While The Kids Are Away

The kids summer vacation from school just isn’t that long this year, but we made the best of what we had. Spent a lot more time in the pool this summer than we did last summer and to top off their summer vacation, the kids got to spend a few nights hanging out with Auntie and Jojo at their house.

Let me tell you… this wasn’t an easy thing for me. Amber has always mentioned having the kids stay with her, but she knows how hard that is for me, but this summer, I decided it was time to face it and let them go. And I also knew it would be good for Courtney and I to just have a weekend with it just being us, especially since we know he will be leaving on deployment soon. 

The kids had so much fun hanging out with Auntie. They did tie dye, they played at the pool and even went to the splash pad. But they said that their favorite part of being there was not only hanging out with Auntie and Jojo, but it was being able to hang out with Lylah and Ethan. 

Courtney and I really didn’t have any plans of doing anything while the kids were away, but at the last minute we decided to go somewhere that we have never been before, Greenville, SC. We originally thought of just making it a day trip, but Courtney was able to get us a room for a night and get our dog sitters to watch the dogs, so once Courtney got out of work, we were on the road to Greenville. 

It was a 2 hour drive from the house, but so worth it. Greenville is such a beautiful place and we can’t wait to take the kids there someday soon, but so happy that we were able to have this experience just for the two of us. 

It was close to dinner time by the time we made it to Greenville, so after dropping off our bag at our room, we got to walking. We were lucky enough to get a motel right downtown and could walk everywhere from where we were staying. It was perfect. 

We fell in love with downtown Greenville and fell even more in love with this city once we came across Falls Park on the Reedy. Beyond pretty and then the back drop of the Liberty Bridge was amazing. Even though I could have spent the rest of the night sitting there watching the falls, we had dinner reservations and we needed to get going.

At dinner, we enjoyed great food and drinks, but also just enjoyed being it just being us two and not having to deal with the kiddos doing this and that at the dinner table. It is always great enjoying dinner with just the two of us, but at this point, we were going on night 2 of the kids being away and I was feeling a little down about them not being there with us. So, even though we wanted to do more exploring around Greenville, I was just ready to just head back to the room, enjoy some drinks in our pj’s and just enjoy some relaxing time together. 

You would think since we don’t have the kids to wake up for, that we would have slept in, but nope. We were up and ready early to get some more exploring done. So, we ate breakfast and headed downtown. To our shocking surprise, there was a huge farmers market going on. I was kind of bummed that we didn’t know about it because I would have been prepared to buy all the flowers and fruit, but we just walked through and vowed to come back next time prepared to do some farmers market shopping. 

We did so much walking and even though it was still before noon, it was incredibly warm. We were so hot and in need of water, but we kept trucking along and came up on a baseball field, Fluor Field. It’s a mini replica of Boston’s Fenway Park. Fluor Field is home to the Greenville Drive which is a class A affiliate of the Boston Red Sox. It was so cool!! And while walking around the stadium, we came across “Shoeless Joe” Jackson’s house and we got to tour inside of it!! Even though the house has moved a couple of times, it’s still the same inside with an added “Shoeless Joe” store. 

After spending many hours walking around Greenville, it was time to check out of our room and do a little more exploring, this time via car. We came across some cute little towns, but we decided to stop at the city of Traveler’s Rest. We knew we needed to get some food while we were there, so we decided to go to Farmhouse Tacos. Best Place Ever!! So good and it will be a must place to eat whenever we are in the Greenville area. 

Courtney and I had a great time in Greenville. It was really nice to get away from Sumter for a little bit and also have some time with just Courtney and I. Even though I truly enjoyed our mini getaway, I’m so ready to get the kiddos back home and hear all about their time at Aunties!