Yes yes, I know, you were all eagerly awaiting this post: The reason behind my visit to Ohio, and really do I need a reason to visit my hometown? ....I think not!
However, I've never gone home (from Grad. School to Ohio) without some reason:
November = My birthday and Thanksgiving
December/January = Christmas/New Years
May =
1) Mother's Day
2) Sister's Birthday
3) Niece's Birthday
4) Garage Sale Day
(and obviously to spend as much time with my family and hometown friends as possible!!!!)
Hmmm...I hadn't really realized that before. I never go home 'just because', but really if I did go home some random weekend in say...September, my family would have to work, my friends in school (undergrad., grad., Law), or teaching school, would all have...well...school. So I guess its o.k. that I go home for reasons, because when I'm there....my people are there. Simple as that!
So without further ado I give you: Ohio In Pictures (with captions of course!)
So this picture would fall under the 'mother's day' realm. It was actually taken on Friday and not Sunday, but it was at the mother-daughter banquet hosted by my Mom's Church. Now this could be another post entirely, but the women always make/prepare food for the men on Father's day...however, a few WOMEN in the church make the food for the mother-daughter banquet and then the men just serve it. How this is fair, I haven't a clue, but I think that if they can't make the food they should at least have it catered! (And I'm pretty sure my mama would agree with me on that one!)
This is my sister (Emily) and my only Niece (Myla). Her birthday (my sister, not my niece) just happened to fall ON Mother's day this year and so it worked out quite well to be home! She is 2.5 years older than me, and while we are best friends, we are extreme opposites in many, many ways. (However, pop-culture is one passion we both share!) [She was also featured 2 days ago in my 'why I love my hometown' post]. Happy Birthday sister...can you believe you are almost 30? You are getting so old! :)
Both of the above pictures were taken at the Columbus Zoo! Part of my birthday gift to my niece was a family pass to the zoo! I figured that its probably going to be about the last time I could do something like that and she would be none the wiser. We had a BLAST! It was threatening to rain the ENTIRE time, but it only started down-pouring when we were headed for the exit. A baby elephant (Beco) was born about 2 months ago and so we got to see him with his mama as well!
Can you guess the theme of Myla's 2nd Birthday party?!?
...That's right, cupcakes! We had cupcakes, cupcake cones, and a giant cupcake cake! (I can only take responsibility for the cupcake cones, and though they are quite tasty, they are unbelievably easy to make!)
Here is the birthday girl (and my sister)! She was allowed to pick out which shoes she wanted to wear and she picked her blue rainboots which was actually genius for two reasons: 1) They totally matched her dress and 2) It was raining cats-and-dogs outside. Unfortunately, Aunt Laura was in charge of putting them on and 1) Forgot socks and 2) Put them on the wrong feet at first :( Oops!
Here I am with the Birthday girl! (Ignore the massive amounts of BBQ potato chip remnants one her face...SHE LOVED THEM). I cannot believe she is 2!!! She was born on May 16, 2007 which was a Wednesday and my finals week for my last quarter in college! Yes a lot has happened in my life in the last two years, but it is crazy to look at her and see all the milestones she has made (and continues to make) in her little life! :)
Here she is demonstrating her 'pretty smile' which basically consists of a huge cheesy grin and squinty eyes. I do love this picture though...you can see her new Little People farm and her super-cool Bert and Ernie themed New Balance Tennis Shoes! Way too cute!
Her birthday just happened to fall Garage Sale day in West Liberty. Garage Sale day, say what?!?? Yes yes folks, there are 3ish events that people come to West Liberty, OH for:
1) Labor Day festival
2) Christmas parade [which is actually held the day after Thanksgiving for some reason]
3) Garage Sale day.
According to the West Liberty historical website (Which I may add, I didn't even know existed) on Thursday, May 13, 1880 the majority of the downtown business district [**Can I say, what downtown business district?!?!?**] you see today was lost to what will long be remembered as "the day of the fire". The blaze began in the stable of Mrs. Lyman Cook and soon spread to the main part of town [**Which is a grand total of 3 blocks**]. This event is remembered in May in West Liberty with a village wide garage sale and sidewalk sale, known as "The Annual Fire Sale".
Since it was raining, I didn't grab my camera...but let me tell you, I will totally bring it next year!!! ....there were many a sites to be seen:
a) lawn mowers with trailers attached hauling the owner's garage sale finds
b) 4-wheelers doing the same thing [on the streets!!!],
c) FAR FAR too many people with less than appropriate clothes on (or no clothes as was the case for some...).
I was with my sister in the morning, and while she spent $27.00 and got a whole winter wardrobe for Myla (including an adorable unicorn Halloween costume with wings!) I got a Bratwurst and soda for a total of $2.50.
Later in the day I met up with Ryan (one of my best friends from High school who just completed his 1st year of Law School!!) and ended up buying a hotdog and soda for a total of $2.50.
Yeah, I totally sucked at Garage Sale Day this year, but since my suitcase was already at 40 of the 50 lbs. weight limit, I wasn't really looking too hard!
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