Away We Go

Every time I leave Arizona I cry. It's not that I'm unhappy to head home to PA, but that I always enjoy seeing my family so much and we have such a great time together, that it hurts to leave them.

This time I'm trying not to think ahead that far and just live in the moment. And at this moment I'm t-minus one hour until I can print our boarding passes and solidify our visit for Christmas. It's pretty unreal considering how fast the last week flew by and all the scary snow we got over the weekend. But, right now the sun is shining and I'm finished with work which is a great feeling.

I should probably start packing!

Delightful

I am a huge fan of anything that director Wes Anderson does. His movies are unique, with a great cast and always have a wonderful soundtrack to accompany them.

His new film is no exception...

It's truly fantastic.

Put A Fork In Me

In exactly three weeks I managed to read all four of the Twilight books without batting an eye. In fact, I can honestly say that not only did I enjoy them, but I looked forward to picking it back up every night (or afternoon).

I won't say that they were the best literary work I've ever encountered, but far from the worst thing I have ever read and I am truly glad I gave them a chance . I definitely felt that the stories drew you in on many levels and was so far from just teen/vampire/werewolf romance, especially the further into the books that you get.

And, quite honestly, I have found it to be a welcome bonding experience with my sister-n-law and so many friends and relatives that share an even greater passion for the series. I even hope there will be more books in the future.

So yes, I loved it, saw the movies (Twilight- eh, New Moon- good) and just in case you are wondering ladies, I'm on Team Edward.

I'm Like Dial-Up

I am the worst online shopper. I just can't visualize something as a good gift from my computer screen. I need to see it up close. This is beyond frustrating when you are traveling for the holidays and it's a good idea to try to ship gifts ahead of you. Ugh.

Thank heavens for awesome websites like Threadless that at least make it somewhat easier and have me in stitches over some of their products. Seriously, how funny are these t-shirts?

They kill me.

Oops, now I'm distracted. Back to 'shopping'...

DCing It

Despite some extremely yucky weather on Saturday, we managed to have a great time on our visit to DC. I got to spend some quality time with A. and E., which always means the world to me, and check out some of the sites that I haven't had a chance to see up close before.

Below are some pics from our trip...

We blogging beauties in front of the Capital, getting rained on, but still trying to make the most of our day. Coffee definitely helped.

We all took shelter from the bad weather inside the Botanical Gardens.

Our husbands

Sunday we had a much nicer (though still chilly) day so we had a chance to walk along the mall

John at the Lincoln Memorial

The White House Christmas Tree which we learned hails from our great state of PA

The Best Is Yet To Come

No matter what happens today, I'm about as happy as I could get.

I'll be mailing off my real estate license application and will be one step closer to taking my final, final test and tomorrow we head down to D.C. to spend time with my two best friends, E. and A. and their wonderful husbands.

The icing on the cake, however, is that not only did I score great seats to see Michael Buble' here in March, but my sister Amy will be headed here for yet another visit to go with me. I am seriously beside myself with excitement.

Nothing brings me more joy than seeing my family and friends.

Phew!

I can't tell you how relieved I am to finally be finished with my real estate classes. Not only were the nights painfully long, but the material was daunting to say the least. Tonight we had our final exam, which we had to pass in order to receive our transcript that is required to sit for the actual licensing test.
I sweated through the math and breezed through the questions I had heavily reviewed material for, nearly vomited while my teacher was grading it, but came out happy in the end with a solid score.

Now I have to obtain a criminal background check, complete and send in my application and then await the date of the 'big test'.
Such a process...