Sweathouz, Semesters, & Snow Storms
Happy 2026, everyone! It’s so cliche to say, but I honestly have no idea how it’s already been 26 years since the world was “supposed to end” in 2000. It feels like just yesterday that Trent and I were at Ybor City ringing in the new year as a young couple that wasn’t even engaged yet. Fast forward 26 years and look where we are! Brayden enjoyed her annual tradition of going on a hike to Crowders Mountain with her “Cookout” crew from high school. I love so much that even after the first semester of college, they have all remained tightly connected and prioritize seeing each other! We wrapped up that weekend by cuddling up on the couch to watch the Sugar Bowl between Georgia and Ole Miss. Unfortunately, it wasn’t in the cards for Georgia this time around to win. But, that loss wasn’t something that retail therapy couldn’t fix. I took the girls to the new Zara store in Southpark to do a little credit card damage. We walked out of there pretty unscathed, so that was good. Just excited to finally have one of my favorite stores in town!
I got together with Heather and Tonya for our “blue hair tribe” (BHT) friendship time, which is always great. Trent took me on a surprise date day, where we went to a place called Sweathouz, which is a hot and cold plunge therapy spa. We had one hour to rotate between a 175° infrared sauna for 15 minutes, a shower that has vitamin C-infused water for three minutes, and then to a tub that is 50° for as long as you can handle it. I didn’t mind the sauna at all, but the tub was quite cold at least on the first go around; however, it was much more tolerable the second and third times and I was able to stay in a lot longer, around two to three minutes. The key was to not move and just lightly set my hands into the water because I did not want any Raynauds to occur. It was a really cool experience and I would definitely do it again! We followed that up with a delicious brunch at Legion Brewing and watched some of the Panthers’ playoff game (haven’t said those words in a while). We came home and since we had just gotten back from our trip a few days before, we hadn’t let the dogs open their Christmas presents yet, so we had fun doing that. It’s always so hilarious watching them rip apart the packaging and get so excited for what’s inside!
Leslie celebrated her 48th birthday! Happy birthday to my beautiful, amazing best friend! Brayden took me to dinner to Barcelona Wine Bar, which was the gift she gave me for Christmas. The gift of time is the best gift! It was so wonderful hanging out with her and catching up one-on-one! We made dinner for Amy and Greg since Amy had recently had knee-replacement surgery and we wanted to make things a bit easier for them. It was great being able to help out. Her healing is going really well! Later that week, Kyle and I had dinner with Dad at Leroy Fox, somewhere none of us had been before. It was great catching up with Dad as well as it had been a while since we had all seen each other. It’s good to know that he is doing well! Love you, Dad!
Mom watched Hanleigh while Trent and I drove Brayden back to Athens to get her settled back in the dorm and kick off the spring semester. It was definitely bittersweet since the past month she had been under our roof and at times (many times) it seemed like it was just life as normal, as if she had never even gone off to college. I guess that’s a good thing, though. Our family unit just resumes life as normal because we just naturally fit together that way, which is beautiful. It was a slight shell shock to be dropping her off again. Leslie had given me a heads up that this would be the case…that dropping her off for college is 100% the hardest thing ever, but dropping her off after Christmas break would be tough as well. It was nowhere near the same level of heartache, and I think that’s mostly due to the fact that she now had a semester in the books (which was extremely successful in all aspects) and there was that level of comfort knowing that she had settled in and was doing college exactly how it was meant to be done…but I still knew I would miss her. So there were a few tears when saying goodbye, and a few more in the car when I could let the ugly cry set in, but it didn’t last too long. I’m just so happy she’s happy! We can’t ask for more! I know Hanleigh misses her as well. Seeing the two of them together interacting over Christmas break just filled our buckets. They are really close, really silly together, and best friends!
Brayden started taking classes for the second semester of her freshman year, which include: Spanish 2002, Law of Mass Communication, an online Government class, and Reporting. She’s saying that there is definitely a lot more work involved this semester, especially with her reporting class. She doesn’t have any in-person classes on Tuesday or Thursday, so that’s really convenient and gives her plenty time to study. I went to Amy’s house for my monthly facial, which is always super relaxing and great to have some dedicated “me” time. Trent and I attended a fall class enrollment session at Hanleigh’s high school, where we tried to decipher the difference between IB and AP. Her high school is solely focused, it seems, on promoting the IB program, but I’m yet to be convinced of understanding how it will actually help in terms of entry into college. I think that program makes sense if someone is applying to an in-state school where you are guaranteed that you will get credit for the classes that you took in high school. It doesn’t always carry across state borders, though, so it’s a bit risky.
Julie and I had dinner at Zinicola, which was awesome as always to have time catching up. She’s one of my favorite people, is so hilarious and also a very amazing advice-giver! Brayden went to New Orleans for the Delta Sig formal, her first one in college. Prior to that, it’s apparently a thing now to take a blank cooler and paint it for the date that asked to you to join them. Brayden did an amazing job of painting the cooler! One side had his fraternity letters, another had a New Orleans theme, and the top had his name painted in the same font as Natural Light beer! I think there were a tour buses that safely transported all the young women and men down to NOLA for a quick 48-hour trip. Every time we looked on Life360, she was at Bourbon Street except for when she was sleeping! Hilarious. I know they had a blast and it just becomes another one of those amazing memories. Meanwhile, we were lucky enough to be able to spend the weekend with Roseanne, Jeremy, and Isaac. They came up for a football camp in North Charlotte and stayed with us two evenings. We laid low on Friday night, and then we gave them a little taste of Charlotte by having lunch at Culinary Dropout, walking the Rail Trail, and playing some games at Penn’s Mechanical, then we came home to curl up on the couch and watch some football. It was so great seeing them! Can’t wait to see them again in July during the annual family reunion.
Mom turned 74 and we celebrated her a few days later. Trent joined some of his Y Guides friends for a dad’s dinner out to reconnect. Hanleigh also started taking classes for the second semester of her freshman year, which include: Dance, Gym, Earth and Environmental Science, Civics Honors, Sports and Event Marketing. Brayden selected her room in the sorority house, which is super exciting and we’re looking forward to seeing it when we help her move in later on this fall. Trent, Hanleigh, Hunter, and me drove up to Kyle and Cammy’s mountain house where they were hanging out with Mom. The plan was to celebrate Mom’s birthday while we were there, which we did a little bit of, but not nearly long enough. We had dinner on Friday night at Happy Valley Brewing Company, which had the most unbelievable pizza ever, hung out that evening and spent the night, and then woke up and went on a very cold, but very beautiful hike around their property. We originally planned on staying the entire weekend, but there was an ice storm approaching and we made the decision to go ahead and get out of there after the walk, but not before we celebrated Mom’s birthday with a homemade salted caramel cake that baked (will definitely make it again!). I’m glad we made the decision to leave (which was literally 22 hours after we got there) because the ice storm was pretty crippling. The three of them weren’t even able to leave until Wednesday, but that was only because they literally slid down the mountain to two of their cars that were parked and able to drive out onto the main road. It was crazy! I don’t think the temperature in North Carolina that week ever got above the teens!
Brayden spent an evening hanging out with her Delta Sig friends, and we took Hanleigh to the doctor for an iron consultation. Her iron has been low for a while okay and she’s been taking supplements, but we wanted to get a little bit more of a bigger picture as to what was going on. It turns out that she’s totally okay, but just needs to take iron vitamins (her prescription is not needed anymore, which is good) each evening, along with her multivitamins in the morning. Will continue to have her levels checked to make sure they are staying where they should be. Heather, Tonya, Kendall, Jen, and I went out to celebrate Julie’s birthday with her at The Palm, a restaurant I’ve never been to, even after living in Charlotte my whole life. It was restaurant week, so it was the perfect opportunity to try out a fancy place for a minimal cost! Happy birthday to one of the best!
Trent got us all signed up for our NC State football parking spot, Brayden went to a Delta Sig wedding-themed party, which sounded like a lot of fun! Hanleigh and I went to get our nails done, and the next day both Trent and I flew out of town for various reasons: him for his annual Big Sky guys’ ski trip, and me for an annual conference for work in San Diego. Even though his flight left just one hour before mine, mother nature had other plans. Just a few days after the ice storm, North Carolina was graced with a pretty large snowstorm, at least by our standards. While I was at the airport, my flight got canceled and then I rebooked to another flight about four or five different times. It was crazy. Finally, around 4:00 p.m., I went to baggage claim to see if I could get my bag back, but they said it was going to take another four hours for that to happen. So I said, “no thank you” and headed home okay where my Mom was at our house since she was watching Hanleigh (who was at a slumber party). So, the two of us snuggled up on the couch with a nice cocktail and watched a movie together. It was the perfect evening! To be continued next month as to how and when I actually ended up leaving Charlotte for my work trip…
