Delightful Dates

Taylor's topic this week for Top Two Tuesday is top two dates. Dave is wonderful about planning interesting things for us to do. I honestly love spending time with Dave no matter what we are doing, but it is always fun to get out and do something new and exciting together. It is really hard to just pick two dates! We have been together for years and have had so many great dates!

Our First Trip To California Together:
This was one of our first overnight trips together and it really strengthened our bond. It was a trip for my birthday and a group of my friends came along too. It was fun hanging out on the beach, swimming in the oceans, and soaking up the sun during the day while drinking and dancing at night. It was the first time Dave met my group of friends from high school and they loved him! We had a lot of fun on this trip and he was so sweet to me during the trip. Even though we have been to California many times since then, this trip will always hold a special place in my heart!

Our First Trip To Vegas Together:
This was another amazing trip we took when we first started dating. We had the typical Vegas fun- blackjack, drinking, dancing, crab leg buffets, and seeing all the sights at all the casinos. We went with some of his friends and some of my friends and that made it even more fun! We would have some couple time then also get to meet up with all of our best friends! The thing that made this trip special for me and Dave is kind of embarrassing... We we staying at a hotel off the strip. They were doing construction and while we were getting ready one day I went to turn the sink on and the water was shut off at the source. I didn't think much of it since we were pretty much done getting ready. We we got back that evening our hotel room was completely flooded. The water was turned back on and I must have left the faucet turned on. It damaged our room and the room below. It was awful and I was so scared of how Dave would react. He was upset since the room was on his credit card, but he was so incredibly sweet to me. He was so great and it was just one of those moments that made me realize what a great guy he is!
There are so many other great dates we have been on so honorable mention goes to:
~The Zoo/Aquarium
~Desert Botanical Garden
~Museums
~Melting Pot
~Camping
~Dancing at the Bars
~Ballroom Dancing Lessons
~Dinner Theatre
~Watching the F-16s take off at Luke Air force Base
~Batting Cages
~AZ State Fair
~Skiing
~Going out on lake in Dave's boat
~Dbacks Baseball Games
~Packers Football Games
~Going to the Archery Range

Seriously I could go on and on! I guess that is how you know you have a keeper! To link up and share your own favorite dates, head over to the Undomestic Momma

SATC...I'm A Charlotte

The topic this Friday at A Girl in Pearls is another awesome one! Favorite Sex and The City Character! I LOVE SATC and I am so excited for the new movie coming out!
I have a hard time picking a favorite character because I seriously love them all! If I had to choose one that I identify the most with it would have to be Charlotte York. I think her style is the one I love the most on the show and I totally understand her perfectionism. My friends dubbed me Charlotte long ago when we were still watching new episodes on HBO! I love her relationship with Harry.

Dress like Charlotte York by Maja Konestabo featuring Lipsy dresses

I would have to say Miranda is a close second as a favorite character. I love her relationship with Steve! These are basically my favorite characters on the show:

I can't wait until I get to see Sex and the City 2! I have always loved Adian so it will be nice to have him back (even if it is a little dangerous for Carrie!) Who is your favorite SATC character? Head on over to A Girl in Pearls and link up!



I am also going to play along with Five Question Friday over at My Little Life:

1. Do you have an iPhone and, if so, how do you get apps and what are your favorites?
No, but my boyfriend does and I love it! I like playing ragdoll and surfing the web the most! One of these days I am going to upgrade to an iTouch iPod!

2. What is your fondest memory of K-3rd grade?
My childhood was a pretty happy one so to narrow it down to one memory is really hard! I would say school, family, and softball were the things that made my life happy during those years!

3. What makes you cringe at the thought of touching?
I have said it before and I will say it again- SPIDERS! I pretty much don't love things with an exoskeleton. I find them ccreeepppyyy!!!

4. If you could have any celebrity show up on your doorstep who would it be and why?
I really don't care about meeting celebs, but if I had to pick I would say.... Oprah? Maybe she would be there to tell me I had won some sweet giveaway of hers!

5. What would you say is your best physical feature?
I would easily say my eyes are my favorite feature.


To link up and play along head on over to My Little Life:

Fossil Creek

I know how blessed I am, but lately I feel like I have been complaining a lot! I know life is never going to be perfect and I need to start focusing on what is right in my life instead of what's wrong.

This is a great quote about how counting your blessings can make you happier and healthier from Time magazine:

"At the University of California at Riverside, psychologist Sonja Lyubomirsky is using grant money from the National Institutes of Health to study different kinds of happiness boosters. One is the gratitude journal--a diary in which subjects write down things for which they are thankful. She has found that taking the time to conscientiously count their blessings once a week significantly increased subjects' overall satisfaction with life over a period of six weeks, whereas a control group that did not keep journals had no such gain.

Gratitude exercises can do more than lift one's mood. At the University of California at Davis, psychologist Robert Emmons found they improve physical health, raise energy levels and, for patients with neuromuscular disease, relieve pain and fatigue. "The ones who benefited most tended to elaborate more and have a wider span of things they're grateful for," he notes."
Read more: @Time.com

I thought it was perfect for Thankful Thursday Five over at Mannland and I am really going to try to come up with a great list every week!

1. We finally got our air conditioning unit fixed. It is starting to get hot here in AZ and it was starting to get pretty miserable without it!
2. Going on a long walk with my dad. He is trying to lose a few pounds and we went on a long walk this week together. It was really nice spending some time together just the two of us and I think it was good motivation for him to start getting active.
3. Having a great doctor. I had a little bit of a health scare and had to have some biopsies taken this week, but my doctor is really nice and definitely knows what to say to make me feel better about everything.
4. Great friends. I am looking forward to a girls only weekend! My bff is dog siting for her brother and I am going to spend the weekend hanging out with her at his house. I am baby sitting Sunday for my other good friend, and I am so happy to be able to help her out when she needs. It feels great to have a few really good friends in my life right now!
5. An amazing day trip to Fossil Creek with Dave yesterday. I had never been and it was so beautiful! I love that we had the time off to go on a weekday and it wasn't crowded. We also found this amazing mom and pop cafe in Strawberry, AZ for some ribs and pie- YUM! He is my best friend and we had a great day together.

For Thoughtless Thursday and Shoot Me this week, I will share our pictures from Fossil Creek yesterday. I couldn't go in the water because I had just had the biopsies taken yesterday, but it was still a lot of fun and I am hoping we can go back soon with some of our friends!

We even saw a deer on the way home! It was a great trip and seeing all that natural beauty and being with my best friend made me realize how blessed I truly am!

To play along head on over and link up! Happy Thursday Everyone

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30 Before 30- Goals For Travel, Food, Money, Love, and Learning

The topic this week over at The Undomestic Momma is to list the top two things to do before I die. There are so many things that I would love to accomplish in my time on Earth (however long or short that it may be.) I have been recently been working on my 30 Before 30 list (the 30 things I want to do before I turn 30 that I saw on E, Myself and I and I have seen a few people post.) It was such a fun list to create! I think I will make it 30ish things and keep adding as I think of more worthy goals. I will be thirty in about five years (yikes!) and I am sure that I won't accomplish everything I have set out to do, but its a great motivation just to see it in writing! I sometimes cheat on the Top 2 Tuesdays and pick wayyy more than two things, but in this case it would be pretty easy to pick the two things that I would hope to accomplish before I die.

1. Get Married To My Heart's Desire and My Best Friend.
I am not one of those girls who dreamed of her wedding day since preschool. As I have gotten older and more ready to make that kind of commitment, I am starting to think about it more and more. Sure, I love to look at the pictures of other people's weddings and think about the things I want to have at my wedding, but that one day is not the reason this is on my list. I am excited to start a life with my best friend and have a partnership based on love, respect, and loyalty with plenty of fun and laughter along the way.

2. Become a Momma
Family is one of the most special and important things in my life and to start my own family is a lifelong dream of mine. I would love to have both my own biological children as well as adopt and I think it is one of the things I am looking forward to most in life.


I know that those are pretty basic things that a lot of people accomplish in life, but those are the two things that I would be disappointed if I didn't get to experience. Beyond those things here is my 30 Before 30 list of all the things I would love to do before I die:

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1. Travel to Hawaii

2. Travel to Australia [& Hold Koalas Here!] [Snorkle/SCUBA The Great Barrier Reef]

3. Swim With Dolphins

4. Buy My 1st House

5. Eat at Pizzeria Bianco

6. Get Married To My Heart's Desire and My Best Friend

7. Become a Momma

8. Take A Cooking Class

9. Go One Month Without Eating Out [Cook At Home For EVERY MEAL!]

10. Get SCUBA Certified and Go Diving In The Open Ocean

11. See A Play On Broadway In NYC and A Circ De Soleil Show In Vegas

12. Find A Regular Volunteer Opportunity [Animal Shelter or AZ4Children?]

13. Read {at least} 50 0f the The Books On The Modern Library's Top 100 List [and/or The College Board List]

14. See All The Movies On The AFI Top 100 List {As of 4/2010 I have seen 24}

15. Host A Fancy Dinner Party and Host A Theme Party

16. Hike The Grand Canyon

17. See The Giant Sequoia Trees In Yosemite/Sequoia National Park

18. Read The Entire Bible [Maybe Using This Guide?]

19. Get A Professional Massage and Have A Spa Day With My Mom

20. Create A Cookbook Of My Favorite Recipes and Have A Few Signature Dishes I Can Make From Memory

21. Start Saving For My Retirement

22. Take A Cruise

23. Get My Parents A Really Great Gift

24. Learn To Play Golf and/or Tennis [Take Lessons]

25. Travel To Europe

26. Learn To Play An Instrument

27. Write A Letter To The People Who Made A Difference In My Life [Teachers, Family, Friends] And A Letter To My Children To Be Opened On Their 18th Birthday

28. Go On A Cross Country Road Trip

29. Pay Credit Card Debt Off Every Month and Pay More Than Minimum On Student Loans/ and/or House Payment, and have six months worth of living expenses in a savings account.

30. Become Fluent In Spanish [Rosetta Stone or Community College Classes]

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These are just a few of the goals that I thought of (for now) for my finances, food, travels, my brain, my heart and my soul. I will keep you all posted on my progress on these goals and hopefully will get to cross a few off soon!

If you want to play along with Top 2 Tuesdays, head on over to the Undomestic Momma

And to link up your list of 30 Before 30 (or whatever goals you have for your stage in life) head on over to E, Myself and I

Busy Little Bee

It feels like it has been so long since I blogged! It has been a busy few weeks for me and it has been crazy but mostly a lot of fun! One of the craziest things that happened at the beginning of the month was my cousin came into town unexpectedly. We were extremely close growing up, but lately we have been really distant. I was expecting our lunch to be really awkward so I decided to call her beforehand and have a frank discussion. It was a difficult talk but it was good to get things out in the open and off of our chests. We went to lunch with our moms, which was really nice. After lunch we walked around the dollar store and bought a bunch of cheap fun headbands and then we spent some time at the park together. It was a nice start to get our friendship back on track, but I am still not sure where we will go from here. On a happier note my other friendships have been going really great! I recently babysat for my friend's little girl and it was really fun! I brought my glove and bat and some wiffle balls and we did some batting practice. I played softball for a lot of years and it makes me so happy when I can get out there and play a little bit. My friend really loved that I did that with her little girl and asked me to come over and play again with them later in the week. It ended up being me, C, S, lil J and a bunch of neighborhood kids and we played a little scrimmage game. It was so much fun and I think we are going to try to make this a regular thing. It reminded me of The Sandlot! We also took her out yesterday for a belated mother's day dinner and then I went with her for her tattoo appointment. She is getting some cover up work done on some older tattoos. She is really nervous about it because she really cannot do anymore cover up work after this. I really hope it turns out how she wants it! After her appointment we went to the park with lil J and played on the playground. Some of that stuff is a great workout!

Dave's best friend is going to be in town for the next few weeks. He has been stationed overseas for the past nine months and it will be great to have him back. He and his girlfriend were our best couple friend and before he left, the four of us hung out all the time. The day he got into town we all went to a D-backs game together. We had great seats, ate at the TGIFridays in the stadium, and they even had a fireworks show after the game.

We went out to Salty's bar on Saturday as a welcome home party for Andy and we have a lot planned for the time while he is going to be in town. I am excited for our Las Vegas trip at the end of the month! We all went together a few years ago and it was amazing. I hope we can make the most out of the time we will all have together!

Happy Cinco De Mayo!

'I wish' .... I was fluent in another language in addition to English, and it would be ________!

SPANISH! As a southwestern girl, I think this would be the most useful language for me. I live about six hours away from the Mexican beaches of Rocky Point and vacationed there for many years with my family and friends. [Unfortunately it has become much more dangerous in the past few years and we have decided not to travel there until things get better.] I have taken Spanish throughout highschool and I loved it. Two semesters of foriegn language were required in college, but I tested into advanced Spanish and didn't have to take any foreign language classes in undergrad. In pharmacy school I took "Spanish For Pharmacists" and I loved it! It's really nice to be able to communicate with my patients! I can communicate in very basic language but it has always been my dream to be truly bilingual and fluent in Spanish! (It is one of the things on my 30 before 30 list!)

To play along with Wishful Wednesdays head on over to the Seattle Smith's and link up!

Everyone Needs A Splurge Now and Then

This week Taylor has another fun topic for Top Two Tuesdays. She wants to know the top two things we splurge on.

1. For me I would have to say Coach purses. I love them and I have six right now. These purses below are ones I actually have and the ones I wear ALL THE TIME (if you look close in some of my pictures you can see them- lol):

I love them! They definitely can be expensive but I usually buy mine at the Outlet store or use a coupon at the regular store. They are still a splurge, but it is literally something I use everyday.

2. The Melting Pot is both a splurge with calories and cash! I LOVE the cheese and chocolate and every once in I will strongly hint to Dave that I want to go ( :
Head on over to The Undomestic Momma to link up and check out everyone's picks for their splurges!

I also wanted to share this little list of lies we tell ourselves to justify some of the purchases we "must" have from The Frisky: (I especially have trouble with the first two)

1.The Lie: I’ll wear this so often that if I divide the total price by the number of times I wear it, it will basically cost me nothing.
The Truth: It still costs a butt load of money.
2.The Lie: I’ll have this forever.
The Truth: You can hold onto something for a lifetime, but after a few years of wearing it, the fabric will be worn and BO will have found a permanent home in the pits. Either that, or the dry-cleaner will lose it.
3.The Lie: I’ll never find anything else like it.
The Truth: Unless it’s vintage or couture, you can probably get something similar at a retailer up the block.
4.The Lie: I’ll fit into it eventually.
The Truth: If you can’t close the zipper now, you’ll probably never be able to. Sorry.
5.The Lie:I can afford it.
The Truth: You can afford it if you put it on your credit card