Well, the happy of thanksgiving is over. Apparently after I left to head to my inlaws, my cousins had an argument about how PREGNANT i must be........REALLY COOL GUYS. SO MATURE OF YOU. Thankfully, my Grandmother has some class and said, "If she was pregnant enough to be showing, I would have known long before you. And since I don't, I say she is not, so you can drop it."
So for anyone who was wondering if the 20 pounds I've gained since marriage is baby weight, it is NOT.
For anyone wondering if my distended bloated belly is baby growth, it is NOT. If it was, believe me, I would have already told you.
I would not have wandered around pregnant enough to be showing without actually telling someone.
Idiots.
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Thursday, November 22, 2012
I'm 22
I turned 22 yesterday.......Doesn't really feel very exciting gotta tell ya! I went to work for a half day and then spent the rest of my afternoon cleaning my Mom's house for Thanksgiving and baking rolls for like 17 hours...not really but I was up til 2am doing that....
The hubs bought me a winter jacket that counted as my anniversary present! It's super nice, and it will be perfect for super cold and snowy weather. I do not have any great winter coats.......I live in the desert, so this is a special treat.
He also got me a bunch of gift cards to go on dates and things at Hobby Lobby and Home Depot. He loves me a lot. He cutely painted, worte, drew, crafted, on the outside of each gift card. He painted the envelope of the one for Home Depot, because he bought it so I could buy the paint I wanted. He drew my name in chilies on the envelope for a date night to Chili's. He's super cute!
He also took me out to dinner to Macayo's. It is definitely one of my favorite Mexican restaurants, mostly because the Baja sauce is AMAZING. Seriously, it is so good on everything. I love that man.
I am anxiously awaiting our anniversary getaway. I have ordered his gift, I'm just waiting for the pieces to come in. I'm crossing my fingers they make it before we leave. Can't wait to tell you about it when we get back. I also have almost ALL of the Christmas shopping done. I decorated the house for Christmas on the 17th. I'm a little excited. That, and I declared war on the crap month that it has been in November.
Hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving. Ours was the same as always, just in a smaller number this year. We only had 29 instead of like the normal 50. We will hopefully do some annual cookie baking tomorrow and the rest of our Christmas shopping Saturday. I'll keep you posted......hopefully.
The hubs bought me a winter jacket that counted as my anniversary present! It's super nice, and it will be perfect for super cold and snowy weather. I do not have any great winter coats.......I live in the desert, so this is a special treat.
He also got me a bunch of gift cards to go on dates and things at Hobby Lobby and Home Depot. He loves me a lot. He cutely painted, worte, drew, crafted, on the outside of each gift card. He painted the envelope of the one for Home Depot, because he bought it so I could buy the paint I wanted. He drew my name in chilies on the envelope for a date night to Chili's. He's super cute!
He also took me out to dinner to Macayo's. It is definitely one of my favorite Mexican restaurants, mostly because the Baja sauce is AMAZING. Seriously, it is so good on everything. I love that man.
I am anxiously awaiting our anniversary getaway. I have ordered his gift, I'm just waiting for the pieces to come in. I'm crossing my fingers they make it before we leave. Can't wait to tell you about it when we get back. I also have almost ALL of the Christmas shopping done. I decorated the house for Christmas on the 17th. I'm a little excited. That, and I declared war on the crap month that it has been in November.
Hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving. Ours was the same as always, just in a smaller number this year. We only had 29 instead of like the normal 50. We will hopefully do some annual cookie baking tomorrow and the rest of our Christmas shopping Saturday. I'll keep you posted......hopefully.
When life decides to take a crap on you
I was hoping that I would have many happy things to update about here in the month of November........but this month decided to just take a crap on all of us in the Zahn-Hall family. My sister moved out on her 18th birthday, in the middle of the day, completely unexpectedly, with no warning. I work with my parents, so I see them every single day. I will let you guess where she moved. It's been really hard and heartbreaking, especially to see my parents a complete wreck like they are. My dad crashed his new car that he bought 3 months prior.....they deemed it totaled. Business is slower than we would hope for, and we all know what kind of stress that brings. And to top all of it off, I have had massive nausea for 3 weeks. Don't get excited, it's not THAT kind of nausea. The smell of food makes my stomach turn......like it did 3 years ago.......i get like 4 bites into my dinner and it acts like it wants to come back up.......like it did 3 years ago.......I've lost 7 pounds in the last 3 weeks, but my belly is increasingly bloated. Anyone else having Mono flashbacks yet? I am more than not pleased. I can't believe that I could possibly have to endure that again. Definitely not cool. I cannot 100% guarantee that this is exactly what's happening.....but I lived through it once so I'm pretty sure. A blood test will definitely confirm both non functioning liver and an active mono virus floating around............and yippee I get to do that soon. I am actually really excited about getting that started. If you have never heard of Dr. Greg Allen at Deseret Aesthetics, you are missing out on a really cool Doc, and a really great thing for your body. They have a really great natural hormone therapy program. Everyone is lacking in hormones and other vitamin crap your body needs, but it's hard to get it in the foods we eat etc. His pills, creams, etc are all natural so I'm game for that. I was seeing a naturopath last year and it helped some, but never very much. We also never did a hormone test, her first concern was to make sure I didn't end up with that nasty acid rash again with all the stress leading up to the wedding. I didn't have one so yay there, but my body is just completely destroyed from mono. I've had endometriosis since I started being a female......so cool beans, but Mono made it SIGNIFICANTLY worse. I can sit still in my chair, or lay in bed, and my cramps are so intense I can black out without moving. It's a serious talent. My hair, my nails, my skin, my metabolism, my energy, my everything has pretty much 100% sucked since Mono. I hate it, but I've just learned to live with it. My hormones are most definitely whack, I've had issues with cysts on and off this year and the worsened endometriosis is also a clue. The cysts and endometriosis by themselves would make it hard enough to have kids when we can finally afford to do so.......I would have been pregnant ages ago, but even if we were in a position to afford it, it could take months or even years of trying. I was more than disappointed to learn THAT. lemme just tell ya. Seriously bummed. I've been trying to come to terms with that and deal with it, but it just bums me out, so I'm not really dealing with it. It is the goal with the new hormone program that we could reverse the effects of endometriosis and eventually eliminate it completely. With the right amount of hormones, etc., my body would function properly and there would be no endometriosis problem because there would be no hormone problem. This would also help reduce some risk of miscarriage once I could actually get pregnant. Hopefully it really will work. I would be super even more bummed if it took years to get pregnant. I can't wait for the day that we can finally be at the point where we can really say it's time. Financially, I think we won't be....which sucks, but it is what it is. I get really tired of people telling me that we should wait for years and spend time as a couple. That's not what WE want, and WE are the bosses, we just can't afford to be the bosses of that right now. Oh well, all in due time I guess.
Sunday, October 21, 2012
Don't piss me off andddd How in the heck can jeans be so ridiculously different sizes??
If you don't want to hear the rantings of a lunatic, I would skip down about 5 or 6 paragraphs to the part where I tell the story of how being married makes you fat.........it's not a whole lot more exciting, but it isnt' so full of yelling........
Okay so at this current moment my blood is BOILING and I have to vent somewhere or I WILL EXPLODE. I promise I have been spending the last few days gathering pictures for another update post. But this first cause its consuming my brain. Now, just to clarify, I am not trying to be a vindictive jerk, I apologize in advance for any foul language I don't catch before I post this, there is an ounce of truth in everything, but most of this is coming from a place of high blood pressure and surpressed pissed off-ness. In fact, if you want to skip this, I will in no way be offended. I will probably look back on this one day and think it was just straight up stupid. But in THIS moment, I do not feel bad......SO.
NOTHING in this world makes my blood boil more than someone telling me how to live MY, in case you read that wrong that was M.Y. as in Alycia Zahn's PERSONAL life........okay so that ANDDDD someone who has been talking about how I should be living my life to someone else behind my back and then fronting that it's all fine and dandy and then the other someone else letting it slip that it is not and telling me in a not so discreet way that that's how EVERYONE thinks I should be living MYYYYYYYYY life. Everyone should be SO glad that I do not have great arm muscles, that two fingers on my right punching hand are swollen and can't be made into a fist since I jacked them up at work.........VERY glad.
SINCEEEEEE we are on the subject of my ranting...........EVERYONE needs to stop telling me when they think I should have children. Your opinions are unwanted and unneccesary. If I wanted to know what you thought the timeline of my life should be, I WOULD HAVE ASKED YOU. I do not give you unneccessary or unwarranted advice/how you should live your life timelines. Quite frankly, I do not give a rat's behind how you live your life, that's YOUR problem, not mine. If you need help or advice, I will gladly give my best answer from my own experiences......
This goes against everything I am trying to be right now. I am trying to be more patient, more humble, more calm, less blood-pressure-through-the-roof-pissed-off about things, but THIS particular subject puts knots in my stomach and makes me blow steam out my ears. It takes all of my strength and every ounce of will power I have ever had EVER to NOT yell at people or punch someone in the face, and it's always at the times in which I cannot do these things that the subject is brought up. So i have to smile, and come up with the sweetest sing songy BSSS answer. UGH. My head still feels like its going to explode, but I'm a little better.
Since this post is on the negativity train at the moment, can I just say that we had to get dressed up today and I did not fit in ONE, not one, single pair of dress pants, nor skirts, nor any of my dresses. I wanted to sit down on the floor and cry myself into a puddle and then just fall over and die in my bed. We don't own a scale in this house, but I'm pretty sure I've gained almost 25 pounds in the last year. and 25 pounds doesn't seem like a whole lot, and people always tell me how i look "skinny".......but let's be real. I am not. I have not bought new clothes since my sophmore/junior year of high school. At that point I was at my peak weight (117), and then senior year I lost 20 pounds due to sickness.......no need for new clothes there, and since then I've been gainging weight back, so again, no new clothes needed. Saturday, I ripped my very last pair of jeans. Which means I HAD to face the reality that i was ACTUALLY too fat for my size 3's.....sad day. Now, some of this is large in part due to the fact that when I turned twenty my hips magically decided to expand horizontally as if it would one day be necessary to birth an elephant and not a small human, but ya know, whatev. The pants were tight, but they still FIT until I gained an extra twenty pounds....blah. So last night the hubs and i went and bought some new jeans. I went to womens first, and got some 4's, because i haven't shopped for jeans in 5 years and 3's don't fit, so I figured 4's would.....logical right? i thought. since juniors was right next door, i also picked up some 5's to try on, thinking they might also be the perfect size.......well let me just tell you, after trying on 7 thousand pairs.......the 4's were straight up 7 of me in one pair of pants, like no joke, I would have had to weight like50 pounds more to keep them from falling off, no joke. I could fit another 3 legs and my arms in those things.......as for the 5's......I ended up in 7's to get them on, but i wore a pair today and after about 6 hours they were like the saggy baggy elephant bottom......ugh I cannot win. Guess it's time to jillian michael's it up in this house, eat salad all day err day...and whatever other wacky worky outy things i should be doing. I am going to be serious about this, even though I haven't been the last 6 months, cause i just can't stand it any more. I DO NOT like shopping and I DO NOT want to have to go buy all new clothes because I'm too big of a fatso to fit in my skinny clothes. I refuse to buy anything larger than medium until I am a pregnant whale.......hopefully I can keep up with that promise. Here goes....
Okay so at this current moment my blood is BOILING and I have to vent somewhere or I WILL EXPLODE. I promise I have been spending the last few days gathering pictures for another update post. But this first cause its consuming my brain. Now, just to clarify, I am not trying to be a vindictive jerk, I apologize in advance for any foul language I don't catch before I post this, there is an ounce of truth in everything, but most of this is coming from a place of high blood pressure and surpressed pissed off-ness. In fact, if you want to skip this, I will in no way be offended. I will probably look back on this one day and think it was just straight up stupid. But in THIS moment, I do not feel bad......SO.
NOTHING in this world makes my blood boil more than someone telling me how to live MY, in case you read that wrong that was M.Y. as in Alycia Zahn's PERSONAL life........okay so that ANDDDD someone who has been talking about how I should be living my life to someone else behind my back and then fronting that it's all fine and dandy and then the other someone else letting it slip that it is not and telling me in a not so discreet way that that's how EVERYONE thinks I should be living MYYYYYYYYY life. Everyone should be SO glad that I do not have great arm muscles, that two fingers on my right punching hand are swollen and can't be made into a fist since I jacked them up at work.........VERY glad.
SINCEEEEEE we are on the subject of my ranting...........EVERYONE needs to stop telling me when they think I should have children. Your opinions are unwanted and unneccesary. If I wanted to know what you thought the timeline of my life should be, I WOULD HAVE ASKED YOU. I do not give you unneccessary or unwarranted advice/how you should live your life timelines. Quite frankly, I do not give a rat's behind how you live your life, that's YOUR problem, not mine. If you need help or advice, I will gladly give my best answer from my own experiences......
This goes against everything I am trying to be right now. I am trying to be more patient, more humble, more calm, less blood-pressure-through-the-roof-pissed-off about things, but THIS particular subject puts knots in my stomach and makes me blow steam out my ears. It takes all of my strength and every ounce of will power I have ever had EVER to NOT yell at people or punch someone in the face, and it's always at the times in which I cannot do these things that the subject is brought up. So i have to smile, and come up with the sweetest sing songy BSSS answer. UGH. My head still feels like its going to explode, but I'm a little better.
Since this post is on the negativity train at the moment, can I just say that we had to get dressed up today and I did not fit in ONE, not one, single pair of dress pants, nor skirts, nor any of my dresses. I wanted to sit down on the floor and cry myself into a puddle and then just fall over and die in my bed. We don't own a scale in this house, but I'm pretty sure I've gained almost 25 pounds in the last year. and 25 pounds doesn't seem like a whole lot, and people always tell me how i look "skinny".......but let's be real. I am not. I have not bought new clothes since my sophmore/junior year of high school. At that point I was at my peak weight (117), and then senior year I lost 20 pounds due to sickness.......no need for new clothes there, and since then I've been gainging weight back, so again, no new clothes needed. Saturday, I ripped my very last pair of jeans. Which means I HAD to face the reality that i was ACTUALLY too fat for my size 3's.....sad day. Now, some of this is large in part due to the fact that when I turned twenty my hips magically decided to expand horizontally as if it would one day be necessary to birth an elephant and not a small human, but ya know, whatev. The pants were tight, but they still FIT until I gained an extra twenty pounds....blah. So last night the hubs and i went and bought some new jeans. I went to womens first, and got some 4's, because i haven't shopped for jeans in 5 years and 3's don't fit, so I figured 4's would.....logical right? i thought. since juniors was right next door, i also picked up some 5's to try on, thinking they might also be the perfect size.......well let me just tell you, after trying on 7 thousand pairs.......the 4's were straight up 7 of me in one pair of pants, like no joke, I would have had to weight like50 pounds more to keep them from falling off, no joke. I could fit another 3 legs and my arms in those things.......as for the 5's......I ended up in 7's to get them on, but i wore a pair today and after about 6 hours they were like the saggy baggy elephant bottom......ugh I cannot win. Guess it's time to jillian michael's it up in this house, eat salad all day err day...and whatever other wacky worky outy things i should be doing. I am going to be serious about this, even though I haven't been the last 6 months, cause i just can't stand it any more. I DO NOT like shopping and I DO NOT want to have to go buy all new clothes because I'm too big of a fatso to fit in my skinny clothes. I refuse to buy anything larger than medium until I am a pregnant whale.......hopefully I can keep up with that promise. Here goes....
Monday, October 15, 2012
MIA
Welllllll........here i am again. let's just pretend it hasn't been 100 years, shall we? it would make me feel like i don't have to apologize.....and it would mean I can deny the fact that i have royally sucked at documenting life the last year......oh well. A brief recap i guess?
We bought a new car in March, built a new patio in May, took a trip to California in May, new car was in a wreck in July, took a trip to California again the end of September and here we are now in October..... when I saw it that way it certainly seems less busy.... But it has been everything but that around here. We have been working between 50 and 60 hours consistently, each and every week. We usually work on Saturdays and a good 3 or 4 nights in the week. Sunday is usually our only day off, and quite frankly, by the time I am done with all of the chores and laundry and all the other crap I never got to in the week, I don't have much time to blog, nor do i have the energy! That and I clearly suck at documenting any life through photography.......we took two vacations and I have like 6 pictures to show for it......eesh. Since I discovered Instagram, I have been much better about taking pictures, but it's usually nothing of great importance or value, and it usually does not contain me or the husband.......so failllll once again. Oh well. To follow up this post, I'm going to add a few of the pictures I've taken just so that they are somewhere......
We bought a new car in March, built a new patio in May, took a trip to California in May, new car was in a wreck in July, took a trip to California again the end of September and here we are now in October..... when I saw it that way it certainly seems less busy.... But it has been everything but that around here. We have been working between 50 and 60 hours consistently, each and every week. We usually work on Saturdays and a good 3 or 4 nights in the week. Sunday is usually our only day off, and quite frankly, by the time I am done with all of the chores and laundry and all the other crap I never got to in the week, I don't have much time to blog, nor do i have the energy! That and I clearly suck at documenting any life through photography.......we took two vacations and I have like 6 pictures to show for it......eesh. Since I discovered Instagram, I have been much better about taking pictures, but it's usually nothing of great importance or value, and it usually does not contain me or the husband.......so failllll once again. Oh well. To follow up this post, I'm going to add a few of the pictures I've taken just so that they are somewhere......
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Honeymoon Pics
Here are some Honeymoon pics for anyone who reads this and does not have a facebook.........and for me one day when i decide to ACTUALLY document on a fairly regular basis. It would be nice to have a journal that I can easily flip to online........minus that part where i never "write" in it. My bad..... anyway, this place has been busy lately so I am going to do my best to get some posts up this weekend. They may all be labeled "JUNE" but at least they are here :)
hubs and our cute towel on day 1
okay so this cheesecake was actually 4 layers and covered in strawberries. i think it weighed as much as me but boy was it delicious
our balcony
cabo
the couch that i will one day own
the "amazing" ficus
the canyon on our safari tour
turtle beach
our tour guide!
josh making me a tortilla
me taking said tortilla as instructed by the tour guide
the giant bus/tank
the lady could not get our picture right, every single one has her finger in it.....
favorite. so cute
our lunch view. had the whole balcony to ourselves
our INCREDIBLE lunch
josh thought this was hilarious
reflection picture
mini golf on the top deck
my love
hubs whoopin my butt at mini golf
gorgeous sunset from the top deck
just kidding, this one was really my favorite
gorgeous stormy day we watched from our balcony
our room
disney all lit up for christmas!
oh hey nemo! thanks for the memories
autopia-man we were tired!
me in my cute tee from Lindsey Carter
hubs!
so sad uncle rob isn't here
more sad
even more sad
happy pic cause wife said so
here is a video of some dolphins we watched from the balcony, definitely the tail end of their little pod cause there were like 20 before i ran to get the camera. we also saw a whale but couldn't catch that in time!
Sunday, April 1, 2012
Rainy Weddings, Honeymoons, Lost Diamonds and Luggage
After the title I just gave you, I'm not sure how much explanation is really necessary. That is really how it all went down....okay so maybe there is a little bit more to it than that. BUT the rainy wedding was the truth, so was a rainy honeymoon come to think of it.......and we did have lost luggage and lost diamonds. I know I had said I was ready for a new crazy adventure, but that wasn't EXACTLY what I had been planning on to kick off week one of marriage. Oh well, what can ya do? At least it makes for a good story someone else can laugh at later :) SO let's start at the beginning.....
I slept in til 745 the morning of the wedding, probably because we weren't getting married til 2 and probably because I was up all night.....either way, it felt nice. Minus that part where it was pouring rain... Tracy and I then went to my hair appointment and Scottsdale (thank goodness for a carpool buddy-she is a great one!). I think we got home around 1030? And everyone was all busy putting up chairs and such.in and amongst the rain......my photography girls came around 11 and we goofed around a bit, the make up lady was supposed to come around noon......she got lost, i mildly panicked but then she showed up at like 1220 and all was okay again. I seriously need to make enough money for her to come over like everyday. Anyway....we got me all dressed and ready by 130-i don't think I have ever in my life had so many people hands shoving dress parts around my butt-it was a lovely bonding moment for the 7 of us in the room :) Everyone left me by myself in the room when they went out to either a) check to see if everyone was ready or b) get things rolling. I seriously thought i was going to fall over and die! I was SO nervous, I couldn't hear anyone bustling around, I couldn't check out the window to see what was going on....I was seriously freaking out. Then someone finnaly came to get me and I seriously wanted to fall over. WORST part of the whole thing. Well that and the fact that the rain stopped like right at 145......talk about making one nervous for delays too. Then I saw my Daddy and he walked me down the aisle and I was totally fine, smiles and everything. AND THEN I saw Joshua standing next to Robert, with big ole tears in his sweet eyes....he kills me. I was doing so good! Right up until the time that he and my Dad were both crying and then he took my hand........I held it together for a good while, tho i certainly did want to start balling everywhere. Robert read a little about us to share with our guests.....my favorite line was "Josh says the most beautiful thing about Aly is her smile, it accentuates her body.....uh beauty...." and we all died laughing. And then a short time later he made us read our vows and then i started blubbering all over the dang place. But my makeup held up well and the crazy photographer said my crying was cute. I'm pretty sure that my wedding day is the one and only day that I accomplished looking cute while crying, sadly I don't think I could ever duplicate it again. Anyway, after all that blubbering mess we were married and oh so happy! We at some cake and signed the license and then took no lie.......like 2400 pictures. crazy-ness. sadly it started raining right as we finally got to take some photos of the bride and groom......so i only have a very limited number of those.....but its okay, they are lovely. it took like an hour to get back into regular clothes......so many buttons and clasps and whatever else-good thing i had tracy and my mom do it or we never would have gotten home!
The day of the reception was gorgeous, it rained until 2pm, but Michelle did an amazing job of decorating despite the weather and it turned out so beautiful! It had been 84 for Thanksgiving, but the night of the reception it was in the high 40's, I felt so bad that the guests were so cold! And I'll be honest in my selfish bride way, I was sad for me too cause we had no heater under that gazebo! It was SO cold! My photo booth girls never showed up-so sadly we didn't have enough publicity for the corner with the lifesize photos of josh and i, but we got a few funny ones!
We had Saturday to do nothing or to visit family, we made the rounds and visited each side since so many came into town just for us. It was a lovely relaxing day, minus that part where we forgot to pack and were up til 2am trying to pack for a 10 day vacation....oops......and then I forgot my formal dress for the Captains dinner, so I drove to my mom's house at 7am to get it, pack it and be ready to go at 730 since Josh's mom was picking us up to drop us at the airport. I was such a nervous wreck on the way there-so worried i had forgotten something and that we wouldn't be able to get on the cruise! We had plenty of time to just chill in the airport, which was nice, and our flight to LA was so short! When we got down to the baggage terminal we saw a few others from our flight picking up there bags so we waited a few minutes......then the carousel turned off......the Cruise ship attendant was waiting there with the ENTIRE group ready to board the bus......and we were holding everyone up. The ladies in the baggage claim said that they had no clue which plane it was on, but they would try to track it down and bring it to the ship before it departed at 4. It was 1030.......needless to say we were very nervous. We boarded the bus that drove us to the cruise ship, got through all of the cruise ship security, sat on the deck and anxiously waited for a phone call......it never came. At 315 I called Southwest and the lady in baggage claim says, "Oh well I think it's gone out of here all ready, I see no record of it here anymore which means they should have already brought it to your cruise ship!" ohhhhhhhhh boy. We crossed our fingers, cause there was no way of knowing until all baggage was delivered to rooms around 7pm. At 714 our bags were at our door......Day 1 of Honeymoon-not the best ever, but we knew the next day would be so much fun!
Day 2 of the cruise we explored the ship, stuffed our faces and lazed around. Sometime while we were at dinner, they delivered a note under our door saying our Shore Excursion for the following day had been canceled. We were so bummed! Josh booked it 6 months ago cause it was the only thing we REALLY wanted to do! We got over it when we realized that the oxygen lines for the helmet dive were malfunctioning, we really didn't want to explore the ocean floor with no air......so the excursion desk hooked us up with a Safari Jeep deal so our money didn't go to waste! We thought that would be SO awesome! Josh loves his jeep and he loves off roading, so why not do it in mexico where the weather is so nice!................We loaded into a bus that drove us to the other side of Cabo San Lucas, they let us out in the middle of the desert off the highway (literally) at this tiny little gated house (I'm sure it was ancient). There was a giant old dog in the driveway and a Mercedes off road vehicle that reminded me largely of a tank. There were straps hanging from the ceiling and 3 step stools to get in...we looked at each other and the group we were with. We had no idea that the people on the bus were all going to the same place. We soon realized we were the only ones under the age of 55-and thats no lie. At this point we were still excited about the safari......we had a great tour guide! he was so funny and LOVED to pick on us, especially once he found out we were newly married! We rode in this giant tank for like 5 minutes.........seriously only 5 down this little dirt road....enjoy the pic cause its the only one I have access to at the moment......
I slept in til 745 the morning of the wedding, probably because we weren't getting married til 2 and probably because I was up all night.....either way, it felt nice. Minus that part where it was pouring rain... Tracy and I then went to my hair appointment and Scottsdale (thank goodness for a carpool buddy-she is a great one!). I think we got home around 1030? And everyone was all busy putting up chairs and such.in and amongst the rain......my photography girls came around 11 and we goofed around a bit, the make up lady was supposed to come around noon......she got lost, i mildly panicked but then she showed up at like 1220 and all was okay again. I seriously need to make enough money for her to come over like everyday. Anyway....we got me all dressed and ready by 130-i don't think I have ever in my life had so many people hands shoving dress parts around my butt-it was a lovely bonding moment for the 7 of us in the room :) Everyone left me by myself in the room when they went out to either a) check to see if everyone was ready or b) get things rolling. I seriously thought i was going to fall over and die! I was SO nervous, I couldn't hear anyone bustling around, I couldn't check out the window to see what was going on....I was seriously freaking out. Then someone finnaly came to get me and I seriously wanted to fall over. WORST part of the whole thing. Well that and the fact that the rain stopped like right at 145......talk about making one nervous for delays too. Then I saw my Daddy and he walked me down the aisle and I was totally fine, smiles and everything. AND THEN I saw Joshua standing next to Robert, with big ole tears in his sweet eyes....he kills me. I was doing so good! Right up until the time that he and my Dad were both crying and then he took my hand........I held it together for a good while, tho i certainly did want to start balling everywhere. Robert read a little about us to share with our guests.....my favorite line was "Josh says the most beautiful thing about Aly is her smile, it accentuates her body.....uh beauty...." and we all died laughing. And then a short time later he made us read our vows and then i started blubbering all over the dang place. But my makeup held up well and the crazy photographer said my crying was cute. I'm pretty sure that my wedding day is the one and only day that I accomplished looking cute while crying, sadly I don't think I could ever duplicate it again. Anyway, after all that blubbering mess we were married and oh so happy! We at some cake and signed the license and then took no lie.......like 2400 pictures. crazy-ness. sadly it started raining right as we finally got to take some photos of the bride and groom......so i only have a very limited number of those.....but its okay, they are lovely. it took like an hour to get back into regular clothes......so many buttons and clasps and whatever else-good thing i had tracy and my mom do it or we never would have gotten home!
The day of the reception was gorgeous, it rained until 2pm, but Michelle did an amazing job of decorating despite the weather and it turned out so beautiful! It had been 84 for Thanksgiving, but the night of the reception it was in the high 40's, I felt so bad that the guests were so cold! And I'll be honest in my selfish bride way, I was sad for me too cause we had no heater under that gazebo! It was SO cold! My photo booth girls never showed up-so sadly we didn't have enough publicity for the corner with the lifesize photos of josh and i, but we got a few funny ones!
We had Saturday to do nothing or to visit family, we made the rounds and visited each side since so many came into town just for us. It was a lovely relaxing day, minus that part where we forgot to pack and were up til 2am trying to pack for a 10 day vacation....oops......and then I forgot my formal dress for the Captains dinner, so I drove to my mom's house at 7am to get it, pack it and be ready to go at 730 since Josh's mom was picking us up to drop us at the airport. I was such a nervous wreck on the way there-so worried i had forgotten something and that we wouldn't be able to get on the cruise! We had plenty of time to just chill in the airport, which was nice, and our flight to LA was so short! When we got down to the baggage terminal we saw a few others from our flight picking up there bags so we waited a few minutes......then the carousel turned off......the Cruise ship attendant was waiting there with the ENTIRE group ready to board the bus......and we were holding everyone up. The ladies in the baggage claim said that they had no clue which plane it was on, but they would try to track it down and bring it to the ship before it departed at 4. It was 1030.......needless to say we were very nervous. We boarded the bus that drove us to the cruise ship, got through all of the cruise ship security, sat on the deck and anxiously waited for a phone call......it never came. At 315 I called Southwest and the lady in baggage claim says, "Oh well I think it's gone out of here all ready, I see no record of it here anymore which means they should have already brought it to your cruise ship!" ohhhhhhhhh boy. We crossed our fingers, cause there was no way of knowing until all baggage was delivered to rooms around 7pm. At 714 our bags were at our door......Day 1 of Honeymoon-not the best ever, but we knew the next day would be so much fun!
Day 2 of the cruise we explored the ship, stuffed our faces and lazed around. Sometime while we were at dinner, they delivered a note under our door saying our Shore Excursion for the following day had been canceled. We were so bummed! Josh booked it 6 months ago cause it was the only thing we REALLY wanted to do! We got over it when we realized that the oxygen lines for the helmet dive were malfunctioning, we really didn't want to explore the ocean floor with no air......so the excursion desk hooked us up with a Safari Jeep deal so our money didn't go to waste! We thought that would be SO awesome! Josh loves his jeep and he loves off roading, so why not do it in mexico where the weather is so nice!................We loaded into a bus that drove us to the other side of Cabo San Lucas, they let us out in the middle of the desert off the highway (literally) at this tiny little gated house (I'm sure it was ancient). There was a giant old dog in the driveway and a Mercedes off road vehicle that reminded me largely of a tank. There were straps hanging from the ceiling and 3 step stools to get in...we looked at each other and the group we were with. We had no idea that the people on the bus were all going to the same place. We soon realized we were the only ones under the age of 55-and thats no lie. At this point we were still excited about the safari......we had a great tour guide! he was so funny and LOVED to pick on us, especially once he found out we were newly married! We rode in this giant tank for like 5 minutes.........seriously only 5 down this little dirt road....enjoy the pic cause its the only one I have access to at the moment......
Then we had to unload everyone.........that was a chore since 3 of them had canes. I love old people, don't get me wrong but this was just not an excursion that fit them. Or us for that matter. So we all "hop" out and our guide leads us down a dirt path for a "hike" in the desert. He starts showing us the plants and pointing out the cactus, and the cameras start going nuts. All of these people were from Minnesota or something cause they had never seen cactus before. Our guide proceeds to tell us that the only cactus that they do not have in Mexico is the Saguaro......and then we got a lesson on the Saguaro.......we both were beginning to wonder why we paid money for all of this education we had learned in public school 15 years earlier...... at least our tour guide had good jokes.
So we get to the bottom of a giant hill on this hike and we arrive in sand. And he says, "Let me show you the amazing ficus tree!" Josh and I both rolled our eyes because everyone we know in Arizona owns a ficus. I will hand it to this guy tho, this one had some pretty cool roots!
We hopped back into the tank and drove down about 5 minutes to the beach where they have a turtle rescue operation. We stayed a few minutes to watch the waves and then drove another 3 minutes to a little ramada on a hill where a lovely lady had prepared us an "authentic Mexican lunch".......we ate cheese melted on a tortilla with some refried beans. hahah
Then they had the "tequila tasting".........um yeah..
On day 4 we made it to Puerto Vallarta and since we had no shore excursions we were free to explore. We hopped a taxi to downtown for some shopping. The shopping rather stunk. So we decided instead to find us some REAL Mexican food for lunch. And we DID, it was amazing. Our waiter took us to the roof top that overlooks the ocean and we got the most incredibly huge plate of the most delicious food we have ever eaten. It was incredible. Minus that part where Puerto Vallarta was 96 and humid that day. We were back in our room an hour later enjoying the a/c.....haha :)
We LOVED our balcony room, we were not really fans of hanging out on the top deck where everyone was so obnoxious, so instead we spent a lot of time watching the ocean pass by while we sat on our deck chairs with our ice cream/coffee/hot chocolate/etc. We ate twice our body weight in food that entire week and it was so worth it. We took advantage of free room service and the midnight snack bar often. And it was wonderful. Not a great way to start off the marriage if you want your husband to think you are an incredible cook, we were so spoiled with such good food that whole time that it was almost disappointing to have to come home and make dinner!
We made it back to LA a week later, leaving the ship with a new watch and a Carnival Splendor ornament to remember our trip by. We had all of our luggage this time and happily made our way over to LAX to grab our rental car for the remainder of our stay. We immediately headed to our hotel room to drop off our crap and head over to Six Flags to use up our passes..........then we passed by Disneyland and our hotel was a block later.....thank you hotels.com for sucking at telling us which hotel was closest to Six Flags. When we realized that Six Flags was more than 50 minutes away we just decided to hop down the street to Disney since they were open for another 13 hours! I had never been during the Christmas season to see all of their incredible decorations so I was so stoked! It was crowded, but it wasn't terrible and we had so much fun! You'd think i'd have some pictures, but I ended up with like 5 from the whole day.........BUT i did find a "Finding Nemo" ornament, which we also took home as a memento of our trip. Good thing too cause I didn't have a whole lot of ornaments!
The next day we went to Universal Studios cause we had an annual pass and why not use free things? So we headed off about 9am, it was cold and veryyyyyyy rainy. Did I mention that it was VERY rainy? Anyways....there was NO ONE there. Can you ever guess why? We immediately purchased an umbrella and some cheap gloves cause our hands were freezing! They had adorable minions I wanted to purchase but I promised myself I would wait til we left so I didn't have to carry it around. It was so nice to not have to wait in any lines! We took lots of pictures of Josh to send to Uncle Rob with Josh pouting about the fact that his uncle couldn't be there with him! They are funny so I will post them later. At lunch we were admiring my ring and talking about how weird it was that we were married. An hour later on our way to a ride I realized that while looking at my wedding band, I was actually staring straight through to my finger. I PANICKED and started searching all of my pockets and Josh's pockets, we searched the mittens........nothing......it was gone. I was so devastated. I had worn the ring for 8 days doing nothing but sitting in a beach chair and one of my diamonds was gone! You would think I would have half a brain and some logic, but my immediate thought was "my mine cut diamonds! they stopped cutting them like that 100 years ago! they won't have any anymore!" DUMB. but that was my thought. I wanted to sit down and cry, but the ground was wet. I was wet and cold and now I wanted to cry. At that point I was just ready to go home. We decided to leave the park early to go sit in the warm airport til our flight so I could mope about not having my diamonds and be out of the rain. It was not quite 2pm. Our flight was at 7. Just because this will be necessary information in a moment. and for the record, LAX is 22 minutes (CHECK GOOGLE I DO NOT LIE) from Universal Studios. Sweet, 4 hours to sit in the cozy airport. WRONG. So we leave Universal Studios cold, grouchy, wet, diamondless, exhausted and minion-less. We get in the car and head to the freeway. Which we enter and it does not move. I will spare you the conversation from the car. Just know this, we arrived at the rental car facility (a mile and a half from LAX) at 5:56. We boarded the next shuttle and made it to the airport at 6:17. We checked in as fast as we could, having to transfer some pants from one bag to another to avoid an extra fee. We pretty much threw our luggage at the poor luggage people and ran to security at 6:28. We had a 7pm flight. Southwest boards at 6:40. We were seriously pushing it. I get randomly pulled for the x-ray screening. Seriously. And I can hear some guy in a room somewhere speaking into the TSA lady's head set. "She's carrying something on her waist. you need to check her waist" And she just sort of looks at me and looks at my pants. Because I was already a grouch and in no mood for this crap so that I might miss my flight I just lifted my shirt to my midriff and said, "I have nothing, is it my buttons? Please feel free to check it out. Sooner is better" She looked at my waist and touched my tag on the pocked and said "all clear, just a tag" and let me be on my way. It was now 6:36 and we were booking it with shoes untied and everything. When we were halfway to the gate we hear "Flight 1829 to Phoenix is now delayed due to weather." Breathless, we both just sat down on the nearest chair and then decided we were hungry for a burrito. So we waited another hour and a half for our dang flight home. Thank goodness my Mom and Dad were already waiting at the gate when we got home cause we were MORE than ready to be home. We crash landed in bed and didnt wake up for 11 hours.
We had a blast on our honeymoon! It wasn't at all what we expected, but we wouldn't trade a single minute of the alone time we had together, we hadn't had a whole lot of that before so it was glorious to have nothing but "us" time for 9 straight days!
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