Singapore-Day 1

We're still 12 hours ahead here in Singapore. Currently it's Sunday evening and we've already had a full couple of days here since we arrived late on Friday. Saturday we woke up early and had an amazing breakfast at our hotel, Dave loves the coffee they serve. After breakfast we took off walking and exploring. It was Singapore's National Day-which was commemorates the 49th year of Singapore's independence from Malaysia. It was very cool to be here for this holiday.

{largest indoor waterfall}

We walked to the Gardens at the Bay and bought a ticket to the Cloud Forest. It was really amazing. I wasn't a fan of the highest walkway, but the whole place was beautiful.

Dave and I walked along the cross way from the gardens to the Marina Sands Hotel to meet up with his two coworkers that are on this trip too. In the background you can see the Singapore Flyer (the ferris wheel) and on the right that dome is the flower dome at the Gardens by the Bay.

We walked around and went to Merlion Park-a landmark of Singapore. 

The original statue at the Merlion Park measures 8.6 metres high and weighs 70 tonnes, and is one of Singapore’s most well-known icons. The lion head represents the lion spotted by Prince Sang Nila Utama when he re-discovered Singapura in 11 AD, as recorded in the "Malay Annals", and the fish tail of the Merlion symbolises the ancient city of Temasek (meaning “sea” in Javanese) by which Singapore was known before the Prince named it “Singapura” (meaning “lion city” in Sanskrit). via YourSingapore

It was hot out so we went back to the hotel for an afternoon swim. before figuring out dinner and splitting up for Dave to buy some shorts and me to get a mani/pedi. We watched the fireworks for National Day from our hotel room. A great way to end our first full day in this beautiful (and oh so clean) city.

Perth, Australia

Hi friends! It's been a while since I've been on my little space of the internet. And it's been far too long since I've read my daily blogs (I'm missing your lives Cassie, Aubrey, Christa etc-but I'll catch up when I'm home).
Anyway, we're now in Singapore but I'm recapping our time in Perth. I still can't believe we were lucky enough to have traveled to Australia! It was a fun week with perfect weather and honestly I enjoyed my time exploring on my own.

{Dave and I with part of the Perth skyline}

{me taking the train (metro) out to Fremantle}

{no matter where in the world I am, I'm happiest by his side}

{kangaroo at the zoo!}

{venison, gator, kangaroo, wild boar}

We went out to this cool restaurant that served a game platter on hot lava stone. The brought out the steaming hot platter and you had to cook your own meat. I really wanted to try kangaroo and I'm glad I had the chance. I wanted to try emu as well but couldn't find it on any menu. However, I did find emu jerky at the airport right before flying out, so I bought that and ate it. I crossed both things I wanted to try off my list! Kangaroo was really good and as for the emu jerky, it tasted basically like regular jerky.

{Dave after his dip}

It was a little chilly but Dave and his co-worker decided they wanted to get in the water anyway. We all wanted to go to Penguin Island (behind us) but when we got there we were told there were no ferry's going over because it's their mating season. So close. It would have been neat to see the penguins that call Australia their home year round.

Meat pies are also a big food in Australia so I may have had 3 of them during my stay! It was a great week and I'm glad I've checked off Australia on my world travel bucket list.

Summer Bucket List- Link Up!!!

I wrote here about my summer bucket list and really want to start making headway with it. I have a tendency to put things off, so making a list really helps me when Dave asks what I want to do. I'll be checking back the last Thursday of every month (June-August) to see how you're doing with your lists. I found this awesome printable How To Summer list from You Are My Fave. 

  

Get your own here. 

 

I've added a few things to my list including: make homemade ice cream, go to a farmer's market, possibly visit a local nude beach, beat Dave at Scrabble, tea time with Momma, and make cards more. I'll hope you'll join me in keeping track of what we're up to this summer and sharing our fun with others!

 

 

 

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Guest Post: public furr-ination

Happy Hump Day friends. I've asked my sweet blog friend Christa from over at Forever Young to guest post today. I'm always so jealous of all her pictures of her sweet golden going everywhere with her and her husband. I constantly text her about what stores we're allowed to go into with Finley so I figured I'd ask her to write about it for me. I think Finley may be a little too rambunctious now to take places but it's good to know for the future; once he gets all the puppiness out of him. I'm so thankful for Christa, she really got me through the phase of not liking Finley when we first got him. She encouraged me and promised that it would be worth it, and it is. I love that little fur ball more than anything. In case I didn't say it back then, thank you Christa, so very much.

 

On that note, take it away Christa (and Thatcher)....

{Thatcher....Christa's beautiful Golden}

Hello new friends! I am Christa and I blog at Forever Young. I am so happy to be taking over Lauren's space for the day. Isn't her little Finley adorable? A few weeks back, she asked me to post about traveling with our dog. He's a huge part of our lives, so of course I was excited to share our experiences.

A little over 3 years ago, my husband (then boyfriend) and I got our little fur-ball, Thatcher. He also answers to Mr. T, Thatch, and Tigger. We travel with Thatcher a lot. We take him on vacations, trips from D.C. to Alabama, weekend beach trips, and shopping excursions. When we got married last August, it was never up for discussion that Thatcher would be a part of our wedding (photo above). It was assumed that he would be there for our big day. Perhaps we are those crazy dog people... Leaving that up for discussion.

We routinely take Thatcher along to (in addition to all pet stores):

Pottery Barn

Apple

Vineyard Vines

Anthropologie

Banana Republic

Gap

Small boutique stores often allow us to bring Thatcher in as well. Just ask if you aren't sure. You'll be surprised how many places will let you bring your dog in. They'll let you know if they don't want the pup in their store. It never hurts to ask!

Side note: Thatcher is a very well-behaved dog. We got extremely lucky. He's very laid-back and lazy—read more about that in this post. I completely understand why some stores are not pet-friendly as it can be dangerous for others in the store as well as their merchandise.

We also do a lot of over-night traveling with Thatcher. I've found that BringFido.com is the best resource when searching for a pet-friendly hotel. The list sometimes needs to be updated, though. Be sure to call to confirm that they're pet-friendly before booking a room. A lot of boutique hotels are often pet-friendly, too.

A lot of our best memories involve Thatcher. He's a well-traveled pup and fashionista (from tagging along on my shopping trips). I wouldn't have it any other way–he's the best companion.

Does your pup tag along with you?

Thanks for having me, Lauren! 

Pop by and say hi sometime. I'd love to hear from you!

Visiting

Paperless Post

I'm obsessed with Paperless Post (I'm waiting to be their official spokeswoman.....). I wrote a post  here a while ago and am still loving their cards/invitations etc. Having friends that live so far away sometimes you have to plan things way in advance. That's why I sent out and e-mail in April to see if anyone wanted to come and stay for the 4th of July weekend this summer. I'm excited at the thought of having a house full of friends- I love it just being me and Dave, but I also like having a house buzzing with close friends. Since sending out the invite to host everyone, only one friend has booked a flight! And since it's first come first serve at Homeward Bounds I decided to send the cute couple an official reservation. I'm hoping by then we'll have finished the second guest room and whoever else decides to come will be able to sleep comfortably in a bed. But now that we have our wrap around couch upstairs  there are 3 more spots for people to sleep, plus an air mattress. And if we need to my parents house a few miles away.

 I'm going to try to pack in all the friends we can for the weekend because we don't see them enough (especially Dave's best friends) and it'd be fun to be all together for a little while.

pancakes the size of your face....no, really.

One of my favorite things we did while in Tucson was go to BoBo's. If you know me and my friends we really just focus our reunions/trips/outings around food. This quaint breakfast place had such a small town feel to it and was really good. We all commented on how surprised we were that it hasn't been on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives-it was that good.

The hit of breakfast were the pancakes. They were insanely huge! I got a chocolate chip pancake and my friend Melissa (Tera's MOH) got blueberry. I like to think I made a good dent in mine, but I also was eating bacon, Tera's omelet, and her potatoes, which were amazing.

{My obligatory mouth open smile-just means I'm REALLY excited!}

I wanted to eat at a couple other places that my Arizona friends recommended but after BoBo's breakfast that just wasn't happening.

cruisin

It's so hard being back in the office after 5 days away. The Bachelorette Cruise Weekend was a blast though. All the girls got along, we relaxed, we ate (we really just centered everything around eating), we got quality time with da bride (a cruise inside joke), and just enjoyed not being connected to our phones.

 

{Freeport, Bahamas}

Our cruise took off Thursday afternoon and we got back to Jacksonville on Monday morning. Our first stop was Freeport Harbor. When we disembarked we walked around for a little and then decided to take a jam packed cab to Junkanoo beach. We enjoyed the day there before heading back to the ship for dinner.

{Nassau, Bahamas-one hat}

The following day we were in Nassau and decided that we just wanted to walk around the city. We walked the main strip where the stores, open market, and Starbucks was. We walked for a bit before ending up at the gorgeous beach where some of the girls got in the water. I was too freaked out by the mini jellyfish to go in. My plan was to lay out on the ship once we got back which worked out perfectly.

{beautiful Nassau-3 hats: w added some hats to our collection at this point}

{Me and the pretty bride to be}

{Fun group of girls}

{last night at dinner}

Every night we had fun dressing up for dinner. Dinner was by far my favorite meal of the day and we all took full advantage of ordering whatever we wanted. Oh 5 starters look good to you? By all means get them ALL! And we did!

{after the diva's show-a bunch of goofy girls}

The entertainment, when we could stay up for it, was really fun. We ended up seeing a Mo-Town show, comedy show, Diva show, and got cut off at Karaoke. It was such a fun trip and it was so good to get to know the other bridesmaids better. I can't wait for Tera's wedding in 18 days!!!!

More pictures of the cruise tomorrow, because let's face it I wish I was still there.

chillin

 

Paperless post card

saving for a big vaca

Growing up I traveled a lot and often. Granted most people don't have the opportunity I did being an Army brat but my family took full advantage of our assignments and we traveled all over. Since being out of college I haven't done as much international traveling as I would like. After meeting Dave, my traveling settled down even more, our "trips" now were 8 hour drives to his home town to see family and friends. Dave grew up different than I did, not bad, just different. His family would swap destinations every summer-one year they would be in a cabin in beautiful New Hampshire, and the following year they'd be at a timeshare on a gorgeous beach in Florida. As for me, other than summer visits to our family stateside we never really went back to the same place to vacation. I'm all about new places and seeing different parts of the world while my husband prefers these cherished places and I've really come to enjoy them as well.

{The cabin-two years ago vacation}

So naturally-like any good couple-we've come to a compromise. Every other year we'll do his family vacation with his whole extended family at one of their locations (mostly NH if he gets his way-plus we live in Fl now) and then following year we'll do a big vacation-just us-somewhere new.

We already have a running list of places we want to go the first place I want to take Dave is Venice (my favorite city) and then on a Greek Island cruise. It's going to be an expensive trip and I want to pay for a huge chunk of it since Dave take care of basically everything else in our lives.

This is how I'm going to save the $'s:

Change-I have two change jars and I'm going to continue to put my change in there. It's amazing how it adds up
Eating In-No more eating out for lunch, or multiple times a week.
Groceries-only buying groceries we need AND most importantly using the groceries we buy. If we don't it's like throwing money into the trash. Wasteful.
Being THAT person, what do you want for Christmas? Money. What do you want for your birthday? Money. And putting that cold cash into my change jar and hiding it away not in my wallet for spending at Target.
Picking up shifts, I can work more at LOFT instead of just one night a week. Sure, I'll be a little more tired but with the extra money I'll make sure I transfer all of it into my savings account and don't touch it.

Do you have ways you save for an upcoming trip or wish item?

Jumping around Chicago

When I said we decided to take jumping pictures everywhere, I meant it. Here's the proof:

We JUMPED....

in front of the Chicago Skyline

on our walk to the planetarium

at Buckingham Fountain in Grant Park

at Navy Pier

in the "L"

at the bean

at the Memorial Day Parade

at the aquarium

And by a dinosaur

It was a good time. 

That could be another reason I'm so tired as it's the most I've worked out in years. Whew. Good to be home and sedentary!

The Windy City

{Nicole, Katie, and me with the Chicago skyline}

I spent the last five days in Chicago with some of my girlfriends visiting our friend Mary. We had such a great time and did so much that I won't overwhelm you with everything, at least not today. While the trip didn't start off on the best foot (flight was canceled, sent to another airport, standby on 3 flights, double booked my seat on our actual flight) thankfully we all made it there safely.

We of course saw the Bean and had tons of fun taking pictures there. I'm pretty sure this is the most normal picture we have from the entire trip.

Mary, Katie, Nicole, and I at Navy Pier}

Our staple move for pictures were jump shots and I'm sure I'll be sharing more of them later this week when I tell you all about everything we did. It was so nice to explore a new city and be with great friends for a few days. I'm so blessed to have an amazing group of girls that I love and cherish. While I missed Dave I'm glad to know I always have the support of some great girlfriends. I'm so thankful we were able to take the time to visit Mary and have a lot of fun quality time together.

{Nicole and I and her move "the cannonball"}

{We can get some height}

Hope you all had a great weekend as well!