Not much to say

This week has been slow, but good. Our Nissan has a recall on it that we're fighting to make sure it's taken care of, so we've been juggling the cars a bit. A girlfriend and I went out Monday night for happy hour and cake afterwards downtown. Tuesday we grilled by the pool with a few friends for another friends birthday. Wednesday we discovered a few museums and parks around town. Today we're just chillin' but I need to get my arse moving here in a bit. Now if only I had some money to go get the things I need for the pool party tomorrow! Oh well, I get paid tomorrow so I'll be running around last minute.

Breaking the Silence

Wow I don't think it's been that long since I blogged in awhile. The week of the seventh was VBS for the boys along with a million and one playdates, a dentist appointment, a haircut, and spending my birthday money on makeup from Sephora.

The weekend following VBS was my birthday weekend!! Whoohoo!! My girlfriends and I floated the guadalupe with sangria and beer. By the time I got out I was waaaayyyy more drunk than I realized sitting in my tube. One happy time! I spent the next two days recovering at home with Brando and the boys, who made me cupcakes for my birthday. We had bbq ribs, asian salad, and s'mores for my birthday dinner. Yummmm.

My birthday continued into the week with Brando being home for three days straight. I hadn't realized he was going to be off so I didn't plan any vacations. So we actually had some good at home family time. We did bike ride Town Lake on Tuesday and took Justinbustin's little friend. Other than that it was just good old hanging out at home and by the pool time. Oh and I forgot to mention I woke up on my birthday to ten different people wishing me happy birthday on my facebook via comments and messages. Talk about warm fuzzies!! I think birthday wishes from multiple people may be one of my favoritest gifts ever.

My girlfriend took me out to dinner at Maudie's Tuesday night for my birthday after I made a stop at a lakehouse for the Shawner's school get together for us who live in north Austin. Talk about a gorgeous house. I was kind of glad I didn't have to save face by keeping a big old grin on my face and talking about all our fabulous summer vacations while they tell me how they went to Hawaii for three weeks, and Colorado for two, and oh my how the rest of summer has been filled with expensive camp after expensive camp for their precious kiddos. You can shove it where the sun don't shine. By the way have you offered a scholarship to a kid in a less fortunate (or younger hehe) family? I think I may make a resolution to do that when I get to that point.

Any who *whistle as I look off into the sky* my girlfriend stole me away from all that and treated me at a new and fun restaurant. Her birthday gift to me, besides dinner, was beautiful earrings from my favorite store Francesca's. They are a single gold line in the shape of a paisley, if that makes any sense, and twisted at the point on the bottom to go back up. They are gorgeous, huge (which I love), and so so classy.

Speaking of those earrings I wore them to Allison's wedding in Vegas!! Whoohoo!! A friend of hers (now a friend of mine - I swear she has the sweetest friends in the world and it can only be because she is such a true friend herself) hooked me up with a plane ticket and we shared a hotel room. We both had to work on Saturday so we flew in Thursday morning and left Friday morning, but we sure did make the most of it while we were there. We even gambled at the airport on the way out - hehe.

Allison's wedding was at 4pm on Thursday and we got to watch Marc cry his eyes out waiting for her and all during the ceremony. Okay, really he was pale and had tears in his eyes the whole time. She was beautiful, gorgeous, with feathers in her hair reminding me of Carrie in the Sex and the City movie. Afterwards we ate at one of the famous Las Vegas buffets and gorged ourselves on all kinds of culinary fare with creme brulee, ice cream, tiramisu, and tiny cupcakes to top it off. After dinner we went up to their gorgeous, ginormous suite on the 26th level and enjoyed a birds eye view of Las Vegas with champagne toasts, and lots of conversation and pictures. After the crowd filtered out the bride passed out after we waited way too darn long for some guys to join us before we headed to the club, so most of the girls minus the bride went out for a good time. I was thoroughly shocked by Vegas, mainly the fact that pr*stitution is LEGAL. Genie asked me to bring her back some cards from the girls on the streets, but when I saw the girls dancing in the club and handing out cards I was too scared I would be arrested if I went up and asked for one... until one of the girls I was with told me it was legal in Vegas. Oh!! We danced the night away and turned in not too late (although it was 4am my time and I'd been up since 5am my time). Good thing, because I was up at seven packing up for the airport. We enjoyed a last breakfast with the girls and took off on our shuttle. My view of the Strip, the Bellagio, Caesar's Palace, mini Paris, was all from that shuttle and boy did I look touristy trying to capture it all. Besides seeing Allison and travelling with M, seeing all the places I've seen in the movies has to be my favorite part of being there. Next time M we are so having that mint julep in front of the Bellagio! Although I might make mine a mojito.

I got back last night and went straight to pick up the boys where I showered them with plane handouts and gave my sis a box of See's for watching my boys overnight. I woke up this morning and went straight to work, grateful that Brando was not in fact working today like I thought he was so I didn't have to scramble around for a last minute babysitter.

We barbequed fajita chicken, fresh handmade tortillas, and grilled onion by the pool this evening and now I am about to upload pictures and look at ones we took on July fourth for the first time!!!

Headache or Exploding Head - You Pick

Why is it that taking care of oneself in a quality manner is SO much trouble and costs SO darn much?! It goes from having a high a*s premium to being charged a high a*s amount AT the doctor's or dentist's office. Grrr.

Then if because I'm a spouse and am trying to access information about the benefits, it's always "We have to talk to the policy holder." Granted that's not ALWAYS the case, but with this new web access they have everywhere one has to have the many usernames and passwords (which I haven't written down the many times Brando's told me because I'll remember it, I always think). When I DO have the username and password and call tech help because their website isn't working they can't help me out because (say it with me) I'm not the policyholder. 

Somehow any office I visit has free and complete access to all of my benefits. They can tell exactly what I will be charged. Do I have that same access? Nope. So when I got fined a hefty $83 for two dentist appointments when we have dentist coverage it comes as a complete shock, not only to me but to the budget. Granted it was a nice dentist office - nice facilities, nice staff, nice dentist and I'm paying for it.

I'm attempting to write down a sheet I'm going to have to put in a lockbox somewhere of all our passwords, usernames, 800 numbers, policies, accounts, credit cards, loans, to put it all in ONE DARN PLACE so hopefully I'll avoid this frustration in the future.

Week of Fun

This week is VBS (Vacation Bible School - they play a bunch of games, eat snacks, and run around like children out of school) week for the boys. Turns out another local church has another VBS type thing going on in the front yards of neighborhood homes. So, so far this week the boys have gone to their VBS with a friend, had two playdates, are going to the other type of VBS thing this evening with a friend, as well as tomorrow morning with another friend, I've volunteered for their primary VBS and it's only Tuesday! Good times and good friends. Now THAT's a summer.

This One's for the Blog

I may've taken the picture partially for the blog (mostly for us), but we had such an AWESOME time. H*Dizzle from Minnesota is visiting her home town here in Austin this week and her home happens to be super close to mine. Whoohoo! We met up at Trudy's for raspberry and strawberry margaritas, migas, and tortilla soup, then we hit up my pool for three solid hours of a perfect view of a nearby fireworks show, floating, and non stop conversation. The weather was perfect and the water was not too cold. Strangely, when we got there at nine thirty nobody else was there. By midnight four different groups of people had shown up and one had just started firing up a grill! You know we started the party ; ) . 

I completely forgot to mention that on the way to the pool we walked on the grass to avoid the sprinklers soaking the sidewalk and the grass on the other side of the sidewalk. As we were walking on the non-sprinkled grass the sprinklers on our side came on and with short eeeks!, our tubes and beer in hand, we were off running through the sprinklers like a scene out of a movie, laughing the whole way. At least we were in our bathing suits! We didn't stop cracking up at ourselves for the next five minutes.

At Trudy's - good memories

After the pool

PS Happy Fourth!!