Summer Days

This summer was one of the craziest, busiest ones I can remember. 

I was so thankful that we both had the time off that we could do all these wonderful things. 

Our July:

1. 4th of July was spent BBQing and hanging out at the pool with the family.

2. Julia and Robbie's Wedding.
The following day we spent an extremely short, whirlwind weekend celebrating my best friends wedding in Colorado. It was absolutely gorgeous.

3. I had my first experience with jury duty.
Thankfully there were too many jurors and I got to go home almost immediately!

 

4. 7/11

 

5. Orlando Weekend

One of Kyle's best friends came down from Iowa to visit. 

So we made the trip up there to see them. 

The last time we saw them, his wife was 6 months pregnant. 

When we saw them this summer, they had a 4 month old. 

 

 

 

 

  Of course, no Orlando trip is complete without a stop at Harry Potter World. 

6. Boender Annual Colorado Trip.

The following weekend, it was back to Colorado for a week long stay.

 

Totally met Clark Duke on the way home!

7. This cutie turned 1!

As you can see, July was insanely busy, but full of wonderful memories.  

Hello Summer!

Between switching over computers, trips, and the end of the school year there just hasn't seemed to be any time!

However, it officially is summer now and I actually have time to post. 

Lots has happened since I took my unplanned break. 

1. My niece lost her first tooth!

It fell right out of her mouth after dinner one night and we had to search the sidewalk in the rain for it. Lucky for her, we found it and the tooth fairy was able to make her first appearance.

2. Right after that, she celebrated her 5th birthday!

We went to Legoland and Sea World to mark the occasion. 

Sea World has gotten way better over the years, Legoland, not so great.

       

3. It's been the beginning of wedding season around here. 

The following weekends were filled with bridal showers, including my beautiful best friend's!

4. That brought me right up to the end of the school year.
I'm so thankful my first year is finally over and can't wait to dive into next year!

Some lovely parting gifts!

5. Right after school ended, we left for a family vacation to the beach.
Despite Kyle and I getting slightly burned the first day, we had a lot of nice relaxing time hanging out on the beach.
           
6. We left vacation early in order to get back for my best friend's bachelorette party.
We stayed on the beach, and luckily it was gorgeous weather!
    \    

Hello Spring Break

I have to say, weekends are much more enjoyable when you know you don't have to go to work on Monday morning. 

This weekend we spent a lot of time with friends and family. 

It was so nice to just enjoy the time and not worry about things I needed to get done.

Friday night, we had some friends over and played Settlers of Catan. 

We really like to broaden our horizons. 

Kyle and I won every game played and figure it must be because it was at our house. 

We might need to play over here more often.

Our friend Brad spent the night and the next day we went with him and Jason apartment hunting.

It's much more enjoyable when you just get to look at places, but aren't moving yourself!

Sadly, this happened. 

We rolled down the window and the power windows went out. 

This had happened a few months before and the fuse just needed replacing. 

So we went and bought a couple fuses and fixed the window. 

Sunday, we did our usual church and family lunch. 

Then we headed to our friend's house to play some more Settlers.

Like I said, party animals.

Stephanie won every game, furthering our theory of house wins. 

On our way home, we stopped to get some food. 

Only to try and roll the window up and the power windows again go out. 

Thankfully, we had an extra fuse this time. 

We replaced the fuse, and before we could even get the window back up, that one blew as well.

Clearly, there's a bigger issue here...

On the bright side, I have Spring Break this week. 

What a great way to spend the morning. 

Now I get to spend the rest of the day dealing with the car.

At least it happened now, when I have time to work on it!

Theme Park Tourists for a Day

Kyle and I have season passes to Universal. 

Living in Florida, we're no strangers to theme parks. 

We've had season passes to other theme parks over the years and it's not a huge deal for us to go for the weekend. 

When we go to theme parks we like to take our time. 

We show up when we feel like it, 

mosey around the park doing things here and there, 

then when we get tired we leave.

We maybe will go back to see fireworks that night, or not. 

We do have season passes and free parking!

This weekend we went to Universal with 4 of our friends, who all have season passes as well.

We don't like to leave to go on trips too late, but luck was not in our favor. 

Once everyone got ready to leave it was after 8 pm!

We finally made it up to Orlando and talk turns to our plans for the next day. 

Imagine our surprise when it was decided that we needed to be at the park 30 minutes before it opened so that we could get in right at 9am!

We rushed to the park and quickly started jumping on rides. 

And I do mean quickly. 

One perk of being a crazy tourist and getting there right at opening is there are no lines!

We then proceeded to race back on rides over and over again. 

Who are these people and what happened to our friends!

First ride of the day!

I finally needed a roller coaster break and just needed to sit for a minute. 

Thankfully my wonderful husband was okay with relaxing with a butterbeer while everyone went on Dragon Challenge again. 

Oh, and did I mention it was in the low 60s?

That's like freezing for us south Florida people!

Keeping my toes warm!

After bouncing through every ride multiple times that anyone wanted to go on. 

And popping into ALL the gift shops, 

ain't nobody got time for that!

I was ready to call it a day, 

but it was only 4:30 and the fireworks weren't till 7!

Who stays all day?!?

Tourists, that's who!

I made everyone go on the kiddie ride so I could take this picture. That's right, I take photos on rides!

I decided I was over it and we were heading back to the hotel. 

Thankfully Kyle views theme parks like me and was more than accommodating.

AKA he was ready to go too!

We did have a wonderful time, 

and will undoubtedly go again with them.

However I did feel more like a tourist than ever before, 

trying to cram every possible thing into one day. 

By the way, we were also going the following day...
Not to mention those season passes!

High Five for Friday

1// Days off!

2// Strawberry Picking!

3// Perks of driving to work at 7am

4// New recipes

5// Games nights with friends!

High Five for Christmas Break!

I love Friday! It's a chance to relax and get caught up on all the things I ignored during the week. 

This Friday I'm especially excited!

It's the last Friday of the school year. Hello, Christmas Vacation!

I definitely appreciate Christmas break as a teacher more than I did as a student. 

I can't wait to sleep in, celebrate Christmas, celebrate our 1st anniversary, and spend time with family.

1. One of the things to do on Kyle's countdown was to go see The Hobbit. 

He has been talking about this movie for over a year. 

Friday night, Kyle came home with matching shirts for us to wear to the movies. 

Yes, we were that dorky couple all dressed up for the movie. 

You know it's bad when the people you go with think it's dorky!

It really was a good movie though!

 

2. On Saturday, my beautiful best friend asked me to be her Matron of Honor. 

She was my Maid of Honor and I couldn't be happier to celebrate this wonderful occasion with her!

 3. Later that same day I got to go dress shopping with her. 

I never went dress shopping for my own wedding so I had a lot of fun experiencing it with her. 

She tried on dresses in practically every style. 

Don't worry, this wasn't one of her top ones!

 4. There is a light show right down the street from us that I had been wanting to do to. 

The park has done it for as long as I can remember, but I couldn't tell you the last time I went. 

Kyle works at the same park so we were able to go for free. 

I enjoyed being able to experience it, but I wouldn't pay as much as they ask to do it!

5. Rocking my Gator PJs to work today. 

Be Jealous!

The whole school is wearing pajamas and doing a Polar Express Day!

It should be a ton of fun and a great send off for break!

"I Believe"