surprise!

the past month has been a whirlwind.  getting ready for vacation, spending nearly two weeks in beautiful espana (separate vacation blog with pics to come), then back to the grind and trying to catch up on work, grocery shopping, cleaning, catching up with the bf and friends, etc.  it's been crazy town around here. 

knowing my dad's birthday was coming up less than two weeks after i got back from vacation, i assumed i wouldn't really want to travel out of town again that soon and was just planning to send a card and make a happy birthday phone call.  however, early last week as i was addressing the card and affixing the stamp, i thought to self, "maybe i could just drive down for the weekend..."  surprisingly self agreed (she doesn't usually) and added, "well, we are off work friday afternoon and could be down there by dinner time."  i texted my mom and told her i was thinking of coming down to surprise my dad on his birthday and she said that would be great.  the bf also happened to have friday off and wanted to come along and just like that, the plan was made.

luckily for me, my two dear friends work for an airline and happened to have extra buddy passes, so the bf and i were able to fly to and from SDF instead of making the 5 hour drive each way.  that was such a nice change to the trip and really, really made it more enjoyable.  thanks a&g! 

my dad had no idea we were coming, though he finally figured it out when they had to park at the airport and come in to wait for us since our flight was running just a little behind schedule.  but up until that point, he had no clue.  it was so fun to surprise him and then go out for a nice dinner in louisville with my parents.  we had some great food at the makers mark lounge and then some post-dinner drinks at ri-ra, which was a favorite watering hole of mine when i lived in charlotte so i had to check out the new one in the ville!  saturday some of my parents' crazy (in a good way) friends met up with us and we all went to a local art fair.  that night we grilled out and had lots of cocktails out on the porch.  sunday we got to hang out with my parents more and finally left for the airport around 4pm. i think we helped make my dad's birthday a great time! 

jim and lyn at ri-ra: (the pic is a little grainy because it was dark in the pub)