Surprise! and the case of the forgotten potatoes!

For the three day holiday weekend we decided to go and spend some time with my folks for mom's birthday. As a special surprise one of my sister's flew in.

Can you see the surprise on mom's face?

While we were visiting we visited a park close by that the little one enjoys.  

The slides were fun until mommy got road rash on her elbow from the slide!

The little one of course enjoyed the swings, it is hard to convince her that the other playground equipment can be equally as fun.

We also went to the pool in mom's neighborhood. Which was a real treat for the little one, who has only been in a pool a handful of times.

Unfortunately she found the water to be more refreshing than the ocean, which is her usual swimming spot.

We all had a grand time playing around with her little float, it made a great necklace for sister and a wonderful chin rest for me.

Mom found it to be a wonderful seat, once she was able to get it under her!

Caught her just as she was making her first attempt at hopping on it! Nice!

We also hit up some of my our favorite places to eat. Lunch at J. Michael's Philly Deli and dinner from Smithfield's , Awesome! J. Michael's Deli has the best cheese steaks and Smithfield's has the most wonderful BBQ, since moving away from Wilmington, hubby and I have found nothing that even compares to either place. Sad to say, but years ago it was their cheesesteaks that broke me of being a vegetarian, I just couldn't resist the yummy goodness of it! The cheese, the meat! I'm drooling just thinking about it!

We also ate several meals at mom's house which brings me to the case of the forgotten potatoes. Mom makes a really yummy dish we call a potato volcano. It is smooth and creamy mashed potatoes baked with lots of cheese and butter. Unfortunatly the meal it was intended to go with came and went before she realized it was still happily baking away in the oven. Ooops! Although I was already stuffed full, I did have a small dish of it, yum!

So the plan was to have it the next night with supper, we would just reheat and enjoy!

Unfortuntaly, it wasn't until after we had all scarfed down our

Elmo birthday cupcakes and a full meal that mom came to the realization that, D'oh!

We had totally forgotten the potatoes in the oven, again! By this time they could have been used as a nice doorstop because the cheese was so very hard and crusty, so out to the trash they went! Which was a total shame because the little bit I ate when they were fresh out of the oven the first time was delish!

It was fun to get out of town for a few days. It wore the little one completely out. Here she is napping at Grandma's in her special princess tent. She thought she was hot stuff because it came with its very own pink flashlight!

Hope ya'll has a great holiday weekend, i'm off to tackle the mountain of laundry that goes along with a roadtrip out of town!