What I love most about Festival of the Arts is the food. Each year downtown Grand Rapids is filled with the smell of grilled meat, fried rice, and sweet-sweet cinnamon rolls. The cars on Monroe Center and Ottawa are replaced with foot traffic that rivals that of ArtPrize and the sounds of hula dancing, rock bands, and choirs of violins echo off the buildings. It's a sight worth seeing.
Saturday we ventured that direction with our posse of stroller friends to watch the people, but more importantly we went because I really wanted marinated meat on a stick. Four bucks for some of the tastiest BBQ chicken you can find! Jeff opted for the giant turkey leg ($10) and refused to let me take a picture of him. The thing really was giant.
With the sun shining, the group had only one complaint... where was the beer tent?! I'll have to write a note to Father Festival about 2016!
While enjoying Festival last weekend I couldn't help but think what a wild ride the last couple months have been. I had my last doctors appointment with the hematologist and found out I'll be on the blood thinners for four more weeks which is awesome... initially they told me 6 months. Four weeks is chump change! After that we won't have to worry about clots again until baby #2 which won't be for a while. And so, for the next 4 weeks I'll enjoy the effect of how blood thinners make one glass of wine feel like two!
I was explaining this 'effect' to my aunt on Sunday and I'm quite sure she was concerned I've been drinking while breastfeeding so let me explain: Pump. And. Dump. If I drink, I pump the milk out and dump it down the sink. It's a sad sight to see the 'liquid gold' swivel down the bathroom drain but it's a happy trade off to enjoying chilled pino grigio on these beautiful summer evenings.
Being a Mom is not only a blessing, but it's also a challenge. Natalie is pretty selfish right now with all her demands of diapers and feedings, and so doing something for myself every once in a while seems like a good way for us all to keep our sanity. Jeff included. Besides, I seem to have more milk than I know what to do with these days so it's probably an easier trade off for me than most. And get this, I recently found out breast milk sells online for up to $4 an ounce. That's $20 a bottle! At that rate, I'd be making around $100 a day. You do the math!
