Ramble Ramble

In a nutshell:

• Visiting family
• A giggly, happy baby
• Overstuffed stockings
• Too much rich & fatty food (blargh, I need veggies, and a salad, and maybe some rice cakes)
• A movie or 8
• More presents than necessary
• Much needed downtime
• Love and laughter and joy

I’m feeling somewhat recharged after 4 days of holiday fun, and with the prospect of a 4 day week ahead of me. Now bring on 2010!

Visit Anna at abdpbt for more lists that are bound to be more entertaining than this one!

Today is my 30th birthday!

It definitely will be a low-key affair today. No big blow out parties for me to mark a new decade—heck, I don’t even get to have a drink to celebrate! Instead, I’m getting a manicure and a pedicure, going to have a nice dinner, and have been offered baked goods to round out my day. Oh, and I got to sleep in this morning (meaning, both the cat and the kid allowed me to sleep instead of their normal disco on and in my belly at 6:30am)! It may not be a big affair, but seems like the perfect way to usher in my 30’s.

It’s weird to me that I’m 30. Not bad–I’ve never really gotten caught up in the number–more just weird. Since I still feel at times like I’m the same person I was at 16, it’s sometimes hard to recognize that I’m definitely getting older. Of course, other days I’d swear I was closer to 45 than my actual age. Maybe that’s why I’ve never really cared about the number–I’ve always sort of acted older than my age, and I sort of feel like I’m finally catching up to myself.  Whatever the case, I think my 30’s are going to be good to me (not that my 20’s weren’t). Here’s hoping!

I’m excited to see what the next decade of my life looks like. When I turned 20, I would never have guessed that I’d move to New York, or marry the guy I was dating at the time, or make myself a decent career in marketing of all things. So I can’t wait to see what my 30’s bring me–what changes in my life are yet to come. It’s exciting to think about!

So bring on the 30’s–let’s see what’s to come.

This past weekend, N.C. and I boarded a jet plane and flew off to Chicago for a belated anniversary trip (thanks to some airline ticket vouchers and Priceline) that was a sorely needed break from the “real world.” For four whole days, we were without email, blogs, twitter, facebook, anything. It was really nice to just…be. We took our time exploring, took it easy, and just enjoyed the city and each other.

We got to stay in an amazing hotel (The Palmer House Hilton), which is apparently this big, fancy, extremely well known historical hotel. Once again, Priceline Roulette doesn’t let us down! Seriously though, we booked the hotel through the name your own price feature on Priceline and got an amazing steal on this great hotel. The rooms were a little small, but the hotel is something like 90 years old, so we’ll cut them some slack. I only wish we had gotten some pictures of the absolutely amazing ceiling in the lobby!

Because of the whole preganacy thing, we took this trip pretty easy, doing one “big” thing per day every day we were there. We had to limit our walking more than we normally would have (thanks to super swollen feet and the slow pregnant woman waddle), but I still think we hit a lot of the big points of downtown Chicago. Of course we hit up “The Bean” the first day we were there.

A friend of ours had tried to explain this odd sculpture to us before, but honestly, until we were there looking at it, we didn’t get the uniqueness. The reflection of the city in this oddly shaped sculpture is pretty striking.

People take pictures of themselves in the reflection of The Bean, since it is basically a giant mirror. We did too, but apparently we stood in front of the portion that had just had a milkshake thrown at it (in other words, the shot didn’t really come out), so this will have to do. But of course, as anyone who has seen The Bean knows, it’s really the experience that’s trippy. You can walk through the middle of the sculpture, and get right up close to it, and it’s all very bizarre, and cool, but no photos really do that experience justice.

Just in case you need proof that we were there–here’s a photo of me with The Bean in the background (and a reflection of the city in my sunglasses–that’s kind of a cool shot!). After this, we did a whole lot of touristy & cool stuff like:

• go see a man about the blues (and some cajun food!) at Buddy Guy’s Legends
• do the double-decker city tour (always a great way to see a city, even if it’s the most touristy thing imaginable)
• have Chicago dogs at Portillo’s
• go see some jazz at Andy’s Jazz Club
• enjoy a day at the Art Institute of Chicago
• have dessert (me) and cocktails (N.C.) in the fancy lobby of our historic hotel
• snarf down some deep dish pizza at Pizzeria Uno (the original)
• check out the art and a mid-day concert at the Chicago Cultural Center
• Plus we did lots of sleeping, napping and relaxing!
• And, as a special bonus, I got the joy of a personalized tour of Chicago bathrooms, thanks to the little man hanging out on my bladder most of the trip.

While we were there, we also got to enjoy glimpses of crazy hordes of soccer fans (Honduras vs. the US, and I swear there were probably 100 Honduras fans for every US fan we saw. It was insane) and bits of the Gospel Music Festival. All in all, it was a really fantastic weekend. I’m glad we made the time to do this trip, both as our anniversary celebration and as a pre-baby vacation. It was nice to spend time together, enjoying a new city with each other. I’m always reminded of how lucky I am that N.C. and I enjoy each others company so much–we make good travel partners! And it was nice to have one last special trip that’s “just us” before our lives completely change in a few months. Even though I’m sure we’ll travel without kids in the future, we’ll be different, in a different kind of world, so it was nice to have one last fling in this non-baby universe.

Three years ago, we stood outside on an amazingly beautiful Texas hill country evening, and said our vows while friends and family looked on. It wasn’t the beginning of our commitment to each other–a wedding that came after 6 years of being together just made it the solidification of a commitment that was already there. I was never unsure, never got cold feet, never nervous about what we were doing (only of tripping up the aisle!). It was absolutely right to stand at the end of that aisle and walk up to you, to see you waiting at the end for me, to be joined to you.

Three years later and I know you’re not my other half–I’m a whole person with or without you, as we’ve always known it should be–but you make the whole of me better. You bring out the joy in my life and I can’t imagine my world without you. And as we start our family, it looks like “when and if” have both come, and I thank the heavens everyday for bringing me you, the most unlikely yang to my yin.

I love you–Happy Anniversary

Well, after countless hours spent in airports and cars, too many nights not in my own bed (and the backaches to prove it), his & her’s family time, Christmas, New Year’s Eve, Texas & Vegas….we’re back, and our “real lives” are about to kick back into real time.

I’ve missed this little blog, and all my blog friends…but I daresay I’m going to be a little rusty for a few days. I can already tell this post needs a re-write. But I’ve got to start somewhere, huh?

I had big plans to discuss Christmas and New Year’s in separate posts, but, well, I’m sure everyone is sick of those stories, so I’ll wrap them up in one Sunday night post and just move forward. Welcome to 2009 and all.

Christmas
For Christmas, we headed to the San Antonio area to spend 5 days with my mom and her husband. They own horses and cattle and dogs and cats and who knows what all other animals, so it’s always interesting to head out there–a little dirtier and more rustic than my day to day life, ya know? Oh, and were you aware that horses are really big, and can be kinda freaky up close? And that cattle aren’t particularly smart (and are apparently afraid of me and my camera)? And that border collies who were raised around horses and cattle can do some impressive stuff moving those animals around?

Anyway, Christmas turned out to be an interesting study in who I am.  See, I was a little bummed out by Christmas this year. Oh, not gifts…despite everyone taking it “easy” this year in the gift department, we got some cool stuff, all of it thoughtful and perfect for us and really, minus one gift (yay Wii Fit!), totally not over the top.

No I was disappointed by Christmas because…well I hate to admit this but…because I’m selfish and bratty and didn’t get to do Christmas my way. I know, I know, I’m ashamed of me too, but Christmas to me means getting up in the morning, opening gifts in my jammies, with everyone still drowsy (but nursing a coffee, tea or diet coke in my case), casual and relaxed. Not at 2:00 in the afternoon, fully dressed, in a somewhat “formal” setting. But, we don’t always get to have things our way (I know, right?).

Anyway, it was interesting seeing how that disappointment colored the entire day for me. I was able to let it go later in the day (and I did enjoy myself), but it did reinforce that I’m building my own “traditions” for holidays…and whenever at all it’s in my control, we’ll do things according to those traditions.

New Year’s Eve
As I mentioned in my last post, we headed up to Las Vegas for New Year’s Eve. My in-laws live there, so we don’t normally head toward the Strip when we’re there, instead sticking to their local casino. You lose some of the flair of Vegas but frankly you tend to win more…which is a good thing!

For this trip, we had tickets to see Blue Man Group at 4:00pm on New Year’s Eve. We show up, and seriously, these might have been some of the best seats I’ve ever been in…about 6th row, just off center. The audience wasn’t all that energetic, but it was still one of the coolest things I’ve seen in a really long time. There was a point where I was just laughing and laughing and I remember thinking–this is really an amazing feeling of freedom. It sort of….reset my thinking a little. Theater and musical theater has been known to do that to me on occasion.

After the show was over, the original plan was that my in-laws would head back to their local casino and we’d stay on the Strip and do the “real” Las Vegas New Year’s Eve. But after thinking about it, we decided we didn’t really care to spend a ton of money going to a crowded club, we would rather gamble at his parents casino (for cash flow reasons), and that the Strip didn’t really suit us. So we left.

Instead, we spent the evening playing craps at his parent’s local casino…and winning! It was a really really cool evening–at the stroke of midnight, the entire casino counted down, my husband and I kissed, and we were up a couple hundred dollars. Not bad for starting the night with about $40! I think we left the craps table around 2:00am, up a little more, exhausted but perfectly content with how our evening went down. (We ended up losing most of that money right back to the casino the next day, but we came home with what we left with plus a little more, so I call it a win.)

All in all, the holidays were good, time off was amazing, and I’m really excited about 2009. I’m not quite ready to go back to the real world, but if I must, at least it’s after a satisfying and enjoyable vacation!