Working Vacation

Last week found us back in Raleigh. Well, that's not how I should lead. I should lead with the big news:

MIKE PASSED HIS LICENSING EXAM!!!!!

So now he can officially work in North Carolina - which is he doing! Mike already has a dental building job all lined up which will probably break ground this fall. This week has been filled with meetings for Mike pertaining to this job along with keeping up with ongoing jobs in Ohio. The kids and I have mostly been staying at the campground during the day while Mike is working.

We arrived late Saturday, July 30th and headed off to church Sunday morning. Our "new" church has been meeting in a high school while it built a new church building and this is was the last Sunday they met in the school. Afterwards, we were all looking forward to eating at Gypsy's Shiny Diner again. After picking up a few supplies at Target, the kids were begging to swim so we headed back to the campground for a while. Later we explored a new-to-us leg of the Neuse River Trail on our bikes. We ended up at the other side of the same bridge that was out we had encountered on a previous ride.

We stopped for dinner at Venero's Pizzeria and now we know where to find good Italian food!

The kids and I spent Monday at the campground while Mike worked at his shared office space in Raleigh. Later on we did some school clothes shopping at a nearby outlet mall which was stressful and yet a relief all rolled into one. When we get back I'll have a week to get the kids all ready for school and have Sydney's birthday party. Apparently we like to just run full steam ahead 100% of the time.

Mike had two business meetings in Wilmington on Tuesday morning so we tagged along. I had him drop the kids and I off at the River Walk and we explored all over until Mike was done and joined us. We even took a scenic river tour which was really enjoyable and even a little educational!

After the boat ride the kids were begging for something sweet so we found The Peppered Cupcake and did not regret it! Corban and I tried the Peach and Lavender Cobbler - it was unique and delicious (and I was so proud of him for trying something new and different!). Sydney and Jared tried the Chocolate Revelation and Jared declared it, "the best cupcake I've ever had!"

 We finally met up with Mike at The Cotton Exchange and had fun exploring the little shops there before heading to The Pilot House Restaurant for lunch.

Afterwards, we made our way back to Mike's truck and headed across the river to explore The Battleship North Carolina. We were in a bit of a hurry because we'd left our dog, Katy, back at the camper. Google said that most people spend an hour and a half at the battleship. Well, we aren't most people and even though we knew we needed to hurry it took us about three hours to explore the ship! It was fascinating!

We have already decided that Wilmington is definitely a place we will be visiting again! At one point Mike looked at me with joy and said, "You know this place will only be 2 hours from where we're going to live?!"

Wednesday and Thursday were both workdays for Mike while the kids and I kept ourselves busy. This whole move thing is getting a little more real when real life starts happening down here, too.

Friday was a little more of a fun day. We started off with another meeting with a real estate agent. You may remember that we met with one is March and we loved her. We still do, but we have now met one, Tracy, who goes to our new church and is more familiar with the area we are looking at moving to. She seems like a great fit for us, so now we have more choices to make, although thankfully I feel good either way.

After that, I dropped Mike off at his office space and we met up with our friends from The Funny Farm at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. First, though, we walked to lunch at The Side Street Restaurant in Raleigh, a place we found when we had lunch with our friends last year. Corban has been begging to go back ever since to get his favorite meal. It consists of an English Muffin topped with peanut butter, marshmallow, raisins, carrots, apples and honey. What?! But he loves it and was one very happy boy!
(Also, look who got contact lenses!)

Later in the afternoon we picked Mike back up and revisited the North Carolina Museum of History where there was a WWI exhibit Mike had been wanting to see. It was incredibly well done and explained the complicated events that led up to the war so well I still feel like I could explain it to you. After a quick(ish) but delicious dinner at The Pit, we finally went back "home" for the evening.

See? Delicious! Corban is showing how big the burger was before he smashed it to try to eat it.

Let me tell you about Saturday. Are you bored yet? Sorry! Of course we started out at the Apex Farmer's Market. We also brought Katy along for the trip. Mostly we leave her at the camper so she was excited to join us, but she didn't know we had an ulterior motive: She was stinky! So Mike found a dog wash in Fuquay Varina and in we zipped. She was not pleased.

Afterwards, we had a great lunch at an old fashioned fast food stand called RJ's Place Fast Food. It is not to be missed! Also, how I am not 1,100 lbs after each trip is an utter mystery.

Later on, we ordered the kids some carry out pizza for dinner and Mike and I headed over to SoDoSoPa for a dinner date night. Honestly, it was such a quiet gift after a crazy week.

 We headed to church Sunday morning. It was the first morning for the new Summit Apex Church building and traffic was backed up to the expressway and we had to park in the overflow lot. How cool! Somehow, they had seating for everyone. Jared was very excited to move up to the middle school programming and all the kids had fun and can’t wait to go back.

After lunch at The Blistered Pig in Apex we went back to the campground and chilled out a bit. We all needed a day of rest!