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Stay-cation 2013: Days 3-4

Find days 1-2 here.

Day 3: Wednesday
Morning: Silas unexpectedly took a longer-than-normal morning nap, so Isaac took the big boys to library story time. Looking back at my blog from our last stay-cation two years ago, I realized that we started going to library story time two years ago this month! I think our days are numbered, however, as we'll have enough other morning activities plus Levi's little bit of school to fill up our mornings come September. Maybe we'll go once a month just to switch out books. :)

Lunch: avocado and cooked carrots for the boys, the last of the leftovers for the adults. Just trying to keep things cheap around here.

Dinner: Skyline (kids eat free at the Finneytown location on Wednesdays) followed by ice cream from the Mt. Healthy Dairy Bar. I like to be loyal to the Goody Shop that we pass going to and from church, but the soft serve at the Dairy Bar really is superior. Isaac's been hankering for a good soft-serve cone: mission accomplished.

Cost for day 3: $16 dinner + $7 dessert = $23. Pricier than I expected for what we ate.

Day 4: Thursday
Morning: Levi's first piano lesson! And I forgot to take a picture. ARG. After his lesson, we hit up the "Friends of the Library" warehouse book sale, where I spent approximately twice as much as I intended. Meanwhile, Isaac took the little boys to Costco for samples and whatever else looked interesting. You may have seen my Facebook post about not having enough junk food in the house for a vacation; that has since been remedied. With brownie brittle: tastes like a brownie, crunches like a cookie. Highly addicting stuff. It probably won't last the weekend.

Lunch: Macaroni and cheese for all of the boys (including the big one), a tuna jacket potato for myself. A what? A jacket potato: baked potato (okay, microwaved, whatever) topped with tuna salad and sweet corn (from our corn-picking adventure!). Sounds gross? I know. I thought so, too, the first time I was presented with one, my junior year of college when I was living in Britain. But I grew to love them, and still do.

Dinner: At the recommendation of a friend who regularly does cool stuff around the city (as we do not), we trekked out to the west side of the city to the Incline Public House. Situated at the top of one of Cincinnati's hills where there was once a steam-powered incline, it has an incredible view of the city, including the back side of Union Terminal, which still has trains running regularly. The boys had a great time looking out at the trains and the highways.

The tree in the left foreground is hiding the train yard down below.



The food was excellent. Having been rather short on protein the past few days, I downed a burger the size of my head. Levi and Owen have gotten predictable in their restaurant ordering: Levi does chicken tenders, and Owen gets a burger. Isaac had a pizza and Silas nibbled off of everyone's plates. Then, in a completely unprecedented move, we ordered dessert in the restaurant! Isaac's a sucker for those cast-iron deep dish cookies topped with ice cream, and in fact has requested one for his birthday, now that we have a cast iron skillet. I'm not about to argue with that.

Everybody is happy that dessert is on its way.

Cost for day 4: I didn't even look. But every vacation is allowed a nice dinner out, and this one was great fun!

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