Sorry, I know it's been a while since I've posted. I'll try to catch up on everything that's been going on.
This weekend, we went down to Florida to celebrate Marcus's grandfather's 97th(!) birthday. We flew down late Friday night. Marcus's dad picked us up from the airport and dropped us off at Marcus's mom's house. We stayed up talking for a little bit, but soon retired to bed. Saturday we slept in a little bit, then went to brunch with Marcus's mom and her wife at the restaurant where his sister is working as a hostess. Then we came back to the house and hung out for a few hours before it was time to go to the party. Marcus's sister was nice enough to drive all of us to the party (me, Marcus, and his little brother). The party itself was interesting. It was nice to see all of his dad's family (we hadn't seen any of them since the wedding), and there were some nice speeches made and cute songs and such. The food was amazing. It was also good to see my parents, who came down for the party too. After the party, we pretty much went back to his mom's house and went right to bed. Sunday we got up early (for us). Marcus and his siblings headed to his grandfather's brunch, while my parents came and picked me up to take me to lunch with them and my great-aunt and great-uncle (who my parents were staying with). We had a nice lunch, then went back to my great-aunt's house and hung out and looked at pictures for a while. Then my parents took me back to Marcus's mom's house and stopped in to visit for a little while before they left for the airport. The rest of us hung out for a little longer, and then Marcus's mom took us to the airport.
Our flight was at 6:25 pm, and we were at the airport and through security by a little before 5. I decided to get Chili's To-Go for dinner, since we had some time. I ordered, and about 15 minutes later, my food finally came out. I went back to the gate to sit and eat, opened it up, and noticed that my black bean burger had cheese on it (which it wasn't supposed to). I took it back, and the manager lady told them to fix it. I waited for ANOTHER 15-20 minutes before it FINALLY came out. They offered me a free drink, but I had already bought a bottled water the first time, and I don't drink soda anyway, so I turned it down. I ran back to the gate and frantically tried to eat before we had to board the plane. I didn't make it. Marcus convinced me to box the food back up and bring it on the plane, so I did. I did NOT appreciate how rushed they made me feel by taking forever with my food! It seriously would have been faster to go eat in their sit-down restaurant area :-P But anyway, we made it home fine, and David picked us up from the airport, and we went right back out grocery shopping before Cliff came in around 11. He had an interview in Atlanta on Monday, so he stayed with us for a couple of nights.
On to Monday. I had my first training session for the tutoring job on Monday (I had decided to at least try it before making a decision about whether to take the job). I ate an early lunch (around 11:15) before heading out around noon to get to the center I was training at by 1. They had told me in the email that the training would be from 1-8 pm, but it turned out that it was actually from 1-9. This pissed me off, because I had been planning to go to the gym when I got home, since it was supposed to be a gym night, but I didn't get home until after 10 pm, and I was too tired to go to the gym. I also didn't eat dinner until after I got home, because I completely missed the half-hour break I was supposed to get around 4 pm. Fail. Anyway, the tutoring itself looked very different from what I had imagined. First of all, it was mostly high school kids, who I don't do well with. Second, when they originally told me that you tutor one-on-one a max of 3 kids at a time, I thought they meant that you have one-on-one sessions with up to 3 different students, one at a time. Well, apparently what they really meant was that you have 3 students at a time (so 3 sessions of 3 students per night, for a total of 9 different students per night) and they still call it "one-on-one" because you're supposed to focus your attention on each one individually while the other two are doing work. I felt really uncomfortable with the setup, and when I got home, I debated for a long time over whether to continue with the training.
Tuesday morning, I had to make a decision. I was supposed to report for training at 1 pm again, so I had to decide by 11 (so I could eat lunch if I did decide to go). I went back and forth. Wrote an email declining the position, but couldn't hit send. Had a long talk with Cliff about it, and another with Marcus when he called to tell me about something else entirely. Finally, I sent the email, so I will not be taking the tutoring job. It was a really tough decision, since I could really use the money, but ultimately, I would have been miserable working there. So now, I need to go to the unemployment office today and make sure that turning down the job won't affect my eligibility to continue collecting unemployment. Fingers crossed!
So I ended up hanging out with Cliff all day yesterday. We went to Menchie's and got frozen yogurt for lunch, then came back and just hung out. We talked a little, and I watched one of my home videos. When Marcus got home, he and Cliff went to the gym (he hadn't gone on Monday either, so he wanted to make it up. I'm planning to go on Friday to make it up while Marcus is at his D&D game), and then we all went out to dinner at Copeland's. Marcus had a $25 gift certificate to Copeland's from restaurant.com, but it required a minimum purchase of $50, which we'd never be able to get to just the two of us. So Cliff came too, and we had a nice dinner and then walked around Atlantic Station for a while. I love Atlantic Station! When we got home, Cliff headed out to drive back to Athens, and Marcus and I watched the end of the Braves game and looked at houses online. We tried to go to bed early, but it just didn't happen.
So, on the docket for today: I need to go to the bank and deposit a check for Marcus, go to the unemployment office, figure out what to write in my cover letter for this job I want to apply to - and then apply. When Marcus gets home, we need to go to the gym, come back and eat dinner, and watch Survivor (and probably the end of the Braves game, too). Then we need to shower and go to SLEEP!
I'm already exhausted...I need a real weekend!
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Oy...
Today was a very long and stressful day. I slept in a little bit, got up around 8:30 instead of 8. Once Marcus left for work a little after 10, I headed out to the bank to deposit my checks, then came home and ate an early lunch around 11:15. Got changed into nicer clothes and headed out to Duluth for my interview with the tutoring company.
It ended up being a video conference (skype) interview, since the hiring lady was out of town at one of the company's offices in another state. It went well, I got the impression that the interview was just a formality, and apparently my friend who hooked me up with the company gave me a great recommendation. So, they want to hire me, but I have some reservations. I don't want to get into it on this public forum, but I wrote a livejournal entry about it, and I've talked to Marcus and a few friends about it. Everyone has pretty much given me the same advice, which is to at least try it out for a while, and if I don't like it, I can always leave. My problem with that is, once I say I'm doing it, I'm not going to leave. That's how I got stuck at the law firm for 3 years, lol, it's just how I am. Plus, it wouldn't be fair to the students for me to leave after a short time, it's not good for them for the teachers to be constantly changing. So we'll see. I'm planning at this point to at least go to the training next week and see how that goes, but I want to make a decision before I actually get in the classroom.
So anyway, after the interview, I came home and was stressing out about it until Marcus got home. I talked to him about it for a while, and then we went to the gym, which was great because it took my mind off the job stuff temporarily. After the gym, we came back and ate dinner, and then I watched the new episode of Millionaire Matchmaker. Now we are watching yesterday's Survivor premiere again (Marcus hasn't seen it yet), and then it will be time to shower and go to sleep!
Tomorrow I'm hoping will be somewhat more relaxing than today, but since we're traveling tomorrow night, I doubt it :-P I do get to go watch Eli for a little bit tomorrow morning though, so hopefully that'll help me feel a little better. I need to find some down time between now and tomorrow night, though, because with my stress levels already so high from this job stuff, I might be headed for some kind of meltdown over the weekend if I can't cool them down. And being so stressed about the job thing, it's a really bad time for me to be put in a situation where a lot of people (whose approval is important to me, I might add) will be grilling me about jobs...it's just not good timing. So hopefully I'll be able to relax at least a little bit tomorrow.
I'm not sure that I'll get a chance to post before we leave tomorrow night, so I may just be gone until Sunday night or Monday.
It ended up being a video conference (skype) interview, since the hiring lady was out of town at one of the company's offices in another state. It went well, I got the impression that the interview was just a formality, and apparently my friend who hooked me up with the company gave me a great recommendation. So, they want to hire me, but I have some reservations. I don't want to get into it on this public forum, but I wrote a livejournal entry about it, and I've talked to Marcus and a few friends about it. Everyone has pretty much given me the same advice, which is to at least try it out for a while, and if I don't like it, I can always leave. My problem with that is, once I say I'm doing it, I'm not going to leave. That's how I got stuck at the law firm for 3 years, lol, it's just how I am. Plus, it wouldn't be fair to the students for me to leave after a short time, it's not good for them for the teachers to be constantly changing. So we'll see. I'm planning at this point to at least go to the training next week and see how that goes, but I want to make a decision before I actually get in the classroom.
So anyway, after the interview, I came home and was stressing out about it until Marcus got home. I talked to him about it for a while, and then we went to the gym, which was great because it took my mind off the job stuff temporarily. After the gym, we came back and ate dinner, and then I watched the new episode of Millionaire Matchmaker. Now we are watching yesterday's Survivor premiere again (Marcus hasn't seen it yet), and then it will be time to shower and go to sleep!
Tomorrow I'm hoping will be somewhat more relaxing than today, but since we're traveling tomorrow night, I doubt it :-P I do get to go watch Eli for a little bit tomorrow morning though, so hopefully that'll help me feel a little better. I need to find some down time between now and tomorrow night, though, because with my stress levels already so high from this job stuff, I might be headed for some kind of meltdown over the weekend if I can't cool them down. And being so stressed about the job thing, it's a really bad time for me to be put in a situation where a lot of people (whose approval is important to me, I might add) will be grilling me about jobs...it's just not good timing. So hopefully I'll be able to relax at least a little bit tomorrow.
I'm not sure that I'll get a chance to post before we leave tomorrow night, so I may just be gone until Sunday night or Monday.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Happy Birthday, Daddy!
Today is my Daddy's birthday! Happy Birthday, Daddy!
This morning I got up normal time and headed over to Joel and Shosh's to babysit. Shosh tried to put Talia down for a nap before she left, but she only slept for about 15 minutes, so she ended up taking a 3-hour nap a little later, which was perfect! Eli and I played out on the deck with beans, bubbles, and basketball for most of the day. He says the funniest things...
We were playing with the beans (Talia was inside sleeping in her swing at this point), and Eli randomly says, "Baby Talia!" I thought maybe she had woken up and he heard her making noise that I couldn't hear or something, so I said, "Baby Talia? What is she doing?" Eli said, "swing!" At this point I relaxed, and said, "yes, that's right, she's sleeping in her swing." Eli responded, "she's a lucky girl!" I laughed out loud...he gave me a funny look as if to say "why are you laughing at me?!?", but it was so funny! I guess he must have heard Joel and Shosh saying it at some point and was just repeating, but to hear a two-year-old say that was just priceless.
Anyway, Joel got home a little early, so I ended up getting home around 3:30. There had been a possibility that I would have to pick Marsha up from either the airport or MARTA, but she texted me earlier saying that she had found someone else to do it, so I just went straight home. Marcus had a board meeting after work tonight, so I was on my own for dinner (leftover pasta, yum!). I watched the season premiere of Survivor...don't worry, I won't post any spoilers! I'm kind of "eh" on this season so far...there aren't any new players who have really caught my attention yet, good or bad. I did like the immunity challenge they did tonight - I LOVE multi-step challenges! Beyond that, it wasn't all that interesting. Then again, it's usually three or four episodes before I really start to get into it and know who I like and dislike, so we'll see.
After the show was over, I called my dad to wish him a happy birthday, and we talked for a little bit (I talked to my mom, too). Then Marcus got home, and now we are just hanging out on the couch staring at our respective computers. Marcus gets to go into work late tomorrow (around 10:30), which is nice, but I haven't decided yet if I'm going to sleep in with him or just get up normal time. I have my interview with the tutoring company at 1 pm tomorrow, and I need to go to the bank before that to deposit a couple of checks.
Speaking of the interview, I'm kind of in a holding phase right now. I found a couple of jobs I want to apply to, but I'm waiting to see how this interview goes first. I really don't know much about the tutoring job - full time, part time, how the hours work, etc., so I want to find out more about it before I apply to anything else.
For some reason, I am REALLY tired, so I think I am going to actually try to go to bed early tonight. Tomorrow should be a slightly less hectic day, but still active. And then Friday is going to be a long, busy, and stressful day (traveling always has that effect on me). At least we (hopefully) get to sleep in on Saturday!
This morning I got up normal time and headed over to Joel and Shosh's to babysit. Shosh tried to put Talia down for a nap before she left, but she only slept for about 15 minutes, so she ended up taking a 3-hour nap a little later, which was perfect! Eli and I played out on the deck with beans, bubbles, and basketball for most of the day. He says the funniest things...
We were playing with the beans (Talia was inside sleeping in her swing at this point), and Eli randomly says, "Baby Talia!" I thought maybe she had woken up and he heard her making noise that I couldn't hear or something, so I said, "Baby Talia? What is she doing?" Eli said, "swing!" At this point I relaxed, and said, "yes, that's right, she's sleeping in her swing." Eli responded, "she's a lucky girl!" I laughed out loud...he gave me a funny look as if to say "why are you laughing at me?!?", but it was so funny! I guess he must have heard Joel and Shosh saying it at some point and was just repeating, but to hear a two-year-old say that was just priceless.
Anyway, Joel got home a little early, so I ended up getting home around 3:30. There had been a possibility that I would have to pick Marsha up from either the airport or MARTA, but she texted me earlier saying that she had found someone else to do it, so I just went straight home. Marcus had a board meeting after work tonight, so I was on my own for dinner (leftover pasta, yum!). I watched the season premiere of Survivor...don't worry, I won't post any spoilers! I'm kind of "eh" on this season so far...there aren't any new players who have really caught my attention yet, good or bad. I did like the immunity challenge they did tonight - I LOVE multi-step challenges! Beyond that, it wasn't all that interesting. Then again, it's usually three or four episodes before I really start to get into it and know who I like and dislike, so we'll see.
After the show was over, I called my dad to wish him a happy birthday, and we talked for a little bit (I talked to my mom, too). Then Marcus got home, and now we are just hanging out on the couch staring at our respective computers. Marcus gets to go into work late tomorrow (around 10:30), which is nice, but I haven't decided yet if I'm going to sleep in with him or just get up normal time. I have my interview with the tutoring company at 1 pm tomorrow, and I need to go to the bank before that to deposit a couple of checks.
Speaking of the interview, I'm kind of in a holding phase right now. I found a couple of jobs I want to apply to, but I'm waiting to see how this interview goes first. I really don't know much about the tutoring job - full time, part time, how the hours work, etc., so I want to find out more about it before I apply to anything else.
For some reason, I am REALLY tired, so I think I am going to actually try to go to bed early tonight. Tomorrow should be a slightly less hectic day, but still active. And then Friday is going to be a long, busy, and stressful day (traveling always has that effect on me). At least we (hopefully) get to sleep in on Saturday!
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Thinking of blogging less frequently...
I know I completely forgot to write a post yesterday. Luckily, there wasn't much to miss, since I didn't really do anything yesterday :-P
Today, on the other hand, has been busier. I got up normal time and headed over to Joel and Shosh's. Shosh wasn't working today, but she had a doctor appointment this morning, so she asked me to babysit. I had a great time playing with Eli with his beans, basketball, bubbles, and playdough. He parrots back pretty much everything you say to him now, which is SO cute! When Shosh got home, I stayed and hung out with them all for a few hours. Cutest moment of the day - Talia rolled over and bumped her head on the floor, and Eli came running over and said, "I kiss it, Baby Talia!" and then kissed her on the head! What a good big brother! He is so sweet <3
I finally left around 4 pm so I wouldn't hit too much traffic on my way home. Marcus had to stay a little late at work today, so I just hung around until he got home. Then we went to the gym, and because I got so much exercise today (between the gym and babysitting), I had enough calories left to eat that we were able to go to Chipotle for dinner! We hadn't been in a few weeks (a LONG time for us), so that was a nice treat. We had some really nice conversation over dinner, too, so that was really good for us.
We got home a few minutes ago, and now we're just watching the Braves game and then we'll probably head to bed early (assuming they don't go into extra innings again like last night :-P), since we both have busy days tomorrow.
So, I've been thinking about possibly cutting back on blogging a little bit. Some days I have a lot going on, but there are a lot of days when I don't really have anything interesting to write about. So I'm thinking about not blogging every day anymore, and just blogging when I have something interesting to mention. The reason I started off blogging every day was to get myself in the habit of it so I wouldn't neglect it for long periods of time. I think I've been doing it long enough now that I'll still remember to post when stuff happens. So we'll try it. I'll probably still be posting every day for the rest of this week anyway, since it's a busy week. And we'll be out of town this weekend, so I'll probably just write a weekend recap on Sunday night or Monday. After that...we'll see!
Today, on the other hand, has been busier. I got up normal time and headed over to Joel and Shosh's. Shosh wasn't working today, but she had a doctor appointment this morning, so she asked me to babysit. I had a great time playing with Eli with his beans, basketball, bubbles, and playdough. He parrots back pretty much everything you say to him now, which is SO cute! When Shosh got home, I stayed and hung out with them all for a few hours. Cutest moment of the day - Talia rolled over and bumped her head on the floor, and Eli came running over and said, "I kiss it, Baby Talia!" and then kissed her on the head! What a good big brother! He is so sweet <3
I finally left around 4 pm so I wouldn't hit too much traffic on my way home. Marcus had to stay a little late at work today, so I just hung around until he got home. Then we went to the gym, and because I got so much exercise today (between the gym and babysitting), I had enough calories left to eat that we were able to go to Chipotle for dinner! We hadn't been in a few weeks (a LONG time for us), so that was a nice treat. We had some really nice conversation over dinner, too, so that was really good for us.
We got home a few minutes ago, and now we're just watching the Braves game and then we'll probably head to bed early (assuming they don't go into extra innings again like last night :-P), since we both have busy days tomorrow.
So, I've been thinking about possibly cutting back on blogging a little bit. Some days I have a lot going on, but there are a lot of days when I don't really have anything interesting to write about. So I'm thinking about not blogging every day anymore, and just blogging when I have something interesting to mention. The reason I started off blogging every day was to get myself in the habit of it so I wouldn't neglect it for long periods of time. I think I've been doing it long enough now that I'll still remember to post when stuff happens. So we'll try it. I'll probably still be posting every day for the rest of this week anyway, since it's a busy week. And we'll be out of town this weekend, so I'll probably just write a weekend recap on Sunday night or Monday. After that...we'll see!
Monday, September 12, 2011
Sunday Recap
Sorry I didn't post last night (for anyone who actually reads this). It got late, and I was tired, and I decided I'd just wait and post this morning.
So yesterday, we got up around 9 and headed over to Jerrilyn's office. She drove us out to Marietta to look at a few townhouses. One of them I had actually found online and sent to her. That was the first one we went to. We found out that it was actually a foreclosure, which is why the price was so low (although it hadn't mentioned anything about that on the listing, Jerrilyn just found out by talking to the selling agent. I kind of felt like that wasn't right, they should be required to include that information in the listing!), but we really liked it. Very cute house, and there are only a couple of minor, inexpensive repairs that it needs. We then went to look at another townhouse in the same subdivision. This was the first house we went to where the owner was actually there. He was an older man who has lived in the house for 15 years. He had SO. MANY. TCHOTCHKES. It was hard to get a good idea of what the house would look like without all the random stuff! It also had a slightly different floorplan from anything else we had seen. We weren't super impressed. Then we headed over to a different part of Marietta to look at another townhouse, which actually ended up being in the same little area as one of the Gables apartment complexes we had looked in a couple of months ago! This was a newer townhouse, it was very nice and well-maintained, but felt very tall and skinny. Even though it had some really nice amenities (new kitchen appliances, refrigerator included, etc.), we ultimately decided that we still liked the first one we had seen (the foreclosure) the best. After we got home, I sent Jerrilyn a list of the single family houses I had found in the Marietta area, so that will probably be the next thing we go look at.
When we got home, I did my laundry while we watched the Braves game. Then we went grocery shopping, came home and ate dinner. We decided to watch a movie on Netflix, and ended up watching a movie called Strictly Sexual, which had been in our instant queue for a while. It was a decent movie, but it made me really upset afterwards. Marcus and I had a long talk about why I was upset, where we both concluded that somewhere along the way, I lost my "mojo" (for lack of a better word). I should add here that "mojo" in this case is not sexual necessarily (I am not Austin Powers!), but more just a general like...passion, and driving force in my life. I'm frustrated, because I remember what it felt like to feel the way the characters did in the movie, and I want that back, but it's like I don't remember how. Talking to Marcus helped a little, I guess, at least to ease some of the frustration, but I still need to figure out how to get my mojo back!
We ended up showering and going to bed right around midnight, so I could watch the new episode of Food Truck Race, since I missed the original airing at 9 (while we were watching the movie).
This is looking to be a really busy week, with the exception of today. I'm just hoping that I somehow have SOME store of energy left at the end of it, because next weekend is going to be crazy.
So yesterday, we got up around 9 and headed over to Jerrilyn's office. She drove us out to Marietta to look at a few townhouses. One of them I had actually found online and sent to her. That was the first one we went to. We found out that it was actually a foreclosure, which is why the price was so low (although it hadn't mentioned anything about that on the listing, Jerrilyn just found out by talking to the selling agent. I kind of felt like that wasn't right, they should be required to include that information in the listing!), but we really liked it. Very cute house, and there are only a couple of minor, inexpensive repairs that it needs. We then went to look at another townhouse in the same subdivision. This was the first house we went to where the owner was actually there. He was an older man who has lived in the house for 15 years. He had SO. MANY. TCHOTCHKES. It was hard to get a good idea of what the house would look like without all the random stuff! It also had a slightly different floorplan from anything else we had seen. We weren't super impressed. Then we headed over to a different part of Marietta to look at another townhouse, which actually ended up being in the same little area as one of the Gables apartment complexes we had looked in a couple of months ago! This was a newer townhouse, it was very nice and well-maintained, but felt very tall and skinny. Even though it had some really nice amenities (new kitchen appliances, refrigerator included, etc.), we ultimately decided that we still liked the first one we had seen (the foreclosure) the best. After we got home, I sent Jerrilyn a list of the single family houses I had found in the Marietta area, so that will probably be the next thing we go look at.
When we got home, I did my laundry while we watched the Braves game. Then we went grocery shopping, came home and ate dinner. We decided to watch a movie on Netflix, and ended up watching a movie called Strictly Sexual, which had been in our instant queue for a while. It was a decent movie, but it made me really upset afterwards. Marcus and I had a long talk about why I was upset, where we both concluded that somewhere along the way, I lost my "mojo" (for lack of a better word). I should add here that "mojo" in this case is not sexual necessarily (I am not Austin Powers!), but more just a general like...passion, and driving force in my life. I'm frustrated, because I remember what it felt like to feel the way the characters did in the movie, and I want that back, but it's like I don't remember how. Talking to Marcus helped a little, I guess, at least to ease some of the frustration, but I still need to figure out how to get my mojo back!
We ended up showering and going to bed right around midnight, so I could watch the new episode of Food Truck Race, since I missed the original airing at 9 (while we were watching the movie).
This is looking to be a really busy week, with the exception of today. I'm just hoping that I somehow have SOME store of energy left at the end of it, because next weekend is going to be crazy.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
A Busy Saturday
Today was a very busy Saturday, but productive and also fun! We got up on the early side (for a Saturday), around 9:30, and headed over to meet Jerrilyn at her office. She drove us out to look at some houses. We had a little adventure getting there - due to the construction on 285, we ended up taking an alternate route, STILL getting caught in the construction zone, but eventually making it to the first house with plenty of time to spare (she had told them we were coming between 11 and 12, and we made it there around 11:30). We looked at SIX houses today! The first two were built in the late 1960s, and we weren't thrilled with either of them. The third one was built in the late 1970s, and we liked it a little better, but still not great. The last three were all in the same two subdivisions. Ironically, they were the same subdivisions that Marcus and I had driven through a few weeks ago, and were a little concerned by the fact that across the main road was a not-so-good looking area. However, Jerrilyn assured us that this wasn't something we needed to worry about, especially since the houses we looked at were pretty deep into the subdivisions.
All of these houses were built in 1999-2000, and we liked them MUCH better than the other ones we had seen. They were very compact, but really cute, and very nice and bright and open. One of them I really liked because it had a HUGE kitchen, with lots of cabinet space and TWO pantries! Marcus really liked another house which had basically an entire apartment in the basement (a bedroom, dining room, full bath, and a kitchen with stove and other appliances, and an entrance to the backyard). We concluded from the day's outing that we definitely prefer newer houses over older ones, but that we haven't really seen anything in the middle (built in the 1980s and 1990s). Tomorrow we are going out to look at some more houses, this time out in Marietta! Today's houses were all in Dunwoody.
We got back to Jerrilyn's office around 1:45, and headed straight over to Panera for the APO Metro Atlanta Alumni Association gathering at 2 pm. It ended up being the same 5-6 people as usual, but it was still fun. Paulabeth brought her baby (3 months old), who we hadn't gotten to meet yet, so that was exciting! He's a real cutie, and he was very well-behaved for the most part.
We finally made it home around 4:30. We kind of just hung out for a little while, and then Marcus left to go chaperone his cousin's AZA youth group event (he sort of got roped into doing it, haha). I made myself some pasta for dinner (an old standby recipe - Marcus doesn't like it that much, so I really only make it when we're not eating together), and watched the Braves game until he got home. At some point before he got home, my mom called, so I spent a good 45 minutes or so talking to her and my dad about our house-hunting today, family trees/reunions, and other fun stuff.
So that was our crazy busy Saturday. Tomorrow is suddenly looking much busier than I was anticipating too, now that we're going out house-hunting again. I also need to do laundry, and we need to go grocery shopping, so the day is filling up very quickly! And we have to get up even earlier than today for the house-hunting, because we're meeting Jerrilyn at 10 instead of 10:30 :-P
In case anyone's interested, here is the pasta recipe that I made for dinner tonight! I found it on the ajc.com's recipe pages several years back.
Summer Penne Pasta
Makes 4 servings
Ingredients:
8 ounces mini penne pasta
1 (14.5 oz) can no-salt-added diced tomatoes or 2 cups fresh tomatoes, mostly drained
1 (12 oz) jar marinated artichoke hearts, cut in bite-size pieces and mostly drained
1 (2.5 oz) can sliced black olives, drained, or 1/2 cup sliced pitted kalamata or other olives
1/4 cup freshly shaved Parmesan cheese
Directions:
Prepare pasta according to package directions.
In a bowl, combine tomatoes, artichoke hearts and black olives. Add pasta and toss to combine. Add additional oil from the artichoke hearts, if necessary.
Grate Parmesan (or use a veggie peeler) on top. (If you wish to add a sixth ingredient, this dish can be served over a bed of baby spinach.)
Notes:
This dish tastes equally good warm or chilled.
To reduce the sodium further, here are a few options: Substitute frozen or water-packed canned artichoke hearts and add olive oil to moisten the salad or cut down slightly on the olives and/or cheese.
Nutrition (per serving):
350 calories (percent of calories from fat, 21), 3 grams protein, 56 grams carbohydrates, 7 grams fiber, 8 grams fat (1 gram saturated), 4 milligrams cholesterol, 448 milligrams sodium.
My additional notes:
You can use any shape of pasta, I usually use penne or something similar.
The cheese is optional - I make it without since I don't like Parmesan and don't need the cheese anyway.
I use artichoke hearts that have already been quartered, and I don't cut them down smaller.
I prefer to eat this dish warm (I don't like cold pasta), but I've tried it cold and it's actually not bad.
All of these houses were built in 1999-2000, and we liked them MUCH better than the other ones we had seen. They were very compact, but really cute, and very nice and bright and open. One of them I really liked because it had a HUGE kitchen, with lots of cabinet space and TWO pantries! Marcus really liked another house which had basically an entire apartment in the basement (a bedroom, dining room, full bath, and a kitchen with stove and other appliances, and an entrance to the backyard). We concluded from the day's outing that we definitely prefer newer houses over older ones, but that we haven't really seen anything in the middle (built in the 1980s and 1990s). Tomorrow we are going out to look at some more houses, this time out in Marietta! Today's houses were all in Dunwoody.
We got back to Jerrilyn's office around 1:45, and headed straight over to Panera for the APO Metro Atlanta Alumni Association gathering at 2 pm. It ended up being the same 5-6 people as usual, but it was still fun. Paulabeth brought her baby (3 months old), who we hadn't gotten to meet yet, so that was exciting! He's a real cutie, and he was very well-behaved for the most part.
We finally made it home around 4:30. We kind of just hung out for a little while, and then Marcus left to go chaperone his cousin's AZA youth group event (he sort of got roped into doing it, haha). I made myself some pasta for dinner (an old standby recipe - Marcus doesn't like it that much, so I really only make it when we're not eating together), and watched the Braves game until he got home. At some point before he got home, my mom called, so I spent a good 45 minutes or so talking to her and my dad about our house-hunting today, family trees/reunions, and other fun stuff.
So that was our crazy busy Saturday. Tomorrow is suddenly looking much busier than I was anticipating too, now that we're going out house-hunting again. I also need to do laundry, and we need to go grocery shopping, so the day is filling up very quickly! And we have to get up even earlier than today for the house-hunting, because we're meeting Jerrilyn at 10 instead of 10:30 :-P
In case anyone's interested, here is the pasta recipe that I made for dinner tonight! I found it on the ajc.com's recipe pages several years back.
Summer Penne Pasta
Makes 4 servings
Ingredients:
8 ounces mini penne pasta
1 (14.5 oz) can no-salt-added diced tomatoes or 2 cups fresh tomatoes, mostly drained
1 (12 oz) jar marinated artichoke hearts, cut in bite-size pieces and mostly drained
1 (2.5 oz) can sliced black olives, drained, or 1/2 cup sliced pitted kalamata or other olives
1/4 cup freshly shaved Parmesan cheese
Directions:
Prepare pasta according to package directions.
In a bowl, combine tomatoes, artichoke hearts and black olives. Add pasta and toss to combine. Add additional oil from the artichoke hearts, if necessary.
Grate Parmesan (or use a veggie peeler) on top. (If you wish to add a sixth ingredient, this dish can be served over a bed of baby spinach.)
Notes:
This dish tastes equally good warm or chilled.
To reduce the sodium further, here are a few options: Substitute frozen or water-packed canned artichoke hearts and add olive oil to moisten the salad or cut down slightly on the olives and/or cheese.
Nutrition (per serving):
350 calories (percent of calories from fat, 21), 3 grams protein, 56 grams carbohydrates, 7 grams fiber, 8 grams fat (1 gram saturated), 4 milligrams cholesterol, 448 milligrams sodium.
My additional notes:
You can use any shape of pasta, I usually use penne or something similar.
The cheese is optional - I make it without since I don't like Parmesan and don't need the cheese anyway.
I use artichoke hearts that have already been quartered, and I don't cut them down smaller.
I prefer to eat this dish warm (I don't like cold pasta), but I've tried it cold and it's actually not bad.
TGIF!
I did end up letting myself sleep in today. I didn't actually get up until around 11:15 or so. This resulted in me rushing to get ready and pay my bills so I could get them out in today's mail. I had to go to the bank anyway to deposit a check, so I stopped at the mailbox on my way out. I also called back the guy from the tutoring company, but apparently he wasn't working today, so I left a message for him. Stupid phone tag!
When I got back, I didn't really do much for the rest of the day. I cleaned the bathroom this afternoon, but that's about it. When Marcus got home, we had an argument about our upcoming trip to Florida. We figured things out before he left for his RPG, but it left me kind of grumpy, and we didn't get to eat dinner together. I ate about an hour after he left (I had eaten a late lunch because of how late I slept, so I wasn't hungry earlier).
I was watching Jeopardy when my phone rang. It was Laura! I hadn't talked to her in a while, so it was a really nice surprise, and we talked for about half an hour just catching up. She actually told me she reads my blog, so I figured I'd give her a shout-out (hi, Laura!).
By the time we got off the phone, the Braves game was starting. I was conflicted, because I also really felt like watching our wedding video again, so I ended up putting that on in the bedroom and going back and forth between the two tvs. It's never fun to watch your team lose a game they looked like they were going to win, and that's all I really have to say about tonight's game.
Marcus came home from his RPG earlier than usual (around 11:30), which is kind of nice. And now I need to go shower and go to bed...we have a busy day tomorrow!
When I got back, I didn't really do much for the rest of the day. I cleaned the bathroom this afternoon, but that's about it. When Marcus got home, we had an argument about our upcoming trip to Florida. We figured things out before he left for his RPG, but it left me kind of grumpy, and we didn't get to eat dinner together. I ate about an hour after he left (I had eaten a late lunch because of how late I slept, so I wasn't hungry earlier).
I was watching Jeopardy when my phone rang. It was Laura! I hadn't talked to her in a while, so it was a really nice surprise, and we talked for about half an hour just catching up. She actually told me she reads my blog, so I figured I'd give her a shout-out (hi, Laura!).
By the time we got off the phone, the Braves game was starting. I was conflicted, because I also really felt like watching our wedding video again, so I ended up putting that on in the bedroom and going back and forth between the two tvs. It's never fun to watch your team lose a game they looked like they were going to win, and that's all I really have to say about tonight's game.
Marcus came home from his RPG earlier than usual (around 11:30), which is kind of nice. And now I need to go shower and go to bed...we have a busy day tomorrow!
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Steps in the right direction
I feel like my life finally took a couple of steps in some right directions today. This is exciting!
I got up normal time today and headed over to Joel and Shosh's around 9:45 to babysit. Eli and I played with playdough, and also played out on the porch with beans, his new basketball hoop, and bubbles! He still does the same thing he's done with the bubbles since he first started playing with them - he watches them land on the floor, then looks at me and says, "pop them!" I tell him to go ahead and pop them, and he steps on each one individually. I say "pop!" each time he steps on one, and this sends him into a massive giggle fit! It's the cutest thing ever :-D
While I was giving Talia her bottle, I got a phone call back from the tutoring company. My scores on the teachers' test were "excellent", and they'd like me to come in for an interview. I need to call them back tomorrow, now that I know what my schedule is looking like next week.
I got home around 4:30, received an email soon after that from Jerrilyn (our realtor), and spent the next few minutes emailing back and forth with her planning an outing on Saturday to go look at a few houses! Marcus came home a little late because he had a meeting at work, so I watched the first game of the Braves' doubleheader with the Mets, and then ate dinner when he got home. We are still watching game 2! I also went and watched the new episode of Millionaire Matchmaker in the other room during the hour it was on. I loved one of her clients this week! He was such a good guy, and she found a great match for him :-)
Tomorrow is looking to be a quiet day, which will be nice. All I have on the docket is to pay my student loan bill and clean the bathroom. And Marcus has his RPG tomorrow night, so I'll be here by myself. I'll probably end up just watching the Braves game, but we'll see. I MIGHT let myself sleep in tomorrow...I've had a hard time waking up every day this week, so I feel like I need to make sure I get enough sleep at least one night.
I got up normal time today and headed over to Joel and Shosh's around 9:45 to babysit. Eli and I played with playdough, and also played out on the porch with beans, his new basketball hoop, and bubbles! He still does the same thing he's done with the bubbles since he first started playing with them - he watches them land on the floor, then looks at me and says, "pop them!" I tell him to go ahead and pop them, and he steps on each one individually. I say "pop!" each time he steps on one, and this sends him into a massive giggle fit! It's the cutest thing ever :-D
While I was giving Talia her bottle, I got a phone call back from the tutoring company. My scores on the teachers' test were "excellent", and they'd like me to come in for an interview. I need to call them back tomorrow, now that I know what my schedule is looking like next week.
I got home around 4:30, received an email soon after that from Jerrilyn (our realtor), and spent the next few minutes emailing back and forth with her planning an outing on Saturday to go look at a few houses! Marcus came home a little late because he had a meeting at work, so I watched the first game of the Braves' doubleheader with the Mets, and then ate dinner when he got home. We are still watching game 2! I also went and watched the new episode of Millionaire Matchmaker in the other room during the hour it was on. I loved one of her clients this week! He was such a good guy, and she found a great match for him :-)
Tomorrow is looking to be a quiet day, which will be nice. All I have on the docket is to pay my student loan bill and clean the bathroom. And Marcus has his RPG tomorrow night, so I'll be here by myself. I'll probably end up just watching the Braves game, but we'll see. I MIGHT let myself sleep in tomorrow...I've had a hard time waking up every day this week, so I feel like I need to make sure I get enough sleep at least one night.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
An Interesting Day
As predicted, today turned out to be a very interesting day. The morning was pretty slow, I didn't really do much until around 11:30. Then I ate an early lunch before heading out to Duluth (about a 45 minute drive) to take the "teacher's test" SAT. When I got there, they first had me fill out an application, which took a while since I had to look up people's addresses and phone numbers. Finally, I finished, and they led me back into the testing area. It was a row of little cubicles against a wall. They gave me a calculator (non-graphing), pencils, an eraser, and scrap paper. They didn't make me leave any of my stuff outside, so I had my phone, my purse, and even my notebook that I had brought where I had written directions of how to get there. Also in the notebook happened to be my study notes from when I took the GRE, and there were several points during the test when I could easily have cheated and looked up certain formulas in my notebook - but I didn't. Anyway, the test was REALLY easy. I don't remember the SAT being that easy, and I didn't find it super hard in high school. There was only ONE question on which I completely guessed, and only about 4-5 others where I wasn't completely sure of my answer. So yeah, I'm pretty sure I aced it, but we'll see. They said they'd get back to me within the next week or so.
I didn't get home until right around 5 pm. Marcus got home soon after. We were supposed to call Susan (the financing lady) at 5:45, but we got an email from her just before then saying that she was stuck in a meeting and she would call us later tonight. So we went ahead to the gym, and then went to this cute little taqueria on Piedmont (Marcus had a coupon for $16 there) for dinner. Susan finally called us on our way home from dinner. Marcus talked to her for a little while, and we found out a lot of useful stuff. We are qualified for a loan that is less than what we'd like, but still doable. We also found out our exact credit scores, which are AWESOME! Mine are slightly better than Marcus's, teehee :-D Susan was actually impressed by them (which is always a good sign)! Anyway, as this was just the first of what I'm sure will be many conversations, we've already started discussing other things we need to ask her about, including other loan programs where we could potentially have to put a smaller down payment.
After we got off the phone with Susan, we just hung out, watched the end of the Braves game, and I called Marsha back (we had been playing phone tag all evening). I'm babysitting tomorrow, so getting ready to head to bed when I finish writing this. Goodnight, world!
I didn't get home until right around 5 pm. Marcus got home soon after. We were supposed to call Susan (the financing lady) at 5:45, but we got an email from her just before then saying that she was stuck in a meeting and she would call us later tonight. So we went ahead to the gym, and then went to this cute little taqueria on Piedmont (Marcus had a coupon for $16 there) for dinner. Susan finally called us on our way home from dinner. Marcus talked to her for a little while, and we found out a lot of useful stuff. We are qualified for a loan that is less than what we'd like, but still doable. We also found out our exact credit scores, which are AWESOME! Mine are slightly better than Marcus's, teehee :-D Susan was actually impressed by them (which is always a good sign)! Anyway, as this was just the first of what I'm sure will be many conversations, we've already started discussing other things we need to ask her about, including other loan programs where we could potentially have to put a smaller down payment.
After we got off the phone with Susan, we just hung out, watched the end of the Braves game, and I called Marsha back (we had been playing phone tag all evening). I'm babysitting tomorrow, so getting ready to head to bed when I finish writing this. Goodnight, world!
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Oh, hello fall!
All I have to say about the weather the past two days is that I wish it wasn't raining so that I could spend the day outside and enjoy the nice, cool weather! It was in the 60s most of the day today - PERFECTION <3
Today was a pretty slow day for the most part. I was out of it because of the weather, and also because I really didn't get enough sleep last night. I spent most of the day job searching and bumming around on the interwebs, although I did take out the trash! So not much happened until Marcus got home.
He actually didn't even come in when he got home, I just went down to meet him at his car, and we headed over to meet with Jerrilyn. Jerrilyn is a good friend of Marcus's aunt, who happens to be a realtor. Marcus's mom hooked us up with her, so we are really getting this house-hunting process on the road! We went to her office, and she asked us a bunch of questions about what we're looking for and our timeframe and stuff, and then she went through this huge packet of information with us, basically walking us step-by-step through the entire process. It was very helpful and informative, and I feel like we really have a much better idea of what we're in for and where we're going with all this now. She also gave us contact information for someone she works with who can help us with the financial aspects - pre-qualifying for a loan and all that. So we sent her an email (her name is Susan), and she emailed us back right away! We're going to call her tomorrow, so we'll see how it goes. And Jerrilyn has already started sending us some properties to look at (via email).
So now we are just sitting here watching the Braves game and unwinding. I really need to go to bed at a decent hour tonight. Tomorrow I am taking the SAT (or a version of it) for this tutoring job I applied for. I really wish the office I have to go to opened earlier. They open at 11 am, so I am going out there at 1 pm (after lunch, I don't want to get hungry in the middle of the test!), but I really would prefer to take it first thing in the morning. Then I wouldn't have the problem of having too many other thoughts muddling my brain. Oh well.
That's about it for today. Tomorrow should be interesting!
Today was a pretty slow day for the most part. I was out of it because of the weather, and also because I really didn't get enough sleep last night. I spent most of the day job searching and bumming around on the interwebs, although I did take out the trash! So not much happened until Marcus got home.
He actually didn't even come in when he got home, I just went down to meet him at his car, and we headed over to meet with Jerrilyn. Jerrilyn is a good friend of Marcus's aunt, who happens to be a realtor. Marcus's mom hooked us up with her, so we are really getting this house-hunting process on the road! We went to her office, and she asked us a bunch of questions about what we're looking for and our timeframe and stuff, and then she went through this huge packet of information with us, basically walking us step-by-step through the entire process. It was very helpful and informative, and I feel like we really have a much better idea of what we're in for and where we're going with all this now. She also gave us contact information for someone she works with who can help us with the financial aspects - pre-qualifying for a loan and all that. So we sent her an email (her name is Susan), and she emailed us back right away! We're going to call her tomorrow, so we'll see how it goes. And Jerrilyn has already started sending us some properties to look at (via email).
So now we are just sitting here watching the Braves game and unwinding. I really need to go to bed at a decent hour tonight. Tomorrow I am taking the SAT (or a version of it) for this tutoring job I applied for. I really wish the office I have to go to opened earlier. They open at 11 am, so I am going out there at 1 pm (after lunch, I don't want to get hungry in the middle of the test!), but I really would prefer to take it first thing in the morning. Then I wouldn't have the problem of having too many other thoughts muddling my brain. Oh well.
That's about it for today. Tomorrow should be interesting!
So out of it
So I'm trying to get back into the daily grind, including writing in here every night. It's hard! I literally JUST remembered to write in here tonight.
I slept in a little bit today, but got up around 10 after Marcus got a phone call that woke me up. We ended up going to lunch with Pearl and Joey, then went grocery shopping. It was a rainy, dreary day (although I did enjoy the MUCH cooler weather!), so we were kind of out of it all day. I did go to the gym tonight (but Marcus didn't come with me), and felt a little better after that. I ate dinner and we watched the beginning of the Braves game before the season finale of Secret Life came on at 8. It was a GREAT episode, definitely the best one this season. I have a love/hate relationship with season finales. I love that they are usually amazing episodes that finally tie up all the loose ends of the story. I hate that they mean I have to wait for MONTHS to see the next episode! :-P
Anyway, after Secret Life ended up, Marcus had left to pick David up from the airport, so I watched the end of the Braves game by myself. Then I just hung out until he got home. I showered and got ready for bed, and now here I am writing this. I'm hoping that I will be able to get back into my regular routine starting tomorrow! The only things I have on the docket for tomorrow are to review some basic math stuff for the SAT teacher's test I'm taking on Wednesday (pre-requisite for a potential tutoring job), and Marcus and I are meeting with a good friend of his aunt's, who is a realtor, to start house hunting in earnest. So hopefully I'll have something interesting to report tomorrow night!
I slept in a little bit today, but got up around 10 after Marcus got a phone call that woke me up. We ended up going to lunch with Pearl and Joey, then went grocery shopping. It was a rainy, dreary day (although I did enjoy the MUCH cooler weather!), so we were kind of out of it all day. I did go to the gym tonight (but Marcus didn't come with me), and felt a little better after that. I ate dinner and we watched the beginning of the Braves game before the season finale of Secret Life came on at 8. It was a GREAT episode, definitely the best one this season. I have a love/hate relationship with season finales. I love that they are usually amazing episodes that finally tie up all the loose ends of the story. I hate that they mean I have to wait for MONTHS to see the next episode! :-P
Anyway, after Secret Life ended up, Marcus had left to pick David up from the airport, so I watched the end of the Braves game by myself. Then I just hung out until he got home. I showered and got ready for bed, and now here I am writing this. I'm hoping that I will be able to get back into my regular routine starting tomorrow! The only things I have on the docket for tomorrow are to review some basic math stuff for the SAT teacher's test I'm taking on Wednesday (pre-requisite for a potential tutoring job), and Marcus and I are meeting with a good friend of his aunt's, who is a realtor, to start house hunting in earnest. So hopefully I'll have something interesting to report tomorrow night!
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Chattanooga Choo Choo!
Marcus and I had an amazing weekend getaway in Chattanooga!
On Friday, we slept in a little bit and left around 11 to drive up to Chattanooga. We first made pit stops at the bank and gas station, and then another one to drop off the final DVD of Julia's montage with the DJ. Then we were FINALLY on our way!
We arrived in Chattanooga around 1:30 pm and drove straight to Ruby Falls. Ruby Falls is one of the attractions at Lookout Mountain, and it is a massive underground cave inside the mountain that contains an amazing underground waterfall! Before we went on the tour, though, we got some lunch at the little cafe there - we each got a sandwich, and Marcus got some fudge! Then we set off on the tour. Our tour guide's name was Martin, and he was HILARIOUS! You take an elevator down into the cave, and then walk through it in a single file line to get to the waterfall. The cave is amazing, it has all kinds of cool formations in the rock, and they've given names to ones that resemble things (some examples are: Dragon's Foot, Steak and Potatoes, and Leaning Tower). It's about 2/5 of a mile from the elevator to the waterfall, so about 4/5 of a mile round trip. It's always around 60 degrees in the cave, which was a VERY nice break from the upper 90s weather outside! We could have stayed down there all day! The waterfall itself was breathtaking. We took lots of pictures in the cave, and one video of the waterfall.
When we were finished with the tour, we went up to the observation tower for a few minutes to look out at the Tennessee River and Chattanooga. Then we browsed the gift shop for a bit, and eventually decided we were ready to head out. By this time it was about 4 pm, so we headed over to our hotel to check in.
We stayed at the Chattanooga Choo Choo hotel, which was AWESOME! They have actual old train cars that have been converted into hotel rooms. Unfortunately, we didn't stay in a train car room, we just had a regular room. But we did get to walk around and see all the train stuff! They also feature "Dinner in the Diner", a dining car where they serve a fancy dinner. We didn't actually do that either, but we took pictures of the car ;-)
Anyway, we settled into our room and relaxed for a little bit, then headed over to get dinner at the hotel's casual restaurant. Afterwards, we went to the on-site Model Train Museum, because we had free tickets included with our hotel package. I wasn't expecting much, but it was actually REALLY cool! The model train system they had set up was enormous - it filled an entire large room! It covered the history of the railroads that had gone through Chattanooga, and they had all kinds of clever little setups with the tiny model people and vehicles (not just trains). We spent about 45 minutes in the museum, then headed down to browse in some of the gift shops at the hotel. I bought a little magnet for Shosh (she collects magnets, so it made me think of her, lol). By this time, we were exhausted, so we headed back to our room and went to bed early - we were in bed before 10 pm!
Saturday, we got up around 9, ate breakfast at the hotel (we also had free breakfast both days included in our package), and then headed over to the aquarium. They had a free electric shuttle bus running through downtown, with one endpoint being our hotel, and the other being right near the aquarium (perfect!). So we took the shuttle over, then headed into the aquarium. At some point on Friday, Marcus had discovered that his friend Mike and his wife Heather were also going to be in Chattanooga this weekend, and we had decided to meet up with them on Saturday. So we called them, and they were already at the aquarium, about halfway through the River portion (the Tennessee Aquarium is divided into two sections, housed in separate buildings - the River section and the Ocean section). So we headed into the River building first, and kind of sped through the first half of it until we finally caught up with them! We took our time going through the rest of the River building and all of the Ocean building together. Being the aquarium snob that I am (having grown up going to the Baltimore Aquarium), I have to say I was pretty impressed. It was definitely much bigger and better than the Atlanta Aquarium!
At 1 pm, we headed over to the IMAX theater, where we watched a movie about rescued baby elephants and orangutans, narrated by Morgan Freeman. It was a pretty cool movie, and the baby animals were SO CUTE! Afterwards, we decided to walk over to where Mike and Heather were staying, which was a little bed and breakfast in the art district. We went to lunch with them at an Italian restaurant right next door called Tony's Pasta and Trattoria, which was pretty good. Then we went back to their B&B and sat around talking and playing games for a couple of hours. Around 5:30, Marcus and I headed back to catch the shuttle back to our hotel, where we showered, changed, and got ready to go to dinner.
We caught the shuttle back downtown and went to a really nice seafood restaurant called Bluewater Grill. It's apparently owned by the same company as Gordon Biersch, and it was a similar level of restaurant. Our waiter was awesome and helped us narrow down the MANY menu options we were interested in! We both ended up getting tuna dishes, and they were both delicious! After dinner, it was finally cooling off to the point where it was at least comfortable to be outside, so we decided to walk across the pedestrian bridge to the other side of the river, where we went to a local ice cream place called Clumpy's (bad name, GREAT place!). It was similar to Jake's, for you Atlanta people, basically, they make their own ice cream in house, and they have lots of flavors that they change up every day. Marcus got cherry almond chunk, and I got chocolate chocolate chip raspberry. We didn't taste each other's, but we both thought our flavors were delicious!
Then we walked back across the bridge and caught the shuttle back to our hotel. We went to bed on the early side again, this time around 11.
This morning, we slept in a little bit and got up around 9:30. We packed our stuff up and loaded up the car, then went to breakfast and checked out. The drive back to Atlanta only took about 2 hours, which was nice. We didn't really do much the rest of the day. We watched the Braves game, and went to Target to pick up a few things, but we're both kind of tired and out of it. I'm really glad we still have tomorrow to sleep in and go grocery shopping and do our typical weekend things! Much less stressful than coming back from vacation on Sunday evening and having to do everything that night!
I really enjoyed Chattanooga, and would definitely go back! It's a great place for a weekend getaway, it has all the amenities (restaurants, museums, etc.) of a city without feeling city-like, and there's a lot of stuff we didn't get to do that I'd love to go back and try. It was definitely a great investment, and I'm really glad we did it!
On Friday, we slept in a little bit and left around 11 to drive up to Chattanooga. We first made pit stops at the bank and gas station, and then another one to drop off the final DVD of Julia's montage with the DJ. Then we were FINALLY on our way!
We arrived in Chattanooga around 1:30 pm and drove straight to Ruby Falls. Ruby Falls is one of the attractions at Lookout Mountain, and it is a massive underground cave inside the mountain that contains an amazing underground waterfall! Before we went on the tour, though, we got some lunch at the little cafe there - we each got a sandwich, and Marcus got some fudge! Then we set off on the tour. Our tour guide's name was Martin, and he was HILARIOUS! You take an elevator down into the cave, and then walk through it in a single file line to get to the waterfall. The cave is amazing, it has all kinds of cool formations in the rock, and they've given names to ones that resemble things (some examples are: Dragon's Foot, Steak and Potatoes, and Leaning Tower). It's about 2/5 of a mile from the elevator to the waterfall, so about 4/5 of a mile round trip. It's always around 60 degrees in the cave, which was a VERY nice break from the upper 90s weather outside! We could have stayed down there all day! The waterfall itself was breathtaking. We took lots of pictures in the cave, and one video of the waterfall.
When we were finished with the tour, we went up to the observation tower for a few minutes to look out at the Tennessee River and Chattanooga. Then we browsed the gift shop for a bit, and eventually decided we were ready to head out. By this time it was about 4 pm, so we headed over to our hotel to check in.
We stayed at the Chattanooga Choo Choo hotel, which was AWESOME! They have actual old train cars that have been converted into hotel rooms. Unfortunately, we didn't stay in a train car room, we just had a regular room. But we did get to walk around and see all the train stuff! They also feature "Dinner in the Diner", a dining car where they serve a fancy dinner. We didn't actually do that either, but we took pictures of the car ;-)
Anyway, we settled into our room and relaxed for a little bit, then headed over to get dinner at the hotel's casual restaurant. Afterwards, we went to the on-site Model Train Museum, because we had free tickets included with our hotel package. I wasn't expecting much, but it was actually REALLY cool! The model train system they had set up was enormous - it filled an entire large room! It covered the history of the railroads that had gone through Chattanooga, and they had all kinds of clever little setups with the tiny model people and vehicles (not just trains). We spent about 45 minutes in the museum, then headed down to browse in some of the gift shops at the hotel. I bought a little magnet for Shosh (she collects magnets, so it made me think of her, lol). By this time, we were exhausted, so we headed back to our room and went to bed early - we were in bed before 10 pm!
Saturday, we got up around 9, ate breakfast at the hotel (we also had free breakfast both days included in our package), and then headed over to the aquarium. They had a free electric shuttle bus running through downtown, with one endpoint being our hotel, and the other being right near the aquarium (perfect!). So we took the shuttle over, then headed into the aquarium. At some point on Friday, Marcus had discovered that his friend Mike and his wife Heather were also going to be in Chattanooga this weekend, and we had decided to meet up with them on Saturday. So we called them, and they were already at the aquarium, about halfway through the River portion (the Tennessee Aquarium is divided into two sections, housed in separate buildings - the River section and the Ocean section). So we headed into the River building first, and kind of sped through the first half of it until we finally caught up with them! We took our time going through the rest of the River building and all of the Ocean building together. Being the aquarium snob that I am (having grown up going to the Baltimore Aquarium), I have to say I was pretty impressed. It was definitely much bigger and better than the Atlanta Aquarium!
At 1 pm, we headed over to the IMAX theater, where we watched a movie about rescued baby elephants and orangutans, narrated by Morgan Freeman. It was a pretty cool movie, and the baby animals were SO CUTE! Afterwards, we decided to walk over to where Mike and Heather were staying, which was a little bed and breakfast in the art district. We went to lunch with them at an Italian restaurant right next door called Tony's Pasta and Trattoria, which was pretty good. Then we went back to their B&B and sat around talking and playing games for a couple of hours. Around 5:30, Marcus and I headed back to catch the shuttle back to our hotel, where we showered, changed, and got ready to go to dinner.
We caught the shuttle back downtown and went to a really nice seafood restaurant called Bluewater Grill. It's apparently owned by the same company as Gordon Biersch, and it was a similar level of restaurant. Our waiter was awesome and helped us narrow down the MANY menu options we were interested in! We both ended up getting tuna dishes, and they were both delicious! After dinner, it was finally cooling off to the point where it was at least comfortable to be outside, so we decided to walk across the pedestrian bridge to the other side of the river, where we went to a local ice cream place called Clumpy's (bad name, GREAT place!). It was similar to Jake's, for you Atlanta people, basically, they make their own ice cream in house, and they have lots of flavors that they change up every day. Marcus got cherry almond chunk, and I got chocolate chocolate chip raspberry. We didn't taste each other's, but we both thought our flavors were delicious!
Then we walked back across the bridge and caught the shuttle back to our hotel. We went to bed on the early side again, this time around 11.
This morning, we slept in a little bit and got up around 9:30. We packed our stuff up and loaded up the car, then went to breakfast and checked out. The drive back to Atlanta only took about 2 hours, which was nice. We didn't really do much the rest of the day. We watched the Braves game, and went to Target to pick up a few things, but we're both kind of tired and out of it. I'm really glad we still have tomorrow to sleep in and go grocery shopping and do our typical weekend things! Much less stressful than coming back from vacation on Sunday evening and having to do everything that night!
I really enjoyed Chattanooga, and would definitely go back! It's a great place for a weekend getaway, it has all the amenities (restaurants, museums, etc.) of a city without feeling city-like, and there's a lot of stuff we didn't get to do that I'd love to go back and try. It was definitely a great investment, and I'm really glad we did it!
Thursday, September 1, 2011
TGI Thursday!
Today was another crazy day. I headed over to Joel and Shosh's at 9:45 this morning to babysit. My plan was to go straight from their house to Nora's to drop off the DVD of Julia's montage afterwards. While I was babysitting, I got 3 calls from Nora, 2 from her husband, and 1 from the DJ for the Bat Mitzvah about coordinating dropping off the DVD. Apparently none of them talk to each other, it's ridiculous! So what the DJ and I ended up deciding (and I later conveyed to Nora and her husband via email when I got home) is that I will drop the DVD off at his office on our way up to Chattanooga tomorrow, since it's basically on the way. I also now have to call Nora AND her husband to let them know when I've dropped it off successfully :-P
So anyway, babysitting was fine, Eli was adorable as usual, and Talia slept for most of the time I was there. Shosh had put her down before I got there (around 9:15), and she didn't wake up until around 12:30! Then she was up for a few hours, but went to sleep again around 3:20 or so, just a few minutes before Joel got home. All I have to report from today (and actually yesterday too, but I forgot to mention it in my post last night) is that it absolutely melts my heart when Eli calls me "Auntie Tara"! Yesterday when I was leaving, he was going down for a nap, and he said "night night Auntie Tara" <3 Today he kept wanting me to "help" him with his toy (which he's perfectly capable of using by himself, lol), and he kept saying, "help, Auntie Tara!", and it was SO. FREAKING. CUTE.
I was all stressed out when I got home, mostly because of trying to juggle Nora, Spencer (her husband), AND the DJ, AND still had to pack and plan for our trip. When Marcus got home, we debated for a while before deciding to forego the gym tonight in favor of devoting our evening to planning our trip. I printed out a whole bunch of stuff, from directions to coupons to my voucher for the hotel. We also looked at restaurants online and decided which ones we want to go to.
Since I'm not bringing my computer with me, I won't be able to update every night while I'm gone. We're coming back Sunday afternoon(-ish), so I promise to write about our trip either Sunday night or Monday! I'm so excited, I can't wait to get away for a couple of days! I need a break.
So anyway, babysitting was fine, Eli was adorable as usual, and Talia slept for most of the time I was there. Shosh had put her down before I got there (around 9:15), and she didn't wake up until around 12:30! Then she was up for a few hours, but went to sleep again around 3:20 or so, just a few minutes before Joel got home. All I have to report from today (and actually yesterday too, but I forgot to mention it in my post last night) is that it absolutely melts my heart when Eli calls me "Auntie Tara"! Yesterday when I was leaving, he was going down for a nap, and he said "night night Auntie Tara" <3 Today he kept wanting me to "help" him with his toy (which he's perfectly capable of using by himself, lol), and he kept saying, "help, Auntie Tara!", and it was SO. FREAKING. CUTE.
I was all stressed out when I got home, mostly because of trying to juggle Nora, Spencer (her husband), AND the DJ, AND still had to pack and plan for our trip. When Marcus got home, we debated for a while before deciding to forego the gym tonight in favor of devoting our evening to planning our trip. I printed out a whole bunch of stuff, from directions to coupons to my voucher for the hotel. We also looked at restaurants online and decided which ones we want to go to.
Since I'm not bringing my computer with me, I won't be able to update every night while I'm gone. We're coming back Sunday afternoon(-ish), so I promise to write about our trip either Sunday night or Monday! I'm so excited, I can't wait to get away for a couple of days! I need a break.
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