spring break - happy birthday to me!

happy birthday to me! i got up to watch the sunrise over the ocean with the dolphins jumping - a perfect start to my day! it was overcast but the colors were amazing. the pictures do not do it justice at all.

we did a job on the free hot breakfast again before hitting the road. our first stop was the virginia zoo. it was supposed to be free with our zoo pass, but it only ended up being half price. matt had run back to the van for my tennis shoes (i was freezing in the cold rain in my flip flops) or we may not have even gone in. but it was my birthday, we were already there, and we had umbrellas.

mason became my model for the zoo because he was the only one willing to stop for pictures - he even requested several of them.

we spent some time in the elephant building so that we could warm up a little. it wasn't raining hard, just a drizzle, but it definitely made it feel a lot colder than it actually was out. we all thought that the paintings by elephants on display were pretty cool.

a highlight of our time was manning trying to befriend a peacock. he wasn't the slightest bit afraid, although i was a little afraid that the peacock might not like being hassled while it hid from the rain. thankfully, there was no aggression by either party.

a few of my happy, wet peanuts before we loaded back up towards our next stop - the mountains!

it only rained for the two hours we were at the zoo. of course. but a few hours later we were back to blue skies and beautiful views! this is the view from the condo we rented in the wintergreen ski resort.

it was about 30 minutes of nothingness up the mountain but then there was an entire community at the top. really beautiful. we took pictures while we waited for my birthday dinner in the sky.

we really did have the most beautiful, clear skies our whole trip. you can just see the moon above the sunset.

after dinner we found a playground where we let the kids burn off a little sitting-in-the-car energy before it got too cold to be out any more.

the resort lobby had this cute peeps display

the coffee table in our condo had this topographical map of the mountains. there is a flag showing where we are but it didn't capture in the picture - it was sort of in the middle.

the kids were in love with the condo. it was stocked with toys, board games, and cable. they were fine with not leaving the condo at all. this was a pretty perfect birthday. love.