Mali-beautiful!

So its been over a week since we got home but due to other travels (Chicago leadership weekend) the California vacation update is late. The trip was AMAZING. First off....let me just plug Sky Bus Airlines. Not sure who knows about them but the first 10 seats on every flight are 10 bucks and then they go up from there. You basically need to be waiting at your computer for months to get those but you can still get them really cheap if you are only moderately addicted to checking the website....which is what mitch was doing. So we got roundtrip tickets direct from NC to LA for $150. We were pretty happy about that. We went out to visit and stay with Randy a Christie who are at Pepperdine for law school. Geography lesson: Pepperdine campus sits in mountains and on bluffs over looking the beach in Malibu.

So we get there tuesday and actually go sit in on one of randy's classes. And I feel asleep in my first law class. (so probably my last) Law school is not for everyone. But before I fell asleep I noticed a few things that are way different than I remember from college. Nobody uses paper. Everyone had a laptop in class (i mean everyone) and thats how they take notes. And i only saw two or three people on you tube, facebook, etc...there's no way i could be in a boring class and actually only takes notes with my computer in front of me. So the ticking on the laptops was a little hint as to when the professor was saying anything important. Crazy.

We did a bunch of stuff there and I don't really remember what days now thats its been a while so it'll be a summary through pictures including the beach, hikes, beach bocce, beach bike tours, etc...

a little hiking on the bluffs over the beach and the rich people's houses...

and some beach bocce...

randy and mitch had tickets to the anaheim march madness games and christie had work so aaron and i spent some time on the beach and hiked back behind the campus while everone was gone...

this monument was built cause one of the people that dies in the pentagon plane crash in 2001 was a student at pepperdine...it was a neat place with bible verses, flowing water, and flowers up overlooking campus and the mountains and beach. we hiked up to up one morning.

the next day we were all together and went to go do the hollywood hike...it was a pretty lame hike cause you basically walked up a gravel or paved path but it was cool to go there. can't go near hollywood and not go see the sign i guess. that day we also drive down rodeo drive, through beverly hills and saw the stars on the sidewalk. again, things we weren't too interested in to spend a whole day but took some time to drive through. poor randy....they're right when they talk about LA traffic...it took way too long and all he wanted to do was get home to watch the games. :-(

a redeeming factor to that day was diddy reese....my personal heaven. you walk in and pick two homemade cookies, and a flavor of ice cream and they make you a ice cream cookie sandwhich for a dollar fifty!!! yup, we went twice.

this was definately a highlight of the trip. saturday the boys went back to the basketball games and aaron, christie and i took a sweet bike ride. there's this path that runs from the santa monica area all the way down the coast. it is literally a path in the sand on the beaches. so we started near the santa monica pier and rode down about 10 miles to marina del ray and then came back. during thse travels we saw some amazing scenery. the beach of course...

the santa monica pier...

the rowing and sailboats area in marina del ray...

and then....the mayhem also known as venice beach. this picture doesn't even come close to showing the strange things that go on at venice beach. the picture is of a roller skating dance crew. weird but kinda cool. we saw a pogo stick jumper with an audience, lots of burnouts on the lawns, the outdoor gym, etc. There was so much going on and so many people milling around it was incredible. we didn't stop so i don't have many pictures because i don't think we qualify as being strange enough to be there.

one night we went to eat dinner at a place called dukes. dukes has half price entrees between four and six so we hit that up and sat out on the deck looking at the water. it was kinda cod outside for me but it was better than being inside with the random hula dancers.

and sunday morning we had a sweet easter service. we walked from campus across the street to the church. they lost their building in the fire and set up a huge tent to hold easter service overlooking the ocean. it was beautiful and a gorgeous day.

and we had this nice idea of going on a hike sunday after gorging ourselves on easter dinner. christie cooked up a storm (and had been all week) and we ate a lot of good food. then we went on a fabulous, yet terrifying hike. we hiked for a while and reached a waterfall. but there were other, better waterfalls higher up so we kept hiking higher. the hike got harder and even got pretty scary at the top. i hope my mother doesn't read this cause she will never stop worrying. there was a point that if you slipped on the gravel) like we had been doing on the way up) you could fall off the side of the mountain. and die. seriously. we were trying to hold on to bushes and brush to give ourselves more stability. there were points where it was not as bad and then times i really as nervous. poor aaron...he had his running flats on with no tread left s he was sliding all over the place. obviously we didn't exactly have hands free to capture these life changing moments but mitch caught a picture from behind us on one of the more stable travels down.

all in all...this trip was amazing! as aaron mentioned one time during the week. "best three hundred dollars we ever spent". and he was right. it was a great time of being active out in nice weather with friends we haven't seen in a while. love it.

next update to come...chicago leadership update from last weekend....and then the keller visit this coming weekend!

playing catch-up

FIRST OFF.....I'M 27 NOW! :-)

once again, its been a while since i've updated the blog. that should give you a clue as to how much homeowrk i've been doing :-( too much. but its been a good few weeks. my parents were here in february and we got the tile floor down in the kitchen! good times. i love it!





we celebrated our birthdays a little early while they were here too. went to maggiano's for dinner and then back to their house for presents. i got some clothes and movies and aaron got socks (of course) and an odometer for his bike.

then on my actual birthday aaron and i went out for dinner and then he had friends show up at our house for dessert. the harveys, the koontzs, the caseys, and mitch. we seriously celebrated my birthday for days. with my parents being here early and then celebrating late with the ross', i've been eating "birthday dessert" for an entire week. i'll be paying for that in the gym for a while. but its worth it i think.

we also had a bridal shower for molly at our house last weekend. molly and ross are moving back to dallas this week and are getting married in may. we're sad but it was a really nice way to say goodbye and get her "ready" for married life. we had a lot of good discussion and encouragement for her and it was a really nice time. of course we played some scandalous games...the pictures from which are not blog safe so they will not appear here. but it was good to have a girls night like that.

then the ross' were nice enough to take us out to dinner for our birthdays saturday. we went to a nice place called brio (thanks to charlotte christian coaching) :-) and as you can see below....i ordered a whole chicken, thats right a whole one. didn't really know what i was getting myself into. i've already eaten three full meals out of it and i'm not done.



and then on the flip side for dessert the ross' shared something so small they couldn't even get both their spoons in it at once. who was the pig at the table??? yup, the birthday girl! :-)


and on another surpise note...T-Money came into town saturday morning! josh had a game down here and they were staying close to the mall so i drove out and got to see her for breakfast. what a sweet surpirse visit that was!!! the only problem was that it didn't seem long enough...gotta plan some longer visits soon!

aaron had another race last weekend too. this was a duathlon. run 5 miles, bike 33 miles, run another 5 miles. this was the longest bike race he's done yet. he did pretty well of course. he came in fifth overall and won his age group! (and got the cheesiest medal i've ever seen)


then on sunday we went on a little hike with mitch and sarah. sarah's up from atlanta since her school is out for spring break. its been so fun to have her here! imagine how much fun mitch thinks it is :-) sunday was a gorgeous day so we took advantage and got some outdoor activity.




well, i think that about covers it for now! next on the agenda is our trip to california later this month and then the leadership weekend in chicago right after, and then a visit from the kellers after that! more good times to come!