July 6, 2016

Empty Nest Update

Martie Sound Off! Bloody Maria, chocolate zucchini cake, empty nest 6 Comments

It’s time for a little empty nest update on what Coach and I have been up to in the girls’ absence. If you’re just joining us, my young daughters have gone on a 3-week trip to Europe with my Aunties Anne and Susanne.  They’ve been gone a week today.

Having never been away from our children for this long of a stretch, we’ve definitely felt a little lost. At the same time, it has been kind of nice (at times) to have the peace and quiet, and to not have to keep to a schedule.  We can eat when we feel like it, lie on the bed for multiple episodes of Dateline without interruption, and sleep late every day! I’ll share a little bit of our happenings, just in case you every find yourself with an empty-nest and need some recommendations.

Empty Nest Activities

• The day after the girls left, I went to lunch with two of my special friends, Jam-It and Strokes. We’re all VIP members of our own club called The WWU, which you can read about here. We had Mexican (including margaritas, because what’s the point of Mexican without them) and lingered over our lunch for a a leisurely couple of hours.  It was pretty glorious.  I had spicy shrimp!
• Coach and I have consumed beer.  Lots and lots of beer.  I’m pretty nuts about Angry Orchard hard cider, and I highly recommend it.  I’ve also enjoyed a Bloody Maria, blackberry rum and 7-Up, and those aforementioned margaritas.  Why not?  I have no kids around to be responsible for, so I’m sampling. (If you don’t know what a Bloody Maria is, just think Bloody Mary minus the vodka, add tequila. It’s one of my favorite cocktails!  Don’t forget the twist of lime…) No, I’m not using alcohol as a coping mechanism! Yes, my bottles are empty!

• I’ve given up wearing pants around the house.  Oh, I’ve had to throw some on a time or two when unexpected visitors showed up, but for the most part I’ve enjoyed my infits (opposite of outfits) of t-shirts, drawers, and flip flops. The flip flops because our floor guy still hasn’t made it here, and our floor boards still pinch your feet. The point is, when you have an empty nest, pants are optional. Who knew?
• I made a chocolate zucchini cake, which I later decided was stupid. I put vegetables in my desserts to trick my kids into eating veggies, so why did I do it this time? I have no answers. It’s really tasty, though, so no harm, no foul. It was just a momentary lapse of judgement. (Seriously, it’s freakin’ delicious, and here’s the recipe I used. Found it on Pinterest.)

• We have gotten very good at Skype-ing.  Tigger has been a little homesick the whole time, especially at night, which is mid-afternoon here.  Pooh has been a trooper to put up with her and help her through it, but Tiggs needs reassurances from Mom and Dad daily.  It gets better each day, thankfully, but we couldn’t have made it through this empty nest thing without Skype!

And beer!

• I’ve had to re-learn how to cook for two.  We’ve been eating a lot of leftovers, because I’m used to cooking for 4. One day I managed to make just enough macaroni salad for Coach and me!  I was proud of myself.  Hopefully I won’t get too used to it and starve us all to death when the girls get home.
• Coach and I spent over an hour trying to hook our DVD player up in our bedroom. Madre gets movies in the mail from Netflix, and we wanted to watch one (yes, I know it’s a felony to open someone else’s mail, calm down). We wanted to watch it pantsless, stretched out on the bed.  Apparently our DVD is too old school for our tv.  We gave up and drank more beer and watched Dateline. With no pants on.
• On July 4th, we ate ribs for lunch (leftover from Grandaddy and Grandma’s the day before), then later we went to Walmart and ate supper at McDonald’s. We figured it couldn’t get more American than that. 

The Dramatic Conclusion

I know, I know, this all sounds pretty boring.  Trust me, it hasn’t been.  No, we didn’t make it to any of those lovely date night destinations I talked about before, but when I was dreading dreaming about our empty nest time, I wasn’t taking into consideration all the chores that had to be done around the farm.  We had to time our outings around feeding a horse, 8 chickens, 3 dogs and a rabbit. We had a garden to water, vegetables to collect, and a strong desire to not wear pants. Going to The Big City wasn’t really an option!  I also didn’t make fondue, but I made chocolate cake, and that’s just as good!

Two more weeks to go!

X,O,X,O,   Martie

This post is linked up with Thursday Favorite Things and Sweet Inspirations!