Summer Weekends #3 &4

Oops! What is it about summer that somehow sucks all my time away? I started this post last week...then it was the holiday weekend. Here's what's been happening around here!
Summer weekends really are the best.
2 weekends ago we celebrated our anniversary with a trip to the coast. We had planned this a while ago, and then mother nature decided to play along. Summer came early to the valley, and it has been in the 90's. The temperature at the coast was in the mid 70's-80 and it was amazing. We decided to head to Seaside for our beach trip. From there we could head over to Astoria. In Astoria we took a little movie tour

The Goonies House

The school from Kindergarten Cop

I basically had to beg for Craig to "do an Arnold pose"

We also hung out at the beach

For the holiday we hosted a BBQ at our house, watched our small town parade and just hung out. The weather was fantastic (still!) and we had a good time. We didn't make it down to the fireworks. But we (and poor Gus) could hear them from our house.

I know I took this same picture last year. 

During the rest of the weekend I went to a Zumba party at the park (so fun!) saw The Heat (so funny!) and Craig and I went out for a quick hike. I am trying to make the most out of my weekends this summer, and so far we are doing a pretty good job with it!
How is your summer?

This weekend I...

This weekend I...

went to the zoo!!
We actually did this Friday, but since Craig now has every Friday off, our weekend starts a day early :) (Well until I go back to work in August.) It was a perfect day at the Oregon zoo. I also saw this sign, which is yet another reason why Kimye did their daughter no favor with that name.

We had some inappropriate comments about this, and how Ms.
Kardashian became famous herself.

Saturday we hung out around town and hit up the farmers markets and headed over to Rogue to enjoy the sunshine on the farm.

We also thought it would be good to harvest our cherries. For the last 3 summers, our trees have always produced gallons and gallons of fruit. This year, this is all we got.

How depressing. We did have to cut down one of the cherry trees in the fall, so I was expecting less, but this is just sad. Especially with the amount of cherry pits on the ground. I say the tree is sad because we killed it's tree friend.

Sunday the rains came. I did manage to have lunch with a girlfriend, but after that I was at home. The gloomy weather made me want to make cookies. Luckily Melissa at Lulu and Sweet Pea tweeted the link to her peanut butter cookie recipe. Craig loves peanut butter cookies, so I decided to make a batch. They were super moist and chewy! Delicious!

How was your weekend? Any ideas why my dumb cherry tree sucks?

5 for 5 week 12, and my weekend

This weekend I Sunday we...

went took advantage of the great weather and had a little picnic at the fishing hole. It is actually a little out of the way county park right on the river that isn't well known. We packed up a lunch and headed out there. After lunch, we played some bocce, and then took some time to read by the river.  Fantastic.

Now let's take a look at something not so fantastic...

My goals from last week.

1. Drink a full water bottle at work everyday.
2. Have everything ready for the next day before I leave work.
3. 2 classes at the gym.
4. Go to Ulta.
5. Go to the bank.

Erika called me out for putting "Go to Ulta" on my list. What can I say, I wanted a win :) I seem to have forgotten where my gym is, that must be why I haven't been there in a while.

Here are this week's 5...
1. Confirm with our DJ for the last two dances of the year.
2. Give the pets their flea medication.
3. Finish reading Undead and Unreturnable
4. Go to one class at the gym. (baby steps people, baby steps)
5. Paint my nails.

Yes, these don't seem like the most challenging of goals this week. This week is the last week of the grading period, so I will be spending quite a bit of time at school grading and listening to kids' excuses on why they shouldn't be failing. (but seriously, my class is super easy. You shouldn't have an F any way.)

Have a great week! What are your goals for the week?

Weekend Adventures at the Coast!

I haven't shared my weekend adventures lately, because quite honestly my weekends have been pretty lazy laid back, and I am guessing that reading about grocery shopping and laundry won't hold anyone's attention.
This weekend I went to the beautiful Oregon coast!

Friday night we were at home, when my husband looks over and asks if I wanted to stay at the coast this weekend. After a quick search, I had booked a pet friendly hotel in Newport, Oregon. The next morning we packed up and headed out.

We haven't taken Gus to the beach with us in quite a while, and I forgot how much he loves it. He spent a good hour or so just running around in and out of the water. One of the big reasons we don't take Gus to the coast more often is he's not great in the car. He whines, barks and gets car sick. Poor boy. He also gets scared at new places. And he was scared of the foam the tide left on the sand.

The weather was gorgeous, which is not always the case on the central Oregon coast. Weather.com said it was supposed to rain the entire time, but we didn't see any rain until a quick shower Sunday morning before we went out for a walk.

Every time we go to Newport we talk about eating dinner at Local Ocean Seafood, which overlooks the docks. For whatever reason, we never have tried it, even though we have drooled over the menu. I seriously don't know what we were waiting for. We started dinner with grilled calamari, then we split a crab po' boy and a bowl of Brazilian seafood stew with a coconut milk broth. So yummy. I highly recommend it!

It was a quick trip, but it was so good to be at the ocean. Gus is super worn out now

Weekend Adventure

This weekend I...

...did not do any sort of St. Patrick's thing what so ever. I just don't get it.

I did however go to the allergist. How's that for a party?? I have been dealing with a pretty severe cough for awhile now. I first went to the doctor about it in August before we went to Hawaii. Since then I have been on a couple of different antibiotics, had a chest x-ray and been tested for asthma. I am hoping that Friday's 2 hour doctor appointment will finally figure it out.

It started with a questionnaire:

Kids seriously carry everything. I'm sure I am exposed to something.

Then came the allergy swabs

I was tested for 30 different allergens. This is one of my arms. Good news is that I am not allergic to cats or dogs, so my furbabies are staying. (like there was a chance of them going anywhere!) I also am fine for milk.

However mold and dust mites are a no go. Dang it. I really wanted a moldy dust mite as a pet.

Source
Gross

The doctor prescribed some nasal spray and told me to buy some Claratin.

This weekend I also had to wash all of our bedding, including the pillows. This was also part of doctors orders. (Why can't I have a cool doctor that just prescribes Xanax for everything?) This was the worst prescription ever.

This weekend I also ran into a former student. She was actually our hostess when the Mister and I were stuffing our face at lobsterfest. I love seeing them all grown up. Well almost. She graduates in June.

This weekend I also got to go shopping for clothes for the Mister. THis is exciting to me. You see, my husband finally got a new job. For the last 10 years he has been a reporter at our small local paper. The stress of his job and the hours he was working was definitely not equal to his paycheck. He has even had to go to the hospital with anxiety issues due to the stress of working all the freaking time. I have been telling him to quit for about a year, but he didn't want to quit without something else. He was starting to get pretty discouraged after a couple of bad interviews and rejections. BUT he was offered a job with the state. It is a part time clerical job but he will be making almost as much as he was working 60+ hours a week for the paper. The paper's dress code was pretty lax, so it was time for my husband to wear some grown up clothes :) His first day is Tuesday. Wish him luck!

How was your weekend?

Weekend Adventures at the Coast!

This weekend I... took a weekend trip to the beach!!

This was the type of weekend I wish we could have every weekend.
Friday was the semester grading day at school, which means, no kids and we get a full work day without meetings. These are days I can actually get stuff done! I got a ton organized (not nearly enough though) and got my plans settled for the next 12 weeks. I always feel so accomplished after grade day.

Friday night we took the hour drive out to the coast and checked into our hotel. It was already dark by the time we got there, so we couldn't really hang out in the sand. We did walk around and found a restaurant/bar and had dinner. We headed back to our hotel after and ended up buying a movie on pay per view. Not that kind of movie. It was The Watch with Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn, and Jonah Hill. Um, it was weird. Not as funny as we thought it should have been. Eh. It was only $5.

Saturday was AMAZING! The weather was phenomenal. Sunny, high 50s and no wind! Are you kidding me? We had been planning this weekend for awhile now and we couldn't have asked for better weather! We spent the day wandering along the shores, napping on the beach, walking along the jetty and exploring the little shops. The biggest let down of Saturday: we really wanted some fro yo, but we had to settle for ice cream cones. Tough life.

Here's a couple pics from Instagram. And these tsunami debris watch posters were all over. I understand why we need to get rid of stuff floating over from Japan, but there has always been Japanese things washing up on our shores. 

Here is another treat from the weekend: Sea Lions!

How cute are they?? We don't see them every time we are at the coast, but it certainly isn't a rare thing.

Sunday was actually The Mister's birthday. After we checked out of our hotel we headed to the casino for the breakfast buffet, and a little gambling. We doubled our $50, and headed home. We sort of watched the game, I totally watched Beyonce, made some Boboli pizza and did laundry.

How was your weekend? What is your favorite thing to do at the beach?

This weekend I...

This weekend I...

*Finished week 3 of  Couch to 5K. We took a week break from running, so we decided we will redo week 3. We have a 5K in April we are looking at doing, so we have plenty of time.

*Babysat for the first time in at least 15 years. We had a good time reading books, playing with the kitty and crawling around the floor. However, the little guy broke our agreement and pooped. He wasn't going to do that. If you can't trust a 10 month old to hold up their end of a bargain, who can you trust??

*I also invited my husband  a boy over while I was babysitting. I had never done that when I was in my babysitting prime in middle/high school, so I decided it was time.

*Had yummy pizza for lunch with my husband. We get slices at the local pizza place in town. It's newish to the area, but it has a pretty good following so hopefully it sticks around.

*Finally watched Argo. So good. Seriously, go see it. And Ben Affleck had this salt and pepper thing going on in his beard/hair that my husband has going on and I find yummy.

*Sunday I worked for 7+ hours at my mom's house. My best friend helped and so did my two nieces (and one of their boyfriends).  I now know how to drain a waterbed. Someday I will have a weekend update post that doesn't include working at the house. 

How was your weekend??

Wedding weekend

This weekend I...

went to a wedding!

At a pizza place!

The couple has been together for 7 years, and after a conversation they had while decorating the Christmas tree, they planned the whole wedding in just under a month. She looked gorgeous, the wedding itself was short and sweet and the food was fantastic. (It helps when the pizza place uses local ingredients!) In a big fail I didn't take pictures except for the two you might have seen on instagram... one was a plate of pizza and beer and the other was this

The Mister and I played some air hockey at the reception. (How is that for a cool reception?!) It was a very close game. I won. 

Confession: I really love weddings. My favorite part? The ceremony. I really love watching when two people are professing their love for each other and committing themselves to one another for life. This couple chose to have friends perform the ceremony and they wrote their own vows/promises to each other. They had some humorous ones as well as some heartfelt, serious ones. 

My second favorite part? Cake. 

What is your favorite part of weddings?

This Weekend I was Pinspired

This weekend I...

Source

... stayed far away from black Friday! Instead a friend came over and we had a Christmas Craft-a-Palooza! In a few hours of crafting, we both managed to knock out several projects on our shared Christmas Pinterest board. My favorite?

This was super easy to do. I took a wire wreath frame and wrapped two red feather boas around it. I probably could have just used one, but I wanted it to be fluffier. Then I took a thick (1 1/2 inches I think) black ribbon and wrapped it around the center. To make the belt buckle, I cut cut out a rectangle out of a thin Christmas box and covered it with rhinestones. Can I tell you how in love with this I am?
Here's my pinspiration:

Pinned via etsy

I really do like the "ho ho ho" across the top. I haven't decided if (or what) I want to put across the top of mine. Here's a preview of the rest of the Palooza:

This weekend I also...

baked the Mister some cookies: oatmeal with peanut butter and chocolate chips.

How was your weekend? Did you do any Christmas/holiday crafts?