much needed girl time

now, i must be honest…i’m not the best friend to have if you like to hang out a lot. i am a home body! after a long day at work, i usually want to come home, change into yoga pants and just veg! i may craft, read, or watch a movie, but i don’t have much energy left after 8 or 9 demanding hours at the hospital, and want to put little effort into activities for the rest of the night. we also have to work every other weekend now, and i have to be on call once a week until 11 pm, so when i have two days off in a row i am either catching up on sleep, doing chores around the house, or running errands.

however, these last 3 or 4 days i have spent a ton of time with my chicas, and had a blast!

it started on thursday after work. cheryl and i were supposed to work out. probably the elliptical, because that’s about all i’m good for. however, since it was such a nice day out, and she lives close to the monon, we decided to go for a bike ride instead. she asked if i wanted to ride all the way to carmel and get a bubble tea, but i didn’t think i was up for that. we ended up riding into broadripple instead, and got ice cream at bric’s. we have never been there before and it was delish! let me tell ya, “one scoop” was more like 4 or 5 so we managed to ruin our dinner. cheryl had cake batter and i had blackberry. we both had waffle cones and were in heaven. the pumpkin was amazing too (we sampled it) but neither of us ended up getting that in the end. not gonna lie, the ride back was a little rough for me. we all know i have more than a few extra pounds, and at that point my butt was on fire. (cheryl failed to mention that her bike-that i was borrowing-is a mountain bike, which has little to no cushion on the seat.) overall we rode almost 8 miles. it was fun, i was just being a baby and was hurtin for the next few days.

when we got back to her place, she made us baked sweet potatoes, and we threw a random smorgasbord of ingredients on top…feta crumbles, avocado, quinoa, and black beans. although i would never think to put those items together, i really enjoyed it.

finally, we watched tv and crafted. we watched “girls just wanna have fun,” which made me feel old because i was 2 when it came out and cheryl was -2. i love musicals and song and dance movies, so it was right up my alley. cheryl was making fun of me because as soon as the first song came on i was like “i’ve got to get this soundtrack.” lol. i had obviously never seen the movie before, but i’m sure it will soon be one of my faves.

we both started to wind down, and when i looked at my watch it was almost midnight! definitely didn’t plan to stay that long, but i guess time really flies when you’re having fun! i got a little bit more done on my cross stitch project…and got a new hoop for it, because my old one was entirely too small

on friday night, our friends jeremy and elecia, who are getting married at the end of october, had a couple’s “stock our bar” shower. here is what we brought them:

i hate tequila! but brian actually owed them a bottle because of a drunken iu vs. kentucky basketball game gone horribly south from like 2 years ago lol. i think they were pleased. they also registered for movies and games, so i was pretty jealous about most of the gifts they received lol.

after the shower, the boys headed to bloomington for jeremy’s bachelor party, and the girls stayed together. we drank sangria and played “cards against humanity” which is like the highly inappropriate, yet hilarious version of apples to apples. we listened to lost of kesha and had a really good evening.

saturday, i ran errands with my best friend ever (jenny) and her son (my nephew) grayson. we always manage to spend way too much money, have buyer’s remorse, but still have a great time. we went to joann fabrics, where i was able to get this amazing IU frame on clearance

and also this adorable kermit the frog fabric

we also picked out this cute elephant hat for nugget. he usually doesn’t allow anything to be on his head, however, i think this one was loose enough and we were able to snap some pics. love this boy! and he loves his auntie too. we give each other “head butts” and kisses and he is always smiling! jenny and i were cracking up about something and all of a sudden he starts laughing too in the backseat, which made us laugh even harder, which made him laugh even harder 🙂

after that we went to target. i got way more than i should have, but i was most excited about these jelly flip flops that were in the kid section, lol, and on clearance for $3. winning!

and finally, saturday evening, i hung out with katie and alyssa. we watched lots of college football, ate lots of snacks, and had probably the most random, yet amazing conversation ever. there was bitching about boys of course, there was dying of laughter, there was deep secret sharing, etc. it was just really fun lol.

this morning, while katie was getting ready, i played with little man. he is a hoot and probably the most advanced 2 year old i’ve ever known. first he climbed in this toy basket and told me he was “sleeping.” he also faked a sneeze and politely thanked me once i told him “god bless you.” lol

after that, he asked me to take a picture of him with both of his chuck e. cheeses, and proceeded to fake snore. he is very entertaining, that’s for sure. he can almost say christina too, it’s super cute.

today, when brian got home, we watched the colts, which got hairy for a minute.

we are headed to the grocery soon, and i don’t think i have ever been more excited in my life. lol. first of all, we haven’t been in FOREVER! second of all, spending money and our ideals on food are way different and always a big ordeal at our house. i had to bribe him with bdubs for dinner, just because kroger is right next to it. so ornery!

but what i’m excited about, is that i’m super prepared. i got on kroger’s website and wrote down everything we wanted/needed that’s on sale. they also have digital coupons that you can load onto your kroger plus card that will automatically be taken off when you check out. yeah baby! and finally, i wrote out our list starting from the entrance, all the way around to checkout, to make sure we stay on task and stick to the list, but also to make sure we don’t forget what we actually need. ocd much?

well, i’m pretty starving, so i think it’s about time i wake him from his afternoon nap and start heading that way.

although i’m definitely not ready for work in the morning, i think i’ve had my fair share of fun 🙂

c

 

 

the louisville chronicles

even though we have been together for a little over 2 years now, brian and i have never taken a vacation alone together. we have gone to out of town weddings and shared hotel rooms with other friends. we have gone to visit friends and family members in other cities, but we have never taken a trip with just the two of us. i have to sign up for pto a year in advance (because i work at a hospital) so that kind of stinks. i tried to pick a time of year that would have nice weather, and was centered around a holiday, so we would already have that day off, and there would be fun things to do. we could also take some days off before the holiday, and after, instead of taking one whole week off. (there is usually a method to my madness)

aside from the weather, everything else worked out in our favor. half of the time we were there, the temperature was over 90 degrees. the other half of the time, it was pouring down rain.

the first night we arrived, we got decked out in our hoosier gear and headed to a sports bar to watch the football game. i failed to mention that we stayed on 4th street, so we were within walking distance of several bars, restaurants, shops, etc. the place we picked was called the sports and social club. it had a bowling alley in it, which we did not partake in. and they had AMAZING wings! omg. best wings ever.

ok, i was going to try to put the pictures in the order they happened, and tell what we did day by day…however, i think they got jumbled, so perhaps i will just explain what is happening as i go along, lol.

this sign was on the building next to our hotel and i thought it was funny because i have heard louisville said so many different ways, and am still not sure of the proper pronunciation. i also bought a t-shirt that has a horse, colonel sanders, etc. with speech bubbles saying pretty much the same thing as this sign, lol.

this trip further reinforced that brian and i are polar opposites. he likes to take his time, relax, and in general is just very easy going. i like to go, go go! especially on vacation, you have limited days and unlimited activities. i only brought one paperback book and left my kindle at home, because i didn’t think i would have much time to read, but i was wrong! i finished my book quickly and even had to go to half price books for replacements. after this, i will update my 30 before 30 reading list. 🙂 here i am in the hotel lobby, on one of my many afternoon reading sessions.

there was this really cool souvenir shop called why louisville, which is where i bought my tshirt. here is brian posing as a muscle man and abe lincoln outside of the store, lol

i am a sucker for old fashioned photo booths and they had one in the store. it said you would get a total of 4 pictures, so we planned to kiss on the last one, but it tricked us 😦 i still think it’s pretty cute 🙂

we also got a funny post card from their local printing press that said KY is for horses not jelly. lol. inappropriate, but really funny, and will definitely make it’s appearance in my scrapbook.

i don’t remember where we were when we saw this sign, but i had to add to it. brian was being a party pooper and didn’t want to join in. i wrote that before i die i would like to ride in a hot air balloon. there were several other things i could have written, but for some reason i really really really wanna ride in one! lol please also excuse the stupid “t” someone added.

we also made it to the louisville slugger museum, which didn’t have as much as i thought it would, but we also didn’t take the actual bat making tour.

and here is my handsome just being weird and posing next to this guy lol

when looking up things to do in louisville, i found this “whiskey bar,” that sounded interesting. i don’t particularly like whiskey, but it said that they had all sorts of beers too. it was a hole in the wall, but i still had a good time. i had a delicious pumpkin beer and also this beer mixed with grapefruit juice? brian stuck with coors…boring!

this next picture is from a mexican restaurant we went to called chuy’s. it was huge and packed so we knew it had to be good, and it did not disappoint. in addition to salsa, they also give you creamy jalapeno dip…to die for! it was pretty reasonably priced too. and it felt like i was at a fiesta 🙂

oh lord, i almost forgot about the next thing…i do not like gambling at all…i would rather spend money on something i want, than lose it for nothing. however, since brian was being such a selfless boyfriend the whole trip, and the one thing he wanted to do was closed due to the heat (kentucky downs…he loves the horse track) i decided to be nice and ask if he wanted to go to the casino across the bridge.

here i am, patiently waiting for brian to be done, so we could leave, lol

here is one of my two vouchers. not too shabby huh? 😉

with my big winnings, i took us to steak n’ shake to celebrate. LOL! the gps kept calling it “steak ‘north’ shake” and we thought that was pretty hilarious.

being the “derby city” meant there were horses everywhere…and who am i to pass up a photo op?

we also learned that there are more bourbon barrels than people in kentucky…interesting…

here we are in the car, waiting out the torrential downpour

and finally, here are all three of the shot glasses we purchased for our collection. i thought it was weird that they are all plain black, but brian didn’t seem to think so.

all in all we had a good time. there were enough art activities for me (which you can read about on my other blog here), and enough sporting events for brian. we were also able to balance relaxation with activities, something i need to learn to do more often, especially on vacation right?

luckily i have today off too to kind of unwind before heading back to work tomorrow. i don’t have another “day off” until the end of the month when we head to a friend’s wedding in tennessee.

i think this might actually be the first time i have fully unpacked once getting home from a trip. i’m embarassed to say that i had to clean out stuff from my arizona trip in order to use my suitcase. when was that? march? april? yikes. unpacked and got all of the laundry done last night. feels good!

i feel like we did a lot more than pictured, but you get the main idea, lol.

c & b