We got up this morning and it was such a beautiful day and we had all of this new gear for our European adventure trip so we decided that it would be a great morning to take the girls out for a walk. We have the new stroller to test out, the new Ergo Baby carrier and the new Nikon AW100 camera all to test out for the first time. We packed up and headed out on foot.
On the way “away” from the house Liesl rode in the new stroller and Luciana rode front mounted on Dominica in the Ergo Baby. Luciana really liked it and was very sleepy the whole time. It is a very snugly way to travel.
We walked to Cafe Brazil and, while we were there, decided to get brunch. We sat outside and had a really nice time. The weather was perfect. The girls had fun too.
We walked back to the house and this time Dominica pushed Luciana in the stroller and I carried Liesl in the Ergo Baby carrier on my back. That gave me a handy extra thirty pounds to increase my exercise for the walk. The total walk was more than three miles! Pretty good for a Saturday morning for the Miller family.
We got home and Dominica set right about painting Luciana’s room. We’ve been talking and with the hopes that we will be moving to Europe in the next few years it is just crazy to invest in converting the attic into a second floor playroom for the girls. It would be six months from now before it was done and Luciana might never be old enough to use the stairs before we move away. That would be quite the waste of money. So since no construction will be done in there we no longer have an excuse not to get it painted. It is being painted a pale yellow. Very much like the colour of the kitchen before it turned green.
This evening we decided that the walk to Cafe Brazil had gone so well and that there was so much food there that we wanted to try that we would walk back again and eat a second meal there and skip our Medifast meals for the day. This is my first time skipping my Medifast meals in about ten months but I figured that if it got Dominica out and walking that it was worth it. It is always a struggle to get her to walk a long distance with me and Cafe Brazil seems to provide much needed motivation.
We walked back as it was getting dark. We ate inside tonight, rather than out on the “patio” like we did earlier. Really the patio is just the sidewalk next to the parking lot. This is a cafe in Texas. It lacks a certain something, to be sure. I can’t wait to be eating at real cafes in Europe again.
I got the barbecue salmon for dinner, it was quite good. The broccoli there is amazing. Really good produce. We were pretty happy that we returned to Cafe Brazil. That was a good decision today. It made for a nice change of pace – all this walking and hanging out as a family and going to someplace new. Good exercise too as not only is it a good walk but we are carrying the kids or pushing a stroller the whole way for extra exercise. Dominica did half of the carrying this morning but tonight I am doing it all. That will wear her out quickly.
On the way back we decided that we were doing pretty well so walked away, rather than towards the house, from Cafe Brazil and took a really long way around and approached our house from the far side. Altogether this evening walk was just over five miles for a total today of nearly eight and a half with about seven of that with me carrying either Liesl or Luciana on my back. That’s some serious walking. It was nice getting to show Dominica around our neighborhood too as she really doesn’t know the different areas that well. This will get her used to it quickly.