Another Queen City Weekend

Weekend before last we gave Winston his very belated and highly anticipated 7th birthday present. A trip to Charlotte to see his beloved Carolina Panthers in action for a regular season game. This was his 2nd trip to BOA Stadium – we took him summer before last for a PRESEASON game; which in my opinion (and his) isn’t technically the same. Something special about being at a game that COUNTS…against a DIVISION Rival …now that’s a football game.

We loaded up the crew on Saturday morning (Hampton too – taking a friend was part of the gift!) and headed to Charlotte for the 2nd weekend in a row. We arrived back to Janet’s house for a steaming bowl of homemade potato soup. Joe ate 3 bowls of this soup and has requested the recipe – I think maybe he liked it just a little!!

We loaded everyone back in the van at dusk and headed to Christmastown USA, aka McAdenville just a few minutes away for some beautiful Christmas lights. It began as a sweet family drive through town until the kids found it hilarious to yell “HOLLA” out the window to each passing car. We laughed at first too then decided it was obnoxious and requested they change their greeting to “Merry Christmas” instead. MUCH BETTER!!



We went by Harris Teeter for Tailgating provisions….and let the boys select their game day fare…..are you ready for this?? LUNCHABLES…..they wanted LUNCHABLES. So lunchables they got.

Sunday morning dawned with cloudy but DRY skies (sigh of relief….a rainy day on Saturday made us nervous). The kicker….low 40’s for temps. ALL THE DAY LONG….the temps hovered around 43 degrees. I think my toes are still thawing out!!













It was a c-c-c-cold day but a super duper fun day for all. There’s just nothing like it if you ask me. Shivering in the stands screaming loudly – warming up with hot chocolate. The Panthers won – clearly they heard all the screaming from the little Grant boy next to me. He screamed DEFENSE until I almost got tired of the word and he banged his seat against the seat back to create the extra noise which clearly was the key to the victory if you ask Winston! We had great seats in an end zone and saw lots of action up close and personal.























It was an exciting game with a great score (Panthers beat the Bucs!). The boys loaded up and headed back to SC while Lilly and I stayed the night so we could travel on to VA the next day for some time with Mom and Dad.

While we were cheering for the boys in blue, Lilly had her own special “YES” day with Auntie and Unc Unc. She got to choose the restaurant for her special YES lunch – clearly after the Lunchable news nugget you won’t be surprised to hear that my other culinary prodigy selected McDonald’s!! (Even funnier if you know that Janet was a vegetarian for many many years and has only recently started eating some chicken again!). After lunch they took Lilly downtown to Imaginon to see a Christmas play. She was also sporting a fluffy pink Hello Kitty doll and matching purse when we got back from the game. Quite a YES day indeed!!

It was a great weekend with lots of shivers but mostly smiles. Happy Birthday Winston…..hope it was worth the wait!!