Adventures in C-Ville

Hello everyone! I'm currently writing this blog post from my grandma's computer in Charlottesville!

I realized it had been a long time since I had actually just gone up to my grandparents house for a visit and done the fun Charlottesville things I always used to love doing when I was a kid, so I drove up here last night to spend some time with my grandparents (don't worry, I'm not being antisocial by writing this, my grandpa is listening to the radio and my grandma is reading so we're all just kind of taking a break) Even though I have to work tomorrow (EEK first day of work EVER) I decided better one day up here in C-ville rather than none! So here I am! Today was wonderful, it was great to do some of the things I always loved doing when I came here as a little kid!

The first thing my grandparents and I did was go to our favorite place for breakfast, Tip Top. I got the chocolate chip pancakes of course!

 After breakfast, we came back to my grandparents house for a little bit, and I wandered around their backyard. My grandma has always loved putting strange little things in her yard, and I found my favorite statue from when I was little, this pig with wings that always reminded me of my favorite book.

Meg and I always loved to play in this little area with all the flower pots and fire wood. We called it our "fort"

After a little while at home, my grandma and I drove to the bakery in town, Chandlers. I have so many memories of going there when I was little, so of course I got what I always do, a radio bar!

You have to admit it looks amazing...

But then again so does everything...

After Chandlers, my grandma and I headed downtown to check out the outdoor mall. I love it, there are so many cool shops and people, and everywhere you look there is something new. (I just included this picture of the courthouse because it was on our way to the downtown mall...)

I loved this awesome clock made out of an old record player!

After walking around a while, my grandma and I stopped at Christian's pizza for lunch. I always loved Christian's as a kid, but had forgotten how amazing it was! Basically, they have every single type of pizza you can possibly imagine, and if they don't have the exact type of pizza you had in your mind, you can invent your own! I stuck with tomato basil though, just because it's AMAZING. My grandma got ricotta and spinach pizza, which was also rather heavenly.

One of my favorite things about the downtown mall was the Freedom of Speech wall. Basically, it is a giant chalkboard wall where you are allowed to write whatever you want to, and I loved looking at what everyone had written. Most of them were just random and silly, but there were some artists who had contributed, and some interesting quotes written up there as well. (See that smiley face in the bottom right corner? That's mine.)

Finally we came home, rested a bit, and then went to Riverside for dinner! We got the big basket of fries as usual...

After dinner, I went upstairs to my mom's old room and discovered this box full of old family photos, which I spent plenty of time looking through. It was strange yet kind of cool to see photos of my grandma back when she was my age, and even younger...

Even though it may have only been one day, I'm glad I got to spend some time with my grandparents after so long. Even though we live so close to Charlottesville, it's not often I get to come up here and spend time with them, so I'm really happy when I get an opportunity to! Tomorrow I have my very first day of work EVER, and even though it freaks me out that I'm growing up, coming here and doing the same old things I always did when I was little reminds me that no matter what, I'll always have that little girl inside of me who likes to eat radio bars and play in my grandma's garden and order the giant basket of fries every time we go to Riverside. 

Here's to that little girl :)