Beach Day

This weekend was a fun one of firsts for Grayson! Saturday morning we went to the mall to meet the Easter Bunny. Grayson couldn't really have cared less about the ordeal but we thought it was pretty cute and had a good laugh.

Sunday we drove out to Capitola for Grayson's first beach day and to celebrate his Auntie Caitlin's birthday!  It was sprinkling when we left home but it started to clear up as we got closer to the beach and it ended up being a beautiful day.

G fussed a little bit but finally fell asleep and had a long beach nap. This kid knows how to do it right. :)

 

Oregon Trip

Back in July Nick and I took a trip up to Oregon to celebrate our sweet friend's wedding. The timing ended up working out perfectly and my little niece was born just a few days before the wedding. Since my sister and her husband live in Oregon only a few hours away from where we were already going, we decided that I would stay, keep the rental car and drive up to stay the week with them and Nick would fly back home for work.

We both had the day off on Friday so we caught an early flight into Portland and made the quick drive into Hood River. Driving up there was such a nice break from being in the Bay Area. All the highways up there are two lane and the scenery is just amazing. We made a quick stop at Multnomah Falls, snapped a few pictures and got some ice cream for the road.


When we got to Hood River we went straight to a winery that Nick had found and wanted to taste at. Some friends met us there and we had such a nice relaxing afternoon with them visiting and catching up. Can I just say... wine tasting has become slightly less fun for me since no tasting is involved. But, sitting on a nice patio in the sun with good friends is always enjoyable. Even with a water bottle in hand.

After wine tasting {and water sipping} we went to check into our hotel. Our whole group of friends was staying at the same place and it was gorgeous. Our suite had a patio that opened up right onto the Columbia River and it was just so beautiful.

We all met for dinner Friday night at a local brewery and pizza place and then went out for drinks {also not as much fun anymore}. Saturday we had breakfast on our patio, just the two of us and then spent the rest of the day at the pool.


The wedding was held at a vineyard across the Columbia in Washington and it was seriously one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. There was an amazing view of Mt. Hood and I can't get over how much I loved that place. The venue was beautiful and so peaceful. The bride is a wedding planner professionally and she really outdid herself with this one.

 

 

Sunday Nick had to drive back to Portland with some friends to catch his flight and I took off toward Joseph by myself. A few hours in the car with snacks and a good audio book made for a really nice day, although I was so sad to say goodbye to Nick. We had never spent that much time away from each other since we were first dating and an entire week was hard.


I spent the rest of the week snuggling with Nayeli and adventuring to the grocery store and out for ice cream with my mom. I really had never spent any time with a newborn and spending that week with my brand new niece was so precious. Watching my sister become a mom has been so special and she just seems so at peace that it really made me feel better knowing what's to come for us this winter.

Needless to say, after spending that week in Oregon I definitely wish we could move up there. Life just seems so much more peaceful. It's so beautiful and we joked the entire time that we were just going to sell everything and move up there and open a coffee shop or Bed and Breakfast. Either one sounds good to me!

Thanksgiving

We had such a great Thanksgiving. The weather was beautiful and everyone had such a wonderful time. 

I woke up in the morning and sat on the couch with my cup of coffee and cuddly Cubby dog to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. This is one of my favorite traditions and even now I still feel like a kid as soon as it comes on.

 

This year we started earlier which meant that the appetizers came earlier and we had a longer period of time between the appetizers and cheese plates and starting dinner. I was hungry when we actually sat down for dinner which might have been the first time in history. Everything that we cooked was absolutely amazing and I didn't take any photos at all.
Before dinner we had a scavenger hunt and potato sack relay races which were hilarious and took some family photos.

 

L for Losers



The guys won as usual.

Friday morning we woke up went to Target and shopped our little hineys off with egg nog lattes in hand. Target is the only black Friday shopping that I will do and we got so much good stuff!

This Thanksgiving was the first year that I didn't have one of my parents with us and I was a little sad about it but we will be spending a late Christmas with both of them and I think that will make up for it. We just had so much to be grateful for this year. I am so thankful for this wonderful family that I have. I can't imagine what life would be like if I hadn't married into this wonderful family.

Maui Family Vaca

 

We made it home! We got back late Saturday night, picked up the pups, and slept for about 11 hours. We woke up Sunday morning to the first 9er game of the official season and may or may not have decorated the entire house for fall and eaten a full batch of baked artichoke dip.

 

Here's a recap of our glorious 8 days in paradise. We arrived on Friday morning and spent the day lounging on the beach and drinking a few Mai Tais. We spent most of the week like that minus a few adventures and meals out. Major photo dump coming your way...



 

The view from our balcony

How cute is my sweet SIL? She is about 4'10" and this giant Rainbow flip flop was almost as tall as her. I made her try it on. 

 

Our family typically doesn't go out for breakfast much, we prefer to save our calories for dinners and wine but we couldn't resist this place. There are only a few other locations {Singapore, Tokyo, Portland, and Hong Kong}. In the unlikely event that you ever happen to find yourself in one of those places, definitely try it out. You order a squeeze bottle of pancake batter and they bring it to you with the toppings that you choose. We picked scallions, cheddar cheese, and crème fraiche. The best part is cooking your pancakes on the griddle built into the table. I never would have thought of making savory pancakes on my own but I am definitely going to be replicating these at home soon. They also had an entire menu of breakfast cocktails which is always exciting. I had a passion fruit mimosa. I pretty much have passion fruit juice running through my veins after this vacation.



The next day we ventured up the volcano and stopped at a goat cheese farm. They had tons of flavors of all kinds of goat cheese and goat's milk truffles. I picked a passion fruit one of course and we ordered a sampler platter of a bunch of their different cheeses.  Delicious. 

Nope.. that's not ice cream. It's goat cheese!

After the goat farm we kept driving to go to a winery also on the volcano. We got there only to find that they were closed for Labor Day and picnicked in the mini van instead. Can you tell from my MIL's face that she was less than thrilled? 

We spent the next day at our favorite beach in Napili. There is a little restaurant right on the beach that has a happy hour that lasts pretty much all day. It was really hot and we spent most of the day on the patio ordering drinks and food with a few occasional dips in the ocean. I snorkeled here for about 3 minutes and we saw a giant sea turtle. Turns out September is turtle season and we ended up seeing them all over the place. 

I ate more than my fill of poke {pronounced pokey} on this trip. Since we started trying to conceive I have completely cut raw fish of every kind, especially ahi tuna from my diet. That means I haven't had sushi since April. Sad face. Until this trip that is. I haven't had any hard alcohol either so a few fruity Mai Tais were a special treat I was really looking forward to. 

My all time favorite. Poke Nachos.

It is said that Maui has some of the most beautiful sunsets on earth. I think my photos turned out pretty good but really don't even do it justice. We sat out and watched the sunset every night either at the resort or at dinner. 

 

 

 

 

On Thursday while the rest of the world was counting down the minutes to the weekend, we were riding mopeds around the island. We had so much fun. I won't lie it's a little scary to ride one of these things down the normal street with cars all over the place and trying to pass you. We rode back up to our favorite beach and got some happy hour appetizers. What else would you expect? 

My husband is just so damn cute. I told him he should have been a motorcycle cop. He totally looked the part.

I got really lazy about taking pictures near the end of the trip. This one is from our last night before we went out to dinner.

 

Today was back to reality and over 300 emails... and a massive forest fire burning right outside our back door.