Spontaneous Trips :)

I am typically a planner.  I like to know what I am doing and when I am doing it.  But, every once in a while, I like being a little bit spontaneous.  Last week I had my chance.

The parents of a law school friend of mine live just north of Sacramento.  My friend decided to come up for a few days to visit and take care of some other things.  I was invited up for a visit with him and his family.  Having not seen my friend since June, I jumped at the opportunity!  With only a couple days notice I had to rearrange a couple of things, but decided to drive up on Wednesday afternoon and back either Thursday night or early Friday morning. 

I left Wednesday around 2, made fairly good time but then hit a stretch of road that had 3 accidents.  I ended up getting to the house just before 5.  Having never been to this particular house, I was given the grand tour.  It was absolutely gorgeous and the backyard was to die for!

That might we went to a restaurant called Land Ocean.  The atmosphere was good and the décor was interesting.  I got the filet with mashed potatoes, my friend got the ribs with fries, and his mom got the NY Strip with au gratin potatoes.  I also ordered a glass of Kung Fu Girl Riesling which was delicious, my friend got a local pale ale, and his mom got a glass of Carmel Road Pinot Noir.  Everything was amazing: the food, the drinks, and of course the company!  After a wonderful dinner we watched a movie at the house and called it a night.

 

The next day my friend’s mom made a delicious scramble for breakfast.  We got out some mixed berries and toasted sandwich thins.  Breakfast was great.  Then my friend and I spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon in the backyard catching up.  We started with our feet in the pool, and then moved into the shade of the patio as the temperature rose.  That evening we went to Live on the Boulevard, which is a summer concert series in Folsom. 

We went to Town Center and got a table at Bistro 33.  We got appetizers (the crab/artichoke dip and the prosciutto wrapped prawns) and drinks (beers for my friend, his mom, and his stepdad, and a glass of wine for me).  After munching and sipping for a while we each ordered a meal.  I got Pan Roasted Chicken, my friend got the Lasagna, his stepdad got the Meatloaf, and his mom got the Margarita Flatbread.  I think we all thought the entrées were just ok.  By then, the band (Pure Ecstasy – Motown) had started up and we were bopping our heads and singing along to the songs. 

After a few more rounds of drinks we ordered dessert: 2 bags o’ doughnuts.  They were doughnuts covered in powdered sugar and served with 3 dipping sauces (honey butter, chocolate, and a strawberry compote).  I thought the doughnuts were delicious by themselves, no dipping sauce needed!  We stayed until after the band was done playing, just telling stories and laughing.  It was a beautiful night with great company.  

I decided to stay the night because I was tired, it was dark and I was not quite ready to go home yet … I was having too much fun!  So we all hung out on the patio and watched another movie.  I ended up getting up around 5:30 the next morning to leave by 6.  My friend and his mom both got up to say goodbye before I left.  It was a very quick trip but so much fun!  (I wish I had more pictures to share, but I forgot my camera.  I guess that is a hazard of being spontaneous ...)

Making spontaneous trips takes gumption!

Motivation Monday: "Something More" by Sugarland

I know my first Motivation Monday was a Sugarland song, but I could not help but share another (and there will likely be more in the future as well).  The song “Something More” from the Twice the Speed of Life album is one of my favorites.  It is on my ipod and I typically listen to it at least twice when it comes on (so easy just to hit that little back arrow and hear it again!).

Just click on the video below to hear the song, or you can read the lyrics below.

Here are the lyrics to “Something More” by Sugarland:

Come on!

Monday, hard to wake up
Fill my coffee cup, I'm out the door
Yeah, the freeway's standing still today
It's gonna make me late and that's for sure
I'm running out of gas and out of time
Never gonna make it there by nine

There's gotta be something more, gotta be more than this
I need a little less hard time, I need a little more bliss
I'm gonna take my chances
Taking a chance I might find what I'm looking for
There's gotta be something more

Five years and there's no doubt
That I'm burnt out, I've had enough
So now boss man, here's my two weeks
I'll make it short and sweet, so listen up
Well, I could work my life away, but why?
I got things to do before die

There's gotta be something more, gotta be more than this
I need a little less hard time, I need a little more bliss
I'm gonna take my chances
Taking a chance I might find what I'm looking for
There's gotta be something more

Some believe in destiny and some believe in fate
But I believe that happiness is something we create
You best believe that I'm not gonna wait
'Cause there's gotta be something more

I get home 7:30, the house is dirty but it can wait
Yeah, 'cause right now I need some downtime
To drink some red wine and celebrate
Yeah, Armageddon could be knocking at my door
But I ain't gonna answer that's for sure

There's gotta be something
Gotta be something more, gotta be more than this
I need a little less hard time, I need a little more bliss
I'm gonna take my chances
Taking a chance I might find what I'm looking for
Gotta be something more
(There's gotta be something)
Got to be, got to be, got to be more
(Gotta be something, yes)

I like the whole song, as can be evidenced by my desire to listen to it multiple times in a row, but the lines that speak to me the most are:

Some believe in destiny and some believe in fate
But I believe that happiness is something we create

There are always going to be things that happen beyond our control, but we need to work on the things that we can control.  We need to create our opportunities, our happiness, our success, our future.

Creating anything takes gumption!

New Shoes!

A few weekends ago now, I had the opportunity to go to Niketown in San Francisco with a new friend of mine I met at the gym.  My wonderful new gym friend has a brother who works for Nike and she gets to use his discount!  :)

We drove up to the city and parked in a nearby parking garage.  We walked the approximately 2 blocks to the Nike store and hopped onto the escalator to take us to the first shopping floor of the store.  As I caught a full view of the store I was slightly overwhelmed … it was HUGE!! 

Thankfully, my gym friend was an old pro at navigating the store and we immediately to the escalator up another floor to the women’s section.  She pointed here and there naming off things like tennis gear, golf attire, cross training, running etc.  I took a lap around the floor just trying to absorb the scene.  I was most interested in shoes so I decided to start there.  First I looked at the wall of cross-training shoes and then I walked over to the probably twice as large wall of running shoes.  I was way out of my league. 

My friend came to the rescue and pulled one of the sales associates over to me.  She helped me explain what I was looking for even though I didn’t seem to know what that was.  I had worn the same Reebox Easy Tones for nearly 3 years (don’t get me wrong I loved those shoes, but 3 years took its toll on them!) and before than I wore LA Gears; yes, LA Gears.  The associate picked out a couple pairs that might be best for me and told me why.  Everything sounded great when he said it, but he was talking so fast and about so much that it practically went in one ear and out the other. 

After spending a good 20 minutes being educated about the different Nike styles I was again left standing in front of the wall of shoes.  What was a girl to do?  Well, I just started trying them all on!  I must have asked for at least 7 different pairs of cross training shoes to try on.  Some were too soft, some were too light, and some just looked weird.  Then I found a shoe that I wanted to try on but they did not have the color I wanted so I told them I would try on the other color “just for fit.”  I slipped on the white and yellow shoe and that was it.  I knew I had to have them; that very pair. 

After having tackled the smaller wall of shoes I moved on to the running wall so find a second pair of shoes for my cardio only days.  I picked out 4 pairs of shoes and asked for each of them to try on.  The first pair I tried on was gray and yellow.  I loved them.  I knew I loved them from the moment I took a step in them, but I needed to be sure they were the pair I wanted, so I tried on the rest.  None of the others even compared!

So there I had it after hearing all about the styles and trying on tons of different shoes in different sizes, I ended up with a cross training shoe (white and yellow) and a running shoe (gray and yellow).  

I must admit I really had no idea there were so many different types of tennis shoes.  There are shoes for different sports and then within the sports for who your particular foot is shaped, and then there are different weights and of course different colors.  If you are a shoe person, it might be worth starting to work out just to justify expanding on a whole new section of your shoe wardrobe!

I had a lot of fun, learned a lot, and bought my first (and second) pair of Nikes.  After nearly 2 months of wearing the shoes I can honestly say they make a huge difference.  I love them!

It takes gumption to try a new brand of workout shoes!

Take a Break

As I am sure many of you have noticed, I have not blogged for a while.  I could say I have been busy (which I have not really been) and I could tell you that I have been out of town a lot (only for like 2 days) and I could tell you that I was uninspired or did not have anything going on to write about (note true because I have been keeping a list of topics on my phone … believe me there is plenty for me to write about!).  But none of those reasons are why I have not been blogging. 

Basically, I just did not feel like it.  I have pulled up a blank page numerous times to start writing about one of the topics on my ongoing list, but I just did not feel like writing.  I had the idea, I knew what I wanted to write, I had an idea how to write it, and I had the time, but I just did not feel like writing it.  I cannot tell you why this happens, but I am sure you have experienced it as well.  Sometimes you just do not feel like doing something, even if it is something you generally enjoy.

So anyway, I have taken a little break and now I am glad to say that I have found my desire to blog again.  I have written a couple posts already so I have some line-up for those times I just don’t feel like writing in the future.  Hopefully there will not be another 2 week absence, but you never know, sometimes you just need a break.

Taking a break takes gumption!

Write on Wednesday - Great One Liners

I am typically a rather verbose writer. I like words and use a lot of them. I think it is better to have too many than not enough. In law school one of the assignments called for us to write a memo with a page limit maximum of 10 pages. When I completed my first draft, my memo was more than 20 pages long. Needless to say I had to pare it down quite a bit.

This week’s Write on Wednesday challenges us to use words wisely and frugally.

Write On Wednesdays Exercise 13 - A Great One Liner...This week you need to come up with one good line to describe a part of your day. It can be 'real life' or fiction. But it must tell us 'who did what'. It has to be an amazing line, like a tiny little paper plane that must travel a big distance (figuratively speaking) with only a few folds ... Every word in that line must earn its place, or be cut as excess baggage. Let's get thinking about each sentence as though every word counts, like working one group of muscles to show how much weight they can carry.

I tried a couple of times, and came up with 3 one liners to share:

As she pulled the seatbelt low and tight across her hips, she stared out the tiny window and wondered why it never got easier to say goodbye, no matter how many times she did it.

Leaving one home for the other is the burden of living two lives, I realized as I bid farewell to my friends to return to my family.

Thoughts of him remained dormant in her mind, strategically buried so they would not surface at inopportune times, but as she inhaled the familiar scent of his cologne she could not help but take a solitary walk down memory lane.




Using less words but making every word count takes gumption!

Motivation Monday - Love Never Fails

I went to an absolutely beautiful and amazing wedding this weekend.  Two of my friends from college got married at a winery in southern California, the very first winery they went to together.  I have known for a long time that these 2 people were meant for each other, but it was never more evident than on their wedding day. 

The groom appeared in front of the crowd long before the bride, which is common.  As he stood at the front with the minster, he was practically shaking, but it was definitely not nerves.  He was so excited to see his bride/soon to be wife that he simply could not hold still (much like a little kid on Christmas morning or a puppy waiting for a scrap of food).  A smile was practically glued to his face.  Not the fake, for the photos kind, but a real, genuine, happy smile. 

When the bride finally walked down the aisle, the groom could hardly contain himself he was so excited to see her.  As she stopped at the end of the aisle he reached out to take her hands and the minister had to stop him so that the bride’s father may be asked “who gives this woman away?” 

Throughout the ceremony, the couple remained holding hands, smiling.  But, it was the way they looked at each other that really got me.  They looked adoringly at each other, as if they were in their own little world among a crowd of 250 of their closest friends and family.  The love was apparent. 

As many couples do, this particular couple picked a scripture passage to be read during their ceremony.  They picked the very popular  1 Corinthians 13:4-8

“Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails.”

Although I have heard this passage countless times, it has never felt so perfectly applicable.  This couple really embodies that particular verse, and I am fairly certain they always will, and that in fact their love will never fail. 

This passage and this couple that so embody it are a huge inspiration and an affirmation that true love does exist and will prevail. 

Love takes gumption!

The Bride and Groom

Fanciful Fridays - Hawaii Scrapbook

In the past my friends have marveled at some of the creative and thoughtful ideas and gifts that I have come up with.  During law school however, my creativity was slightly stifled by my analytical workload and my extreme lack of time.  Now however, with all of this extra time on my hands I have found myself tapping into my creative juices like never before.

Over the past few months I have worked on several projects.  Some were fairly large projects that took a lot of time and energy, others were smaller projects that took barely any time at all and provided almost an instant gratification.

Since I have so often been asked “how do you come up with this stuff?”  I decided to post some of my projects on this blog in the hopes that friends and readers will be inspired to tap into their own creativity.  Thus, Fridays will now be “Fanciful Fridays” and posts will showcase past or current creative projects.  Let’s get started!

In March I found myself with a ridiculous amount of free time on my hands.  I had just taken the CO bar and was not ready to jump into studying for anything else.  I spent time at the gym and looking for a job, but still the free hours piled up.  I had to find something to occupy my mind and my hands so that I would not go stir crazy.  It was time to be creative.

I have been a long time scrapbooker.  I have a scrapbook for every year since eighth grade thru my senior year in college.  Law school put a halt to my scrapbooking but I still have all the photos and other memorabilia to eventually finish those years as well.  The original books are smaller (8.5x11) whereas the college years are bigger (12x12).  As I grew up, my skills developed and my books started to look better.  As I contemplated what to do with my free time, scrapbooking naturally came to mind fairly quickly.

I was hesitant to tackle the law school years knowing that three years of undocumented photos and items might overwhelm me.  So I thought about what else I could work on.  Luckily in September 2010 I had taken a trip to Hawaii and had taken so many pictures that the trip would need its own book instead of being lumped inside another year.  This provided the perfect project – plenty to do but not overwhelming. 

I started by having all the pictures printed.  I sent them online to costco because it was the cheapest and the quality is decent.  When I got the pictures back I divided them into days that we were on the island – 7 piles in total.  I got large ziplock bags and placed each pile in a separate bag, labeling the bag with the date and where we had gone on the island. 

After dealing with the pictures, I dug through my boxes of saved items until I found all of the stuff from my Hawaii trip – ticket stubs, brochures, napkins, dried flowers, business cards, etc.  I then sorted this stuff into the 7 days as well, placing the items into the corresponding picture bags.  Once that was done it was time to start!

I took one bag at a time and figure out the paper and the matting I was going to use for each set of photos.  Then I trimmed the main page and started cropping the photos and the matting.  I arranged the photos on the page, added a little glue and then moved on to the next page.  I know that some people decorate as they go, but I prefer to get all the pictures on pages and then go back and add the details like lettering, journaling, and stickers.  But, to each his own!

It took me almost 2 weeks to finish putting the photos on pages.  Then it took me a few more days to do the decorating.  Most of the pages are completely finished, but I still have to journal about the events of the trip and paste in a few more titles – just the finishing touches!

Scrapbooking takes gumption.  

Here are some of the finished pages.  Enjoy!

Part of the R&R wedding photos.

 

The view from Pali Lookout.

(the bottom photo is actually 3 different photos lined up to create 1 image!)

Photos from our hike to the waterfall.

 Beautiful Hibiscus Flowers!

Photos from our day at Shark's Cove!

(there are different fish in each of the blue bubbles)

The sunsets were stunning!