I think this may be the title of my blog about May last year, but my feelings about May haven’t changed in all my years of life. Some people like May, it’s the beginning of summer, it’s when the sun starts shining again, it’s when you can hang out on your patio and relish the thoughts of the coming warm months.

These are not my thoughts about May. May is crunch time in schools, it’s the stretch that seems to go on forever until summer break. In my recent life (in China), it’s a time when the oppressive humidity comes back and the incessant rain. It’s a reminder that the school year is almost over, but not quite. It’s the push to get in shape knowing that I’ll see everybody in a month’s time. May is long, hot and maybe a little bit overrated? But that’s just my opinion. This May is a little different. I long for it to end like all other Mays before it, but I also recognize it’s my last full month with some very special people to me, and that makes it all the more conflicting.

With that said, I have had a really awesome month so far! 🙂 We’ve been busy and the sun has finally returned (although briefly and in between downpours). Here’s a few highlights so far (as it’s only the 10th day of this horrible month).

Homebrew Meeting

So this was technically the in the last week of April, but I’m going to write about it anyway. We usually only go to these meetings every other month because either we don’t have beer to share, or we’re too tired. This month we brought one of the beers I am the most proud of. It’s a Deschutes clone of their summer IPA, Fresh Squeezed, but we tweaked it to fit the hops we had. We also used some of our White Labs yeast, imported from the great USA. I was super proud of this beer because I had put together the modified hops schedule and it was SO GOOD. I think I say this about all our homebrew, but this one was definitely the best. Our homebrew buddies agreed, and they are a tough group to please. They even asked for the recipe and hop schedule, which I shared to our group. It was also cool because there were two more chicks at the meeting! I’m usually the only brew mama, but this night there were two more. Jess and Lindsey showed up and talked beer with us all, and it made it that much more fun. 🙂 I’m not sure how we’ll top that beer though. yum.

Long Weekend Staycation

That very weekend, we had our Labor Holiday weekend so we booked into our old favorite, the Intercontinental. We usually go solo on weekends like these, enjoying family time and relaxing by the pool/doing nothing in the room. But this time was different. We’ve been spending a lot of time with the Sanders (you may have seen a trend in recent posts), and our families mesh well together. Jess and I get along famously, JC and Donnie are great pals, and our kids do ok (when they’re not tired). So for this long weekend, we decided to go together.

It was so much fun! We all took turns taking care of the kids, Jess and I got girl time, Donne and JC got dude time. And we had time for our kids as well. The weather didn’t cooperate very well, so we had a couple cloudy days and the pool was a little cold. But our last day was full sun and we made the best of it! We even went out on Saturday night to Bionic (after a cab tried to give us the run-around) while the kids stayed at the hotel with the ayis. It was Jess’s birthday on Monday, so after a day at the pool, we checked out and had some birthday dinner (and dessert) at Frankie’s. It was such an awesome adventure. I wish they weren’t moving…

Mother’s Day 2016

So last year, the guys took me to the Intercontinental, but we couldn’t do that two weekends in a row…so we went to the Hilton instead! 🙂 We’ve been members of the IHG rewards club and last week Donnie status-matched us at Hilton, which means we’re now Diamond level there too! So Saturday afternoon(after we watched an awesome Spurs win!!), we jumped on our scooters and headed down to Seaworld and checked in. The room was AMAZING. Like better than I’ve ever stayed in and probably bigger than our apartment. We went promptly down to the pool and got our relax on. Then hit the club lounge for some dinner and drinks (which were free as a Diamond guest!!!). I fell asleep content and we had a lovely breakfast and pool sesh the next day (Mother’s day) before heading back to our house.

Mother’s day is always a time of reflection for me. I miss my mom so much on a daily basis and although I get to skype with her, it’s never enough. She means so much to me. I also think about what it means to be Paul’s mom. I try to do my best and give him opportunities to grow and boundaries to feel safe within, but it’s a struggle some days. I hope he grows up to appreciate all the work and love we’ve poured into him (and also how lucky he is!).

Paul

To wrap up this post I wanted to give an update specifically about Paul. He’s changing so fast these days, and I am so bad about recording his milestones. He’s still in preschool, but next year he’ll be in 5’s, which is essentially Kindergarten. He’s started reading, and his teacher sends home a book each night which we read together or he reads to me. I’m so impressed with his skills! He is working on his writing, although he can’t quite hold a pencil right yet. But he’ll get there. He plays soccer twice a week, once with a younger age group, and once with an older group. He seems to really like it, and I’m glad he gets that time to play sports, especially soccer! He is absolutely obsessed with Star Wars. We put the movie on for him and he’ll play with his toys and interact with the movie and his toys at the same time. He will talk about it all night if you let him. I love seeing him so enthusiastic. He still has tantrums sometimes (we had a rough week last week), but he is mostly a happy guy who wants to do what he wants. He knows what he likes, and he likes what he does most of the time.  He really likes to sing and dance and will bust out moves in the middle of the living room for no reason. We have some really awesome moments going down to the bay and riding or running or just playing. He gives me the best snuggles whenever I ask, and I know that won’t last forever. He’s a marvel and a challenge, and I feel really lucky that he’s mine. 🙂

Ok that’s all for now! I’ll most likely post again in this longest month ever. Much love to all. 🙂