Pre-Deployment Leave

Four years (and 11 days ago) I posted my very first entry on this blog. Hard to believe I am writing almost an identical entry four years and two weeks or so in the future.

As you may remember from my last entry Ryan took Rylie down to South Carolina to see his family for the first half of his leave while I worked. While he was there my parents drove down to pick Rylie up and they kept her so we could go to Myrtle Beach for the second half of Ryan's leave. We basically had a repeat of our vacation from two years ago with a few minor differences... but we even stayed in the same hotel!

The week was spent sunning on the beach, avoiding afternoon thunderstorms, staying up late (usually drinking), meeting awesome people, and eating really good food! Our hotel had an outdoor beach bar the was open until 11 every night with live music, an indoor club that was open until 2am, and a bar down the street that was open later on certain nights. My poor liver went into shock!

We ate at some amazing restaurants, RIOZ and the Flying Fish are two I highly recommend. Now they are pricey, but worth it for a big night out. RIOZ is a churascurria, a Brazilian restaurant that basically carries big slabs of meat around to your table and slices them as you request them. Plus they had a huge salad bar (I got to try quail eggs!), side dishes and a heavenly dessert cart. The Flying Fish had delicious seafood and was worth the hour wait we had.

There was one night we opted to bar hop and then we met some people from our hotel that invited us to hang out once the bar closed. We played drinking games and talked until it turned gray outside. Ryan and I headed back to our room but then as I laid my weary old head down to finally sleep Ryan decided he wanted to go on the beach and watch the sunrise. Now, once my husband gets an idea in his head it is pretty hard to break him of it... when he is drunk it is impossible. Hence the reason I found myself watching a sunrise on the beach in my pajama shirt and sweatpants with my husband in my sweatshirt with all the morning joggers and shell collectors. We obviously were the only ones who had not yet gone to sleep! It was beautiful though and I am glad he forced me down there.

We also went back to the Boardwalk to play arcade games and spent time at Broadway at the Beach. Our newest favorite find was the mirror maze. It was so fun! For a decent price you can go through as many times as you want until closing. I am not lying when I say we did it at least a dozen times. We also had these trippy beer goggle-esque glasses that they gave us which made it even more difficult. We went through with the glasses, without them, forwards, backwards, starting from separate ends and racing... it was a blast. The employees liked us so they walked us through the "quick" way and showed us the mirrors that are actually doors (for emergencies and the break room, important!). We caught some fireworks and had a blast.

Even though we've done the Myrtle Beach thing before I didn't mind doing it again since Ryan really wanted to go. Our next trip anywhere should be international and post deployment, so I am really looking forward to that for many reasons. Thanks for sticking around with my lack of posting... just trying to spend as much time with my husband as I can!

You know you're a blonde when...

You know you are a blonde when...

- You somehow made yourself exempt from federal taxes and now owe the government a lot of money.

- This happens the month before you buy a house.

- The one time you almost curse out loud at work since you are crying about said taxes and there is a small child in the lobby.

- When the leasing lady asks you what unit you live in so maintenance can fix your leaky radiator you forget for a moment. It's only your address. No big deal.

- You get two blocks into your walk with your puppy before realizing your sneakers are on the wrong feet.

- You take a different route on your walk through Old Town, get turned around, and head in the opposite direction of home for a few blocks before you realize your mistake.

and last but not least...

- You know you're a blonde when all of the above happens in the last five hours prior to writing this blog post.



But the good of today... and yes it involves blondeness... is that my no heat curls worked!!!


This morning


Two hours ago


Tutorial here but learned from my neighbor Carrie long before I found it online.


Sigh. Off to work on my mortgage application. Then this girl is getting a drink!

Play Ball!

I love baseball. I really do. My blood will always flow with pinstripes for my first love the Yankees, but I have adopted the Nationals since moving to DC! I try to go to at least one game a summer, usually I make it to two or more, but this year I realized I was cutting it close! The season ends this weekend, so I roped my neighbor Carrie in to going with me last Saturday night.



You can tell it is the end of the season because all the Presidents were looking a wee bit worse for the wear!



It was a little chilly but we made it out into DC with plenty of time and trekked our way up the stadium. Of course getting $10 tickets means you sit at the tippy top, but hey, at least we were the second to last row!



It was also Half Way to Saint Paddy's Day, 9/17, so that was fun to see. Lots of green and half priced beer!





We split some aaaaamazing garlic parmesean fries and I got a hot dog as well. But man oh man those fries were heavenly. So worth $9.50... almost as much as our seats! The Nats were playing the Florida Marlins and I finally got to see the wunderkind Strasberg start and pitch!





It ended up being a looooooong game. Just my luck eh? 13 innings! It was 1-1, cringe I know, until the 13th inning when the Marlins busted out three runs from nowhere. Drat. The game went so long the Presidents raced twice!





The first race Teddy was doing so so well, but then the leprechaun came and stole his Lucky Charms. Poor Guy.





The second race he was way out in front, but he ran the wrong way around the stadium. Poor Teddy, he is just never going to win at this rate!

All in all, good night, lots of fun and plenty of baseball loving for me!




Oh! One of our clients got me flowers and chocolates today to say thanks for all my help (: Nice to know people appreciate things! I was very surprised.

Holidays = Blogging Fail

Wow, I went a lot longer without blogging than I intended to! We drove up to New Jersey Thursday night and got in pretty late. The one toll going into Delaware was INSANE. One hour to go fifteen miles. Once we hit the toll itself and cruised past the line to the EZ Pass section we hit 75 and did not stop til Jersey. So the stop go stop go, in a standard mind you, was pretty heinous.

I ate a lot of delicious food, saw a ton of family, did the church thing, and got some nice presents too!

Christmas Eve my bestie Sam came over and then we welcomed the chaos of my Dad's 100% Italian family for dinner. About 40 people? Not sure, just a lot of people and my mom and I are the only blondes present (I always felt like such a stepchild at these things... but I love my dad and being able to be Italian by association for a night!). They are always good for a big ego boost too, telling me I look fabulous/married life agrees with me/you lost weight etc. I may not agree with all of it, but it is nice to hear!

*watches her inflated head sail off into the distance*

Naturally inordiante amounts of food were consumed. Pasta with the secret mushroom tomato sauce, rice balls (AMAZING), eggplant, string beans, a million finger foods and snacks, home made cannoli and baklava, cupcakes, chocolate... oh it goes on. My pants feel a little snug at the thought.

Then we went off to midnight mass at ten o'clock. We've called it that for years. Originally our church had a midnight mass, but then they changed it to ten pm for the poor priest who had a seven thirty am mass after being at church til two am! But the name sort of stuck. I was a lector (reader) and it was amazing to have my family, my husband included as well as my aunt and cousin who surprised us, my best friend, and the best friends of our family (Fran, Rob, Chris, and Nicole) all sitting together. I also love reading at church.... and truth be told it is the closest thing to acting/being on a stage/in front of an audience that I have had in ages. :( Miss that.

Christmas morning was fun. Lots of presents were opened and the living room was demolished. I could not believe Ryan woke me up at 6:25 AM saying, "Let's go see what Santa left us!" I just stared at him, m little brother was still asleep!! Haha I am horrible and said no and went back to sleep. He let me stay that way til about 8:30 and then I had to be up because I did actually hear Stefan watching tv in the living rooms.

Presents:


From the top, an amazingly warm blanket made with that pattern from my mom and dad. Eat Pray Love on DVD and a VS gift card from the hubby (totally need that in one month for bras to fit post surgery!!). Santa got me a Kindle, which I AM IN LOVE WITH. We also got a laptop and a Wii for ourselves at Best Buy two weeks ago (with speakers for the tv too) that we wrapped up and acted surprised to open. My mom also discovered Scentsy and got us the USMC one with lots of blocks to burn. We've used it in our room every night so far and I do love how the room smells! I also got these amazing socks from my mom (and a client at work) that are scented and have shea in them and they are just SO cozy and comfy. They even have the little stickies on the bottom so I don't fall on the hardwood floors. Couple all that with some sweaters, a Betty White calendar from my cousin Jill, candles, candy, and some black sketchers snow boots and we had a pretty great Christmas!

Christmas Day brunch (as per tradition) followed at my Aunt Joan's house. We ate too much again, I may have gotten drunk on champagne mixed with pomegranate liquer while Ryan schooled the kids in pool in the basement. We then stopped by Fran and Rob's on the way home so the kids could hang out... and the adults too. It is at this point I realize my husband is quite drunk. I am long sober... but he was not. And had more to drink at Fran and Rob's. Needless to say I was not pleased. Especially since he kept going.

I played rummy with Nicole and tried not to be a nag and ruin our first Christmas, but I was upset at him for his behavior. Especially today when I get an email from my dad of all people saying how some of the things that happened were not acceptable. When I get home today we have to have a "talk" about it that I am not looking forward to.

Sigh.

Couple that with the fact he had a nightmare while drunk and freaked out since he was convinced it was real and would not listen to anything else I said. I was awake watching tv and he was out all of thirty seconds when he started saying 'help' so I woke him up. He was convinced he saw a demon in my room (this is not the first time he has had this sort of dream) and would not listen to a word I said. That in turn freaked me out.

Anyway Sunday we went to church and the snow started. We were going to go see my other two brothers and give them their presents and then stop by my grandparents before heading home but I just got a feeling that we shouldn't. I am glad that feeling struck because that snow fell fast!! It was slow go up until Philidelphia and then got better, but it was still a long and snowy drive back to DC! We then put all our presents away and crashed.

Work has been dead slow. I spent yesterday catching up on blog reading and was going to start this but the mail came at the last minute and stretched out my day. Typical.

There ya go, Christmas.

Pictures to follow when I figure out which laptop to load them on to...