Thursday, December 31, 2009

Twilight - 1 star

Ok so I'm one of those people that has refused to get into all the Twilight/New Moon hype. I have to admit, I'd never read the books or seen the movies, the whole idea of a vampire love story was just too . . . weird for me. So when I was in Utah and I saw my sister-in-law owned Twilight, I figured I might as well open my mind and give it a try, what was there to lose? I fell asleep watching it 4 different times! I did finally finish it though and here are my thoughts:

Not for me. Main character girl had NO personality! Vampire dude was annoying and disgustingly pale. Vampirish blood-sucking sexual tension = CREEPY and just plain WEIRD to me. I suppose I can see how some can get really into that "I want what I can't have/living on the edge" theme but it just didn't do anything for me.

So, I guess I was right, vampire love stories are not for me. It's ok, I'm sure I'll find something else to waste my time reading or watching, no worries.

Friday, December 18, 2009

Happy 30th Babe!

Today my sweet most amazing and wonderful husband turns 30. Seriously, he's the man of my dreams. I know people say that just to say it, but not me. Anyone who knows me well knows I don't say anything I don't mean and I am ALWAYS 100% real. Can't help it. Sometimes I wish I could hide better what I'm feeling but alas, that is not one of my talents.

Back to the topic of the day. STEVE. 8+ years into our marriage and I still consider him my one and only, my best friend, my lover, my support system, my confidante . . . He makes me laugh every day and he has my back 100% and always lets me know it.

Of course let's not forget he has his faults too. Like he thinks vanilla ice cream is better than chocolate. And he prefers his eggs scrambled instead of over-easy. And sometimes he forgets to email me when he gets to work so I know he got there ok (I have major anxiety). And sometimes he'd rather watch football than listen to me go on and on about my feelings. And once he even ate the last piece of chocolate, thinking I didn't want it?!

Nevertheless, I continually forgive him for these shortcomings because I'm such a good person. Ok, who am I kidding here, this husband of mine is pretty much the greatest husband ever. I feel bad for the rest of you because I took the best man out there. He makes me incredibly happy and I'm so glad I have him in my life. And that I get to celebrate his 30th birthday with him!

Happy Birthday Babe!!!

P.S. I hope I didn't embarrass you too much : )

Sunday, December 13, 2009

I did it!

I finally did it! I actually bought and cooked a turkey for the first time in my life. I know . . . an almost 30 year old who's never cooked a turkey. But hey, I've never had a need to, someone else always ends up doing the turkey at Thanksgiving or Christmas and I've never made the effort to cook a turkey for just the two of us. But this week as I passed the meat section I decided to drop one in the cart and that way I'd be forced to figure out how to cook it. And it worked! Yum, I forgot how delicious nice and juicy turkey is. But even more delicious is the creamy gravy, ahhh.

Looking forward to turkey sandwiches this week. Given the smallest turkey I could find was 13 pounds, there are a lot of leftovers. Anyone hungry?

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Thanksgiving in New York

Steve and I took a trip to New York City for Thanksgiving. (Thanks Alison and Curtis parents for watching Blackjack!). We spent a week there, staying with our awesome friends Sabrina and Jose. They have an apartment in Manhattan with an amazing view, it was so great! I don't know who's going to read all this as it's going to be long, but I'm posting it more for our own memories than anything. Blogging is my only journaling!

View from their 20th floor apartment.


View from the rooftop terrace.

Tuesday morning, we got up early and made our way to the NBC studio audience for Who Wants to be a Millionaire with Meredith Vieira. It was fun to be in the audience, this time without the pressure of having Steve as a contestant! And Meredith is SO much nicer than Regis, I love her.

After the show we booked it over to Rockefeller Center where we had tickets to Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. The guests were Claire Danes and Chad Ochocinco. Not a huge fan of either really but Jimmy Fallon was really fun to watch. Being an audience member is so interesting, you get to see some of the behind-the-scenes and all the work that goes into producing a show, it's really neat.

The famous Rockefeller Center Christmas tree. They didn't light the tree until the next week so we just got to see it with all the scaffolding. It's huge!

Wednesday morning we were out the door long before the sun came up to make it to Good Morning America. Steve surprsed me once for my birthday a few years back and took me to New York and we were in the GMA audience which was so fun! This time the guests on the show were the final three couples from Dancing with the Stars (Donny Osmond, Mya, and Kelly Osbourne). We don't watch the show so it wasn't a big deal to us, but we happened to be one of a handful of people they pulled to the sidelines of the "red carpet" where the finalists ran in. The woman next to us kept asking us to shield her from the cameras. Apparently she'd called in sick to work and was worried she'd be on national television. And she was, haha, too funny!



We didn't stay for the taping, I was bored and mad that both Robin Roberts (my favorite anchor) and Diane Sawyer were out of town. I got to meet Diane last time but Robin was out of town that time too, sad. Chris Cuomo just doesn't do it for me.

Then it was off to do the . . .
. . . Sex and the City bus tour! I know, I know, you're all thinking I'm such an idiot. But seriously, the tour gets great reviews and I just had to see what it was all about. Not only was it way fun and entertaining, but it was a perfect basic overview tour of NYC. Steve even enjoyed himself, as much as he and the other husbands and boyfriends dragged along tried to pretend they didn't ; ) How could they not when they're on a bus full of hot women?!

That night we went to dinner at this really great French restaurant and saw the broadway musical "In the Heights" with Sabrina and Jose. I hadn't heard of it previously but it was really quite entertaining.

After the show at Times Square.


Awesome picture of 30 Rockefeller Center disappearing into the fog.

Thursday morning was the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade of course. We didn't feel like getting up early to stake out a good spot so we just meandered over and stood at the back of the crowd for a while. The balloons really are gigantic!

Sabrina and Jose enjoying the parade.

Then it was back home to start cooking Thanksgiving dinner. And by "cooking" I mean taking the plastic wrap off our pre-ordered feast and heating everything up in the oven. Such hard work :) It was delicious! Then the obligatory Thanksgiving nap and Christmas movies.

Black Friday we joined the crowd at Macy's to take advantage of some good shopping. Yes, it was really THAT crowded on the main level!

Saturday we met up with my sister Becca and her husband Jay. We tried out a couple fun food hot spots, including Magnolia Bakery. They are best known for their cupcakes, but better than their cupcakes is their banana cream pudding! Oh wow, we made a second trip to Magnolia's just for the banana pudding it was that good.

Me and Becca at Magnolia's.


The good thing about vacationing with others is we had someone to take our picture and document we were both at the same place at the same time.

On the subway.

We stopped by Dylan's Candy Bar to check out the candy displays.

The snozberries taste like snozberries!

That night we went to the holiday Cirque du Soleil production of Wintuk at Madison Square Garden. It was cute, very family-friendly.

But then we saw these big posters outside the stadium . . . Nadia Comaneci! How could Beck and I NOT get our picture in front of that?!

Me with my "Perfect 10."

Sunday morning, after brunch we headed to Central Park. It was the first completely sunny day with not a cloud in the sky, beautiful!




Sabrina and Jose also got us in for free at the Museum of Modern Art. Interesting, but I just am not into the artsy museums. I guess most of the time I just don't "get" it.

For instance, this is supposed to be some kind of chair. ???

Monday we had tickets to go up to the crown of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. It was the only really bad weather day of course. Rainy, drizzly, windy, and COLD. On a ferry, fun stuff. But we hiked up the Statue of Liberty which was really neat, especially getting to look up into the body of the statue from inside, so cool. Then we headed over to Ellis Island. They have some really great displays set up there, very ineresting statistics and information that's been gathered over the years. I could have spent more time in there but we were in a hurry.



Ellis Island


Steve told me to stand in front of this picture . . . of what he thinks I should do all day every day. No honey, I blog all day, not wash floors!

We raced from the Ellis Island ferry back to the subway, grabbed a slice of NY style pizza and ran to catch the New York Public Library tour. We couldn't hear the little old man from our spot in the back of the crowd so we broke out on our own. What a beautiful building! I wish we had more pictures.

The main lobby entrance of the library.


One of the intricate ceilings.

We wandered the city a while in the rain, running in and out of Starbucks locations and trying to find shelter. We ended up at the "Charmin - Enjoy the Go" restrooms in Times Square. So fun! Normally there is a huge line, but that rainy afternoon there were just a few of us. Charmin pulls out all the stops for this "experience" each year and it's very cool. They set up 20 private restrooms, each with 6 different types of Charmin toilet paper, an iPod or TV, and someone comes around and cleans each restroom between EVERY person! How cool! I still put tp on the seat before going, can't get over that habit. Anyway, so while you stand in line to "go," the MC guy is up front entertaining all of us as we wait. It was hilarious, he goes around asking people on the mic if they plan to go #1 or #2. Then he tells the men we'll know if they went #2 because their coats will be off. It was too funny! Such a normal thing to do, and yet when confronted about it in public people get so weirded out. I thought it was great.




Can't spare a square.

When we left Charmin we saw the Broadway discount tickets booth and decided to go see another show spur of the moment. We found cheap tickets to a comedy off-broadway show called "Newsical." It was in this tiny little theatre, very cozy. And it was pretty funny, singing and a little dancing, but mostly comedy sketches on recent political and entertainment issues. Before the show we had dinner at this cute little restaurant called Sweet Emily's. Yum!

Tuesday morning we got up and wandered the city, hitting the last of the hot spots we wanted to see before heading back to the airport.

Helpful tip for future NYC visitors: Many of the subway stations do not have escalators or elevators for your luggage. In fact, even if a station does have one, there is no guarantee it will be working! We got a good workout dragging our huge suitcases up and down flights of stairs through the subway system. But it was all so worth it.

We ate at tons of great places, saw lots of interesting sites, walked miles and miles through the city, and came away with many wonderful memories of our Thanksgiving in New York City. Thanks Sabrina and Jose!

Monday, November 9, 2009

Double Trouble!



Our new foster, Holly, is almost Blackjack's twin! Holly is an adorable and very playful little Puggle. She’s about one year old and loves to chase and play with Blackjack. She also loves playing with her toys and dragging her blanket around with her. Holly likes to play hide and seek, and hides under chairs, tables, and benches and then pounces on Blackjack when he comes by. She’s very sweet and likes to sit by my feet or cuddle on the couch after playtime. She already knows some commands like “sit” and “up” and is anxious to please. She does well on walks and knows her potty spot outside. This sweet happy girl’s curly tail is always wagging! She's looking for her forever home, let me know if you are interested . . .
http://www.tvar.org/RP_AdoptMe.asp?aid=7961


Sunday, November 8, 2009

Sunday Mornings at Our Place


Even Blackjack is a spooner.

Monday, November 2, 2009

Trick or Treat!


Blackjack was a fireman for Halloween. We took him out trick or treating with my brother Ben's kids. He had fun doing his duty and putting out "fires" on every bush with his built-in fire hose.

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Our Little Conehead

Poor little Blackjack has an infected toe and must wear the dreaded cone for a few days to keep him from chewing and licking his feet. Needless to say, he's not liking it. The vet put the Halloween handkerchief on him, I would never do that!

Here's Blackjack barking at his reflection in the fireplace. "Who IS that with that big weird looking plastic thing on his head?!"

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

8 Years and Counting!

Today is our 8th anniversary. We've done a lot in our 8 years of marriage. According to my calculations we've lived in 4 different states and 6 different homes. We've driven accross the country together twice and we've taken trips all over the U.S. (from California to Vegas to Colorado to New York, etc.) but only recently did we finally take our first trip together out of the country (Cancun, Mexico counts, right?).

But for our anniversary we decided to stay local and spend the night in San Francisco to do some touristy site seeing and to see Wicked! I very much enjoyed the show, it was fabulous. Steve's reaction . . . "It was weird." But he seemed to enjoy it enough while we were there, enough so that I'm hoping we'll go again when we're in New York for Thanksgiving.

The amazing view of the Bay Bridge from our hotel window! We NEVER have good views from our hotel rooms, we always end up with a view of the building next door or the alley or parking lot, this was such an awesome surprise!

The view from the other window. The Ferry Building and the Bay Bridge.


Our hotel, the Hyatt Regency. I love this hotel, so strange but so interesting.

I thought this "Les Croissants" place looked like a fun place to grab some breakfast . . . until I saw the last part of the sign, take a look. "Pastries, Donuts, Espresso, and VIETNAMESE SANDWICHES." Um, no. I mean, I'm not saying Vietnamese sandwiches aren't good, I'm just saying I'm not eating a donut at the same place that specializes in Vietnamese sandwiches, that's too weird!

Street view of two things San Francisco is famous for: the cable car and the insanely steep hills.

The high voltage cables just above our heads on the touristy open-top bus tour.

The Transamerica Pyramid.

Chinatown. I didn't know it is the largest Chinatown outside of Asia. The things you learn as locals on these tours.

Happy Anniversary babe! We've made it 8 years, what's another 60 or 70 more? ; )