Weekend update x2

The weather here has been completely gorgeous these last few weekends, so of course we've spent as much time as possible outside taking advantage of it!  Here's a recap of what we've been up to.

We kicked off the weekend before last with our innaugural "Don't act your age" outing.  We went out on the town with the Whitworths and the Andersons to enjoy ourselves and for once not act like we have a care in the world.  Needless to say we had a blast, and there are no pictures to prove it. On Sunday we took advantage of the B-E-A-U-tiful weather and went on a bike ride on the Silver Comet Trail.  We've been wanting to do this for a long time now, but just never really got around to it.  My goodness it was beautiful.  You definitely didn't feel like you were anywhere near a major city.  Here are a few pics:

We rode 11 miles out, and then took a break to eat our lunch before heading back.  Before we got on the trail, we grabbed some sandwiches from Muss & Turner's.  They turned out to be quite tasty!

The trail was like this the whole way - gorgeous!!! We were some of the few recreational bikers on the path as there were tons of professional bikers.  We weren't intimidated though (on our 10 year old mountain bikes)....

On the way back, we diverged off the trail a bit to go into historic downtown Powder Springs.  It was really cute, and enjoyable (minus the part that you had to bike uphill the whole way back to the actual trail). 

This past weekend, we also took advantage of the amazing weather and went on an all day hike with Bonney and Paul to Cloudland Canyon.  Bryan and I originally wanted to go camping, but by the time we got around to actually reserving a camping spot there wasn't a single one to be found in the whole dang state park.  That's what you get when it's leaf season at one of the most beautiful places in the state. 

As 4 Georgia natives (and 3 of us are from north Georgia), we were all amazed that we hadn't been to Cloudland before.  It was hands down one of the most beautiful places we've seen in the state.  We had a blast hiking all day and enjoying the perfect weather and beautiful scenery.  We even hit up a delicious BBQ place on the way home (and then drove through Chattanooga to get back home).  It was a long, but incredibly fun day.  I'll let the pictures do the talking. 

This weekend we're headed down to Jacksonville for the GA/FL game.  Here's to more time with friends and family, good weather, and please God can we just have a W in Jacksonville this year??

Also, be sure to check out the photography tab.  Bryan added some more photos to show of his photography skills.

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Let's go on a tour of LA

As promised - here's some highlights from my whirlwind day trip of LA.  Better late than never. :) 

I started the day with a yummy breakfast at the hotel before hitting the road to Santa Monica.  I took a quick self portrait before I left because I knew I'd be flying solo for the day which means there aren't a lot of self portrait opportunities. 

Sidenote: There were a TON of pictures from this tour, but I spared you all the pain of looking through all of them and I just picked the highlights.  You're welcome.

Everyone warned me that the drive to Santa Monica would be horrible and I'd sit in traffic forever.  Now being an Atlantan I think I know a thing or two about traffic, so I left myself an hour to get there.  However, it only took me twenty minutes to get there (people, there was no traffic at all).  So I took the time to walk around Santa Monica.  I found good shopping and the farmer's market - which was awesome. This picture though, is from when the tour actually began.  We loaded the Rasta bus, which sounds sketchy but was actually tons of fun!  We drove by the Santa Monica peer before heading up the Pacific Highway (PC to the locals) to Malibu. 

Malibu was gorgeous, and there actually weren't a lot of tourists b/c it was still pretty early.  We then headed back down the PC and then over to what I like to call the "high falutin' area".  We went through Pacific Palisades,  Brookwood, and the neighborhoods of Beverly Hills.  We saw lots of celebrities houses, but honestly I can't remember which one's which in the pictures.  Most of them were hidden so far behind high fences that you couldn't really see them anyway. 

The bus also let us off Rodeo Drive for a little window shopping.  The stores were cool, but I wasn't about to walk into any of them.  I'm pretty sure they all sell approximately one blouse a day! 

I had to get a picture in front of the quintessential Beverly Hills sign.  

After lunch at the Farmers Market in LA (and strolling around The Grove where of course I went into the Banana Republic - I think I have a problem) we went up to the Griffith Observatory.  There were gorgeous views of the city as well as lots of astronomy geeks (and of course I thought of Paul)! 

One of the people on the tour was nice enough to get  a pic of me with the Hollywood sign.  The Griffith Observatory is as close as you can get to the sign without going on a hike.  There was not time for hiking in our all day tour. 

I just thought this was a cool pic of our tour guide.  If you're ever in LA and don't have a lot of time I totally recommend this tour.  They were very entertaining, knowledgable, and you can't beat $45 for the whole day! 

We also went down Sunset Strip, got to see all the stars at Grauman's Chinese Theater (WAY too touristy for my taste), and we also went to Venice Beach.  For anyone who lives in Atlanta, Venice Beach is like Little Five Points on steroids.  I kept my purse close. :) 

It was an exhausting, but incredibly fun day.  I hope you enjoyed the abbreviated version. 

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How to make shoe bags

Alright, so it's finally time to get caught up on blogging.  Here we go!

The Friday before I left for LA I got it in my head that I couldn't possibly travel across the country without shoe bags.  That's right.  I have no idea how I even got this idea, but it was absolutely necessary for me to have cute bags to put my shoes in.  I have to say they were fun to make (even though I didn't have the time to spare), and I LOVE them now!! They're so cute and keep my clothes clean!  Here's a little tutorial on how to make them

Shoe bag 101

First of all, I have to admit that I got the tutorial from here.  Go figure...Martha has a solution to every problem.  I do have to say that her tutorial was a little hard to me to follow as there were no pictures.  (I'm a very visual person.)  So, here is the step by step with pictures.

1. Though Martha used a snazzy velvet, I opted for a more wallet friendly discount fabric at the local Hancock Fabrics.  I realize velvet probably protects your shoes better or some mumbo jumbo like that, but it was expensive, and I'm pretty sure if you get the real deal you also have to get a new foot for the sewing machine.  No thank you.  So, I purchased 1.5 yards of three different types of fabric, ribbon, and buttons.  I bought too much fabric, and I returned the buttons.  I thought I would use them to keep the ribbon from slipping back through the holes, but it wasn't necessary.

2. I cut each piece of fabric into 13x36 inch sections.  Then fold the fabric in half, and sew up both sides leaving a one inch gap 5 inches from the top on each side.  In order to mark this, I measured down 5 inches from the top and marked it with a pin.  I then marked one inch down from that with another pin, and did this on both sides.

3. After sewing up both sides. you fold the top of the bag down to create a 3 1/2 inch hem.  You can pin it in place to hold everything as you sew.

4. You are now going to sew a casing.  This will create a place for the ribbon to go.  In order to do this, you will sew around the bag twice where you marked the 1 inch opening.  Be sure to not sew the bag shut, and instead sew all the way around (as shown in the pic below).  Not that I almost sewed it shut the first time or anything...  The second picture below is what it will look like when this step is finished.

5. The next step is optional. You can sew a line straight up the bag from the bottom of it to the first casing stiching.  This will create two separate compartments for your shoes.  I did this for all of mine except for one b/c my tennis shoes wouldn't fit into the two parts.  I think they'll be okay touching each other. ;)

6. The final step is to put the ribbon through the casing.  I found the best way to do this is to put a safety pin on both ends, and use a magnet (second picture below) to pull it through.  That was my idea, not Martha's. ;)

And then you have your finished product! Voila!  As you can see in the pic below, there are the two compartments - one for each shoe.

Here are all 6 that I made.  I have loved traveling with them so far!!  Let me know if you make some - I'd love to hear any different ideas you have.

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And, I'm back!

I apologize for the hiatus.  After a whirlwind weekend in Brunswick, it's been nice to just come home and veg at night this week! So in order to catch up on blogging, I'll start with our trip to Brunswick this past weekend.  No worries, I'll come back to the LA tour, and my tutorial on shoe bags that I promised (I know you've been waiting in eager anticipation.)  Bear with me.

So - my flight landed at 9:30pm last Friday, and by 10pm I was in the car with Bryan, Bailey, and Tippy headed down to Brunswick!  We arrived around 2:30am, and after not being able to sleep well (the dogs were driving us nuts) we were up and at 'em by 7:00am.  I was so screwed up from the time difference and driving all night that I didn't really know which way was up.  But why waste the day?  We only had about 1.5 days with Bryan's grandparents so sleeping was for the birds.  I could tell you all about our weekend, but I'll just show you instead!

Saturday we went to Driftwood Beach on Jekyll Island.  I have great memories of going here with my parents when I was younger, so I'm always excited when we get to go there.

The dogs were in heaven.  Bailey and Tippy just ran back and forth through the shallow water.  We even found a ball on the beach so Tippy chased the ball and Bailey chased Tippy.  Typical.

Bryan's grandparents LOVE animals.  They were so excited to meet their great-grand-dog for the first time!  :)  He was pretty excited about it too. 

Bailey was in heaven running free on the beach.

There's nothing quite like some quality sister-in-law time.  Saturday afternoon we found a project we wanted to do on pinterest.  So we drove out to Michael's and found everything we needed.  The only problem was that we needed burlap and apparently there aren't any fabric stores in Brunswick! I know, right?  So we put everything in our cart back, and headed over to Target to buy some premade Halloween decorations instead (and maybe a little Halloween candy and some Coke products. I mean, we were already there).  At least we had good intentions, right?

It was so great to see Bryan's grandparents!  We wish they lived closer so we could see them more often.

It was incredibly windy on Saturday.  I mean there were times when it was really hard to walk into the wind - noted by Bryan's grandma appearing to be blown away by the wind.  It was some serious stuff.

This was a Coast Guard boat that was trying to brave the choppy seas. We got a kick out of watching them get beat up by the waves.  I don't think they were having very much fun though.

The weather was actually quite warm when you got off the beach and out of the wind!  We tried to go on a little walk inland, but it was a little too warm for our taste.

Bryan's grandpa tried to walk Tippy, but I think Tippy walked him instead. 

We sat on the shore and watched this huge cargo ship that carries cars go by.  The crazy rednecks in the boat that looks like it's sinking decided they were going to get closer.  Yes, it also looked as if they might sink in real life.  Oh my. 

We went to the St. Simons Arts & Crafts festival on Sunday.  It poured rain right before we got there, but we were still able to see some cool booths.  After walking around for a bit we hit up Barbara Jean's for some amazing crab cakes.  I may or may not have specifically requested to go there.  What can I say? They're the best!

Love this pic. :)

After lunch we Bryan and Amy enjoyed some creative photography fun! Amy's getting into photography now, so it's cool to see her and Bryan bonding over photography nerdiness! She bought Bryan's old camera when we got the new one, so she's been taking classes in Birmingham and is getting quite good.  I can't wait to see her skills! 

One of Bryan's creative shots - pretty cool, huh? 

So we had a wonderful weekend, and I'm so thankful to be home now (and home for the rest of the year)!! 

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The perfect LA night!

So – last night at dinner I finally had my first celebrity sighting!!!  And when it rains it pours.  So we went to this amazing place for dinner and about halfway through our meal we all admit that the table next to us has a lot of familiar looking folks.  Everyone else at the table was totally recognizing the dark headed girl (turned out to be Carla Gugino), but I knew that I knew the blonde headed girl from somewhere (Marley Shelton).  About a half an hour later they all get up to leave and when one of the guys turns around I completely recognized him and it turned out to be Rufus Sewell.  Those three were dining together with some other people who were probably also famous, but we didn’t recognize them. While we were waiting at the valet with all of them we looked over and saw Haley Duff, and then a co-worker pointed out Kelly Monaco as well. 

These three were dining together at the table next to us: Carla Gugino, Marley Shelton, and Rufus Sewell.

We waited on our car at the valet with Haley Duff.  (Our Mazda looked a little out of place with all the fancy cars.)

Kelly Monaco was also at the restaurant.  I didn't know who she was but everyone else did! :)

I felt like last night was the epitome of a great night in LA.  We had such a fabulous dinner - the food was completely amazing!!  If you're ever in  LA you must, must, must eat at Angelini Osteria.  The only downside is that now my favorite restaurant is a 5 hour plane ride away.  I could have ordered at least 15 other things on the menu - everything was delicious.  Seeing some celebrities was just the icing on the cake. 

I'm also incredibly excited to fly home tomorrow.  2 weeks away is definitely my limit - I'm ready to get back home.  It's also nice to know that I'll be in town for the rest of the year.  Even better is that I now have an official office at the North Avenue location!!  I got an email yesterday that they're officially moving me.  So no more getting there early to take over a space.  I will now have my own little space to decorate and come and go as I please.  Things are working out quite well!

This weekend we're headed to Brunswick.  Yep, that means that when my flight lands in Atlanta tomorrow at 9:30pm, Bryan is picking my up from the airport and we're driving straight down to Brunswick.  We'll get there around 2 or 3am, but it will be totally worth it b/c his grandparents (from Salt Lake City) will be there.  I believe the last time they were in Brunswick was almost 10 years ago - obviously we couldn't miss this trip!!!  So I'm looking forward to a great weekend with family on the coast.   

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Weekend update

Well folks - I survived the weekend in LA!  :)  I'm proud to report that I not only navigated my way around LA without a GPS, but I also enjoyed myself along the way.  Saturday morning I set out to Santa Monica where my tour left from.  I got there early b/c everyone kept telling me that traffic on Saturday is horrible.  Well, it wasn't.  It was fine that I arrived early though as I had time to walk around and I even found the Santa Monica farmer's market.  The tour left at 9:30, and it was a really fun experience.  There was a young couple from England and a guy from Australia who was also traveling for business on the tour with me.  Our tour guide, Aaron is from LA and was able to give us all sorts of info about the city.  We went to Malibu, Pacific Palisade, Brentwood, Bel Air, Beverly Hills, the LA Farmer's Market, The Grove, Hollywood, and Venice Beach.  I took tons of pictures, but I'll have to wait until I get home to upload them (so Bryan can edit them for me).  It was lots of fun, but I was definitely completely exhausted when I got back to the hotel.  8 hours of touring was about all I could take.  I definitely slept for 12 hours last night!!

This morning I took it easy, then drove over to Calabasas to have brunch with Tony and his girlfriend Catherine. It was cool to see Tony on his own turf.  We ate and sipped mimosas for a few hours, then I headed off to do a little shopping.  I tried to go by DASH (the Kardashian's store), but it turns out it's closed on Sunday.  So I just peeked in the window and then went on my way.  I ended up hitting up the local outlet mall (shocker, right?  I found the one Banana Republic Outlet in LA).  I enjoyed taking it easy and shopping around for a few hours, then headed back here to order some room service. 

I'm hoping this week flies by as quickly as last week did because I am ready to see my hubby!!!  Friday can't come soon enough. :)

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This is a big deal

For those of you who know me well, you know I am not the type of person who enjoys doing pretty much anything by myself.  If you don't know me well, then you may think that as an only child I am perfectly happy hanging out all by myself, but you would be completely wrong.  I always prefer the buddy system.  So naturally traveling for work and flying solo for the weekend is pretty much the last thing on my list of "things I would really like to try."  (Sidenote: My co-workers are both flying to other cities this weekend b/c they've done the LA thing before.) Nonetheless I'm giving it a go.

Last year when I accompanied Bryan to Chicago for a business trip  I had my first taste of "solo" sightseeing.  We flew up together, but that Friday while he was at work I explored the shops of Chicago and even ate lunch by myself.  (Baby steps here people.) It turns out I had a great time! Even though I felt incredibly awkward, I enjoyed all the things I got to see and do (and all the things I bought...). 

One year later, I'm now embarking on my second solo travel experience. Back when I found out I was going to be in LA for the weekend, my first thought was for Bryan to fly out here. We agreed it was an awesome idea, but it just didn't work out with his workload.  I flirted with the idea of flying home, but it's just too much with a 5 hour flight and a three hour time change to fly home just for a day basically. (I would have to take the red eye home Friday night, and I'm sorry but I just don't sleep well on planes.)  So that left me with the third option of sucking it up and seeing what LA has to offer.  Since I had never been to LA it actually sounded like a fantastic idea.

Knowing that when the weekend rolled around I wouldn't exactly be the happiest person in the world, I decided to pre-book a tour of LA for Saturday and arrange to see a friend who lives in the area on Sunday- all in an effort to not just sit in my hotel room and be a hermit.  So tomorrow I set off on an 8 hour tour to see what there is to see in Santa Monica, LA, Hollywood and anywhere else we may stop along the way.  I'm arming myself with my best attitude and the DSLR.  (Bryan was generous enough to part with his most treasured material posession - his camera.  You're the best, hubby!) On Sunday I'm driving up to Calabasas to spend some time with Tony and his girlfriend Catherine.  Believe it or not I'm excited about the weekend!  I've mapped out how to get to where I'm going and I'm looking forward to living it up.  I'm sure that once I get on the tour I can find someone to buddy-up with, right? Sometimes you've just got to put your big girl panties on and go see what the world has to offer.  Here's to new experiences (despite being homesick).  Cheers!

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