January Getaway

 At Avery, this is the way vacation hours work. You accrue a certain number of hours every pay period. But your vacation bank has a max. So, if you don't use enough hours, you stop accruing them until you use some vacation time. I try to make sure Andrew never gets to that max. Ha! But, when we looked at his pay stub this month, we saw that he was there. Unacceptable! So, he took a random Friday off of work and we decided to take a little overnight getaway. We wanted to stay close by so we could come home quickly if the girls had an emergency. We had the best time!

First stop: Lexington, NC.

Lexington is only about half an hour from home, but we hadn't ever been there. It is a great town and we'd love to go back when it's not so cold.

We stopped at the Davidson County Historical Museum,

which is housed in the old pillared courthouse behind us.

It is a GREAT museum. We had the place to ourselves

and learned a lot about the history of the area.

(But didn't take a lot of pictures.)

There is a photographer who is from the area that had

a lot of displays up, but photos were off-limits in his galleries.

Andrew is bigger than the old-timey jail cells. :)

Main St in Lexington has some really cute stores.

We only stopped in two.

First, the River House Emporium,

which was super cute.

We mostly window-shopped there,

but I did find a great hand-made pottery bowl

to replace one that broke recently.

Their displays were super cute.

The other store we stopped at was The Candy Factory.

It is the CUTEST old fashioned candy store.

We did more than window shop there. Ha!

In fact, when we checked out, the nice woman asked us,

"Is that bag going to be too heavy?"

THAT'S what you want to hear when you're leaving a candy store. :)

They had some old records in the back 

that made me think of B-train.

Lexington is known for their barbeque,

so there are pig statues all over town.

I had checked with a friend from Lexington to ask for recommendations

of where to eat. She gave a long list, but we ended up

choosing Yarborough's. 

It's an older mom-and-pop place that is nothing to look at,

but had GREAT food at reasonable prices. We loved our lunch there.

After lunch, we snagged a quick geocache.

Then out to Boone Cave Park for a little hike.

The cave was on the side of a hill where the sun doesn't

shine, so there were lots of icicles around.

It looked so cool!

It was a good-sized cave inside. Fun to explore for a minute.

Next, we were off to Winston-Salem, where we stayed for the night.

I booked a room at Graylyn estate.

It's a GORGEOUS old estate right in the heart of Winston.

Isn't it awesome?

We LOVED it.

Every estate should have...

an ice cream room!

With cool tile work.

A BUTLER showed us to the ice cream room.

What????

I don't think a butler has shown me anywhere before!

Except, this wasn't quite what I was picturing

for the Ice Cream Room...

It was a mini freezer with ice cream bars in it. Ha!

But they had Choco Tacos!

Which we hadn't tasted in years.

And we could take as much as we wanted.

So we helped ourselves.

And the Choco Tacos were yummy.

There are several buildings on the estate where you can book a room.

I decided to book a room in the Gardener's Cottage.

It was cute, but if we go back, I'll choose a room in the main estate instead.

It just feels more regal there.

But our room was cute and cozy.

And we didn't cross paths with any other guests,

which is a nice perk during a pandemic.

The bathroom was really cute.

We explored the grounds a bit before the sun went down.

The walking paths are busy. Graylyn is right next to Wake Forest University's campus, so there were lots of college students who go for walks on the beautiful grounds. We came to the rescue of a woman who's dog had gotten off his leash. That was an adventure.

Went out for Mexican dinner at Xcaret.

It was actually my third choice of Mexican restaurants.

I LOVE Alma Mexicana, but it is closed temporarily for COVID.

So I chose Crafted: The Art of the Taco, but I was mistaken

about their closing time and we missed it by twenty minutes... oops.

So, I'm glad Xcaret was nearby and open late!

AND they had vegetable tamales, which are one of my favorites.

Yum, yum, yum.

The next morning, we slept in.

And Andrew did church e-mails for a while.

(He spends HOURS every week on church email.)

I read and played word games on my phone.

Then we explored more of the inside of the big house.

Cool spirally staircase

Intricate doorways

This dining room was completely wall-papered

with tiles from a mosque in Constantinople.

So cool!

The dining room

I loved these flower arrangements.

Fancy windows

One of my favorite rooms:

the indoor swimming pool,

which has been converted to a 

socially distanced dining area.

Cool arched door

I think this was an altar from a Hindu temple in India

This is a portrait of the woman of the house,

Mrs. Gray. She's holding tobacco blossoms, 

which is how her family made their money.

The library

With a really cool chess set

And some cute miniature tea sets

And I thought this little kids' chair and sofa were adorable.

When we left the lap of luxury behind us,

we stopped at a nearby museum, SECCA,

Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art.

There were some beautiful pieces,

some disturbing ones,

and others that left us scratching our heads.

This kite was amazing.

I liked the depth in these pieces.

This was one of my favorites.

I love the way the words spill over

like a waterfall.

Shark teeth art.

They had an old vending machine that used to sell packs of cigarettes.

It has been converted into an "Art-o-mat" machines.

you can purchase small pieces of art for five bucks.

What a great idea!

We got two and I love them both.

Our last stop was in Thomasville.

The city website has three different self-guided

walking tours you can do through town:

A commerce one, a historical homes one, and one for historical churches.

I downloaded all three of them.

We started with the commerce one, but it was super boring.

We gave up after reading about the brick work on the third business...

But the tour of historic homes was great!

These were a couple of my favorites.

The churches weren't quite what I expected, but they were ok.

They also have some fun murals around town.

Pepsi is "Very Healthful"???

Gremlins???

And, of course we had to get our picture taken by the iconic giant chair.

Having older kids is awesome. So glad we can leave them at home for little getaways like this. I love having time with Andrew. And we both love exploring this part of the state. It's awesome that we've been here for over 17 years and there's still lots of places where we've never been. Many of the places we visited were in our stake, so it's fun for Andrew to have a better idea where they are, too. Hooray for random days off!

Spotlight 2021: Andrea

Andrea, 40-something

Highlights from 2020: The year of the global COVID-19 pandemic. We were quarantined from mid-March through mid-May and hardly left the house. We didn't put gas in either of our cars for over a month! Since I am the adventurer of the family, I would not have chosen to stay home that much. But we found ways to entertain ourselves and had a lot of fun as a family. Brandon moved home for those two months because both of his jobs shut down. But he moved back to St. George when they re-opened. Our big spring break plans to go to Universal Orlando and visit the Wizarding World of Harry Potter got cancelled. I was SO sad about that. I'm still sad about that, actually. AND I decided not to take the annual road trip, either. I was too afraid that I would infect people that we visited, many of whom are considered high-risk. The girls and I took day trips around the area instead, which I LOVED. 

Some of my favorites were hiking Crowder's Mountain (even though it was REALLY hard and we wanted to give up sometimes), 

hiking Mount Mitchell (the highest peak east of the Mississippi) 

and Grayson Highlands (where we got to see the adorable wild ponies again). 

The Young Women's organization in our church celebrated their 150th anniversary. In conjunction with that, the YW general presidency invited us to set goals related to the number 150. I set two. First, I decided I wanted to add 150 names into our family tree. This was a GREAT project to keep me working on something productive during quarantine. And I did it! So satisfying! The second goal I set with Whitney and Caroline to walk/hike 150 miles. We started tracking ourselves in June. We counted all of our hikes during our day trips. And we would go on walks around the neighborhood a few times a week. I loved spending that time with them! By the time school started in August, we were over 100 miles, but still well short of 150. The girls kind of petered out, but I continued going on walks and tracking my miles and made it to 150 in October. Yay!

In September, Andrew's parents came out to visit. We got a beach house in Carolina Beach and had a FANTASTIC time together.

And then at the end of the year, Brandon came home for month at Christmas time. We took a few days between Christmas and New Year's and drove down to Daytona Beach, FL. We rented a cute house and had a wonderful time exploring and being together.

*Something you're good at: Being happy

*Something you're proud of: That my kids are willing to work hard

*Something you earned, won, or accomplished: Stacey and I won our Racquets and Jackets league! There were only three teams in the league, but still! I took third place in Fantasy Football. I renewed my AZ dental hygiene license. 

*If you could sum up the year in one phrase, what would it be? Social distancing. Those were two words and I had never heard together until March. And now they are a constant part of our vocabulary and conversation.

*Any other notable changes/events for 2020: I got released from being a seminary teacher after four years. I was so sad to let that calling go! I loved starting my morning with amazing young men and young women, discussing the gospel and learning together. It was a growing experience and I'm so thankful I had the chance to serve.

At the end of August, I was called to serve as second counselor in the YW presidency. Glenda Leinbach is the president, Mendy Greenwood is the first counselor, and Laura Dudley is the secretary. Even though I was so sad to leave seminary, I LOVE serving with these women and am so happy that I still get to work with the youth. At this point in the pandemic, we are allowed to have in-person activities every Tuesday night. (Although we usually choose to do half in-person and half virtual.) We haven't started meeting in-person for second-hour Sunday meetings. We have been having a Sunday lesson for YW once a month on zoom.

Follow-up from last year's hopes:

*That Andrew's calling will get easier as he adjusts to his new church responsibilities. 

Hmmm... Well, it got a lot worse before it got better. Guiding our stake through a global pandemic was AWFUL. So stressful. It was incredibly difficult to watch Andrew struggle through that and to feel that there was nothing I could do to help lift his burden. March through July were rough months to be a stake president. So many missionaries to bring home and each call seemed super urgent. And then working through how to safely return to worship and feeling the burden of making sure no one would get sick from coming to church. Thankfully, Andrew had experiences from work that helped guide him. And his counselors and bishops are wonderful. So they made it through! And while his calling is still hard, it's not as overwhelming as it was at some points in the year.

*That Brandon will keep his GPA above a 3.5 to keep his scholarship at Dixie. 

Hmmmm... I don't think that happened. Again, I blame COVID. Brandon struggled with online classes. He is a social kid and feels like he learns better in-person where he can ask questions and more easily form study-groups. He was failing a class in fall semester that his advisor told him he should drop. Even then, I think his GPA has dropped below 3.5. He is taking this first semester of 2021 off of school and just working. He'll start back up in Fall 2021 and has a grace period to get his GPA back up where it needs to be. Fingers crossed he can do it.

*That we'll have a fun spring break trip to Universal Studios in Orlando. Especially looking forward to visiting the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. Yay yay yay!

Didn't happen. Boo.

*That we'll have a fun summer. Not sure yet if we're going to road trip or not. Both girls want to go to church girls camp, which might mess up my plans...

We managed to do some fun things this summer, but it was far different than what we had imagined.

Hopes for 2021:

*That the COVID vaccines that have been invented will help alleviate this pandemic so we can resume many of our normal activities. I especially miss going to the temple, which I haven't been able to attend since March.

*That I can continue to volunteer at NAI and anywhere else that works with my schedule.

*That my girls can have successful school years. They are still doing remote learning right now, but should be returning to in-person learning in the next month.

*Vacation plans: Girls trip to the Gulf Coast of TX with my sisters at the end of April. I hope I can visit with Grandma Cuca. She turns 90 this year and I'd love to celebrate with her somehow. Attend Grandma Hiatt's memorial service in Utah in July. Celebrate Barb and Dennis' 50th wedding anniversary at the Oregon Coast in August.

Hobbies: Board games, video games, traveling, tennis, walking/hiking, and I learned how to knit over quarantine.

Something you like about being a homemaker: Super flexible schedule, especially when I don't have to drive kids to school or dance/sports. 

Something you don't like about being a homemaker: Dishes

A job you might want when you're older: Teaching English as a second language

A compliment you receive on a regular basis: Your laugh is contagious!

What can usually make you smile? Playing tennis

What do you most enjoy doing when you're alone? Reading, playing word games on my phone, listening to podcasts, playing the piano

If you could have a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world, where would you go? New Zealand!

What's the best gift you've ever given? Not sure, but I think the best gift I gave this year was to surprise Andrew with an excursion to go Flounder Gigging while we were in Florida. He LOVED it. Brandon and I were able to go with him. He'd love to do it again. And we've continued to enjoy the fish that we caught! Yum!

What's your dream car? A Lotus

How has your personality changed in the last ten years? That's hard to say. But I think I've become less stubborn and more flexible. When I was younger, if I felt like I was right about something, I had a really hard time changing my mind. An example is the way that we vacation. Personally, I feel like we need to take advantage of every moment while we're on traveling. I don't want to miss anything. Let's wake up early and go to bed late and take in everything that we can while we're here! But that's exhausting. And Andrew hates that. He is up for adventures, but wants to have them in moderation. And have plenty of time to just chill and relax. I've realized that I don't have to be RIGHT about that. We can both have our preferences and I can plan our vacation to include time for both adventure AND relaxation.

FAVORITES:

Restaurant: Southern Roots, QDoba, Mi Pueblo, US Sushi

Sport:  Football to watch, tennis to play

Recent reads: Joyful by Ingrid Fetell Lee, I Am Malala, The Answer Is... by Alex Trebek, Kon-Tiki

Candy or other treat: Chocolate covered cinnamon bears, Sprees, Smarties, Mint Oreo shakes from Cookout

Color: Red, black, purple, turquoise

Snack: Popcorn, crackers and cheese, grapes

TV show:  Survivor, Downton Abbey (rewatching with Whitney this year, so fun!), Jeopardy, The Amazing Race, World of Dance

Place:  The beach, the temple, and the Blue Ridge Parkway

Season:  Spring

Meal:  Chicken and rice and beans with homemade tortillas, especially if made by Grandma Cuca

Song: Hamilton soundtrack, Sunflower from the Spider-Man soundtrack, pretty much anything that we can harmonize to when we sing along.

Game:  Pandemic, Space Invaders, Coin Pushing, Azul, Jackbox

App: Words With Friends, Yahoo Fantasy Football, Snapchat (Brandon is my only friend, but I love getting videos from him), Among Us (that was a favorite to play this year, but we've stopped playing lately), Psych (a new one that the whole family downloaded and is super fun to play together and I almost always win. Ha!)

Podcasts: Duolingo, Freakonomics, BYU Speeches, Y Religion, Radiolab, Planet Money

RANDOM FACT: When the church changed from visiting teaching to ministering, I had a difficult time with that transition. I felt like I was a good visiting teacher and I didn't feel like I was a good ministering sister. I just wasn't quite sure what to do. It was a struggle. Sometime during the pandemic, I decided I wanted to text my ministering sisters at least once a week to touch base with them. So I put a reminder in my phone. I have five sisters assigned to me. One of them doesn't respond to my texts, so I give her space. But the other four I text with on a weekly basis. It has been a great way to stay in touch with them and feel like I'm involved in the details of their lives.

One of my ministering sisters, Yoanh, is a young single adult. She started dating a guy, Pha, who was not a member of the church this summer. He would come to church with her. They are such a cute couple. He liked what he heard. He started taking the missionary discussions. I was able to join several of them through zoom. He is awesome. And he chose to be baptized in December. I got to speak at his baptism. I loved being able to share in that experience with them.