Holiday Weekend and a Big Announcement

Hello, darlings! I hope you had a wonderful holiday weekend! The beau and I opted not to take Friday off work, so it wasn't a long weekend for us, but it certainly was an eventful one! 

First of all, I have a big announcement... no, not as big as the last one, but perhaps more surprising... We're moving to Kansas City! And we're doing it in two weeks! That means the countdown has officially begun - the countdown of days left at work, of plans made with friends, of boxes to pack, and of wedding tasks to complete before we hit the road. 

I never could have imagined this year would be so full of huge life events, but what a delightful year it has been. Talk about finishing out my 20's with a bang, eh? 

Thursday we decided to spend one last holiday with my family, enjoying a perfectly summery dinner at my parents' house followed by fireworks downtown - the same ones I've been watching light up the skies over my hometown for 29 years. We ran around waving sparklers with my nephews in the same dead end street where I learned to ride a bike and climb trees.

Saturday we met up with my family again, this time at the Oakland Zoo. My fiance hadn't been to a zoo since he was a kid, so we decided that was a good item to put on the "lasts" lists for the countdown of days left in the Bay Area.

 

Sunday the beau and I spend the morning hiking at Mount Tamalpais. I got my first sunburn of the year. It is his favorite place in the Bay, so he really wanted to go one last time, and even though I'm a local, I had never been to the peak before, so it seemed worth a go.
 

We finished up our weekend with an award-worthy bargain shopping trip to the North Face Outlet in Berkeley. You know how much I love a good sale! We managed to pick up two snow jackets, three hoodies, one pair of gloves, and a beanie for... get this... $230. I kid you not. We added up the regular retail prices on all of our items and it totaled $830. *Patting myself on the back*

Tourist in my City

There are so many fun things to do in San Francisco that I never do unless I've got out of town guests. It has been ages since I spent some time being a tourist in my own city, but I more than made up for it last weekend!

We drove down "the crookedest street" (Lombard), people watched at Ocean Beach from the patio at Cliff House (we event spotted a wedding ceremony on their balcony!), fingered through the endless racks of used albums at Amoeba Music in the Haight, shopped the farmer's market at the Ferry Building, enjoyed a 90-minute sailboat ride on the bay, rode the carousel at Pier 39, where we also watched a magic show and took silly photos in a photo booth.

 

 

 

Tea Bridal Shower

Erin and I have been friends since we were four years old. We met in Sunday School at a little church in our hometown. We've had oh so many adventures over the last 24 years; growing up at the same church and sometimes in the same schools, spending a summer in Nepal together during high school, an internship in Dallas, and in recent years plenty of visits back and forth between her home in Los Angeles and mine in San Francisco. She's a gem, and I couldn't be more thrilled to be a part of her big day - in Jamaica no less!

Last weekend was Erin's bridal shower, a tea party with flea market inspired decor. It was a very "Erin" tea, with every last detail well thought out. I'm not sure how her fiance will react when he realizes Erin registered for and indeed received every type of bowl and desert dish imaginable, but I'd say the event went off without a hitch and she got piles of fabulous gifts.