Our Family Valentine's Date

If you would have told me that we'd end up at an Irish Tavern in Atlantic City on Valentine's Day I would never have believed it. But that is in fact where we ended up and here's how it happened...

We woke up Sunday morning and Jim and I started talking about breakfast (of course). I thought we'd have some pancakes which I'd make (although Jim is usually the pancake maker) but Jim started talking about going out to breakfast. We couldn't decide so we posed the question to Sophie "Where do YOU want to eat pancakes, honey? At HOME? Or OUT?" She got this excited look on her face and said "Pancakes????? Uncle Bill's???" Well Jim and I about fell off our chairs because Uncle Bill's Pancake House happens to be our favorite pancake spot in the world. It's a Jersey shore restaurant chain that quite simply has the best pancakes in the world. We ate there a lot when we were down the shore this past summer and Sophie always enjoyed her "cakes" whenever we went there. But, she had never said "Uncle Bill's" before. NEVER! So for her to pull that out of nowhere and be so excited about it just melted Jim and I so we knew we had to go!

So, off we drive the hour and a half to the Jersey shore for Uncle Bill's pancakes. We get there and the place is PACKED! We sit down to eat our cakes, put our order in and Sophie's shortstack comes out. We're so excited and cut the pancakes for her and put them in front of her and wait with excitement for her joyous reaction. But alas, like the zen master toddler she is as she continues to teach us life lessons in zen patience and the suffering that ensues from having expectations, she does not touch them. I mean will not put a single "cake" to her mouth. It was hysterical. Here we drive all that way to fulfill the Valentine's Day wish of our toddler (ok, Jim and I were fairly overjoyed at the treat of Uncle Bill's pancakes in February too) and she won't even touch them. Oh good times. All she would put in her mouth at the restaurant was apple juice. That's it. Oh well!

Then we went up to the boardwalk which was completely covered in snow. It was a sight I had never seen and quite bizarre to be walking the boards in our snow boots.

Since it was still pretty early and not much was open on the boardwalk we were trying to come up with other things to do so as to not put her back in the car too early. And spur of the moment we decided to extend the day and head down the coast to Atlantic City and grab some dinner there and then head home. So that's what we did! Sophie LOVED walking through the casinos (too cold to walk on the boardwalk!) and seeing all the "lights" from the glow of the slot machines and other bizarre Atlantic City decor. We took her to the "It's Sugar" candy store in Ceasar's Pier which about blew her mind (all that CANDY!) and then we were going to take her to Rainforest Cafe for our family Valentine's Date dinner but Jim went over to make sure there wasn't too much of a wait and lo and behold - apparently Atlantic City is THE hotspot for family dates on Valentine's (who knew??!!!) - and there was in fact a TWO HOUR wait for dinner. So, with that plan shot to all heck we wandered around trying to figure out where to grab our Valentine's dinner and ended up having a very fine meal in an Irish tavern. What a bizarre but wonderful Valentine's Day 2010 for the Oxenford Family!

Finally look at these ADORABLE Elmo pants Grandma Kathy made for Sophie!! Aren't they the cutest? Thank you for the adorable Valentine's Day outfit (and other treats and goodies, Grandma!!).