Sunday Walk

 Yesterday we went to the Houston Arboretum. It is pretty big so we will be coming back to check out the rest of the trails. I like this Arb because Gertie can come with us so she gets a walk out of it too.

for my AH friends: doesn't this look like a Waterhouse setting? #PRB

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Have a happy New Years everybody! Joey and I still need to work on our plans. We have so many parties to go to it is hard to narrow it down to just 5....totally kidding. We will probably not do anything for New Years Eve (we need to develop a social life out here) but tomorrow we see the Hobbit! Great way to start the new year right?

checking back in

aaaannnd i'm back to blogging again.

RECAP
I finished my finals. passed my classes-with amazing grades I might add :)

Packed up my belongings into 3 suitcases, a cat carrier, and a "personal item"

just call me a magician/super packer

Flew to Houston on Christmas eve with kitty-no accidents on the plane (thank goodness!). I drugged her up before flying so she wouldn't freak out while traveling. I was nervous that the sedatives wouldn't do much because the first time I gave them to her to test them out before we flew she didn't act any different. Well let's just say they worked on the plane. She did not move or peep once the entire 7-8 hours of travel it took to get from my house in Madison to our house in Houston. She didn't sleep either. She just sat there.

 Since she hadn't gone to the bathroom since the morning we left I was really nervous she was going to make a mess at some point, but she never did! As soon as we got to our apartment we slid her into the litter box...she must have thought that was her bed or something because she hung out in there just starring out the window of the box for about an hour. Didn't pee or poop. just sat there. kitty was super stoned haha.

 We spent Christmas as our own little family. We went to a lovely Christmas movie, relaxed, unpacked, and went out for Chinese.  Extravagant Christmas dinner...very similar to the one in Christmas Story ;)
I am currently getting settled by unpacking and buying odds and ends that I have no idea how joey has survived without for 4 months...dishes, utensils, cooking equipment, ahem....
Our 4th wedding anniversary was two days after Christmas. We went out for tacos to celebrate. After tacos (which were utterly delicious) I made a fort (for our fourth anniversary...yes I know so clever.) and we watched a Woody Allen documentary. Pretty chill. 

 Here's to our new adventure sweetheart.

Here in Houston we are starting from scratch. When Joey moved he only took what he could fit in his car. I mailed a few things to him from Madison while I was still there, but we got rid of A LOT of stuff.
It was kinda crazy and maybe foolish to get rid of all our things, but we see it as a way to simplify our lives and only have what we really need.
I am currently in the job market which SUCKS. I am applying for jobs like its my job...hehe. hopefully something pops up soon.
Houston is huge...no. Houston is ginormous. Not like NYC big where it is all concentrated in one area. Houston is really spread out and just never ends. Downtown has big buildings etc, but there are like two other areas that seem just as big that are away from downtown...I still have a lot to learn of this place and I can't wait to get it all figured out. There are shops, malls, restaurants, strip malls, and franchises every two feet.  Which is cool, but I think I am going to miss the more personal/locally owned atmosphere of Madison. I will just have to look extra hard for the cute little ma and pa shops wedged in between the slew of Whataburgers and Chase Banks.

now if you excuse me I need to write another cover letter. 

channeling my inner twiggy

So recently I have become a model...baha! Just kidding. Despite my height I think my love for cookies and ice cream kinda keeps me from such a career. I did model for my lovely friend at College Fashionista though. Never did I think I would see the day where I am recognized for my style... I guess I owe working at a retail store recently to help cure me of my serious lack for it. I mean I love clothes I just had never been very good at putting together outfits. Well look at me now folks! I am all grown up and am being featured on college fashionista today repping UW Madison :) check it out! It will probably be my only claim to fame/ fashion moment.

I will see you all after finals! This is it! Graduation in T-19 days but more like 24 because for some reason UW has winter graduation ceremony before finals take place?...oh yeah that's because they like to have finals five seconds before christmas. oh well either way this lady is graduating! woooooo!

lake geneva...wisconsin

after the temple my dad and i took the wrong freeway for a little while and realized that we were going to go home the really long way by driving up to milwaukee then over to madison which would have added another couple hours to our drive. boo. luckily we live in this awesome age of technology! seriously i don't know what i would do with out iphones. we remapped our route to get home. it turned out to be the best part of all of our driving that weekend. instead of the big freeway...which wasn't free we took county highways rolling along the hills and farms in the beautiful countryside. totally gorgeous. i realized that along the way we would be passing lake geneva which is one of the most touristy spots in wisconsin. we stopped there for dinner and walked around the cute sleepy town. the lake was gorgeous and the little shops around town were adorable! after dinner at a cute little nautical themed  joint we hit the road one last time. the only unfortunate part of the drive was it was dark by then so we couldn't enjoy the countryside view the rest of the way.

least to say that weekend with my dad was so wonderful. i love being with my dad and going on adventures with him. he is the best and i love him so much! so excited to be seeing him again in a couple weeks for thanksgiving!

chicago, illinois lds temple

since it was sunday the temple was closed but my dad and i wanted to check out the outside at least while we were in that neck of the woods. confession: i have lived in madison over 2 years now and haven't been to this temple yet...oops. all you utah folks be grateful you have a temple just down the street from you! i have to drive about 3 hours to get to my closest temple! when we pulled into the temple's property the gate was closed so we couldn't even pull into the parking lot.(boooo) it was going to be really lame driving all that way and only seeing what you can see of the temple from the side of the road. my dad and i started to explore to see if i could hop the fence somewhere. we struck gold and found a gap in the fence by the maintenance shed and had the whole temple grounds to ourselves! the temple is of course gorgeous. not my favorite temple but it's a nice one. the salt lake city temple will always be my temple.

mad dash magnolia

i love big cities. i love the architecture, people watching, shopping (duh), and amazing food EVERYWHERE. i love eating the local fare at cool trendy places and little bakeries. magnolia bakery has been a place i have wanted to go to for a long time and now there is one in chi town! my dad and i wanted to get back up to wisconsin at a decent hour so we didn't leave much time to check out magnolia.

we were on state street (the one with the famous chicago sign) which is really busy approaching magnolia bakery. of course there is no street parking on this street so my dad pulls over fumbles through his wallet, throws me a $100 bill, i jump out of the car with my camera and dash in to absorb the whole experience of this famous bakery while my dad  drives around the block...yeah it was probably a funny site to see.

while waiting in line i am wildly snapping pictures while deciding what i am getting. i picked out a few cupcakes, cookies, some bar thing, snagged a cook book and a jar their famously cute sprinkles...in my favorite color, mint :)

I paid while snapping more pictures, dashed out the door with a bag full of goodies. snapping pictures. this place was adorable all decorated for halloween and i wish i could have spent more time there. i walked outside snapped some pictures while i waited for my dad to pull around the corner, jumped in the car and we booked it out of chi town!

next stop? the lds temple!

navy pier

more late photos to blog about :)

I love llamas

after waking up late sunday morning dad and i grabbed some breakfast at a little dive called mary's cafe. it was a lovely day so we thought navy pier would be the perfect spot to be before we headed back up to sconnieland. we lucked out they were having a halloween bash for kids so we saw cute decorations, performers and a petting zoo! i love halloween. i love navy pier. gosh darn it I LOVE CHICAGO

cougar for a day

This post is much delayed. My bad. If you know me then you know I am NOT a BYU fan. I can't explain why in any sort of logical way and this post isn't for me to rant about "God's University". While in South Bend, Indiana I set my opinions aside and put on my cougar face to root for BYU at the Notre Dame game last weekend. The last time I was at a football game for the Cougars I am not sure if I was even fully potty trained...which was a really long time ago I swear.

My dad and I drove from Chi town for a couple hours to Notre Dame's INCREDIBLE campus. It took us about an hour to get off the freeway with the traffic...crazay, but once we were parked we explored the campus with what felt like the rest of the state of Utah. I wasn't expecting seeing as many Cougar fans as we did. They were everywhere! It was kinda nice actually I felt like I was back home instead of the middle of the Midwest. We saw a few people we new, and there was this amazing feeling of community as we walked around sharing smiles to those with a big Y on their hat or sweatshirt.  Also Notre Dame people/students/ fans are the NICEST people ever! They were so welcoming to the herds of BYU fans tromping around the campus. I think I was told "Welcome to Notre Dame" about 20 times.

The game was super fun...BYU lost but that didn't dampen our spirits! After the game we met a few players on the team that my dad's Hawaiian friend knew from back home and oh yeah one of those players was Manti Te'o. 

the picture I have of Manti and I isn't as good as the one my dad has on his camera. We actually are posing together in that one lol.
After that dad and I drove all the way back up to Chicago and ate amazing soul food at a New Orleans style restaurant with LOTS of hot sauce, fell into bed and slept like babies.