Shout out to the ATL

I am very delinquent in blogging of late, secondary to the extremely long list of deadlines that have been looming over me.  However, Ellie D and I took a trip down to the ATL last weekend so I thought it worthy of a post, even if belated.

After getting hosed on the way down with Ellie not sleeping at all, 45 minutes of traffic of traffic in Chattanooga, and a fateful wrong turn at the last minute, we finally arrived at the Chatigny's house in time, but probably a little late, for dinner.  They live in a great suburb of ATL called Dunwoody so the restaurant we went to was literally a half mile from the house.  Lisa is training for the Atlanta half marathon so she had to squeeze in a 10 mile run before she and the fam headed to NY for the weekend.  Which worked out perfectly for me because I also had to do a long run and needed a sitter for Ellie.  Thanks Neal! (and Noelle and Andrew).  The classic moment was when I asked Neal how Ellie had been since I wasn't there when she woke up, and he responded 'she's been fine' and Noelle, the 4 year old, says 'Ellie was crying all morning long'.  I will give it to Neal, she was happily pounded waffles at the table when we got back so he found the way to her heart.

From there Ellie and I headed to Jen Waters Fair's house for a stroll in the Fernbank Science Center and lunch at Fellini's.  It was an amazing 70 degrees out so it was awesome to be outside.  See pics below from us hanging out on Jen's porch and playing with her dog Legolas.

After that it was to Autumn and Andrew's house.  More hanging out and dinner at an unfortunately unkid friendly restaurant led single mom for the weekend to be VERY tired.  The next morning was a lot of "saying yes to the dress" before Autumn's baby shower.  Ellie was having fun playing with their dog Miles, a labradoodle that looks like a muppet and is just fun and sort of floppy.  He was bigger than Ellie so every time he got close she just sort of screamed.  A playful scream, but since Miles was literally following her around the house, there was a lot of screaming.  My favorite question from Autumn was "is it unreasonable for me to expect to have a quiet toddler?"  Hilarious.  We had a great time at the shower, Ellie was very good and super cute in her outfit.  And the drive home was a snap, of course Ellie slept even though it wasn't actually her naptime. 

Ellie D had a lot of fun feeding Legolas

Mr. Andrew, that isn't how it goes!

Miles was always close by

Ellie's new move is to just plop down wherever she is to do whatever she wants

Autumn, her mother Chris and sister (also expecting) Honey

Can't say that any of us are terribly photogenic in this pic....

All of us working very hard on our quizzes.  Did you know the British term for pregnant is "stuffed"?

Who gave her the breast friend?  Her best friend (well at least one of...)

Honey sporting the breast friend.  Coming your way soon Honey!