Strip Trip FAIL

Yesterday I needed to run a couple of errands, so I asked Daddy to stay home with the kidlets while Mommy did some solo (and infinitely more efficient) grocery shopping and craft store returning. I snuck out during Porter's morning nap, so Brett and Kaiser had some fun father-son Lego time in my absence. Apparently they ventured away from our "construction-truck-building" norm and created some cutting-edge eyewear.

 Sweet glasses, Daddy-O.

Since Kaiser couldn't wear the Lego ones, he got to try on real specs.

Look good on ya, Kid!

When I got back home, Brett suggested that we take a trip to the Strip District after Porter finished eating. He had a hankerin' for falafel from a Middle Eastern grocery store/restaurant that we like down there, and I had to admit that sounded good. I also hoped to nab a ripe avocado for the salad I planned to make that night. It was an overcast, misty day, but not ridiculously cold. We didn't think walking outside would be too miserable, so we bundled up the boys and hit the road. 

As we approached the Strip, we started to sense our brilliant Saturday plans may be, in fact, not so brilliant after all.  There seemed to be an awful lot of people heading in the same direction we were. But we parked the car, popped Porter's carseat in his stroller, and decided to check it out. In the mass of people, the Bralys stuck out like sore thumbs. Why's that? See, word on the street is there's this kinda big football game going on tonight, and our city's team is playing in it. :) Just about everyone on Penn Avenue was decked out in their black and gold attire but us. How on earth could we forget that we're in STEELERLand, not SOONERLand anymore??

I wish that I'd been able to take a picture of the madness that was the Strip District. Unfortunately, I was a tad busy trying to navigate the stroller along the sidewalk (or in the street when the sidewalk was impassible) and not lose my husband and firstborn. Everywhere you looked, there was a stand set up selling Steeler stuff. One guy was selling James Harrison gear and encouraging everyone to purchase it by yelling, "Help him pay his fines!" (#92 is a beast of a player and has racked up quite a few of them for his rough hits.)

The four of us made it to Labad's Grocery without sustaining any serious injuries (I kid, but it was crazy!), but were disappointed to learn that they weren't serving food inside, only to-go at the stand outside the shop. Oh, well. We were able to pick up some falafel mix and whole wheat pita bread, so it wasn't a total waste of time. While we were in there, another lady shopper said she was impressed by my bravery in bringing a stroller. I replied that she shouldn't be impressed by my bravery, but my stupidity. :) I then explained that we were from Oklahoma, so we hadn't even given a thought to what the crowd would be like the day before the Superbowl. She laughed and said, "Oh, so you didn't know today is a national holiday?" No, no we did not.

After leaving the store, we thought we'd keep walking and see if there were other options available for us to sit down and eat lunch. Upon seeing the lines of people out the doors of a couple of restaurants, we were not feeling too hopeful. To make matters worse, the temperature seemed to have dropped dramatically, and it really was just too cold at that point to be walking around with our 2-year-old, who refuses to wear mittens. So back to the car we went to come up with a new game plan.

 Piggybackin' to the parking lot.

We decided to head down the road toward an area that we hoped would be significantly less hoppin'. Brett suggested we grab some pho at Tram's Kitchen down by Children's Hospital, which sounded like a great alternative to falafel. We pulled right up, parked by the door, and were seated and served quickly. Far better choice when we've got these two cutie pies in tow:

 Entertaining himself with his squeaky keys.

Sharing some of Daddy's noodles.

From there on out our Saturday was pretty quiet. After the boys were down for the night, Brett went over to an attending's house to watch UFC with some other residents, and I got some cleaning and ironing done around here. 

Unfortunately, my hubby is on-call today (clearly he wasn't considering professional football when that schedule was put together!), so he's at the hospital all day and night. Hopefully no one does anything crazy to hurt themselves right before or between the hours of 6:00 and 10:00pm, so he can watch Pittsburgh beat Green Bay. If for some reason he does have to go to the OR, though, you'd better bet he'll be sporting his recently-purchased Steeler scrub cap! Meanwhile, I'll be kicking back to follow what I can of the big game (and of course enjoy the commercials) after my babies are sound asleep.

Happy Superbowl Sunday!