An Easy Weekend

i'm always grabbing molly like this and kissing her on the face. i love how she reacts when her whiskers get tickled!

This weekend was a lazy weekend. Michael worked on Saturday so I spent the day watching chick-flicks, eating candy, and just being lazy! Sometimes I have such a difficult time relaxing, I'll often feel like there's something I should be doing. I'm sure that says a lot about me but I'm only human, right? :)

Sunday we spent time with one of Michael's oldest friends. It was a blast. His friends area always such crack ups and they are some of the kindest and most sincere people I've ever met. We went down to the beach and grabbed some lunch. I had a delicious bison burger and amazing curly fries. Yum!

While we were with Michael's friend I really got a bit of a wake-up call. He kept marveling at what a beautiful day it was and how great it is that we live so close to the beach. He couldn't stop admiring the day.

It got me thinking about how fortunate we really are to live here. I'm always saying that I'm not much of a beach person, I'd much rather live in the desert or the mountains. That beach town atmosphere just isn't my thing. But it is nice that we get to enjoy such lovely weather and just such a nice area. I mean, we are less than ten minutes away from a great area to watch the sunset, every night if we wanted to.

I know there are so many other people living in worse conditions or just in really unsafe neighborhoods. We are so blessed to live where we do.

This week don't have a whole lot coming up, just work and more work (and some more posts)! Thankfully this weekend we'll get to spend some time with Michael's family as we celebrate a 50th wedding anniversary!

Traveling North

This weekend Michael and I traveled up to northern California for a wedding. Two very good friends of ours were getting married in the Redwood National Forest. It was a gorgeous and really heartwarming wedding. I was definitely in tears at one point!

In the days leading up to the ceremony, we did a bit of exploring around the forest and the surrounding area. I don't have many pictures of our time in the forest since I really wanted to enjoy the scenery, and just take it all in.

When I have my camera I tend to constantly be scanning my surroundings trying to see what my next shot will be. Not to mention, my current camera bag isn't the most comfortable--it tends to pull my hair--so it gets a bit annoying to carry around. I really want to save up for something like this. I would prefer something that looks more like a purse, and not a backpack. Gotta save up for that one, though!

It was such a beautiful trip with just amazing views. The last few photos are from our day trip to Shelter Cove. This is a magnificent area that remains fairly undisturbed. If you're familiar with California beaches, you know that it is pretty difficult to find a beach that is empty, not full of shops, restaurants, or other businesses.

Shelter Cove is actually known as the Lost Coast. Instead of running along the edge of the coast, the Pacific Coast Highway came inland at this point since the terrain along this beach was so difficult to build on.

It was really peaceful and breathtaking. We had a blast on our trip, but it's definitely nice to be home.

Weekend Adventures

We had a nice weekend of running a few errands and visiting with friends and family.

Saturday morning we got up early to take Michael's car in for some scheduled maintenance.  A bit of a stressful day, that ended well. :) Sunday afternoon we made a trip to the beach with two friends. It was a lot of fun, and such a gorgeous day. To be honest, I am actually looking forward to going for walks on the beach, sitting and reading in the sand, people-watching while I tan... All things that normally wouldn't be so easy to do if we lived farther away from the beach (traffic would be nightmare if I left the beach too late).

While we were apartment hunting, I kept repeating to Michael how if we were going to live smack dab in the city I wanted to live somewhere that was "walkable". My word for describing an area that had a lot shops, grocery stores, etc., within walking/biking distance. Even though I consider myself a fairly introverted person, I do enjoy walking to nearby stores, crossing paths with strangers and such. I guess its the residue from my this dream I had when I was about 14. I had daydreams of moving to New York City and just living this fabulous life, where I had a fantastic apartment, walked to my awesome job as an artist of some sort, and took the subway everywhere. And I was the beautiful and mysterious girl on the subway...

Needless to say, that is no longer my dream. My dreams involve much more rural scenery. Maybe some pigs, horses, cows, and a huge garden with little babies running through it with dirty feet and chubby faces. And my handsome husband off chopping some wood without a shirt on(TMI?? :P)

Although, now that I'm learning my way around our area, I'm starting to see the bright side of living here (I'm done complaining, I promise!). I see a lot of people walking to and from work in our neighborhood, or just out exercising. That gets me excited to walk to the store, ride my bike (when we buy one) to get a cup of coffee, or just walk around the city. Things that were really difficult to do at our last place, since everything was pretty far away.

I also dropped off our old apartment keys to our manager. It was sort of bittersweet. Even though most of our neighbors weren't really on the friendly side, our manager was really nice and worked really hard to make living in the building comfortable. Not to mention, that will be the apartment we'll always remember as our first home together. I imagine us looking back with smiles on our faces and thinking, "Remember that teeny apartment we lived in right after we got married???" It was a small but comfy and clean home for us newlyweds.

So it is the end of a chapter in our lives, and the beginning of a whole new adventure. I'm excited to be side-by-side with the one I love.

I'll be back soon with the photos of our home tour, so come back soon!