Rafael took the entire week off of work for his Birthday. It was so amazing. I was reminded (again), why we need to hit lotto so he can retire at 35 and be home all day everyday with us!!
We didn't really have any plans, but knew we wanted to take the kiddos to do something fun. We saw this place online called trampoline nation. It's an entire building that is ALL trampolines! It looked like SO much fun! We showed Ava some pictures. She was super excited about going, so that was the plan. At some point the "Super Mall" was brought up. Ava LOVES the Super Mall. They have a huge carousel and lots of little coin rides and candy machines. Ava quickly changed her mind that she would rather go there. SO... we spent most of the day just hanging out, and headed to the Super Mall in the afternoon. We had about 5 or 6 rides on the carousel and TONS of rides on the kiddy rides around the mall. We did a little shopping. Rafael got some new pants! We finished it off with some french fries from the food court and 1 more carousel ride before heading home.
I made an awesome dinner of top sirloin steak with a homemade brandy peppercorn sauce, shrimp sauteed in butter and garlic, mashed potatoes, and asparagus with hollandaise sauce. YUM!! I am going to insert a story here... I am not much of a hard alcohol drinker. Ava and I went to the grocery store and found out that the only brandy I could buy was in a huge bottle (we needed about 3 ounces). From there we went to the liquor store. It felt so weird walking in a place like that with a 4 year old!! I had to wait in line to ask the cashier where the little shots of brandy were. I told her it was for cooking, so she showed me the best one. I felt the need to tell her I was cooking with it, so she didn't think I was some deadbeat Mom buying shots for the road...HAHA!
ANYWAYS... while I was cooking the sauce at home, Raf decided I should follow the recipe to the "T" and light the brandy on fire while it was in the pan evaporating. AWESOME!!! Super chefs in our house!! It was fun with lots of exciting screaming from my part!!
Rafael got LOTS of clothes for his Birthday!! He needed them so bad, and he got some really cute stuff!!! I found an E.T. movie shirt at the Gap while shopping with my Mom and Sister. Ava LOVES E.T. so that's what she gave Daddy. She was SO excited for him to put in on!!! :)
