richmond's bacon festival

 

When my huge event at work this past Friday was postponed due to the predicted tropical-storm-that-wasn't, I took that as my opportunity to end a nine day work streak early. Friday started with sleeping in a little, cleaning a lot & Jared's car battery dying. Off we went to the auto part store to retrieve a new battery for him. It was as we got back in the car to leave that MY car's battery decided to die. It's in those moments that you just have to choose to laugh instead of cry. Like, hysterical, ugly cry. So, we laughed-instead-of-cried ourselves away from the auto part store, knowing that we at least had a mini vacation planned for the next day. It had been a little while since we'd had an entire weekend away from work, & there was plenty to look forward to.

We were already 100% in for a quick weekend trip to Richmond as soon as Amelia mentioned the inaugural Bacon Festival taking place on Sunday. But when we got the texts confirming that Amelia & Andrew had found the puppy of their dreams on Saturday AM, we went a little nutso. I think we chanted "PUPPY PUPPY PUPPY" for a solid 2 minutes when we got in the car. Little Miss Maisie (who is a mix of chow + adorable) stole our hearts right away. It was so fun to see their little family of three (because you can't forget Raja, the only cat I'll ever love) grow to a family of four over the weekend.

But back to bacon. We traipsed down to the 17th Street Farmer's Market & were not disappointed by the parade of bacon that greeted us. The local restaurants and food vendors pulled out all the stops with everything from Bacon Pierogi Nachos to Pork Belly Avocado to Maple Bacon Pops. Bacon was being sold on sticks, in cupcakes, blended into drinks, on pies, wrapped around veggies... It was pretty astounding. Things got busy fast so the camera got put away as bacon treats filled our hands. Sorry/Not sorry. 

Maisie was such a trooper, & almost a bigger hit than the bacon. We had to take a puppy nap break & people were going out of their way to bring her everything from ice to puppy pops. Yep, puppy pops. I imagine that she'll have grown so much the next time we see her that we'll already be looking back to these pictures saying, "OMG, her head fit in your hand!"

We went home & finished the day by putting their new fire pit to good use. Amelia dreamed up some Caramel + Bacon S'mores, & I will just never settle for anything less than that for the rest of my life. Gourmet camping trips from here on out. (Grahams, caramel sauce, mallows & bacon. Milk chocolate optional. Dark chocolate tested & not recommended.)

It was back to work today (which started my third-to-last-week in the office - EEK), but we have wonderful memories of bacon & puppies to get us through to the weekend. Seriously. Bacon. And puppies. Best weekend EVERRRRR.

p.s. May have started watching Game of Thrones. So far, we're mostly just freaked out. Will report back.