I’m back in California after 5 days of luscious relaxation. If there is anything better than being surrounded by your favourite people out on the water with good music and tasty drinks, I haven’t found it yet.
They say you can’t buy happiness, but you can buy tickets to Montana in the summer, and that’s pretty much the same thing.
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| Hail storm |
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| hydrate or die |
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| sister sister |
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| please sir, i’d like s’more |
We went on our first trip with my sister and her husband a few weekends ago, we were only in Vegas for a couple of nights but we had so much fun. I hadn’t seen them since Thanksgiving so it was great to catch up, and hang out, just the four of us.
We didn’t win any money, but we did some shopping, dancing, lots of drinking, and ate at some really cool restaurants. I even tried calamari (it’s gross) and encountered a magical chocolate fountain (it was amazing).
Vegas has always been one of my favourite places, when I was little I always more excited to go to Vegas than Disneyland, I just loved the lights and the environment and the showgirl costumes. Now, with our family so spread out, Vegas is kind of a central place for us all to meet up and be together, so it will always have a special place in my heart, no matter how much of my money it steals.
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| I am obsessed with mermaids. I will never grow out of this. |
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| the mermaid tank at the Silverton |
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| Siegfriend and Roy’s secret garden |
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| beatlemania |
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| hogs and heifers |
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| thousands of dollars worth of bras. seriously. |
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| fremont |
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| old school slot machines that give you actual coins, soooo much better. except his hands were black from touching all the nickels |
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| this guy had actual magical powers. sooo talented |
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| i wanted to try every single one of these |
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| yum |
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| supper at lakeside, amazing food |
While we were in L.A. a few weeks ago I dragged Derek to the La Brea tarpits. I’ve had an awkward obsession with going there ever since I saw My Girl 2, so finally 16 years of yearning paid off. It was pretty neat actually, a lot of the area around the tar pits has been developed now, but it used to be acres and acres of tar, and animals would wander in thinking it was water, get stuck, and die.
They have tons of really neat fossils like saber tooth tigers, dire wolves and mammoths, and it’s pretty neat to see how it used to look in that area. It’s like seeing the pictures when Waikiki beach used to be farming fields.
The tar smelled pretty terrible, but other than that it was a really neat experience. They also let military in for free, so we didn’t even have to pay to get in.
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| la brea tar pits. looks cool, smells like feet |
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| it’s a sloth. but actually |
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| tar is sticky. fact |
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| cawwwwww |
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| dire wolf skulls. winter is coming |
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| here kitty kitty kitty |
Some more pictures of our wonderful Hawaii trip. Derek graduated, we kayaked out to the Mokulua islands, went to Sandy’s, did the booze cruise, and stayed at a cabin on Bellows for 3 days. We ate at all of our favourite restaurants, and just relaxed.
It was heaven. Excuse the gratuitous beach porn shots, it was soooo beautiful I took like 500 pictures of nothing but sand, sky and water.
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I haven’t actually unpacked from my trip to Hawaii yet (it’s been a very lazy week) and I’m off to Las Vegas tomorrow. I am so excited to see my older sister, we haven’t seen each other since Thanksgiving, so even in the unlikely event that we spend the whole weekend trapped in an elevator at the Wynn, it will be a great weekend.
I was feeling a bit guilty about our whirlwind month of travel, so far in May we’ve spent a weekend in L.A, and then 10 days in Hawaii, but I’m really only going to Vegas to see my sister, so I think it’s definitely worth it.
I just read this article about how to buy happiness in the LA Times, and it’s making me feel better. Thirty years from now, I won’t remember the Memorial Day weekend that I stayed at home and relaxed, but I will definitely remember my first solo (besides our husbands) trip with my big sister.
Hope everyone has a great weekend!
While we were in L.A. last weekend, I finally made it to the Hollywood Forever Cemetery. I’ve wanted to go there for years, becuase they show old movies there at night and it just seemed like a really cool and unique place.
They only show movies a few times a month, and so far we haven’t been there on a weekend when it was happening, but hopefully one day. It was probably weird of me to take pictures of a graveyard, but it was so beautiful and peaceful there, and it’s really a historical landmark, this beautiful, sprawling old cemetery in the middle of Hollywood.
You can learn more about it, here.Salty. Sun soaked. Satisfied.
This morning we had a great big breakfast and relaxed, then went to rent a car for the rest of the week.
We went to SSG for lunch, I had the BBQ chicken plate with two peanut butter temptations for dessert.
After lunch we went to sandy’s beach. It’s so beautiful over there but a bit windy so the waves were huge.
Sandy’s has a shore break so it’s pretty dangerous, and it’s awesome to watch the body boarders getting rolled in the surf.
We flew into Honolulu today and it’s so nice to be back. We’re staying with my sister at the dorm where I used to live and it’s pretty surreal to be sleeping here again, so many years later.
I’ve been up for exactly 24 hours as of now but I’m not tired. I’m laying here listening to the sirens and sounds of Waikiki, thinking that I used to be so accustomed to hearing them every night that I would often have a hard time falling asleep when I went back home to Canada because it was too quiet.
I am so glad it’s finally May. For some reason, so many good things are happening this month, and I am so excited that it’s finally here. This weekend we are off to L.A. on a mini-roadtrip, and we are driving home on Sunday just in time to watch the Sharks play the Canucks.
Next weekend we fly to Honolulu to visit my sister, and Derek is walking in his graduation ceremony for his Associate’s degree. I am so proud of him, and so excited to be going home for 9 days. I am also possibly running a triathlon while I’m there, I’ve been training a little bit but we haven’t signed up officially. In true Spearing fashion, we are waiting until the very last possible second to enter. We are slightly indecisive.
We fly home on the 19th (I am sad to be missing Bay to Breakers, but it’s definitely going to be worth it) and the next weekend we are flying to Vegas to see my other sister. We haven’t seen each other since Thanksgiving, and I am super excited to spend the weekend with her and her husband.
On top of all of our traveling, I also got a promotion at work, and I start my new job on May 6th. It’s definitely going to be a whirlwind month, but those are my favourite kind. I’m feeling very lucky and grateful for all of the good things in my life at the moment, and I can’t to see what the rest of the summer holds.
loveliness. 