Weekend Wrap Up : Basset and Buddies

This past weekend we headed to Charlotte to seem some best buddies of ours, Casey and Eric.  And, of course, Mr. Pierre. 

We seem to have a thing for traveling to Charlotte for birthdays.  This time it was for Eric's 30th and we were so happy to be able to celebrate with them!  This time they actually knew we were coming ;)

 Plus I needed some Pierre lovin in my life.

The whole weekend was equal parts eating, drinking, relaxing and basset snuggling. 

Floyd and Pierre did really well together. 

They did not snuggle or sleep together (as is my dream) but I have hopes that one day it will happen...

Once Floyd gets over the fact that Pierre is a DAWG hanging out with him, a human.

There may or may not have been a lot of conversations in basset voices going on.  

We are so happy that know people that share our crazy basset love ;)

Saturday we hopped around to some really fun breweries in Charlotte.  It was a beautiful day to see other areas of Charlotte.   Charlotte always leaves us wanting more, see more, do more and spend more time there...guess that just means we will have to go back soon ;)

Not to mention all the breweries are dog friendly!  Drinks, sunshine and puppies running around...check check and check!

As always when we see Casey and Eric we had a really, really great time.  We were this close to just moving into their guest room and calling it a day.  You know those people you feel like you've known your entire life and everything just clicks...yep, love it.  

Besties, Bassets and Birthdays

This weekend we had the pleasure of having Casey, Eric and Pierre (!!) in town to visit and celebrate Mister's birthday.

Fun is an understatement for the weekend.  We had been planning, counting down the days and looking forward to this weekend for quite a while.  We were excited to show them a few new places around town and spend time together with the bassets snuggled on our laps.  

Almost more than having precious friends stay the weekend, having two bassets trotting around makes me SO happy.  

Friday Mister and I snuck out of work early to greet our guests and get an early start on the weekend. 

We had a little mini tour of downtown and had a great time showing them Rhinegeist.

We had every intention of swinging by the store and picking up food for dinner.  But by the time we headed home we decided pizza and wine was a better option.  

Turns out it was.  Delicious pizza, fabulous wine and good friends around the table was the perfect way to end the night.

Saturday Casey and I hit up bootcamp to work off some of said wine and get a good start on the day.  We rounded out the morning with banana bread, multiple cups of coffee and, of course, basset snuggles.   

Saturday night we headed back downtown to Goodfellas Pizzeria for crafty cocktails and...pizza.  Again.  

It's a good thing we all love pizza because we sure had a lot of it.  Goodfellas knocked it out of the park.  The cocktails were SO interesting and delicious and the pizza was some of the best I've had in a very long time.  

As for the rest of the weekend, I will let the photos do the talking.  

Bassets in the sun warming their bellies warms my heart like none other. 

And a very, very HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my handsome MISTER!! Floyd and I (and Pierre!) hope you have THE best day, you deserve it!  

When I'm not blogging

To start off being 100% honest, I am totally stealing this blog post idea from Amanda.

That being said, I think it is an excellent idea.

 And I sorta want everyone to do a post like this.

There are a million and a half things that I do (or at least feel like) I do every single day.  This blog is one small part of those million things.

Here are a few of the others:

Basset hound wrangling/holding: Floyd is our baby and takes up a lot of our time and I love it.  Homeboy needs walks and loving and holdins.  Currently he is on my lap and I am typing at an angle to accommodate his snuggling.  

Working out: I make it a priority to fit in a workout session every day.  Even if it is short and sweet or just my push ups, I am determined to get something accomplished.  Running is on the back burner right now due to my IT band.  Prayers for fast healing...

Reading:  One of my resolutions was to read more and so far I've read two books and listened to one!

Cooking:  Turns out Mister needs dinner every night and its a good thing because I love cooking.  We love cooking together at night after working out and spending time in the kitchen.

TV Time:  Mister and I love a good TV series and have quite a few that we watch.  We try to get in at least one or two episodes in a night of whatever particular ones we are involved in.  Lately it's been The Americans- we are almost finished with the first season and really enjoying it!

Pinteresting:  I love a good cruise around Pinterest (follow me here!) and some evenings it is my way to wind down.  Like most of us ladies, I can easily get lost in the maze of Pinterest, clicking on links and finding new sites/blogs.  I have been finding the best recipes for my meal plans lately and in turn, finding fantastic food blogs! 

Blogwork:  Speaking of blogs, another cruise I like taking around the ol Internets is finding new blogs to read and fall in love with.  Any new ones out there I should be reading?!

So what are you doing when you're not blogging?

Weekend Wrap Up : Merry & Movies

It went too fast, as always, but we had a great weekend 'round these parts.

Friday night we had 0 plans. 0. 

It was glorious.

Floyd and I wrapped a few presents for our friends.

He was super helpful.

Then we all three snuggled up on the couch and watched 22 Jump Street.

Saturday morning I did a crazy thing and did not run but went to bootcamp instead.

It was a nice change of pace and a great workout so still a win!

And it was a good thing I worked out because that afternoon I headed to Anne's to decorate cookies with some her and some other ladies.  A few cookies were consumed while decorating...it was necessary.  

Anne had the most adorable set up for decorating and our group was quite creative and made some adorable cookies!

Saturday night Mister and I finally went to see Mockingjay.  It did not disappoint, once again and now I am dying to see Part 2.  It needs to come out, like right now.

Sunday was a total free for all day and I, surprisingly, loved it.  I got just about 0 from my to do list done but that was a okay.  Mister and I met some friends and checked out Mad Tree Brewery (so nice to have such a great place in our backyard!).  

Sunday night I took upon an endeavor I've never done before...I cooked a turkey! And! It turned out well!  I was pretty impressed if I do say so myself.  Not too mention the fact that we have leftovers for days! We have a standing Sunday night dinner date with our neighbors and it is one of my favorite parts of the weekend every single week.  

Aloha! Hawaii Part 5

This may be long but it should be the end of the Hawaii recaps ;)

Unless you want to see step by step of our photo book creation process...

In our finals days we tried to cram in all the last little things on our list and eat up more deliciousness.

(see, Leonards, we had it twice and I will never regret it.) 

Friday morning we were up early and headed to Pearl Harbor.

We did not have tickets but had planned on just walking around the exhibits and forego touring the Arizona Memorial.  Well we got lucky and Kait was able to score tickets for a tour starting right after we got there! 

Though somber, the memorial and all of the exhibits there were very well done and I am very glad we had the chance to experience all of it. 

After Pearl Harbor we headed down to beautiful Waikiki.

I had no idea Waikiki had such great shopping and high end shops, really fun window shopping!

Not too mention, the beauty that was the beach! 

The next day Mister and I headed back to Waikiki and were able to check out the Royal Hawaiian hotel.

You may recognize it from an opening season of Mad Men, which is one reason we wanted to see it.

That and also because ENTIRE thing is bright pink. 

One day we will stay there...

We took our last day slowly and tried to soak up all the wonderfulness that the past week had been.
We delayed leaving as long as possible and tried to put Judy in our suitcase.
Before leaving we walked down to the ocean, made a wish and tossed our leis out to sea...

As the Hawaiians say

(thank you)
to Kait, Dane, Judy and all of Hawaii for showing us one of the best and most beautiful vacations we've ever had!

Aloha! Hawaii Part 4

Now that we had hiked the side of a cliff, Diamondhead was next on our list.

Mister and I started bright and early to try and beat the heat Thursday morning.

It sure isn't a smooth path but the trail at Diamondhead is relatively paved, which is nice.

It's also windy, steep, hot and full of metal stairs.

But the views at the top are incredible and were totally worth it!  

After Diamondhead we headed to what turned out to be my favorite beach. (well besides Miss Judy's secret beach but that's another story.)
I present to you Hanauma Bay in all of it's beauty.

You can guarantee this one is being framed in our house.

We snorkled, we beached and we soaked up the beautifulness.

And to cap off an amazing day, we went to dinner at Dane and Kait's favorite Thai restaurant.
Let me tell you, it did not disappoint.
We are still drooling over the Pad Thai and drunken noodles.
And I don't hate BYOB either.

Happy bellies and happy hearts.

Aloha! Hawaii Part 3

Back with more aloha for you!

Long before we got to Hawaii I asked Kait if we could go to the Makapu'u Tide Pools because I had seen her amazing pictures and really wanted to experience it.  Getting to the tide pools required a bit of a hike (totally fine) and then scaling down the side of a cliff (not so fine).  No one told me about scaling a mountain to get to the tide pools and it is better that they didn't.  The climb was intense and scary and really awesome all at the same time.  About halfway through I thought 'well this is happening and there is no turning back.'  I am actually pretty proud of myself for doing the climb, it was a doozy.

The photo we told Mister to send to Dateline if we didn't make it. (Kidding Mom, sorta...)

And totally worth it!  The tide pools were absolutely beautiful and worth the trek.  A true hidden gem.  

And what goes down, must climb back up...

Just a bit daunting...

But also one of my favorite parts of our trip.

When we weren't out scaling mountains, we spent a lot of time with Miss New Judy.

She is such a sweet, sweet girl.

And loves a good golf cart ride...

Stole this one from Kait

And when Judy needed a break from us, we would happy hour at cool places...like a bar full of Coast Guard memorabilia or the best and most unusual mai tais you've ever had. 

Aloha! Hawaii Part 2

It's luau time!

We were lucky enough to attend a traditional Hawaiian luau on Saturday night.

As we were greeted at the door with mai tais and I knew it would be a good night.

The timing of the luau was just perfect with the beautiful sunset over the water.

I could have taken about a million more photos.  I loved taking the same shot just a few minutes apart and watching the sky change.

Dinner was a true Hawaiian feast full of pork, salads, traditional desserts and, of course, pineapple.

That sky! Have you ever seen anything so beautiful?!

Thanks to the time change we were getting up very early, which made it easy to squeeze in some great work outs.

My favorite being an early morning run along the lagoons/beach near Kait and Dane's house.  My pace for the whole run was terrible because I kept stopping to take pictures.  And I was a okay with that.  The morning was too beautiful to pass up.

I'll take that running scene any day.