Tennis Weekend

Back in January, before everything happened with my mom, I went away for a weekend with a group of ladies that I'm blessed to call my friends. I've been close to Linda, Tina and Alison for years. But the others -- Christy, Lauren, Alexa and Jessica -- have become very dear to me through the process of learning tennis together the last year and a half.

We decided to go away for a weekend-long tennis clinic on the ocean. It was really fun! We rented a big house together, and there was laughter and silliness, quite a lot of eating and drinking, hours of tennis instruction, and priceless memories. 

The original plan included eight of us. But Alison had to back out at the last minute -- her daughter was unexpectedly home from Notre Dame that weekend, and they wanted to spend time together. And Christy broke her foot, but still came to hang out with us at the house, and cheer for us on the courts.

Our first morning of tennis, I realized I hadn't brought a water bottle on the trip. So I grabbed an empty tequila bottle from the night before (we'd made delicious margaritas) and filled it with water for the day. We all thought it was hilarious. Of course, the other ladies who joined us for our clinic didn't realize it was water (and naturally, we didn't tell them). The looks on their faces were priceless when we took our first break and I chugged a bunch of "tequila"!

The weather was unfortunately bitter cold -- a winter storm was sweeping the region, and some of our tennis times had to be adjusted to compensate. We bundled up with all our snivel gear every time we played, and otherwise we mostly huddled in the house. Our final day, the sun broke through the clouds after we finished up a late lunch, and we grabbed a picture in front of the water.

We've decided we have to take a tennis trip every year! Each year we'll go to a different place. Plans are already in motion for next year!