Disneyland

I seriously can't believe how fast that vacation went. I am already hoping that Brandon will let me plan another one sometime soon, maybe for his birthday or something. Or maybe my parents will plan some extravagant family vacation for this summer and will let us tag along (hint hint). We left Friday afternoon around 2:30 and drove all the way to Vegas that night. Brandon's older brother James and his girlfriend came with us too. We hit quite a bit of weather on the way down there. It was snowing like crazy between Provo and Cedar City and it was a little scary, not gonna lie. We got to Vegas at about 9:00 their time, and stayed at a hotel just south of the strip. It was a pretty nice hotel. Brandon and I had booked it before James and Candis decided to come so the room only had one bed, but they brought sleeping pads and everything was fine. The next morning we left the hotel at 7:00, drove down the strip, then made our way to Anaheim. We got to our hotel around 11:30, but couldn't check in yet so we parked the car and walked over to the park.

We stayed at a Travelodge hotel, and it definitely wasn't the nicest hotel ever, but it worked, and the location was prime. All we had to do was walk across the street, walk through the Disney parking garage, and take the Disney tram to the loading area at Downtown Disney. It was super convenient. So we got to the parks, got our tickets from will call, got a "Happy Birthday" button for me and an "I'm Celebrating" button for Brandon, and made our way into Disneyland! James and Candis went to California Adventure the first day, and I think it was kind of nice for us split up and go to the parks just as couples. Brandon and I have been so busy lately that I feel like we hardly ever get time alone, so it was fun to hang out together for five days straight.

Holding to tradition, the first ride we rode was the Jungle Cruise. It's not our favorite, but it is the first ride you come across when you turn left into Adventureland. We were starving when we got to the park, because we hadn't eaten since breakfast that morning, so we got some barbecue skewers and a mickey pretzel (my fave) for lunch. We made our way around the park, waiting in lines, riding the rides, and people watching (we did lots of that). Unfortunately, the weather in Anaheim was nothing like the weather was in Orlando when we were there in August. It was maybe 65 degrees at noon, and from about 3:00 on it just kept getting colder. We got a mickey shaped ice cream that afternoon, but at about 7:00 we were so cold that we got hot chocolate! Nuts huh? Around 8:30 we were so cold that it just wasn't even fun to be there anymore, so we went and checked into the hotel and fell asleep.

The next morning we woke up early so we could get to California Adventure when it opened. James and Candis didn't go to a park that day, so Brandon and I were on our own again. When we got to California adventure, we hurried to get fast passes for the show World of Color. Then we went to Cars Land so we could do everything over there before it got busy. Cars Land was way neat! We got to walk through Radiator Springs, see Mater, and we even got some Cars buttons! The main ride in Cars Land was great too. You get to drive through the town, then you race another car around a track. It was a long ride, and we were all way impressed with it! I was so happy that we got there when we did though. Later that day the wait time was more than 90 minutes! We got fast passes for it after we rode it the first time so we could go on it again later.

We finished out Cars Land, the Bugs' Life area, Tower of Terror, and by then it was probably about noon and we were starving. We went over to the pier to eat at Cocina Cucamonga, a Mexican place, and let me tell you, it was so dang good. By that time too it had started to get pretty warm. The high that day was 75, but I wore jeans because I had been so cold the day before. I rolled my jeans up into capris though, and had on a t shirt, so I was pretty comfortable the rest of the day. We did all the other rides in the park like California Screaming, Ariel's Undersea Adventure, and tons more. We didn't do Toy Story Mania though, because the line was so long and we pretty much beat the game on the Wii like three months ago. Like the day before, we had a lot of fun just people watching. The pier area was so pretty lit up at night, so we just walked through the shops before World of Color started. World of Color was amazing! It is a water show with lots of, you guessed it, color. I am always amazed at how well Disney does things. Their shows are so magical that it seriously makes me want to cry every time. After World of Color we hurried over to Disneyland so we could watch Fantasmic. I was so happy that we did that, because the show doesn't run during the week, and we hadn't planned on going to Disneyland again until Monday, so we made the right decision! We never got to see Fantasmic in Disney World, so yeah, it was a good thing we raced over there for a good seat Sunday night! After Fantasmic we went on Indiana Jones. I hate that ride. I had only ever been on it once before and I really didn't want to go on it, but Brandon did, so I decided that I would be a good wife and make the sacrifice. I won't go into details, but lets just say the ride didn't work out so well for me.

Monday morning we got to sleep in since the park didn't open until 9:00. I think we all finally got out of bed around 8:30. Brandon and I got to Disneyland around 10:00 and hurried to get in line for the Matterhorn. While we were waiting in line I told him that he should text James and tell him that we were at the park if he and Candis wanted to meet up for lunch later. Brandon said that he would text James after the ride, and as soon as he said that James and Candis walked right past us! They were going to get in line for the Matterhorn too, so we let them hop in line with us. That ride is not as great as I remember. It just made my bum hurt. After that ride Brandon and I went over to Tomorrowland to ride the Finding Nemo submarine ride and Star Tours. The line for Space Mountain was really long, so we got fast passes for that and then rode Pirates again before we had lunch with James and Candis. I got free dessert from the place we ate because of my birthday pin! And at dinner the previous night the cashier lady gave us a discount because it was my birthday. I love those pins, they get you so many great things. Anyways, after lunch Brandon and I went back over to California Adventure. They have an Aladdin show there that we hadn't been able to see the day before so we went and watched that, and just spent more time walking around. We saw two people that we used to work with at the movie theater, so that was fun! We went back to Disneyland around 7:00 and were going to ride some more rides, but there had been a parade, so we had to take roundabout ways to get where we wanted to go and after walking around so much we didn't even care. We didn't even ride Splash Mountain or Space Mountain. I think we are disney'd out. We did watch the fireworks that night though. James and Candis came and sat with us too. After the fireworks we snagged some hot dogs and then went back to the hotel.

Tuesday morning I woke up dead. Not literally, but I had been keeping a cold at bay for about two weeks, and it finally hit. Airborne had been my best friend before the trip, but I forgot to bring it with us, so each morning I could feel myself getting more and more sick. Tuesday it hit in full force. On top of that, we had a 12 hour drive ahead of us, and I always tell myself that if Brandon is driving then I have to stay awake to make sure he is doing okay. Luckily James offered to drive for about half of the trip, so Brandon and I got to nap in the backseat. It was a long drive, but it wasn't as terrible as I thought it would be. We stopped at Del Taco on the way home, and my throat hurt so bad so I got a shake and a small taco. We got back to Logan around 8:30, so we made pretty good time. We dropped off James and Candis then went to go get Sophie from Brandon's parents' house. She was so happy to see me! It made me the happiest cat-mom in the world. She heard the car pull up and was waiting for us by the door when we came in, then she let me pick her up and she just sat on my shoulders for probably a good fifteen minutes.

When we were getting ready to leave to go to our apartment, I noticed that my wrist was itchy. I looked at it and had a few bumps, but I wasn't sure what they were. About five minutes later I looked at it again, and the bumps had turned into hives. We had to stop at the store to get milk, so I bought some benadryl too. When we got home and was getting ready to put on my pj's, and saw that the hives had spread to my stomach, armpits, and legs. My legs felt like they were turning to toad skin, it was gross. Brandon told me that I should go take a shower, just in case they were from something that I had touched, but when I went to turn on the water, nothing came out. They were doing construction out on our street so I guess they had turned the water off. It's a good thing we keep water in the fridge or else we wouldn't have been able to brush our teeth. I went to bed in a miserable state. Coming home from vacation was a lot worse than it usually is, because of my sickness and the hives. Yesterday morning the hives came back, and they have been off and on since then. But I felt so tired yesterday that I only came to work for six hours then went home for the rest of the afternoon and did nothing.

Honestly, the vacation didn't live up to my expectations. I don't even know what to think about it now, because if a Disney Vacation didn't cure my mid semester blues, I don't know what can. But oh well. Below are some happy pictures of things we did/bought on our trip.








 
 

This was the best day ever!!

 

 




 

New Favorite Thing

Tomorrow we leave for DISNEYLAND!!!! I seriously am so excited that I can't even focus on anything else. I think falling asleep tonight and tomorrow night is going to be so difficult. The weather right now in Anaheim is a good 30-40 degrees warmer than it here in Logan, and I cannot wait to break out my short shorts and sandals! Sadly though, my skin is whiter than the dang snow that keeps falling from the sky. So in preparation for our trip, and for my short shorts, I went and got a spray tan.

When I say they are my new favorite thing, that might be sort of an understatement. I am in love with them. I found a $25 gift certificate to Planet Beach, so I only ended up paying $4 for my tan, and let me tell you, I look pretty good. It was way weird to get sprayed with the stuff, plus I had to hold my breath for like 30 seconds, which is hard when you are nervous turns out, and I smelled way gross all night. But let me tell you, it was so worth it. I got to wear my darker, summer shade of foundation this morning, you can't see my veins through my legs, and most importantly, nobody in Disneyland will go blind when they see my legs reflecting the sunlight.

I did learn a few things though: always always always pat dry your feet. My feet turned out kind of orange, but I don't even care. Also, if you are a women and have legs larger than toothpicks, stand with them further apart than you normally would. I have this awkward less-than-tan area on the inside of my legs. And finally, even if you are nervous, don't bend your arms so much that the spray stuff can't get inside the crook of your elbow. White circles are not attractive.

I know this all sounds way superficial, but I am pretty sure that there is some unspoken rule that if you have skin whiter than printer paper you are allowed to be kind of superficial when it comes to this stuff.

Next time I blog it will be about Disneyland!!!!!!!!! I can't wait!

Exciting stuff.

Ha. The title of this entry fooled you into reading the blog didn't it? Well now you have started and can't stop, so sorry if it is disappointing. This week has been happily atrocious. Doesn't really make sense does it? We'll start with the negative things.

1. Brandon is sick
2. Spanish test today
3. Adult development test on Friday
4. We still have 8 days until we leave for Disneyland
5. I haven't had time to read my book at all this week
6. I had a meltdown yesterday about how much I currently dislike my job and want to do something different
7. It is still freezing cold here, and I am more than ready for it to warm up and for the snow to melt.

So all of those things have been super sucky. But good things have come of them all! Okay, mostly all of them.

1. Due to Brandon's sickness we have left the house twice this week in our sweats to go get ice cream. We never leave the house in sweats. And we have been watching lots of t.v., so that's nice!
2. Spanish still sucks, that will never change.
3. My adult development test will be easy, so that is alright.
4. At least we are going to Disneyland
5. Still bad.

6 and 7 are kind of combined. I decided yesterday that there is no way I can handle working 40 hours a week at the library this summer. I decided to maybe look for another part time job. But then I started thinking about an internship somewhere outside of Utah. Brandon isn't really taking initiative to look for an internship for himself, and no one offers internships for Human Development majors, but I decided to branch out and apply for some anyways. I have found quite a few that I am interested in, but I have only applied for one so far. It is a publicity internship with Pixar! I know that I am limited because I am not a business or PR major, but it is something that I feel I would like and would be good at. I would really love to find an internship with a publishing company or with Disney or Universal or something like that, but we will see!

In other news, today I am wearing my Harry Potter shirt for good luck for my test. I can't wait until school ends. I decided that every summer I am going to reread the Harry Potter books, and I seriously can't wait to be able to do that! I might even make a paper chain to count down the days. I love paper chains!

Also my birthday is on Sunday.

Have a great week!

Words.

So yesterday I started this book called Love is a Mix Tape by Rob Sheffield. It is a memoir about music and his wife who died. They got married when they were 25 and both knew they were crazy, because who gets married that young right? Wrong, obviously. More and more people are getting married younger lately, even people who aren't from Utah (surprisingly). I haven't had a lot of personal experience with people telling me that getting married so young was a mistake, but I do know that some of my friends have had this problem. I found this little section in my book, when the couple were deciding to get married and kinda just wanted to share it. Mr. Sheffield and his little wifey had a good way of sticking it to the man.

"We were just a couple of fallen angels, rolling the dice of our lives. We'd heard all the horror stories of early marriages and fast divorces and broken hearts. But we knew none of them would happen to us, because as Dexy's Midnight Runners sang to Eileen, we were far too young and clever. What if we just decide not to fall apart? What if we decide not to wait and see what happens, but instead decide what we want to happen and then decide how to make it happen? Like Burt Reynolds says to Jerry Reed in Smokey and the Bandit, 'We ain't never not made it before, have we?'"

It's going to be a long day.

Happy Wednesday!! I can't believe we are already halfway through the week. Not having class on Monday has made for a great week so far. Plus I only had two of my four classes yesterday, so that was really nice. Today though, I have all four classes, and for some reason that really drags out the day. On top of that, I only got about five hours of sleep last night. I didn't fall asleep until midnight, so when the alarm went off at 5:30 it was super hard to get out of bed. Yesterday morning the alarm didn't go off, so we didn't end up getting out of bed until 6:00, and it was a good thing that I woke up when I did. Somehow I still made it to work at 7:00, but today, even though we were up earlier (only by like 15 minutes by the time we actually got out of bed) I was six minutes late to work. Hopefully this isn't a pattern that is starting! Luckily no one in their right mind is at the library at 7 am, and my boss doesn't really mind if I am late anyways.
Also luckily, if this is just meant to be a bad week at least I don't have assignments to do. I had two assignments due this week and I finished them last week and turned them in, so this week a a week for book reading! I am super excited. I read about 12 books last semester and so far this semester I have only read one. I feel like a slacker, so I am trying to make up for that this week.
This last weekend was pretty great! Friday night we stopped at Taco Bell for dinner, watched Robot & Frank, and The Breakup, and went to bed at a pretty decent time. Saturday we spent all day out on the town shopping. We literally shopped until we dropped, because around 4:00 we went home and took a nap for two hours. That night we went to dinner with Brandon's fam. Sunday we cleaned the house then went out to try on running shoes, because I am asking for some for my birthday! That night we went to dinner at Brandon's parents' house and stayed for games and dessert. We played a super fun game that I want to teach my family how to play. It is quick and easy!
Monday Brandon had to work, so I woke up, did the laundry, cleaned up the house a little bit, watched a TON of The Office, and then Brandon's mom took me out to redeem a gift certificate she gave me last year for my birthday. It was to a place called Beadles, where you can go and pick out beads and such to make your own jewelry. I ended up making eight pairs of earrings and a necklace.

 

Sorry, I can't get the pictures to go in the center of the page. Anyways I am pretty excited. I got 5 new shirts and 2 skirts on Saturday, so it is nice to have jewelry to go with it! Brandon told me the other day that he can see that my style is changing, it is becoming more grown up and kinda professional. Except not today, because today I am tired so I'm wearing my fat jeans, mocassins, and a hoodie. Stickin it to the man.

Tonight is pancake night, tomorrow night we have to pack, and then Friday we are heading to Idaho Falls for my cousin Dylan's mission farewell. I can't believe that two of my favorite cousins will be in completely different places soon! Not only that, but my cousin Ethan is taking some crazy road trip soon that is going to take him all over the place! I don't know the details, but it sounds like a ton of fun. I am excited for all of these people that get to go new places and experience new things. I can't wait for when that time comes for me and Brandon! 11 more months.

Have a great day!

Twice in one week? What?

Okay fambam. Here's the deal. I have been sitting in a chair at the library for six hours. SIX WHOLE HOURS. What, might you ask, have I accomplished in these six hours? Welp, besides a quiz that took all of three minutes and filing some papers that took maybe 45 minutes, mostly I have accomplished a whole lot of nothing. Want to know what I have been doing? Of course you do, that's why you are reading my blog. Or maybe, like me, you are bored out of your mind but are so incredibly comfortable where you are sitting that this is the most productive thing you can do without employing any effort.

--I have been shopping for Disney shirts.

My friend Alycia has the cutest Mickey shirt, which she has agreed to let me borrow, but I have been on the hunt for my own cute Mickey shirt and guess how many I have found. One. And guess how much it costs? Too much. My dreams of having my very own cute Mickey shirt hanging in my closet have been shattered.

I have good news though. Today is Valentine's Day!! And I have the best Valentine of all! (Don't let that hurt your feelings, it really is true. Brandon is the best.) I woke up this morning when the alarm went off, which in itself meant it was going to be a good day, and went and hopped in the shower, also a sign of a good day. I kept hearing a bunch of thudding and the first thing that came to mind was that someone was in my house murdering Brandon (give me a break, it was early, I was tired). And I would have been really upset if that was happening, because today is a special day, ya know? Well I get out of the shower and Brandon is alive and well, shaving his handsome face, and Sophie is sitting outside the bathroom door staring at me and meowing her little head off. So I follow her into the bedroom thinking she just needs a drink of water of something, and look what I found on my night stand!!

Best ever right? Roses, a balloon, Twizzlers, brownie bites, Milk Duds, Chocolate Milk, a Mickey card, and a gift card to Costa Vida! You know what this means right? I am getting fat today. Yes I am. I drank my chocolate milk with lunch, we are going to Costa for dinner, then we are going to see Safe Haven where we are getting popcorn and a drink (thanks to Gram and Gramps C. for the Valentine's card and moolah), and will probably end the night with a dozen one or two brownie bites. I hope everyone is having as wonderful of Valentine's Day as I am. But I hope it is not about to get ruined by going to class for three hours, like mine will be. Seriously, how fun is it to sit in a class for 75 minutes where you have to actually think to listen? Don't get me wrong, I like thinking, but I also like thinking in English. Anyways, happy love day!

Finally.

Finally, finally, finally the crazy weeks are over! The past three weeks have been insane, to say the least. Brandon and I have both had about two tests each week, and an overflow of papers and assignments to do. Thankfully, the tests are passed, the papers are done, and we will (hopefully) have some down time this week to enjoy each others company. Brandon still has a test in his second class today, and I have an in-class paper to write tomorrow, but the rest of the week is completely open, so we are pretty excited!

Unfortunately, we are pretty much already in vacation mode. We leave for Disneyland in 25 days, 6 hours, and 24 minutes, and yes, we are counting down the days. Our little paper chain is starting to get so small!! We/I have also already started looking into planning our vacation to New York for Christmas...can anyone tell we have a bad case of senioritis already? And pretty much every day we talk about how excited we are to graduate and move somewhere new for grad school. We are getting pretty antsy here in the daily routine. Once summer comes I'm sure it will be better, but because it is so cold outside we always just shut ourselves in the living room and watch movies.

This past weekend was pretty great! We went to dinner with Brandon's brother James and his girlfriend Candis on Friday night to a super authentic Mexican restaurant. You know the kind, super sketchy, but the food is amazing, and then you end up taking all your friends there because you feel like you have discovered a hidden gem? We didn't exactly discover it, I guess, because it was packed that night, but it was tasty nonetheless! After that we went home and watched Here Comes the Boom. It was pretty funny, but I fell asleep, so we finished it the next morning. Saturday afternoon we went and saw Identity Thief. I laughed through the entire movie! We went home for a little bit, then left the house again to go to Costa for dinner. After that, I went to a bachelorette party, and Brandon played video games and finally conquered Uncharted 3. Needless to say, he was pretty proud. Then yesterday we woke up around 10:30, I worked 12-6:00, then we went to have a birthday celebration with his family. I seriously don't even know where the weekend went. My six hour shift yesterday felt like it was only 2 hours, which is great, but I am afraid this whole week won't fly by like that.

Valentine's day is Thursday and this year it is a surprise! Kind of. I am pretty sure Brandon is taking me to see Safe Haven, and he said that dinner is involved, which, let's be real, is probably going to end up being Costa Vida. I wanted to buy him some clothes for Valentine's Day but he is specific with how his clothes fit so I want to take him shopping sometime this week.

After writing all of this, I realize why I don't blog too often: I'm boring. Have a happy Monday!