The De Falco Family: Two reunions and a hurricane

Sunday, October 23, 2016

Two reunions and a hurricane

Tony and I spent months looking forward to our 20th high school reunions...who would be there? Would we recognize our old friends? Would they recognize US??

And would you believe it? Our reunions were scheduled for the very same weekend (in two different cities in Virginia)...so we had a lot to tackle in 48 hours! No surprise, but the weekend flew by! Here's how it all went down...

We drove to Northern Virginia on a Friday and had a delicious dinner and a (TINY) bit of quality time with Nonna...

and Nonno...

Before heading to the informal bar night that Tony's high school hosted in Old Town. It was fun to catch up with old friends, like Mike!

and Jacob! Tony's known both of them since elementary school. :-)

And I had a great time hanging out with Beth (she joined us!) since she lives in NoVa.

Then right after breakfast the next morning, we went to Tony's school to see all of the updates and renovations it's had since he graduated, including the addition of this mini-rotunda at the front (after all, it's not called Thomas Jefferson High School for nothing!).

Brie instantly made friends with another Gabriella...the daughter of Tony's old friend Shannon from the track team!

We got to hear about all of the latest happenings at the school from the current principal!

And then snapped a group shot!

Everyone thought the new lab spaces were cool. And our kids ran around with their buddies from Cleveland (their dad went to Tony's high school).

Here are Deniz, Mike and Tony (and Brie)!

We had a good laugh over the the two "lunch lines" in the cafeteria: the "Asian Inspired Line" (represented by our Turkish-American friend Deniz) and the "Italian Inspired Line" (represented by Italian Tony). Haha.

I was really excited to reconnect with my friend Allison (we were in the same sorority at UVa)! Pretty cool that she also went to high school with Tony!

Lunch with your family in your old high school cafeteria? Yum!

Right after lunch, we hit the road and headed straight for Virginia Beach. Luckily (??), because of Hurricane Matthew, no one else was driving south...and we made it there in record time! We got in a little time with my folks and then got all dolled up for my reunion!

This is what we drove through to get to the event...heavy rain and very high winds!

As soon as we arrived, we saw Berto (he went to UVa with us, too)! Like our yellow cups?? "Cheers to 20 years!"

I especially enjoyed catching up with Jack--one of my first friends from my first class on my first day at Cox High School in 10th grade!

I also caught up with the other Steph Krebs...that's right, the girl at my high school (and college) with the same name! Now we both have different last names, thank you very much!

And Jessica--my classmate, Leadership Workshop buddy and friend at UVa, too!

And then, sadly, our fun had to end. The chair of our reunion sent us home a bit early since the weather had taken a turn for the worse...roads were flooding, winds were strong and several neighborhoods had already lost power! Needless to say, we took our time driving home...

And then this is what we found in the morning: my parents had a sinkhole that was nearly 6' long in their driveway!

And there were lots of trees down everywhere. My folks even lost power for two days. :-(

So we did the smart thing...and went to play indoor tennis!

On Sunday, the weather was much better, so we went for a long walk! It was sunny, but blustery!!

Snuggle time before bed!

Then bright and early on Monday morning, we hit the road and headed back to Cincy. The trip was way too short, but we accomplished what we set out to do: attend both of our 20th high school reunions and visit the grandparents! And it was time for our cuties to get back to school! Thankfully, they don't mind being in the car for hours at a time...and they do love a good picnic when we're on a road trip!