Wicked.

Ok, time to catch up. I was too cheap to pay for internet access in our room again- $12 a day!- so here I am at the airport wasting time until our flight. We had no idea how long it would take to get from Midtown to LaGuardia so we left the hotel at 12:40 for our 3:45 flight. That was a mistake. Boo. We got to the airport in RECORD time due to our taxi driver who "loves fast cars and racing!" (That's an exact quote. When we told him we were from Indy he told us that he dreams of going to the race. I told him I was dreaming of never being in a car with him again!!) It took us a mere 14 minutes to get to the airport. I may have screamed and threatened to puke in his cab a few times, but so be it.

Once I caught my breath and put my stomach back where it belonged, we checked into our flight. The news made it seem like airports were swamped with people. Not true. It took us maybe 10 minutes to check-in and make it through security. The food court here is lacking to say the least. The airport is really small, but I think that is because they have the terminals broken up in such a weird way. We are flying US Airways and they charge for sodas onboard! What?! That is crazy. Jerks. They also charge $15 for the first checked bag. I hate that. I understand charging for the 2nd bag, but charging for the 1st just makes for slower boarding and deplaning as well as grumpy people. Whatever airlines. You all suck.

Now that I have updated you all on what is currently happening I will go back and cover the last day we had in New York City.

Friday morning we got up at a decent hour- 11 Eastern- and headed out to do a little shopping and eat lunch. I got these little crafts that I had been eyeing for 30% off since I waiting until after Christmas. Cha-ching. We tried to eat at 2 different New York-style delis, but the food grossed Jackson out. LOL! I thought he would love it! We ended up at a Qdoba. So it goes. I enjoyed my burrito immensely. We hurried back to the hotel to get ready for the show. We had to meet my friend Jenna at 1:30 so we were pushing it. Once I was ready- for once I took longer than Jackson to get ready- we hailed a cab. The cabbie didn't have a clue where we were going and passed the theatre! GRR! He had GPS. USE IT! Anyway, we got to the theatre and who do I see? SUZE ORMAN! 

You may not know of Suze if you're not a financial person like Jackson and me. We love to watch her show! Callers pose questions to her about what to do with their financial lives and she answers- she typically does an OK job, but I always feel that she lacks getting the whole picture. I scream when she gives tax advice because she does not know all of their information. And then viewers take her tax advice as fitting for them and it is a big mess. Anyway. We pause the show before she answers and give our answers. It is really fun. Jackson hates her because she thinks men are evil. She is a big lesbian and really does man bash quite a bit. I wanted to get a photo with her and tell her how we watch her show, but she was with some kids and we didn't wanted to bother her. It was still cool to see her. I assume she had GREAT seats. ;)

We found Jenna and headed to our seats- on the 3rd floor! Oops! They really were not bad seats though. I enjoyed the show. The set was incredible as were the costumes. I was unaware that they'd sing the ENTIRE show, but I lived. It was a cute story. Cuter since I'd been on the yellow brick road in Kansas and all. ;) Jenna entertained me before the show started. She is seriously so funny. It brought back memories of laughing myself to sleep in college. She is so witty and quick. She really kills me. My self-diagnosed ADD did not act up too much during the show because it was so fast-paced. 

We left there and headed to dinner at a place called Juniors on Times Square. Our food was excellent.  They were so busy and their cheesecakes are so popular that they sell them outside! I had to pretend to eat one. ;) Anyhow, we really enjoyed getting to see Jenna. She is seriously hilarious. MacKenzie would love to meet her, we're sure. :)

We went back to the hotel to change into comfy clothes and headed to the Empire State Building. It was a 2 mile walk, but since we'd had dessert we decided we'd better hoof it. We actually steered off course and saw Grand Central Station and the Chrysler building because they were pretty. When we finally go the to ESB, we walked through lines and lines. It was not crowded at all, but they make you go through lines so they can try to sell you things. I was annoyed. Mostly because I had a ridiculous fear of heights and I just wanted to get it over with. We finally got to the 86th floor and Jackson headed outside. It took me a second to get up the nerve to go outside. I finally did and found Jackson- on the other side of the building! UGH! I had to hold the wall the entire time. I did not feel steady walking on my own. I did it though. That was my second time atop the building and I am finished with it! The sights were incredible. I will admit that. 

We went to the world's biggest Macy's for a few minutes then headed home to the hotel. We wanted to wake up early today, but that did not happen. Our room was so dark and the bed was so comfy. It just sucked us in. We went to Central Park for a little bit to check it out. We ate at a cute little diner for lunch. Then we headed to that cab ride I mentioned earlier.

Well this blog has taken me within 2 hours of our flight. Excellent.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend. We're headed to Harry & Izzy's tonight with Susie. I love that place. And I love free food. Life is good. :)

The Curious Case of Manhattan

Merry Christmas!

Today we were very anti-Christmas and slept-in until 1 pm Eastern time. In our defense that is only 11 our time. A normal Christmas would bring Grace with bells ready to open presents. We missed her today, but we did not miss the bells. ;):) We were dead tired from yesterday's red eye flight and full day of sight-seeing. 

After we finally got up, we went out to search for food. We decided to head to Chinatown because we figured only Chinese places would be open. This was before we left our room. As we left the hotel and entered the sunny world we realized that like any other day New York City does not stop. Stores were open. Restaurants were going. People were EVERYWHERE. This really rocked our world. We honestly thought that Christmas day was probably really slow around here. WRONG. 

We decided to ride the subway to Chinatown and the financial district. It is only $2 per person making it MUCH cheaper than taking a taxi. Our iPhones (God bless them!) are able to give us walking directions and public transit information. We did not have to read a single map as the phone just told us when to switch trains. Money! It was awesome. We had one little hiccup where I thought it read "Grand Central Station" and it said "Grand Street" oops. We missed the Grand St. stop and ended up crossing into Brooklyn! Shoot! We did get to see Lady Liberty that way, though. It was pretty funny. Once we were back on track we landed in Chinatown. Jackson says, "just show me a huge wall and I'll believe that I'm in China!" LOL!! It was very, very, very genuine. The signs were in Chinese. The papers were in Chinese. The people were Chinese. It was very Chinese. After finding that their food was too authentic for my American-ized taste we headed to little Italy. Little Italy was not as genuine as Chinatown. There was a restaurant that looked excellent, but the line kept us at bay. After all we were losing daylight since we had slept in so long! We ended up at a Sbarro (a wonderful place for a Christmas meal- right?!) and had pizza there. It was really weird that so many places were open. It was terribly easy to forget that today was Christmas day. 

We walked to Wall Street and got some cool photos. We went to see the Bull statue that Jackson had been DYING to see. It was pretty cool, but there were people everywhere. Again. We headed back to the subway to get back to the hotel. We only had to ride one train so there was no chance for missing anything. Whew. ;) Riding the subway was very easy, but those things need some LYSOL. No kidding. I am scrubbing myself tonight. And washing my jeans in boiling hot water. Ick. 

We decided to go to a movie tonight as I love seeing movies on Christmas day. Theaters are different here as they do not really have multi-plex buildings. The theatre we went to is really old and HUGE. We stopped in at 6 to get tickets for the 8:15 showing of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. It was really a cool movie. I normally do not support Brad Pitt in anyway, but the movie was great. We went to dinner before the movie since we had some time to kill. We had Chinese since it was more American around here. Haha! :) We walked down to Times Square to get cheesecake. The line- again- was too long and there were no tables so we headed back to the movies. We get to the theatre at 7:50- waaaaaay earlier than I would ever get to a movie in a regular town- and we have to wait in a line a block long. Are you kidding me?! We already have tickets. It was just the line to get in. Then there was a 20 minute line to get Milk Duds. GRRRR. These people must be the most patient on earth because all you do here is WAIT! The theatre was really old and historic. It was a great place to see a movie. It was so weird to walk out of the theatre to and be in New York City! We decided to go to bed at a decent hour tonight as we want to get a lot of stuff done tomorrow. 

We are headed to walk in Central Park and then to see Wicked with my roommate from IU, Jenna. We are also going to go to the top of the Empire State Building. It should be a good day.

We hope you all had a GREAT Christmas. 

Merry Christmas from New York City!

Isn't she a beauty? This tree is truly breath-taking in person. I cannot imagine a more beautiful tree. 
I love this display of HUGE ornament balls. It is really a cool piece of art. 
We met up with Heidi and Andrew at Rockefeller Center. It was so nice to see them!
Jackson in front of the LOVE sign because he is my love. ;):)

Ok, I am not posting anymore photos right now because it is a painfully slow process. Sorry. On to the rundown:

We left Denver at about 1 am mountain time. We flew JetBlue and they were awesome. Our flight was very full- much to our disappointment. We wanted to be able to spread out. They did, however, hand out sleep kits that had eye masks and ear plugs. How nice! Each seat has a tv and free satellites and movies. I watched for a little bit, but fell asleep. Poor Jackson couldn't get any rest. We landed 30 minutes early so it was only a 3 hour flight. Not bad at all! Thank you, JetBlue.

After a disaster with our shuttle service not showing up (do NOT use SuperShuttle- they suck!!) we got a taxi and headed into the city. Taxi drivers seem to have death wishes. Jeez. I about puked 800 times in the back of that cab from JFK to Manhattan. We got here in one piece, though. Our hotel was willing to let us check in at 10 so we had 2 hours to kill before we got some much needed sleep. Jackson had been up for over 24 hours at this point! We were pointed to a diner called "Astros" that was really good. It was so New York! It was tiny and the help was foreign. (There are not many English speaking people in NYC on Christmas Eve.) From there we went to a Starbucks to rest and enjoy a wonderful coffee treat. Yum! It was cold and rainy this morning so we wanted to take shelter- quickly! It finally came time to check-in and get some sleep and we could not have been happier. We showered up and got a long 3 hour nap. It was heavenly. 

We headed out to meet Heidi and Andrew at Rockefeller Center. The tree! Oh so lovely! We had lunch down by the skating rink and watched many people fall. One girl did some tricks, but they were lame compared to the Olympics. ;) It was nice to catch up with our friends in a place the none of us call home! 

We did typical tourist things and headed to Times Square. Kill me. Now. I have never seen so many darned people in one place. (Minus the breast cancer walk in Denver, but that was different.) I just wanted to scream. People run into you like you're not there. GRR people GRR. We walked down 5th Ave and did some shopping. I loved the window displays. We went to FAO Schwartz. We were like kids in there. It was a TON of fun!!! :) 

We came back to the room and cleaned up before we headed out to dinner. We went to an Italian place near our hotel. It was SO delicious. We had bruschetta that was to die for! YUM! And chicken parm and lasagna. It was awesome and not too horridly expensive. That's important because this place is expensive!

After dinner we headed to a church service here in the city in a really old, gorgeous church. We stood in line for 50 minutes to get in (the services are really popular here) and right as we are walking in I notice a homeless man sitting on the stairs. I went to him, gave him some money and wished him a "Merry Christmas." I had no more left his side when a security officer for the church told him this was not a place for beggars and made him leave. The church is not a place for people with nowhere else to go? Really? Then where are we to go? As Jackson pointed out to me, weren't we at church to celebrate the birth of Someone who had nowhere to go many, many years ago?! (Jesus.) We went into the service, but I just could not shake the feeling that these people were missing the point of a Christmas Eve service. I told Jackson I wanted to leave and we did. Jackson told a guy on the way out what happened and he brushed us off and told us to tell someone who cares. Oh ok. Sweet. Nice church. Not. My heart was absolutely broken. After a few minutes of being upset I regrouped and decided that jaded New Yorkers would not mess with my Christmas. My Jesus still cares for the homeless man, even if they do not. Thank you, Jesus.

Jackson and I went back to see the big tree and it was packed! Do people not sleep?! After a quick stop for some New York cheesecake- yum- we came back up to retire. I convinced Jackson that I just had to pay the $12 fee to sign online so I could update you all on our trip thus far. Thank me later. Haha! :)

Merry Christmas to each and every one of you. May God bless you and yours on this very holy day. 

Keep tabs on MacKenzie

While we are away MacKenzie will be paying Camp Bow Wow's rent for the next 2 months or so (ok, a stretch, but still $252 is a lot of cash!) you can check her out at:
http://www.campbowwow.com/us/co/parker/CamperCams/tabid/1143/Default.aspx
She will be dropped off tonight around 7 Mountain Time and won't be picked up until the morning of the 30th. Tear. We'll miss the little pup.

Love and hate...

I feel that I have been in Denver long enough to compile a list of loves and hates.

Loves:
1. That snow melts very, very quickly. We're talking within hours. Cha-ching.
2. There is no humidity. Lovely.
3. The sun shines so much. Honestly. Cloudy days are few and far between. The sun even shines when it rains. Odd. I know. But this leads to my 4th love
4. There are so many rainbows here! Beautiful!
5. I enjoy living in a tourist-y destination. This has so far not helped out with people visiting us, but I harbor hope.
6. There are not many old people here. Sorry, Florida, but I enjoy people driving at higher levels of speed.
7. There are mountains here. They're gorgeous. I cannot ever imagine life without them again.
8. I do not have flea/tick treat MacKenzie because there are no issues with them in this climate. Cha-ching. That stuff costs a fortune.
9. Flights out of Denver tend to be very inexpensive and the airport (when the trains are working) is lovely.
10. Jackson lives here and that is all that I need. :)

Hates:
1. There is a SEVERE lack of sweet tea in the greater Denver area. SEVERE.
2. McDonald's of Denver has done away with bagels in the morning. That's such crap. I had to go to Burger King because of this and I HATE Burger King.
3. The fact that Mexican restaurants do not serve white cheese is inexcusable.
4. The fact that there are only 2 Cracker Barrels locally and it takes at least 45 minutes to get to either of them is just annoying.
5. I will move on from food- but it is the worst thing about being out here. 5 is that Denver drivers are horrid in the snow! GRR.
6. I hate bicyclists who do not think that they have to follow traffic laws...this means that I hate all of the bicyclists in Denver.
7. People with big dogs here seem to think that leash laws do not apply to them. No, my little 14 pound white schnauzer does not want to play with your German Shepard weighing in at 130. Thanks, jerk.
8. The toll road by our house is increasing its rates to like $2 per toll plaza. That's going to be an expensive drive to the airport now. Grr.
9. They put a pink clay and sand mixture on the roads which is just hideous. Hideous. And it does not help anything to melt. What the heck?!
10. We have no one here to puppy sit for MacKenzie so we have paid about $400 to Camp Bow Wow in 4 months alone. Ouch!

As you can see, the pros outweigh the cons and we are really happy here. No place is perfect, we know that. But if you don't strive for improvement you'll become complacent. Ick.

P.S. I GOT THE JOB! :)

A new ring

We went to church this morning- it was packed- and heard a GREAT sermon. I love to see families together worshipping near this holy holiday. The sermon was given from Joseph's perspective of Jesus' birth. The speaker brought up a ton of things that I had never thought of before. It was really lovely.

After church we headed to Shane Co. to get Jackson a new wedding ring. I missed him looking married. :) He had a $300 budget (because people who lose things do not get rewarded!) so we ended up with a tungsten titanium ring. He really likes it. It was $317 so we went a little over budget- when don't I?- but who's counting?! ;) 

Then we headed to lunch at our favorite Chinese joint. Yummers. We had a nap and watched the Broncos get beat. We love watching the Broncos lose. :) Tonight we are baking cookies for Jackson to take into work and watching the Giants vs. Panthers game. We're looking for a Giant win! 

I have an interview tomorrow so please keep that in your prayers. Have a great Monday!

I have added this photo of MacKenze simply because she is so cute. ;):)

Mazda vs. Median

Well, well, well. Remember when I said that my car had no damage from my brush with the underneath of a semi? I was incorrect. Incorrect is an understatement. I was dead wrong. I knew when I tried driving it that it felt bad. I was right. Let's start at the beginning of the morning we had here.

I wanted to take my car to the Mazda dealership to be looked at because it was driving terribly. Jackson, ever the thrifty husband, wanted to take it to a discount tire store. Guess who won. Jackson. Of course. We head out to a store that it is to be 9 miles from our house. Totally fine. We get there- wrong store. We had accidentally called and ordered tires to a store 30 minutes away. Awesome. I'll drive my wrecked car on the interstate for miles. Why not? I mean it is just safety right? GRR. So we drive and drive and drive and finally get to the other store. Oops. They cannot aline my car because the tires are too big. GREAT. WONDERFUL. THANK YOU. Oops again. I need a new wheel because mine was cracked in the whole Mazda vs. median fiasco. (Aren't SUVs made for all terrain driving? And doesn't a median count as all terrain?!) Ok. A new wheel. Sweet. Order me one. No problem. Oh wait a new wheel- not even the tire just the inside- is $565. AWESOME. Again, thank you. So I get the wheel ordered. We get the 3 tires put on. We pay. A cool $1,500 t0 get out of the place. They not have to trailer my little Mazda from BFE to Castle Rock- a solid 25 minute drive from our place- to get it aligned and install the new wheel. It won't be done until Tuesday. We leave for New York Tuesday night. WONDERFUL. Again, thank you. UGH! What an annoying day. I have an interview Monday morning and I have no car. Our insurance will not cover a rental car unless we file a claim. If we file a claim then our rates go up. Jackson told them how much he hated insurance and how we pay for something we cannot afford to use. I totally agree. I hate insurance companies. (On that note, do not ask me who my interview is with on Monday because it is totally an insurance company, LOL- but they only do life...no auto. Whew!) A rental car for 1 day (1 day!) is like $55. Are you kidding me? No. We will just have to think of a plan. I am beyond annoyed right now. GRR. GRR.

On the positive side of things since we were already so far out of town going to a Cracker Barrel was feasible. Ah yes, nothing like comfort food and sweet tea to ease the pain of a cracked wheel. I mean my wheels are not even chrome- why are they so expensive? GRR.

We did Christmas shopping for MacKenzie tonight. She got food (HA!), a new red ball and some poop bags. I know. She's spoiled. ;) Practicality this year folks. I have a wheel to pay for! We also made a Target run and it was shockingly calm there. I loved it. Our friend Meg was brave enough to face Wal-mart today. I am rarely that brave on regular days, but the Saturday before Christmas? Forget it. I told you that she's a trooper.

The rest of the evening was spent watching football. The Cowboys lost. Add that to my crappy day. I love the Cowboys. :/

Tomorrow should be better. I hope you all are well! :)

Seven Pounds

Jackson, Meg and I went to a movie tonight. We saw Seven Pounds. It is pretty much one of the greatest movies I have ever seen. Go see it. Now. Seriously. Go. We had a taco dinner here before. Meg is such a freakin' trooper. She rolled out to see us right out of chemo! Seriously. She is my hero. She's just awesome.

If you are a loyal blog reader (if you're not, that's totally fine this just won't make as much sense to you.) then you will recall that I LOVE getting presents in the mail! Honestly. I love it! YAY for presents in the mail. I do not include things that I purchase via the internet presents in the mail. That's just silly. I also do not purchase things that way very often so I have gotten way off of my point here. Back to presents in the mail. I love them. This week was a GREAT week for presents in the mail. I do not mean just wrapped presents, I include Christmas cards as presents in the mail because the represent thoughts. And thoughts are really the best presents. Besides perhaps a Gucci bag, but who cares?! Anyway, I love Christmas cards with photos. It is always so nice to see how people are! This week I got a ton of cards. Thank you everyone! I loved it! I also got a package from my sister-in-law, Kathi, and from my dear friend Cali Kate. Thank you, ladies. LOVED IT! Kate sent us the most beautiful artist rendition of the Golden Gate Bridge (a personal favorite) and I love it so much that I sat it on my desk so that whenever I am on the computer (wayyyyyy too much!) I will see it. Thank you Cali! Kathi sent us a lot of goodies (I opened them early. Shame on me!) but my favorite it a snowman drawing/painting by Grace that is framed so nicely. It looks gorgeous. I seriously love it and I am considering leaving it out all winter (Shannon and her mom think that snowman represent winter not Christmas but I am not sure how I feel about that yet...).

Today was a tremendously wonderful day. Yay.

" I CANNOT STOP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Today it snowed. I do not watch the weather so I was unaware that the weather was going to change. I met Jackson for lunch and then went to get a pedicure. Finally! It had been too long! Then I had a knee doctor appointment. I have to have surgery. SURPRISE! Oh wait. No. Anyway, I have surgery on January 9th. Susie is flying out the night before so she can go with me and so Jackson won't have to miss any work. I want to keep his days off for fun- not surgery! He really wanted to come so don't think he's a careless hubby or anything. ;) Anyway- on to the juice.

I wrecked my car today. Don't worry. I am fine. My car, surprisingly, does not have a scratch. (And if it does I cannot see it yet so I feel ok about it.) I was on my way home from getting the surgery news when I got to an intersection and just could not stop. I was trying. I really was. I knew my car needed new tires. I actually have an appointment to get new ones tomorrow. These puppies just have no traction or grip left on them at all. I knew they were death wheels. So I am trying to stop at this intersection and if I cannot stop I will go under a semi. I was not looking too forward to the whole airbag going off, ambulance coming and canceled trip to New York City thing so I was thinking fast about how to avoid this situation. I looked to my right and saw a turn lane triangle thing (super technical language, I know) so I coasted through it and then to avoid hitting a car I ran my Mazda up into a rock-filled median. It took me a second to catch my breath and remember to put my car into "park" so that I wouldn't cross the median. I burst into tears (because isn't that the normal reaction when you avoid a serious accident?) and finally found my way home. I thank God that it was just a little scare and no one (nor my car) was hurt. I definitely think He was watching over me and gave me an escape route. When I got home it was as if MacKenzie knew Mommy was upset because she jumped into my arms (she never does that) and licked my face all over. Gross, but it is her way to show love. I am again thankful for God's provisions and protection.

I'll be getting those new tires tomorrow.
I hope you all are well. :)

We need heat!!!!!

As most of you know, Jackson and I are semi-reluctant landlords. When we decided to up and move to Colorado the housing market was and still is in the toilet. Instead of taking a beating on our homes we decided to rent them. We have been extremely blessed in the way of our tenants. They care for the homes really well. They pay their rent on time. Most of all, they very rarely call us. Lovely. Yesterday I got a call though. Sigh. The heat at Jackson's house was not working properly and was topping out at 64 degrees. Rob, our tenant, assured me that they would just build a fire and wait until morning for it to be serviced. I really did not want to pay the after hours charge. I had to call Susie to see who she uses. She hooked us up with a few names and Jackson got up early this morning to make some calls. It is not so easy to coordinate things in the morning when we live in a different time zone! Jackson is a trooper and made the calls before coming back to bed for a little bit. We were able to get someone out there this morning and it turns out that it just needed serviced. A few filters that we did not know about needed changed. He changed out a few parts and viola! HEAT! YAY! It ended up only being a $105 fix. We are so grateful. It could have been a lot worse! So now everyone is happy and warm again. Yay! :) Let's keep our fingers crossed that no more repairs are needed until after we sell the place. ;)

I have a knee doctor appointment this afternoon. Yick. I'll let you know how it goes!

Add-ons

I forgot to post this photo of MacKenzie making sure David had plenty of balls to throw! :) Too cute. Please disregard his Purdue t-shirt and how disrespectful it is to wear such garbage in our home. ;)

I also wanted to post that I got a semi-disappointing B on my taxation final. There's always next semester. :/

Only a few days until we head to NYC! I could do without all of the flying time though. Ugh.

We're back!

6 days and no blogging. I cannot believe it. I didn't even miss it too much! I opted not to take my computer to Palm Beach and while Danielle has one I just never found time to blog so here I am now...back in the freezing cold with nothing better to do! :) I'll do a timeline as I feel that will be the easiest. This will be a long post so go get your coffee/diet coke/ drink of choice and settle in for a weekend rundown.

Friday
My plane left at like 6:20 AM so I had to be out of the house around 4:45. Ok, make that closer to 5 but who is keeping track?! ;) Anyway, I get to the Denver airport and make it through security (I HATE getting dressed for the airport then undressing around 600 strangers for the security lines then redressing in some corner all while trying to make a freakin' early flight- so annoying!) and head down to the trains to concourse C. Well the trains were not working. As I am standing on a not-yet-moving after 35 minutes train, I start thinking about the engineers who designed Denver's airport. (While I know many great ones I will admit that for the most part I dislike engineers nearly as much as I dislike cinnamon.) I imagine that the design meetings went like this,
"Let's make a HUGE airport!"
"Yeah!!!"
"Let's make it so big that people cannot walk from concourse to concourse. Seriously, let's not put in a way to walk. Let's build fancy underground trains!"
"YEAH! TRAINS! We LOVE trains!"
"Ok, what if the trains were to break down, then what?"
"Trains break down?! Why would they do that?! Why on earth would we waste money on a second way to get around the airport?!"
"You're right, let's rely solely on the trains!"
As you are now aware, the trains do not always work. The trains not working caused delays EVERYWHERE. Didn't the engineers know that there are only a few planes that service the entire world and when one is delayed it has a domino effect?! UGH!!!!!! End of rant.

Once the entire flight was able to make it to our gate we took off. A mere 1 hour late. I was certain that I would miss my connection in Atlanta (another huge airport with trains- but sweet tea and a way to walk so I give them a pass) to West Palm Beach. It turns out my plane was the one continuing on to West Palm so I didn't have to worry. I just sipped sweet tea and waited for the beach.

While I sipped sweet tea in Georgia things were going crazy at Jackson's office. There were a ton of people fired for under performing. Thankfully Jackson is awesome at his job so he's fine. It was still quite a day for Mr. Petefish as people were freaking out. All of the people who lost their jobs had families. What a though time of year to get a pink slip. Our hearts go out to them. We are extremely thankful for Jackson's position. Jackson's friend David flew in that evening and the two of them went to the Cherry Cricket for dinner. Yum! Then they went to bed after long days and a day on the slopes ahead of them. MacKenzie was at Camp Bow Wow all day. She says she had a nice time.

After I finally landed in West Palm (after sitting with really fun people who made the flight seem like it was 5 minutes long) I got my rental car and headed north to see Danielle. Aren't I so grown up? Flying and renting a car on my own. I know. I had a case of the "Oh my, I'm old!" while on my way to Stuart. Danielle lives in a cute little town about 30 minutes north of West Palm on I-95. I love Stuart for 4 main reasons: Danielle lives there, Sonny's BBQ is there, Tropical Smoothie is there and they have HUGE bridges that I enjoy walking across. Danielle and I caught up for hours before we decided to go to dinner and chat more. We went to Sonny's BBQ which is my favorite Florida restaurant. The food is just so good. Yum. Yum. I could eat there daily. That night we went to see a local group perform and they were really good. It was kind of folk/pop music and I really enjoyed it.

Saturday
David and Jackson got up super early and headed for Copper Mountain to go skiing for the day. They made it up without any issue even though the roads were not great. Jackson took over my little SUV for the weekend so he wasn't worried. ;) They skied all day until their legs "felt like jell-o" and then they headed back to Parker. Since it was earlier than we had expected (we planned for bad roads) Jackson was able to spring MacKenzie from camp a day early. She loves to play with David so she was elated. She brought him toys all night and he played quite a bit. Mac loves a player. They were so sore and tired from skiing that they did not do anything exciting. I know. They're old. Sorry.

Once I finally woke up (the time difference is a killer!) Danielle and I headed to walk to bridge. This is a quite popular thing to do in Florida and I really enjoy it. Stuart has a particularly huge bridge, the Roosevelt Bridge, that I enjoy walking. It is 1.3 miles from shore to shore so it is a nice little workout. We ate lunch at Tropical Smoothie. I love that place! Then we cleaned up and headed south to the Palm Beaches. We stopped for dinner at a Cracker Barrel. Food heaven! Then shopped at the Palm Beach Gardens mall. That place is so nice! Whew! I loved it! We went to City Place next, but since they have a new night club "Taverna Opa" that plays loud music the echoes through the whole place the mall didn't hold the same place in my heart. They had fake snow falling and people were so excited about it. I thought it was cheesy! We did a little more shopping then headed to the beach. Ahh that drive into Palm Beach on Royal Palm way is my favorite! The wind was gusting and it was a perfect night to stare at the ocean. The salt, the waves oh I love it! :) We decided to head back to Stuart and see what was going on. We ended up at a karaoke party. Classic. I had not seen karaoke in a looong time. People still suck. Really. They do.

Sunday
Jackson and David headed to Red Rocks to see some local Denver sights. It was a freezing cold day and Jackson lost his wedding ring while taking off his gloves. He is certain it is somewhere in the snow at Red Rocks. He worried and worried about how to tell me. I didn't care at all. Accidents happen. We'll look for a new one soon, but until then he is ringless. He's much more upset with himself than he needs to be, but whatevs. Anyway, they saw Red Rocks and then headed to Golden for a tour of the Coors brewery. Jackson says it was not as good as the at Anheuser Busch. Too bad. They ate at an old restaurant in Golden that had excellent "bar food" so that means Susie would love it. ;) They played with MacKenzie a bit more- David wanted her to learn to shake hands but he was not successful- then David headed home to Indy. Jackson was so tired that I am pretty sure he was in bed at 9! Old. Again. I know.

My Sunday was again a trick of the freakin' time zones. I made Danielle miss church because she didn't wake me up-??! So once I was finally around we went to Tropical Smoothie- AGAIN- then headed to Okeechobee to see my grandparents. We visited there for a few hours. We looked at old pictures and took a golf cart ride then headed back to go to a Cantata at Danielle's church. It was beautiful! I loved it! :) That evening we went to dinner with her parents. They crack me up. They're so fun! After a little bit of time at the bookstore we headed home to watch John and Kate Plus 8. I don't love the show, but it is like a train wreck. You cannot turn away. Kate's attitude gets on my nerves! ugh!

Monday
Jackson had to go back to work and he was tired! Poor kid had a busy weekend and needed a weekend from his weekend! No more people were fired so that was a positive.

I had the whole morning and afternoon to play in Florida still so we went to breakfast at Tropical Smoothie (by now you all feel badly for Danielle and I do not blame you. We do not have decent restaurants in Denver so I was determined to eat what I loved while on my trip.) and headed to the bridge to walk. It was such a nice day! 75 degrees. Ah, love it! I cleaned up and headed to West Palm to meet with a friend from high school for lunch. I went to to high school and IU for one year with Brittany, but had honestly not seen her in like 4 years. We chatted easily and it was so nice to catch up. She's a personal trainer and in the most ridiculous shape. Note the self: workout. Shoot. Anyway after our visit I milled around City Place until it was time for my flights. Palm Beach's airport is so little and lovely. Security takes all of 5 minutes and I love it. My connection in Atlanta was only 30 minutes so I, of course, ended up booking it through the Atlanta airport from one side to the other and made my flight. Whew! I was ready to see Jackson and MacKenzie! I landed and once Jackson figured out how to pick me up- I won't go into it as it is more frustrating than the loss of his wedding ring- I was homeward bound. MacKenzie was so happy to see me that she jumped from the front seat to the cargo area and into my arms. Aww. :) I love that little dog. We ordered some Chinese food and caught up on our weekends. It was lovely. Then we went to bed and snuggled close since we'd missed each other so much. We're pathetically in love and I love it. :)

I hope you all are having a wonderful week!

Wild decor!

This is a house in the neighborhood across the street from ours. This photo does not do it justice. It is tackier than this. Really. It makes our place look nice. ;)

We have been busy getting the house ready for a guest (our first non-family overnight sleeper!). I baked cookies and grocery shopped. The boys should be all set. Tomorrow I intend to do a good cleaning of the guest bath and I will be finished!

I started packing today only to find that my Grandma's present did not fit into my luggage. I went to mail it at UPS 2 day to Danielle's so I could take it to Grams on Sunday and they wanted $93 to ship it. $93! Are you kidding me?! Are you kidding me?! I took my present to the good ol' U.S. Postal Service and sent it 2-day for $9.80. That's more like it. UPS must be on CRACK. UGH! I was so mad! They also wanted $6 for a box and $7 to pack it for me. Listen, UPS, I love the whiteboard commercials but your prices are insane. INSANE. (End of rant.) It was cheaper to mail my package than to check a bag with Delta. Madness. I have such tight connections- think 45 minutes in Atlanta- that I hope everyone is on schedule and ready to go. I better wear comfy shoes so I can book it across the ATL airport. :)

Until next time- have a great weekend! :)

SO excited!

We are about to explode with excitement!

Jackson cannot wait for David to be here to ski this weekend. I CANNOT WAIT to be in Southern Florida with Danielle for some girl time! YAY!!!

In just a few more weeks we'll be headed to NYC for Christmas. We get to see Heidi and Andrew one day. My old friend Kyle another. My old roomie, Jenna, is going to see Wicked with us. I CANNOT WAIT TO SEE ALL OF MY DEAR FRIENDS!!!!!!!!!!!! I don't think I can wait 2 more weeks! Bring it! :)

Weekend in the West

Saturday afternoon we headed to downtown Denver to see the Parade of Lights. Our good friend Meg and her friend Heidi met us at the light rail station around 3 to head down. Thanks to Meg for free light rail tickets- AGAIN! We all walked around the 16th street mall for a while then went to dinner. Well, they ate dinner. Somehow I managed to not find one thing on the menu appealing so I later ate at a Corner Bakery. They all liked their meals though! And we got to sit outside in December because it was such a nice night!!!!! :) LOVE IT! We watched the parade on 17th street. It was a nice show but really SLOW! There must have been a 20 minute break at one point. The kids around us got kind of restless and began running into the parade route- it was pretty humorous. I wore boots down there that were not that comfortable because I had planned to buy new ones when we got to the mall. Well the store was out of my size so my brilliant plan failed and by the end of the night my feet were killing me. I ended up walking in my socks back to the light rail station. Sweet. I know. ;) The light rail on the way home was PACKED. A small child actually bit Meg! I screamed. I was so grossed out. Parents really had no control over their children and they didn't care. How annoying. Also, men were sitting while women had to stand and hold on. Grr. Anyway, we had a fun night- public transit and all!
Today we went down to Colorado Springs to go to church and to hike. Above is an aerial photo I found of the New Life Church campus. It is HUGE. I really didn't mind the size, though. Today marked the 1 year anniversary of the shootings on their campus. The family who lost 2 daughters stood up and spoke. There was not a dry eye in the house. The sermon was on grief and the pastor knew what he was talking about as his nephew was killed this week in a car accident. I was heart-broken for him. We decided that if it were any Sunday except the anniversary of the shootings that he wouldn't be there. He was a trooper and delivered a very touching message.

After church we headed to Chipotle for lunch. We ate outside with MacKenzie as it was another gorgeous 60+ degree day here. After lunch we headed to Pike's Peak to do some training on the trails. We ended up on a stair trail that almost killed me. My legs are jell-o. We didn't even get half of the way up that trail either. We intend to conquer it one day when we are in better shape! MacKenzie was worn out and slept the whole way home. She just tugs and tugs out on those trails- she loves it.
We had an unfortunate event happen tonight: Jackson's 1st gray hair. He came out of the bathroom this evening yelling for me to come quick. We plucked it then sat in mourning of his youth. He is certain he will have to soon start dying his hair. Poor kid.

Tomorrow we are supposed to get a ton of snow. This wacky weather is really different, but I'll take it! I enjoy a nice day sprinkled in among snowy ones.

Happy Birthday, Susie Petefish!!!

Jackson got a drunk dial from his mother last night to remind him that today was her birthday. We knew that already, but the reminder was nice. ;) She is in New York City for a lady's getaway and will be attempting to appear on the Today Show this morning. We'll be tivo'ing it.

Have a great day, Susie! We hope you're not too hung over to enjoy it! ;)

We love you! Happy Birthday!

Baking our parents' recipes...

The ever-so-popular with the Petefish family Lena Cookies! YUM! :)

This is the tray I made for Jackson to take into work: half Lena Cookies and half of my Dad's famous fudge recipe. (The fudge is soo good! Thanks, Dad and Diana!) It was really fun to make things that our parents made for us as kids. I hope Jackson's co-workers will enjoy their treats. :)

The weather here was so nice today...it was nearly 70 degrees! It was wonderful. MacKenzie got to take multiple walks. :) It is supposed to snow tonight, though. This is like Indiana's weather on crack! Even in Indiana we didn't have this big of a temperature swing!!!

There's not much else going on here. Jackson is getting excited for his skiing weekend and I can hardly wait to get to Palm Beach! I love having things to look forward to. Hope you all have a lovely day!

RED

Today is World AIDS Day. You can help support the Project (RED) by going to Starbucks today. The intend to give $.05 of every sale to the (RED) cause. Those mochas could add up quickly! I really like this cause (not just because of my obsession with the color red either!) and I am proud of Starbucks for partnering with it.

In other RED news... this is what I hope to get on my exam today: a BIG, RED A+. :)

Have a great Monday!

Christmas Tree oh Christmas Tree

We put up our Christmas tree last night. We wanted to go cut one down, but all of the permits were sold out. We also heard that those trees are all a little puny. We wanted a nice looking tree so we headed to Lowe's. ;) We picked the first tree we saw and headed home. The whole tree fit in my Mazda! Jackson also decorated the outside of the condo and it is BRIGHT! He has lights EVERYWHERE. Yes, he is THAT guy. ;) Then he told me that I overdecorated the tree. Pssh. Like a tree can have too much red or silver. NEVER.

It is going to be a lazy Sunday here in Parker, CO. We had planned to go down to Colorado Springs this morning for church (at that mega church New Life where the shooting was last December-that place is HUUUUUGE) and hiking near Pike's Peak, but the snow stopped us in our tracks. Then I accidently overslept and missed church here. Oops. We are now planning on a day of football and studying as I have my final tomorrow evening.

MacKenzie thinking about attacking Santa...MacKenzie attacking Santa. Yay! ;) Just kidding, Susie. She's looking forward to her new bandannas. Mac has already played in the snow a ton and is looking forward to more snowball fights with Dad! :)

SNOW!!!

MacKenzie playing with Mommy in the snow!

Jackson was so excited for the big snow! It is really coming down out there right now. It is fun...for now. ;)

Today Jackson only had to work 1/2 of the day so we spent the afternoon apartment shopping. We are thinking of moving closer to our jobs and to school. The commute and leaving Mac in her cage for so long each day is getting old. We found some nice places, but we still have to break our lease here. Eek.

We went to the Macaroni Grill for dinner. Jackson had to send his dinner back! :( It was the greasiest mess of an entree we'd ever seen. Not good. We ended up sharing a meal which was probably for the best anyway. Then we ran some errands before the snow hit. Lucky for us we have turkey for years should we be trapped in the condo. ;)

We did NOT Christmas shop today as we were not really looking for any great deals on electronics. (It seems that stores lure you in with electronics these days.) I did read where a Wal-mart worker was killed today by people running him over. Yes, that is the state of our world. I was disgusted.

We need gift ideas from the Coomes family, please. :)

We are not sure what tomorrow will bring as we do not know if the snow will stick or not. Hmm.

Turkey!

Jackson with our 20 pound turkey! It looks great. It better taste great because Jackson is going to be eating this for DAYS!!! ;)

This is MacKenzie helping her father with turkey leftovers. (Notice the cute snowman plate, thanks Kathi!) Mac has decided that this was her favorite holiday this year. After she finished her snack we took her for a 2 mile walk. She loved that! :)

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

This is Jackson about to eat a pumpkin pie that I, Jenna Petefish, cooked for him. Now if that is not love I do not know what is. Our whole home STINKS! (I think most of you know how much I hate pumpkin, cinnamon and any related spices...their color and their smell just disgust me.) Anyway, Jackson enjoyed his pie and that is all that matters. I feel bad that he doesn't get to be at home with his momma on Thanksgiving so I made him a pie. :)

We are very thankful this year. We have a great little family here in Parker and loved ones sprinkled from Evansville to Indy to Marion from Stuart, Fl to Chicago from San Francisco to Radford, VA. We are so glad that each one of you are in our lives. We are very blessed.

Have a great day everyone and know that we love you!

Broken Egg

Funny story...

This morning Jackson and I were getting ready for work and he decides he wants an egg sandwich. I told him just to stop by McDonald's on the way into the office, but he insisted that he had time to make one here at home. As I am pouring my cereal into my bowl and giving MacKenzie her share of my banana, Jackson drops an egg. No big deal as I just bought a dozen. After he cleans up that mess he gets another 2 eggs out and DROPS ANOTHER EGG! No kidding. 2 eggs dropped in 2 minutes. (It made me think of one of my favorite breakfast restaurants: The Broken Egg. It wasn't that great, but it is in Siesta Key. I LOVE that place!) My poor kitchen is chalked full of salmonellae now. :( After he finished the madness that was his egg sandwich making he went to iron his shirt and burned it! I had never seen this happen before either. Quite the morning for Mr. Petefish. (The rest of his day turned out much better! Thankfully.)

I went to class tonight and it was canceled! The nerve! I wanted to show my face again before the final. (The class has been such a review that I have had a hard time finding time to go..oops!) The final is on Monday so I have started to study. I am just ready for this quarter to be over and to actually have good classes in January!

In other news, we have decided to hike Pike's Peak for Jackson's *gasp* 32nd birthday this May. His actual birthday is on a Tuesday so we will be bumping it to May 9, 2009. It should take us about 8 hours to do the 12.3 mile hike. Anyone is welcome to join us. The weekend before we will be in Indiana for the mini marathon. We figure that will be a good warm up for climbing a 14,110 foot mountain. Sweet. :)

MacKenzie got so into playing ball tonight that she did not want to stop. I got in the shower and she dropped the ball in the tub with me. I was shaving my legs so I was in no position to grab the ball. She paced next to the shower for a few minutes and then gave up on me. She jumped in herself, grabbed the ball , jumped back out and shot me a warning look. It was pretty hilarious! She loves ball!!

Monday, Monday, Monday

Tonight we had our dear friend Meg over for dinner. We had chicken parmesan with pasta and green beans. We had "birthday brownies" for dessert (I really made them for a pregnant lady at Jackson's office who has been craving chocolate, but I figured she could share with us!) It is always nice to have Meg over. She got to see all of my Christmas decor (minus the big tree that we have not cut down yet!) and play ball with MacKenzie. Lucky gal. ;) I have been excited for someone besides Jackson to see our Christmas setup. Jackson's friend David is coming in a few weeks, but guys don't notice your Crate & Barrel decor. ;) 

December 6th we are hoping Meg will join us at the Christmas light parade in downtown Denver. She is starting some new chemo here soon and she is not sure how it will make her feel. As always, if you could keep her on your prayer list that would be great. She looks great! I would never guess that she was in the middle of nasty chemo. She is just as wonderful as ever!! 

I tivo'ed the IU game for Jackson today...how sad. Notre Dame killed them. GRR. It is going to be a long year as an IU fan.  

It was a gorgeous day here in Parker. I took MacKenzie for a walk without my jacket- only a t-shirt. It was so nice. We walked a brisk mile and then I headed for the grocery. Someone remind me to never go near a grocery store around Thanksgiving again. Cinnamon city. :( The whole place stunk! Gross. 

Jackson has a short week at work this week and we are pretty excited for that. Wednesday we intend to hike around at Red Rocks as the weather is supposed to be great. Thanksgiving day's weather is looking iffy so we may just do a movie! 

Bald Mountain

This my favorite picture ever of MacKenzie- what a little mountain dog! She's just taking in the view with her dirty paws and Colts bandanna. (She seems to be a good luck charm for the Colts as they pulled out a very exciting W this evening! GO COLTS!) I just couldn't resist snapping a pic! :)
At the top of the little mountain that we climbed today there was a bench. One needed a bench as it was so windy that little MacKenzie was getting whipped all around (that is why it looks like I am choking her- I'm not, she was just blowing a bit!).

This is the view from the top. Since the mountain is only 5 miles out of Boulder we had a lovely view of both Boulder and downtown Denver. It was a gorgeous day here!

After the hike we went into Boulder's Pearl Street Mall area. It is a really cute promenade shopping district with both chain and non-chain stores. We got a few Christmas gifts and an ornament for ourselves before we headed out. The downside about the Pearl Street area is that they do not allow dogs. I know. Disgusting. Typical Liberals. (I'm just kidding, calm down.) While we were shopping we saw the oddest thing: a woman asking a store owner to use the telephone. Jackson and I were so confused. Borrow a phone? Doesn't she have a cell phone? Who doesn't have a cell phone in Boulder (I call it the cold Palm Beach!)?? The shop owner even stumbled around a bit like he hadn't heard a question like that in a long time. After she promised it was a local call he handed the phone to her. So weird. It was really funny, we were all totally just shocked by the question. (She had just lost the group she was with and needed to phone one of them to see where they were. Still...no cell phone lady? Come on!)

We went to Cracker Barrel for dinner. It was so good! The restaurant was all but empty since the Broncos' game had not ended yet. We enjoyed our meal then headed back towards Parker...just in time for the game to end and to sit in traffic! It was not too bad, but we definitely did not time things well!

We had a great Colorado weekend! :)

P.S. We are going to start making Christmas cookies soon...could we please get the Leena (spelling?) cookie recipe? Also the stuffing recipe. Thanks, Susie. :)

A day in Denver

Thanks for making the switch to the new blog! :)

We had intended to go to Boulder today to hang out, but we got a little lazy. We decided to hang out in Denver instead.

This is a picture of Washington Park- a very lovely park in the middle of Denver. It is really close to downtown, my school and the ritzy Cherry Creek shopping area. We love Wash Park! The homes that are right on the park go for 700k+ because the park is so wonderful. They have 3 different paths so that bikers and rollerbladers don't run over walkers. They have a dirt path for those runners who shun concrete. There are always tons of people there walking around, playing tennis, playing volleyball or selling puppies! We would LOVE to live near Wash Park as it is really what living in Denver is all about. MacKenzie enjoyed all of the dogs. There were a ton of dogs! (Please notice her Thanksgiving bandanna- thanks Grammy! She got tons of compliments on being so festive.)After we walked in the park we headed to dinner at the Cherry Cricket. It is our favorite non-chain restaurant in Denver. It is really a bar that just has great food. It is such a misfit in the Cherry Creek shopping district as it is nestled in with a Saks and Neiman Marcus! :) After dinner we walked Mac around the shopping area. She tried to eat a pigeon- causing her mother to scream like a crazy woman because a.) I am deathly afraid of birds those dirty, nasty things b.) she thought it was a toy and really made it mad. The people in Crate & Barrel got quite a show of a small dog attacking a bird while its mother flipped out and its father laughed at both. Hmm. After all of the excitement we took Mac to the dog bakery for a quick treat. She loves that place.

We have not done much else today. We organized the garage. Yay! ;) Tomorrow after church we are headed to Boulder to do some hiking. On the way home we intend to stop at a Cracker Barrel for dinner. Yum! :)

New address

We changed the address to keep random people from posting comments. Please do not link to our blog from yours.
Thank you.

Decorating for Christmas!!

This year our holidays are a little mixed up. We moved Thanksgiving up by 2 weeks so it is already over for us. I decided to decorate for Christmas today since I will not be home Dec 12-15 or 24-29. That's a lot of Christmas decor time to miss! (Don't cry for me though, I'm certain Palm Beach with Danielle and NYC with Jackson will be much cooler than looking at my Christmas decor around the condo!! :))

MacKenzie is helping me to get in the Christmas mood. She has a santa doll that we kept at Susie's last year since Susie actually likes Santa and I don't. Since Mac won't be home this year we brought santa home to her. She has not let him leave her side. I decided he must smell like Grammy's house because surely any dog of mine wouldn't like santa this much!! ;)

Ok, I feel the need to explain my disdain for santa. Growing up we were not allowed to believe. I don't know how much of it was Kylie was unwilling to believe and ruined it for her little sister (me!) and how much of it was my mom thinking that santa distracted from the real meaning of Christmas. Either way, I do not ever remember believing that some fat dude made it to every home on one night to bring gifts. I think I am far too logical for that mess. (If you, dear reader, are like most people your first concern is for our future children. Are you saying that don't get to believe? Good question. It is quite the controversy whenever we discuss it. I say NO! Jackson thinks it is all in good fun. I think it is teaching kids that lying is ok as long as everyone is doing it. For now I avoid the topic and when Kate/Carter is old enough to believe I am certain there will be an ugly fight ;)) Anyway, Deb never decorated with santa and I never gave him much thought until I met Jackson. Jackson's family really digs the jolly old man. Susie has the creepy little santa that is like 100 years old that sits under the tree. She collects santas. She LOVES santa. (I will admit that "Mrs. Claus" gives some excellent girly presents!!) Isn't it funny how our 2 families are so different? I go along with the santa talk at Susie's because I love her and Gracie (whom I hope stops believing this year--???). Susie even gave me my first and only santa statue. I was a bit upset to discover some santas while trying to help my mom pack this last weekend. TRAITOR. (Kind of like we never got to do Halloween and I found a costume of her's from last year!!) Anyway, there is my convoluted story about why I don't love santa. It really bothers some people. (Susie! Jackson!)

We are decorated our condo's exterior! I am really excited because we've never done much of that before. We also are getting a permit to cut down our own Christmas tree. When we finish with it, we return it and they make it mulch! (I don't think we get to keep the mulch which is fine since the HOA does landscaping here.) We are pretty excited for this adventure! :)

Until next time- keep to NYC Christmas ideas coming!

NYC at Christmas

We're headed to New York City at Christmas time this year. We will be there from Dec 24-27 (updated dates since our family Christmas has been cut short) and we are looking for input on what to do.

We will be going to Rock. Center to see the tree and perhaps ice skate

We will be taking a walk in central park

We will be meeting some friends for lunch (hopefully at Serendipity 3's- love that place)

We will be walking to store window displays to see their glory

We will be going down to Wall Street (it is like a trip to Mecca for those of us in the financial industry!)

We are toying with the idea of seeing the Rockettes...

Does anyone else have some great idea on things to do? I will be shopping there, too. Naturally. 

We would really like to see a choir sing carols and such on Christmas Eve but we're not sure where to find that either

Any ideas are welcome! :)

Strange day

With all of our issues with the condo right now, I decided to stay home today so that I could be here when the landlord was. He was sooo rude. My favorite shirt was stuck and ruined and he had the nerve to tell me that it was too fancy to be washed in a standard washer. WHAT?! Who tells me how to wash my clothes? I was so annoyed. Then he went into the attic to see if our furnace was gas- it is. He knocked down insulation and didn't pick it up. I had just vacuumed. UGH! He finally left. GRR.

Then I take MacKenzie out to pee. A lady riding her bike on the trail stops and says, "your dog pees here too often. I paid more to be back in this part of the neighborhood and I don't want brown grass all of the time." I assured her that Mac peed no more than any other dogs and that we also paid to live her. I let her know that single family homes were built each day and has private yards. I was so mad. What a witch. Mac will certainly be peeing there each time we go out now. Take that!

Then my doorbell rings and it is a milkman. Seriously?! He has me try his fancy milk and gives me a free half gallon. I can hardly contain my excitement. ;) How random. I highly doubt that I convert to having my milk delivered.

Ugh, what a weird day. I'm like beyond annoyed at the world right now so I think I might nap!

Happy Anniversary, Jackson.

STUCK!!

Sigh. How annoying. We come home from a trip and on my first load of laundry the washer eats my FAVORITE shirt! It is so stuck. I have tried everything. I ended up sending an photo of it as an SOS message to our landlord, Kevin. Kevin is on our list right now as he told us the place was all electric and we just got a $85 gas bill. LIAR! So now he needs to get my washer fixed. I have laundry just waiting next to it to be cleaned. MacKenzie will have to sleep in a dirty bed tonight. :( Poor baby. She won't be pleased.

In other news, we got presents in the mail again! YAY! Happy anniversary to us! Free food- my favorite kind! :) My Dad and step-mom sent us a nice card, Qdoba money and Cracker Barrel gift cards. Thank you so much! :)

I met Jackson's external counterpart today. I expected a fat, old Mexican dude. He was a middle-aged, short, thin, white-haired Italian man. Hmm. Good thing it was dark and he couldn't see my surprise! He makes Jackson look like a giant.

We had a lovely dinner at Buca this evening. Yum! And now we're not eating for days after having so much food at home and here. Back to the gym tomorrow!

Recap of home

The IU game was great! The Hoosiers won. :) Go team. We love sitting in those seats and feared we wouldn't make it to any IU games this year. We are happy that we did.

Sunday we went to our church, Grace, to see the new sanctuary that opened 2 weeks after we left. It was really nice. It made the venue feel much more intimate than it really was. We were quite impressed. We then met up with Heidi, Andrew and Laura for lunch at McAlister's. YUM! We even ran into Gretchen and Gerald there so we enjoyed their kids' antics. So fun!! :) We hung out at the Porterfield's place for a bit then it was time to head to Upland for "Thanksgiving." Shannon stopped by and had appetizers with me. Then we head the real meal: turkey, dressing, potatoes, green bean casserole and apple salad. It was delicious. After that we tried to help my parents pack, but since they seemed to not need us we headed to Ivanhoe's for dessert with Christina! We had a nice time catching up with her and hearing about her wedding plans. Poor Susie even got teased quite a bit about her boyfriend! :) We had a nice time and really enjoyed getting to see everyone! Thank you!

Susie had a few things she needed done around her place so Sunday night we came back to Indy and busted our humps for a little bit. She's doing much better since the surgery, but it still quite restricted in what she can do (i.e. no taking to trash out...Rose Mary! GRR) We then retired because our flight was at 7- so early!

We got to the new aiport without any problems. ;) I cannot say the same for the people who were just so confused and poking along 70 at like 5 mph! GRR! We had Qdoba for breakfast- it was so good. We had never tried to before. They make mini burritos in the morning and I wish they did that all of the time. YUM! Security is really weird at the new airport because they break you up by how often you fly. We fly all of the time so we got a fast line. It was really strange. I really, really hate the Clear service that allows people to cut into security. I seriously told a lady today that she could not cut me again for one of her customers. She tried to fight with me- she clearly had not met me on too little sleep before. I won and she moved to the back of the line. HA! Anyway, our flight was not full at all so we had a row to ourselves. Jackson and I slept most of the way back to Denver. It was lovely. We swung into a Starbucks to poor Jackson some caffeine (he had a FULL day today at his office on like 4 hours of real sleep!) so that he could make it through the day. I dropped him at the office and headed to get MacKenzie. She is soo tired from camp! She had to take a shower as she always stinks when she gets home, but she has been snoozing since.

Tonight we're going to dinner to celebrate our 2nd anniversay that is tomorrow, but I have class in the evening. I better go get myself around as I've spent the day doing laundry, unpacking and settling back into our place here in Parker.

Back home again in Indiana :)

We made it home to Indiana! The flight was...interesting. Jackson was next to a BIG dude who didn't feel the need to stay in his own seat. Jackson wanted to charge him for sharing seats! LOL!! Other than that the flight was uneventful- just how I like a flight. Indy's new airport is simply amazing!! I LOVED it! (Jackson thought it was too much- I disagree.) We ate at Harry & Izzy's (a sister restaurant to St. Elmo's) before we headed out to Susie's the night. We had their famous shrimp cocktail of course, yum! It was a fabulous meal. 

We chatted with Susie for a few hours then headed to bed. Jackson tossed and turned all night, keeping me awake in the process. Someone remind me why married people have to share a bed? GRR. He finally went downstairs to toss so I could have 2 hours of sleep. Grr again. I got up bright and early to come to Upland (God's country) to spend the day with my Mom. I have a video of Madison and Macy's reactions to my homecoming that I'll post when we get back to Denver. Mom and I went to Cracker Barrel (of course) for breakfast- yum again. Then we went into Auto Pros to visit Duckie. It is a cold and rainy day in Indiana. Very November like. I got my ears candled this morning, too. If you have never had this done I highly recommend it. It feels really good and gets you all cleaned out! Lovely! ;)

Now I am helping my Mom pack up her office and some of my leftover memorabilia from high school. Tear. I'm getting so old. Back to my quarter life crisis mode. 

We're headed to an IU game tonight- front row seats (thanks again, Uncle Duane!!) and all. We're pretty excited to be at Assembly Hall again. Go HOOSIERS!!