Thursday, May 31, 2012

{Travel}: Navarre Beach Vacation.

As I mentioned in my last post, as soon as I was done with school I hopped in a car and drove down to the "Redneck Rivera" with my parentals and one of my brothers (Ezra was off in Europe doing an architectural tour - the poor guy!).

My parents have friends with a condo in the Navarre Beach Regency and so we have rented a place there for the past two summers. I highly recommend Navarre. It is close enough to Destin to hit the outlets (oh and we did) but far enough away to not have traffic.

We had a great, relaxing time.. here are some pictures.

Here is my brother Jacob driving late on the way down there - we left after a work meeting I had so we didn't get out of town until 1pm:


This was our view from the condo of the beach looking to the right:


And here we are, on the beach the first day:


It isn't called the "Emerald Coast" for nothing:


Here was our condo view looking left - that is a pier for the Navarre Beach where you can walk all the way out and hang out or fish:


Here's my dad and brother proudly showing off their find of the week - Stella in a can! They had me send this picture to Ez in Europe and Jake, who was back at home being a doctor in training:


Here is a time when we actually had some waves (it was very calm for the most part):


Here is the front of the condo building:


And of course - an outlet stop:


Back on the beach - here's Jacob reading..


The water was so so clear while we were there. It was beautiful:


This is my favorite - a calm, beautiful beach picture:


Another shot of the pier:


One night we went out to dinner (usually my parents cook, they like doing fun recipes on vacation). We went to a sort of hole-in-the-wall local place called East Bay Crab House. It was pretty good!


This was our last day on the beach..


And saying goodbye to the beach....


Love family, love vacations, love family vacations. All in all, a wonderful time spent with the people I love in a place I love.

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Wednesday, May 30, 2012

{Pets}: Beamer's Trip to the Vet.

While I was away at the beach, Jake noticed that Beamer wasn't feeling so hot. On Sunday he texted me and told me that Beamer wasn't lifting his head up when he walked and once I was home all Monday he slept. By Tuesday I was really worried and so we took him in to the vet. The poor guy was pathetic.



The vet couldn't exactly determine what was wrong other than maybe an inner ear infection or neck injury so they gave him steroids and antibiotics. They did x-rays and blood work, both of which were clear. So after his doses of both drugs and some watching and waiting, he seems more upbeat and they sent him home:




He's feeling a little better but is still sleepy and sore. We're watching him and are going to call the vet and update her after tomorrow. He had us pretty freaked out and his health is certainly work the bill we got for this episode (ouch!).

Here's to our health and the health of our children (furry or otherwise).

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{Life}: Long time no see...

So I've been away from the blogosphere for a bit now - my apologies. Life has been crazy (in good ways). So here's a little photo recap of where I've been and what I've been doing:

Right at the beginning of "exam season" at school, Jake and I went to Sweet Cece's for some fro yo and I snapped this pic of their topping wall:


Overall impression of Sweet Cece's? Love any froyo but I'm still a devout Yolo fan.

One reason for the lack of posting was the onset of the end of the school year. Like I said... life got crazy. Our seniors this year decided to try to take pranks to the extreme (really extreme in some cases). One of the less awful ones they did really made me laugh. The spray-painted their graduation year (2012) on a lot of surfaces, including the top of our gym:


Only thing? They ran out of spray paint... so all it says is 201. So I decided it would be hilarious if someone climbed up there and wrote "Poplar" under there - as in 201 Poplar, where the vandals should go. Some of their "work" was just outright disgusting, disgraceful, and made my stomach sick. Plus they ruined 100 year old brick...

In preparation for the end of the year, I got a gel manicure from my new favorite, Nina's Nails on Poplar at Highland. I've been doing with Lincoln Park After Dark - makes me feel young and "trendy":

Then a lot of that last week of school is a blur for a few reasons. I stayed after school late every day helping my students do last minute preparations for their AP exams (I get scores in July... nervous but excited!) and then got hit by a nasty stomach virus in the middle of semester exam/AP exams. I was useless for a few days but still had to go to work (kids were taking exams, turning in books, I couldn't not go...) so most of my time not at school was spent with this view:


But I made it through and managed to only throw up at school once (let's talk about how fun that is).. and just for clarification, because my co-workers thought it was so cute to hint that this wasn't a stomach virus, I can tell you with authority that my 102 fever said was definitely a stomach virus.

I wasn't the only thing slowly dying that week. My mom was so sweet and bought a cilantro plant from the store for me to grow my own cilantro from. I watered it dutifully but still managed to kill it. I really am awful with plants. I don't exactly understand how this one died. I tried my best, Mom.


The Saturday after the kids' last day of school we had our graduation. It is held at the convention center downtown and the weather was just beautiful. I snapped a few pictures while going in:



On the dog front, we bought the pups each a "pal" from Target (the blue and orange one are in the picture below). Every time we buy them toys, they spend all their time fighting over them and pulling out the stuffing... and yet we always buy them more. We're either suckers or really love our pups.
Here's Harley with two of the pals:


And you'll notice in this picture Beamer has the same pal that Harley had moments before... it is an endless cycle:


After the weekend was over, I had one last day of school where we were checking out, turning in grades, etc. Before I left, I snapped this picture of Beamer and Tyson. I think they spend every day like this.. what a strange pair:


But the real exciting news that makes this post happy and fun is that I spent the majority of that Monday packing up my room at school. Here it is during the sorting phase:


Here are my boxes and little Goodwill table I used for a student station (it needs a serious repaint now after four years of abuse):


And here is some of the aftermath - over the course of a week, I filled up four of these gallon trash cans. The cleaning staff hated me.


And here is my room, the way I left it at the end of Monday:


Now why was I packing? Because I got a new job teaching at a new school! I am so freakin' excited about the move to my new school but it is a sad time too because I had a ton of students at my old school that I'll miss - my AP students were so wonderful and some of them I taught for three years straight so that was hard to say bye to them. But my new position is going to be a good challenge and a new environment where I think I will thrive.

Speaking of thriving, I snapped this picture of some flowers growing in the bed between the neighbor's house and ours. Somehow, despite complete negligence, these flowers bloomed again this year. There's probably some allusion or metaphor in there somewhere...


And just like that, I was done with school. Done with that school forever. New beginnings, renewal, refreshment, and change on the horizon. But for the next few days, my horizon would look like this.... a good break from what was quite a roller coaster year.


More on my beach trip next post...

In change and continuity,
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Wednesday, May 16, 2012

{Make this}: Margaritas for Mother's Day.

For Mother's Day this year we had a fabulous weekend of celebrating our mothers - dinner at Flight on Saturday night, church on Sunday morning, lunch, and finally cooking dinner for Jake's family on Sunday night.

Dinner Sunday night was lots of fun - we made our black bean avocado salad, Jake grilled pork tenderloins, and we had java chip ice cream for dessert. One thing we did for Jake's mom was we made margaritas. I got the recipe from (where else?) Pinterest but modified it a little bit. Here's the original:

We followed this recipe but added a splash of orange juice (a tradition picked up during our college years in Knoxville via OCI, one of our favorite restaurants). The result was, in fact, the BEST Margaritas after all.


Definitely try them out next time you're having a party... or when you just feel like being fancy.

In mothers and margaritas,
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Tuesday, May 15, 2012

{Go there}: Bogie's Delicatessen.

One of my favorite Midtown lunch spots is Bogie's Deli. Located over in Overton Square, Bogie's Deli has charm and that laid back Midtown feel. I love sitting out on the porch with my pasta salad and my guy, soaking in the day.


Bogie's is in an old Victorian home so it has the charm of someone's house but the efficiency and tastiness of a deli. Their menu ranges from sandwiches to soups to award-winning cakes. Personally, I always get the turkey breast deluxe (half) and a side pasta salad. Jake likes to change things up and tries something different each time.


Next time you're in Midtown and wanting some lunch fare, stop by Bogie's - right behind Bosco's by Studio on the Square. You'll love it.

In lunch spots and lunch dates,
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Monday, May 14, 2012

{House}: Exterior, Part Three.

In our last installment of the exterior renovation on our ranch-bungalow (side note: that is a real thing. I found out the other day it is a real architectural category), I shared that we had installed our new door. Then I droned on about staining versus painting the door (I think I'm staining it) here.

Last week we got our next step in the exterior renovation: the new window.


The Christenson Sash and Door guy is the one that suggested this style - I knew I wanted a Craftsman door and wasn't sure what to do about the picture window and he came up with this design. I love the way it mirrors the door.


So we still need to stain the door. That's the next step. After that, new posts and rails.


 I've been keeping an idea board going over at Pinterest and saw this house that has the perfect posts and rails:


So that is where we go from here. Now how about that perfectly manicured lawn on the idea house...


In staining a door (expect a blog post!),
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