Thanksgiving Staycation

The Strange family decided to celebrate Thanksgiving all week by having some special family time.  Rather than extravagant gifts that eventually end up in some closet or the basement, our family really tries to focus on having experiences together.  We are so blessed that North Cobb Christian School‘s calendar gives me the whole week off school and Clint had enough vacation days to take the whole week too!  We were trying to think of something fun to do for the first part of the week before family came down on Wednesday.  We realized that we live in one of the coolest cities in the world and decided we needed to check out Atlanta for some fun things to do.  My mom got us an awesome rate at the Doubletree Hotel  in Buckhead and we headed down there on Sunday right after Thanksgiving with Clint’s family in Summerville.  We picked up pizza on our way to check in and ate it in our room picnic style while hanging out.  Since we were at the Doubletree, we topped off our pizza with some of the awesome chocolate chip/walnut warm Doubletree cookies.  Wonderful!  We all went to bed early to rest up for a big Monday.

Monday morning started with Starbucks for me and Emma (apple juice for her…chai for me) and the Georgia Tech McDonald’s for Daddy.  Then, we headed to the Georgia Aquarium.  What a blast!  I’ve not really been all that interested in the aquarium before because I am not really into museums or tours or that sort of thing.  But…the Aquarium was right up my ally since it is all self-guided and there are tons of cool things to see.  Of course, it was even more fun watching Emma’s reactions to everything.  She was most concerned that something would “bite me”.  Once we convinced her that wasn’t happening…she was good to go.  We stayed at the Aquarium from the time it opened until around 12:30ish.

We ate lunch at Baja Fresh down by Centennial Park.  Since it was so beautiful outside, we decided to play at Centennial Park for a few minutes.  That quickly turned into about an hour and a half since we were having so much fun!  From there, we headed to do some quick shopping.  One of the most fun things we did while we were out shopping was to take Emma to ride the Pink Pig at Macy’s at Lennox Mall.  The Pink Pig is an Atlanta tradition and she loved it!  After shopping, it was time for dinner.  We went to the OK Cafe in Buckhead since none of us had ever been.  It was pretty good.  Then, we rushed back to the hotel to enjoy another round of those Doubletree cookies before bed.  Emma was so pumped about sleeping on the pullout sofa.  She absolutely loves hotels and elevators, so the Doubletree was a big hit with her!

Tuesday morning, we woke up and did Starbucks and Chick Fil-A on our way to the Atlanta Zoo.  Emma and I had never been to the zoo and Clint hadn’t been in a very long time.  We  figured that it might be a bit much to cover in one day, so we went ahead and bought a family membership.  We are looking forward to visiting the zoo a few more times in the next several months. Emma loved looking at all the animals.  If you want a laugh…just ask her what a giraffe says…pretty hilarious!  From the zoo, we headed to Nueva Laredo Cantina…an Atlanta favorite for Mexican food.  The restaurant was pretty packed, but we got a seat right away and all enjoyed our lunch.  We headed home from there after our awesome Atlanta adventures.  It was such a treasure to have this special family time together!

 

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