Throwback - Steeler Painting

So before I moved to Mississippi (Kris was down here for about 6-7 weeks before I was able to come down), I tried to make sure to spend as much quality time with family and friends as I could. One of those adventures was taking a "Painting with a Twist" class with my Mom and some of her friends. A huge thank you to Diane, who graciously offered to let me come along! As many of you may know, neither my Mother nor I are artistically inclined in the least. In fact, we are lucky if we can draw a stick figure that is recognizable. So we figured we might be stretching our abilities a bit but it sounded fun. The concept of the class is that you can bring your own food and drink (adult and non-adult) and they provide all the painting equipment and an instructor. You can sign up based on what the painting for the night will be and given that we were in Pittsburgh chose a Steeler's theme painting. Ironically it also turned out our teacher for the night was now the art teacher at one of the middle schools I attended! Small world! Anyways I thought this was an appropriate throwback post as the Steelers are currently in San Diego ready to demolish the Chargers tonight on Monday Night Football! GO STEELERS!!!!

My Canvas after round 1

My Mom's canvas after round 1. And yes if you notice we were drinking "DaVinci" wine!

My Canvas almost complete

My Finished Product!!

Hilton Head Island!

So the last week of September/first week of October I had the amazing opportunity to spend a few days on Hilton Head Island with my parents. They were so gracious to invite me along for their only vacation they take each year.

I arrived early Monday evening, and of course the first thing that happened was I said hello to the ocean. We were staying in a condo which was part of an oceanfront complex so the beach was only a few steps away.

Our condo was part of this complex

After our hello to the beach we went in search of dinner. Luckily we didn't have to search long or hard since there are more restaurants on the Island than one could imagine. After dinner we wandered around a bit where my Dad managed to make a new friend....

The next day started off with a Mother/Daughter bike ride. Of course nothing can go exactly as planned.....When we took off we decided to follow one of the many bike paths which was on a street running parallel to the ocean. Our goal was at some point to find a beach access road and then we could bike back to our complex on the beach. While this was a wonderful thought in theory we learned how few public beach access roads there are from where we were biking. Eventually we found a key card access gate that was conveniently unlocked which just happened to provide us with beach access ;) Although we rode longer and sweated more than originally planned it was a fun adventure.

After our adventure we spent some well deserved time relaxing on the beach. That night we went to the other side of the Island and had dinner at Skullcreek Boathouse. Luckily the weather was beautiful so we were able to sit on their outdoor patio. We had a good dinner with some fabulous hushpuppies. Since they were on the water we managed to get some great photos before it became too dark.

Day 3 began with a little less activity than day 2. We started off the morning in search of an advertised local farmer's market. Sadly we were never able to locate the market, but we did make a few other stops along the way.

It's a bike rack shaped to be an alligator

My Dad doing his "Walter" impression (from the Jeff Dunham Character)

Once we returned to the condo it was time to head off to the Beach. After spending most of the day on the beach we took a family bike ride along the ocean. During the ride we got to see multiple dolphins playing in the water, some of whom were very close to shore.

See the Dolphin fin???? 

Once the bike ride was over we weren't ready to leave the beach so we decided to have a picnic on the beach for dinner. We set up a collapsable table and ordered pizza! We received a lot of jealous looks from passerbys. It was one of our most favorite family meals ever (which is saying something!). Afterwards we were also able to get some wonderful sunset pictures.

Our fourth day started off with another vacation tradition - tennis. Mom and I managed to find some public courts and the competition was fierce. In the end, for the second time in my life, I defeated her 6-4! It was a great start to the day. Once we returned it was time to head to the beach. The waves were super intense when we first got out there so I took the opportunity to refresh my boogie boarding skills.

Daddy watching on - and yes he reminded me for the 100th time what to do if I got caught in a riptide. Some things never change. 

Today wasn't quite as sunny as some of the other days so we moved inside during the afternoon and had a wine/reading break. My Dad found these shockingly cute wine glasses at the dollar store.

And finally it was time to get ready for dinner, which conveniently was going to be at a Steelers Bar, as the Steelers were playing Thursday Night Football. There wasn't a bad crowd at the bar and we definitely had some group cheers. Sadly the steelers lost (*grumble* Scobee *grumble* when you need a yard put it in the hands of your best player *grumble*) but it was still a fun night out!

My final day on the Island started off with another bike ride. We did plan a little better this time and found some spots to take some great pictures. The one surprise we had was to bike back we knew we had to cross a bridge. We didn't realize it was the same bridge that the cars use which had a pretty steep hill. So biking up the side, with cars whizzing by immediately to your left was a little more intense than we had anticipated. Other than that it was a great last bike ride on a beautiful island!

Photo Credit goes to my Mom on this one

Unfortunately then it was time to pack up and head to the beach for some goodbye time. There was a storm moving in (okay Hurricane Joaquin), which was causing some great waves, probably some of the biggest I've seen in person.

It was an amazing week and I was so grateful for the chance to have a beach vacation!!!