I Vote for a Day of Shopping

Today was such a fun day for Brookelynn. What a great treat to have schools closed on your actual birthday. We like to say that schools were closed because of Brooke's birthday, but in reality, it was the presidential election that kept the kids out of school today. Most of the schools in our county are used for voting precincts. It just worked out that this year, election day fell on Brooke's birthday.

Brooke and I started the day off early this morning. She and I headed to Cracker Barrel for breakfast.

While we ate breakfast, we discussed our agenda for the day. Originally, we wanted to take a big shopping trip in a city with lots more shopping options, but since we both came down with the crud over the weekend, we didn't feel like traveling far.

I took Brookelynn for a birthday manicure.

After her nails were neon, we hit a few outlet stores, before heading to Kohls.
She had a panda jacket there that she had wanted to buy. She was so excited to get to wear it out of the store. This evening, Stroker and I visited the polls to cast our ballets. Brookelynn went along with us to shadow us.

Aunt Darlene picked Brookelynn up at our house around 4:00 and took her to pick out birthday gifts from her and Gary. They shopped for a couple of hours before meeting up with us at Olive Garden for Brookelynn's birthday dinner.
We hung out at Olive Garden for almost two hours because "when your here, your family" (slogan).
We had dinner and cake and laughter. The presidential election was our topic several times too.