I dropped Avery off Thursday morning in Columbus with Nana and Grandma Raab. It was a bit of a hurried drop off because it took me much, much longer than expected to get there. I met up with Scott at home, threw my clothes in a suitcase (almost literally) and we were off to the airport. Upon arriving, it was very cloudy and the forecast for the weekend was cloudy and rainy. However, it actually turned out really very nicely. On Thursday evening, we kept it low key and stayed at the hotel. We ended up staying at the Mandarin Oriental and they have a great restaurant called Azul. It was very yummy and the decor and view were gorgeous! On Friday, we went to early lunch at Senora Martinez’s, by famous chef Michelle Bernstein, followed by an entire afternoon of shopping and more shopping. It was a cloudy day and it was nice because all the shopping was outdoor so the temperature remained tolerable. We went to the Design District, shopping on Lincoln Rd, and I think one other place. It was a lot of walking! On Saturday, we decided to do some exploring and took a private boat tour of Miami which was a blast and spent some time at the spa at the hotel. We had a fabulous dinner at Il Gabbiono (our mutual favorite) and I highly recommend it to anyone traveling through or to Miami. Yum, Yum and the view is awesome! Sunday was our last day so we mainly just pittled around since we had a late flight (8:30pm). We left the hotel around noon, drove around for about 2 hours and settled at Smith & Wollensky’s right across from Fisher Island watching monstrous boats come in and out of the bay. We walked down to the beach after eating lunch (it was scorching hot) to see thousands and thousands of people on the beach and in the water. I’ve never seen so many people in the water in person. They looked like little ants! It was kind of cool to see. We decided to stay cool and went to a movie before heading to the airport around 7pm. We ended up having beautiful sunny weather and a great time! We missed Avery tons though and were ready to get home to see her 
Menu Memento:
We might look a little windblown here. The house in back of us is one of the famous stilt houses out in the middle of no where ocean. It’s crazy really! These stilt houses were all built in the early 1900′s and they are not allowed to renovate them and they have made it through countless hurricanes. They cannot be sold either so they are heired. They are mainly used for parties or weekend hangouts.
Boat Tour of Miami (we learned a lot of really cool things including some history):
Dinner at Il Gabbiano’s:
Bewildered at the amount of people on the beach (south beach):
