Vacation and a Birthday

It started off rainy and took us forever to get there, but was well worth the crazy traffic we endured. Check out Carolina Designs (#157 Gardenia) for all the details on the house we got.

Of course we had our obligatory gigantic bowl of M&M's. These were gone by Monday afternoon, which is actually close to record M&M consumption standards for our group.


Six bags of M&M's (plain, peanut, almond)

This was the 20th anniversary of the OBX trip. Of the original group, in this Kill Devil Hills house was Freddy, William, Rosa and Shaun (who was 8 on his first trip).


Kevin presents a 20th OBX Anniversary gift to Freddy



Chillin' out the first night

We had great weather throughout the weekend. A bit of rain Tuesday morning and cloudy Tuesday afternoon and rainy when we left the house Wednesday, but most of the time, it was very sunny.


Stacey and Mom Baltz

Sunday night, I cooked a beef curry, a chicken curry and some sauteed zucchini. Mom Baltz put together the salad and Rosa cooked some chicken tenders for the kids. Check my food blog for more details on that meal.


Goofballs giving thanks for curry

We had delicious cherry pie for dessert and watched "Wedding Crashers" in the house's movie theater.

Monday morning, we went to Stack 'Em High for breakfast. This was only my second time there, but I have to say their pancakes are the best. We all spent the day hanging by the pool. This is rather unusual for this group, as we're normally on the beach, playing volleyball, soaking up the sun. KDH beaches are a lot narrower than the ones towards Corolla, where we usually stay. The "sand" was mostly crushed shells. So, the conditions weren't there for setting up a volleyball net.


Leave a caption for this in the comments!

Monday night, we grilled some fabulous steaks and kielbasa and William made his famous mashed potatoes. I sauteed some cabbage and Mom Baltz made another salad for us. Of course I forgot to take pics! You'll just have to imagine the feast.

Tuesday was my big day. I'm so thankful to have celebrated with great friends and family, although I wish more of you could have been there/stayed for the day. After a yummy breakfast at Sam & Omie's in Nag's Head, I was ready for my traditional b-day B-52.


John preps the shots


Celebratory 40th B-day B-52 shots

Many thanks to everyone for all my presents! I am truly blessed to have such generous friends and family! Here's a present that will go with my graying hair:


40th Birthday prezzies from Kevin & Rosa

John drove me up and down Rt 12 looking for Quagmire's, a bar Mike & Diane have been to a couple times. No sign of the joint. Sad. I wanted to go there for my birthday. Instead, we went to my second choice, Dirty Dick's. I wanted to get some blue crabs, but they had a special AYCE on snow crab legs and shrimp. Mary Beth, Freddy and I got this deal and MB and I got crab legs first while Freddy got shrimp.


A pound of crab legs


A pound of shrimp

MB got a second platter of legs. I gave up after one round. They were meaty and delicious, but I couldn't do it. Freddy looked full, but kept muttering, "I'm just gettin' started." He ordered crab lebs for round two, but needed help getting the meat out of the shells.


MB helps Freddy crack his crab legs

During dinner, I kept thinking of Shaun (aka Jake) who would have given MB some competition on the crab legs. Sadly, they had to leave earlier that evening to head home and couldn't join us for dinner. We got back to the house and I was greeted with a yummy cake!



Shortly afterwards, I pretty much crashed in my room with a belly full of crab legs, margarita and cake...

We were sad to leave Wednesday morning, but the rain made it easier to go. A stop into Knitting Addiction, my favorite OBX yarn store netted me some new yarns. Did I mention how cheap gas is in the south? We actually found it a couple cents cheaper after we filled up.



Thursday, we slept in very late and went to the mall, book store and DSW. At some point during the day, my right big toe developed an infection. It must have been from Tuesday when I trimmed my toe nails and went into the hot tub at the beach. It took 2 days for infection to set in. YUCK! It's all swollen and puss-y. I'll spare you the picture (on my NEW digital camera! Thanks Johnny!). I'm hoping the cleanings with alcohol and all the Neosporin I've thrown at it since last night will make it better by tomorrow for Bianca and Jay's wedding.

Hope everyone had a wonderful week! I would have kept my faithful readers up to date on my vacation, but I was having too much fun. It definitely would have been easier to have almost daily updates than one big post. Oh well... next time!