised me with) and relaxed.  Even though we were only an hour away from home, it really did kinda feel like we were somewhere else on vacation, which was so needed.  As we lay there, we didn't even really talk, we just read and listened to the waves crash on the shore and let the stress fade away (or at least into the background for a while).  How different life would be if we really, truly took a Sabbath like that, where we literally did not work for a whole day, but rested and focused on God, every week. 

Landon, I love you more and more as the days and years go by.  You know me so well and lead our family perfectly.  Thank you for knowing what we needed and for making it happen--one day I'll learn how to surprise you like you always manage to surprise me. :)

And to our sweet baby boy--I think the ocean lulled you to sleep just like it does to your momma.  I hope you liked it, because I guarantee you it is only the first of many trips we'll be taking to the beach in your lifetime! :)