Fabulous St. Paddy's Weekend

So you know how sometimes one person says, hey, why don't we do this, and then other people say, yeah, me too, and before you know it, you're organizing a trip with a whole bunch of people?  Well, that's what happened with St. Patrick's Day this year.  One friend posted a picture of the absolutely delicious burgers at Daniel Thaiger's, and the next thing I knew I was booking a van for a bunch of ladies to go downtown for lunch to have burgers and green beer.  It ended up being a great time :-)

Daniel Thaiger started out as a food truck, but recently, they added a burger kiosk to the great beer place called BREW on Soi 11.

They knew enough about St. Patrick's Day to offer a special on Guinness, but they didn't have green beer.  It wasn't a problem though, because our organizer came prepared with green food coloring.  I put some in my cider, and it came out great!

The menu isn't extensive, but it is full of delicious options.

I went with the Thaiger burger and split the parmesan truffle fries with my neighbors.  It was SO delicious.

The company made it a lot of fun too.

Because I am the best wife in the world, I also got Jeff a takeaway burger.

We had a fun ride back to the bubble, and then when Vivian got home from school and Jeff got home from work, the fun continued.  We went to see Beauty and the Beast in first class.

Vivian loved it.  She's a huge Emma Watson fan.  I liked it a lot, but it was a bit disconcerting to see so many different versions of the story mashed together.  I think I need to see it again to form a final judgement.

After a full Friday of being a good wife and mother, I spent the rest of the weekend being Nicole, doctoral student.  ISB hosted an Adolescent Literacy Summit, and the guest list was amazing.

I spent most of the weekend in workshops with Kelly Gallagher and Penny Kittle, but I also went to one on the art of slow reading with Tom Newkirk.  It was a total geek out moment for me, because I saved a copy of his article on slow reading when it first came out.  I was also incredibly impressed with Matt de la Pena who delivered a powerful keynote sharing the story of how he became a writer, and how his father became a reader.  It was a fantastic weekend for getting me motivated.  I'm in the final stages of my doctoral process, and that dissertation isn't going to write itself, so it was great to be reminded why I'm doing this.  Jeff also got full dad points for managing the girls over the weekend.

The following week, Vivian got to wear one of her new dresses to school for the music celebration of learning.

Elena and I went to watch her and really liked the song her class performed.  It wasn't long though before Viv was back in her regular shirt and shorts for basketball practice.

We had a lazy weekend to recover from our hectic week.  Elena has discovered the Elephant and Piggie books.  She's had me and Vivian read them to her so many times, that she's got at least one of them pretty much memorized, so now she's reading it to her toys.

She'll be a full blown reader soon :-)