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!

School Woes

so i'm in full swing with school these days....let me give you more of a mental picture of what that means. i get up and go to work at 7:30 and get out about 1:00 each day. at that point, i work out and then come home and sit on the couch doing homework until i go back for more clients at dinner time. thats basically every day except friday which has more time devoted to homework.

doesn't sounds that bad does it? well, some days it is. i'm taking three classes and two of the three are very manageable. i would really only have to devote one full day to get it all done for those two. but my third class is a nightmare. its about managing non-profit organizations...i know, you can imagine how boring that is because it sounds insanely boring. well, it is.

i do not have a business or corporate background at all and thats making this class harder. i'm acting as a consultant for the YMCA for our project, doing all this analysis. well, i don't even know what all the business terms are and i definately don't know how to do anything with them. this is the first time i'm hearing things like swot anlysis, internal and external environmental scans, strategic planning, capacity building, etc. and i don't care. i'm not interested in managing a non-profit organization...i don't want to manage anyone or anything. i rather be the one doing the hands on work.

all that to say...i'm spending hours a day trying to figure all this out...post 3 page papers about it on our discussion boards, and then write 8 page papers about it each week. ugh. not to worry though...if you even have questions about managing non-profit organization, oh, i'm your girl!

if it wasn't for this class, i'd think getting your masters was easy!

Heck Yeah!

this post is purely to express my joy on the giants underdog extravaganza! there's some sweet satisfaction in the upset and sweet justice that the team caught cheating did not win it all in the end. love my giants :-)

Cococay, Bahamas

Our last day was spent at this paradise. It was basically a small island, owned by Royal Carribbean. There was nothing there except our cruise ship and the people tha run the fun there. You walked off the boat and all you saw was endless beach chairs, ocean, and the best yet...hammock's between palm trees. Amazing. We didn't do much but that was the point I guess. We all camped in this little hacienda with padded chairs, and sheers for privacy. Why would you shut those though...I mean really, you're overlooking a very blue ocean!

Anyway, Aaron and I rented snorkel gear and went out pretty early. We saw some pretty sweet fish of course along with some sting ray. Aaron really loved the snorkeling...and proceeded to pass around the other set of snorkel gear providing guided tours for the rest of the family. When he finally came in I think his body temperature was a few degrees colder. So I took Ben out after that and then Brett and John went out together. Unfortunately for them, John planted his hand on a sea urchin and had to seek a little medical advice. Looked pretty nasty. Had me reminiscing back to my jellyfsh debacle last fall. Other than the snorkeling, we read, laid around in the hammocks, and bought cocoloco's from the guys walking around selling this tasty frozen drink. Oh Sweet Paradise!

After our relaxing day at the beach, we got back on the boat to enjoy our last formal dinner, shows, and music.

This vacation was amazing...I mean at this point after all you've read I'm sure that's not a surprise to you. It was just non-stop fun. We came home pretty high on cruises, telling everyone we know that they have to go on one in their lifetime. After some reflection we decided that the vacation was fantastic but it wouldn't have been nearly as fun if we weren't there all together. The company makes the experience.

Cruisin' Key West Style

well, its taken a few days for me to get back to blogging but i'm back...with more stories to tell!

so our first full day was "cruising" as they call it. we spent the day out at sea and took advantage of the fun the boat had to offer. hit the trampolines, took a salsa class, hung out at the pool, hit the casino (with only the change in the bottom of my purse for the slots), and had our "formal night" for dinner. the boat had more than enough options to keep us busy.

So after a full day out at sea waiting out the weather, we port at Key West the next morning. aaron and i had signed up for an excursion called "snuba" in the afternoon so we went walking through key west in the morning. we had fun just the two of us walking to find the beach. the town's pretty cool looking. lots of beach-town-looking shops and boutiques and stuff. i mean, don't get me wrong, i'm not gonna go to key west and waste my time shopping, but it was a cool atmosphere to walk through.

after about an hour of walking, aaron and i got to a beach. it was fairly sketch though. a bunch of homeless people loitering around and such. but we walked past this guy who gave us a coconut that he had peeled and stuff. apparently he was a chef in new orleans until katrina hit. now he sleeps on the beach in key west. as he put it, "i guess i traded up". quite the outlook after losing everything. we tried to take it back on board with us but they wouldn't let us so we had to have some fun with it before we got back on for lunch.

after lunch we found our excursion spot...only to have it cancelled!!! such a bummer. but it was nice of them to cancel it cause they had taken people out in the morning and i guess they couldn't see anything so it would've been a lot of money and time to not see any cool sea life. i was pretty impressed that instead of taking our money and saying "oh well, sorry we couldn't see anything", they just told us not to waste our money. so we ended up hitting the beach (a not so sketchy one) for the rest of the day it was a nice afternoon on a pretty beach!

random side note for you...and on our walk back to the boat we saw these dogs that had legit dreads. weird.

so back on the boat. ben, aaron and i hit the rock climbing wall before we got ready for dinner again. i'm sure many of you will not balk at this story but i'm telling it anyway. i forgot socks for the climbing wall. picture going bowling, getting the shoes that the rest of the world does, and having to put bare feet in those publicly used shoes. i'm still hoping i didn't catch some gross fungus from it. i still have a hard time believeing i actually did that. i mean, my mom did raise me to fear all germs, especially in public places. i wish i had pictures of this cause it was cool but along with my socks i forgot my camera.

and the next and last update to come...cococay, bahamas. let me just warn you, i just let out a whimsical sigh just thinking back about it :-)

BING-BONG! Faro Family Christmas Cruise!

"bing-bong" is what the cruise director, mark, said everytime he concluded hosting something or making an announcement on this cruise this past week. sounds like it might be annoying, yet it wasn't...i grew quite fond of it by the end of the trip. for those that don't know wha i'm talking about, we just got back from the faro family christmas vacation today. they took the family on a royal carribbean cruise to key west and the bahamas for christmas...and it was amazing!!! we had such a good time!!!!

this post would be redicuously long if i talk about everything tha was amazing about it so i'll go in stages in the next few days so keep tuning in! :-)

we flew down to florida on tuesday (yup, the day they had that cold snap and freeze warning) it was cold and we were wondering if we would be that cold on the cruise too. regardless, we were still too excited to be let a little cool weather stop us....i mean really, we're new yorkers. so wednesday we board the boat and waste no time getting in the hot tub. we were one of the first ones on and the whole rest of the day people were boarding the boat with their sweats and coats on while we're outside in bathing suits in the hot tub. we got lots of "you're not from florida, are you?" comments. obviously not. we were glad we flew in the day before and got on early cause we basically got a whole other day on the boat.

we spent the rest of that day scoping out all the boat had to offer. 11 decks, climbing wall, bungee trampoline, pools/hot tubs indoor and out, lots of different lounges and bars, a sweet fitness center, and of course lot of places to eat...whenever you want. so it was pretty cold and cloudy but we didn't care because we were excited to get started on all this fun!at night we all got dressed up nice for our fancy dinner. our waitress for the week was from lithuania. her name was inga. we learned lots of stuff from inga...like they work six straight months without ONE day off! how crazy is that!?!? and they work all day long. they must have crazy standards for service because all the people working there (and there was over 800 of them) were so helpful. you could tell they weren't american as sad as that is for us to say. the international feel with all the people from all over was really sweet. it made you feel like you were far away even when we were still docked in fort lauderdale.after dinner we went to the orpheum theater for the opening night dancing/singing show. they were really good! just like sitting in on a broadway show. and then it was on to karaoke. good times. we were supposed to head down to key west the next day but weather changed our plans so we spent thursday "cruising" as they call it...just out at sea on the boat all day. i'll write about that another day!