New House

Let me be clear:

I did not pick out my new house.

It is gray. GRAY on the outside. There is no grass in sight. It has rocks for a front yard and dead dirt in the back.

There are pretty small closets.

There are tinier bathrooms. Two of them.

There is no garage and no carport.

And there is weird air circulation and weird built-on rooms.

However.

There is a great kitchen.

Cool tile.

Decent carpet.

Decent-size bedrooms.

And it's coming together. I bought some shelves. The last roommate (Gina) just got here from Utah this morning. And instantly went on a jamba juice hunt. (Definitely from up north. I did the same thing when I got here.) I initiated Vanie into late nights talking until 5am (unfortunately, she didn't sleep in the next day. I felt so bad! No more late nights for her). Between work and school and clinicals, it has taken me over a week to have the house look close to put-together. I almost killed Cox communications this week (really? you left the house instead of calling me like I told you to? I have to wait 3 more days now?). It took about 6 days to find the garbage can (in the alley; there are big garbage cans for all the neighbors. Odd, but I like it.)

Anyways, pictures coming soon. Promise. Meanwhile, here's one of Vanie being handy.

Did I mention I bought an electric screwdriver? I love it. It's my first power tool. I bought it right after I swore I was never ever buying any more stuff.

Good-bye, House

So last week I finally moved. It was crazy, as it always is. It's only when I move that I realize just how much stuff I have. I don't have clutter. I wouldn't say my house feels crowded when things are put away, but when you start to pull everything off the shelves you start to realize just how much is there. See, being 30 and single is kind of a weird situation when it comes to stuff. It's like if I had a husband to go with all this stuff it would make more sense. Or actually, even if I just had a house and a garage. That would help. As it is, having all this stuff just seems a little crazy now. But I like to go on adventures, and I've kind of been the mom of whatever house I've lived in for quite a few years. So that means when someone says, "Christin, do you have....
a pasta machine? yes
a raft? yes
hydrogen peroxide, band-aids, a thermometer? yes

a desk? yes
some pictures? yes
a snow cone maker? yes
a grill? yes
a tent? yes
an exercise step? yes
The answer, essentially, is always yes.
Which is nice for living and terrible for moving. Especially when it's just me and John, who, thankfully, was sweet enough to take off two days of work just to help me move. Over two days, probably 24 full hours were spent moving. We rented my Penske and started loading up. Over and over again. Now, the other day, I had asked my co-workers exactly what caused their arguments with their significant others, thinking how lucky I was that John and I pretty much never argue. And then I found out what makes us argue:
112 degree weather
11 hours of moving
Me buying stupid couches at an estate sale that don't fit in Brad's storage unit.
John telling me what to do too much.
A little house.
A 200 pound dresser that the drawers don't come out.
It wasn't like we were truly mad at each other, but we were definitely ready for the day to be over. It was long and crappy and exhausting.
And then while I went to clinicals the next day for 9 hours, John did the rest of it. I will never ever be able to pay him back for all of this.
Saturday I cleaned the old house. I thought of all the fun memories of that house.
Our first (terrible) reaction to it.
My first living-by-myself experience.
Becoming a nurse.
Watching The Office in Brad's room.
All the Dinner Parties.
Ariana's "walk of shame"
Summer with Bridget
Cupcakes
Blue Bell
Meeting John
The Guest Book
Yes, the house was a little dark. And more than a little brown. But there's a lot of good memories in those walls. And I'll miss it. Good-bye little house.

Inside My Dreaming Brain

There are lots of mornings I wake up and want to tell someone about my dreams. Simply because, they. are. so. weird.
Last night was maybe a little crazier than most.
It started with dream that John called me and said, "You'd better hurry and come pick me up because I think I'm...." and then the phone hung up. I thought gangsters were getting him, and it actually scared me enough to wake me up out of a dead sleep.
When I went back to sleep (three whole minutes later), a wooly mouse was running through our hospital and it was very important for some reason to catch it (and save it or kill it, I'm not sure). All I know is I followed it outside amidst some security guards and a person wearing "LDS people are Hispanics too" with the letters made out of those kiddie magnets on refrigerators.
This was, of course, followed by a family vacation of all of us riding flying jet skis over Phoenix. Dreamland Phoenix looked a lot like a cross between Disneyland and the Candy Land board game. Brad was upset that we couldn't fly a little lower and go exploring more, and I kind of wanted to, too, but my dad really wanted to get wherever we were going. I think Brad and I took a little detour anyways.
When I woke up, I was exhausted, even 8 hours of sleep. At least it was an adventurous night.

Hip de Dip

So I've been wanting a new comforter for awhile. Not that I want to permanently get rid of the one I have, but I needed a change. Unfortunately, this is the kind of change that is usually expensive and has to be just perfect, you know? And most of the ones I've looked at are too much of an investment, and I only kind of like them. Yesterday I was at Marshall's and found this one!!!

For $90, it came with the bedskirt, the comforter, two pillows, the sheets, and two shams. I threw the sheets away. I think they were like 50 thread count. Seriously. But I had expected that. Luckily, the nice sheets I had already matched great. The comforter is also a tiny bit scratchy, but I washed it in the washing machine (and it survived) and put fabric softener in it, and now it's fabulous, too. So now my bedroom looks a little more modern, and my comforter for the summer months doesn't weigh 100 pounds. Yay!

Geriatric Love

Last Friday night, I was looking through etsy when I came across vintage jewelry. Vintage jewelry that was listed as "Vintage Estate" jewelry. At which point my little brain put two and two together and I thought, "How is it possible that live so close to Scottsdale and I've never been to an estate sale?" and "Tomorrow is Saturday!!"
So I googled estate sales and was even more pleased to discover that an estate sale featuring Danish furniture was taking place in Sun City just the next morning. Now, Sun City is a remarkable little place. Twenty-five miles northwest of Tempe sits this town of 38,000 entirely created for retired grandmas and grandpas. Literally. The entire town. This is a town where signs like this are on nearly every street:

The lawns are perfectly manicured, and all the trash cans are underground in the yard so you can just throw your garbage bags in without hurting your back. It's lovely, really.
And there are a lot of estate sales.
For those of you not familiar with estate sales, they generally go like this: Someone dies, and their relatives let you go through their house and buy their old stuff. In some situations (like in North Scottsdale or Paradise Valley), this amounts to great art collections and vast amounts of jewelry. It was somewhat different in Sun City.
First, at the first one I went to, it was the third day of the sale, and it was $2 for anything you could fit in a plastic bag. It was all well and good except I didn't want mozart LP's or her old books. So I went into her closet. At which point I realized maybe nurses shouldn't go to estate sales. Because we are much too AWARE of things. Like the arm sling hanging next to her dresses. Did she fall and break her arm? Was it the beginning of her unfortunate demise? Of course, I still got two cute little vintage dresses that I realized yesterday are much too small for me, but I still think of her closet whenever I look at them.
I ended up driving around the neighborhoods and finding three estate sales (apparently, not so hard to find here). And seriously people. DON'T TRY TO SELL THEIR BATHROOM STUFF. Throw away the tweezers and the hemorrhoid cream and the nail clippers. People who don't know each other shouldn't share this stuff. I know what old people nails look like and this is gross. Aren't there rules for this somewhere?!?! It's tacky and it's gross and I really wanted to tell someone, but then I felt bad because maybe they were grieving and obviously not thinking straight. I almost slipped it all into a garbage can for the sake of everyone's sanity. Maybe next time.
Because there will be a next time. Because despite the obvious lack of tact, there were some excellent moments.
I got a great little tablecloth, some cute little vintage handkerchiefs, and at the last one, I hit the jackpot.
This again, is where being a nurse made things too real. I picture too much the cute little old guy that lived there and his shoe size and what he ate for breakfast and I kind of feel I'm trespassing. And then I bought two of his shirts, his suit, a fabulous leather suitcase, two chairs, and two retro couches. All for $33. Now, the chairs are great wood and need to be recovered. The couches and the suitcase are for Brad. And the couch, despite it's amazing yellow velour-ness, really needs to be recovered.

But Brad is really good at that kind of stuff. And I think the cute old guy would be glad his stuff lives on with someone as cool as us. (Even though John was not thrilled at driving back up to Sun City with our friend Phil's truck to go back and get all these treasures. Luckily we got bungee cords from the 99 cents store...)
I gave Lena one of the shirts last night because it's super sweet. I get to borrow it at will.
I went through the suitcase and found two vitamins and a glipizide. It was a low dose, so I guess he was a newly diagnosed diabetic. Really. Maybe nurses who love old people shouldn't do this sort of thing.

(The suitcase says "free & easy" which also happens to be one of Brad's favorite country songs.)

The Dailey Method

So I was a pretty good cross-trainer in the month of May. I swam, I did yoga, I did Zumba, I lifted, and I did the Dailey Method. The Dailey Method is a fancy-schmancy Scottsdale class that also happens to be in Paris. It's loosely based on ballet and is a lot of moving your body 1 inch at a time. Supposedly it gives you very long lean muscles.
It is true that I couldn't walk for about 2 hours afterwards.
But I wasn't sore the next day.
And I totally looked like a football player next to those girls.
And I was reminded that North Scottsdale is its own special place full of lots of money and lots of plastic.
And I had to buy 3 classes to go so I have two more of these magical experiences. Whoo-hoo!

Self Workout

So the other day I was thinking I would like to use the cable machine more but I wasn't sure how. And then this workout was in SELF this month! Perfect!

I've done it twice, and it's fabulous!

Phoenix's Camelback

On my list of 100 things in 1001 days is hiking Boise's camelback and Phoenix's. So far I've done Boise's twice, but until Friday morning I hadn't done Phoenix's. Mostly because I didn't want to hike it alone, and schedules always seemed to conflict. But John took me on Friday morning. Because it's already 100 here (110 today to be exact), we had to get started early. He came over at 7 and we got already with our sunscreen and our 6 bottles of water and our energy bars and headed out. It's only a little over a mile long, but its 1200 feet up. There's a lot of bouldering, which is very different from any hike I've ever been on (and it's in the middle of a huge city, which is crazy). There were a ton of people hiking it; some in terrible clothes, some in terrible shoes, some running it like it was a track. We had a blast, though, and the scenery was fabulous. Here's some pics!






The last picture that looks like just a bunch of rocks is actually the "trail" down!

The Deeper Things in Life

Ok, so really, not deep at all. But very fun. First, I got grey nail polish, and I love it. I think it looks very classy.
The color is "You Don't Know Jacques!" and it's everything I thought grey nail polish should be. (I blurred out my bathroom stuff as to not be distracting....)


Secondly, I am about to move in with roommates, one of whom I went shopping with the other day. Here is what she talked me into buying. I still don't know quite how, but I do know I'm wearing them to church today!!

AND... Banana Republic is having a deal this summer (until August 31st) that if you buy ANYTHING in the store (even a $3 chapstick), you get a $20 giftcard if you shop on Tuesday. And even with this deal, it's taken me a month to be able to get there on a Tuesday. I thought I was going to get a pink shirt I had seen earlier, but it was a little blah, and I still always feel the need to spice up my wardrobe from what I usually wear. Hence, the zebra tank. I love it.

Two more things: Nordstrom was having a sale, and I almost never ever shop there. But they have fabulous shirts that are at least as great as SHADE shirts called STEM that were on sale for $17, so I bought one in purple and one in yellow. They are basic and similarly boring as much of my wardrobe, but also very soft and organic cotton and therefore cooler. I also got this crazy shirt there that I really think is great for dinner dates and maybe for occasional church with a black shirt under it and a black skirt. This is just me trying it on in the store:

And I finally got adorable flats. See, we have this friend we lovingly call Polly, as in Polly Pocket. She's the tiniest girl I know. And she is very fashionable and can wear a lot of things that would look very awkward on me, although I always always dream of having her sense of style. I think these shoes are the one thing that we could both wear, and I think of her every time I do.

And they were on sale and are so comfortable. And now I don't have to wear converse tennis shoes with my gray cardigan anymore. Whew!

Inspiration

The day after I got back, I went running around Tempe Town Lake. Kind of a half-run, half-walk. You know how it goes. Anyways, I see this older guy with all this stuff on his bike looking at a map. Not "homeless guy" stuff on his bike; "Athlete" stuff on his bike. Wearing biking shorts and a racing jersey and looking crazy in shape. With a Chinese symbol tattoo on his left calf.
So I asked him if he needed help, even though it looked like he knew much more than me.
"Yeah," he said. "I just need to know if this road goes all the way to Power Road."
I was surprised because it was so far (I always take the freeway). I was like, "Yeah, but it's pretty far. It's about 10 miles."
He didn't care how far it was. He didn't care because he started in SAN DIEGO and was going to be stopping in the FLORIDA KEYS!!
This man apparently took up biking at age 62 when he retired and he biked up a 12000 foot peak in Colorado. Then he biked from Antarctica to Argentina and from Finland to Norway. And now it was time for America. He's from Michigan. Very cool guy. He was finding it expensive to stay at hotels all along the way, and I didn't think to tell him about couch-surfing networks until after my run. I spent 45 minutes trying to find him later, but he was already gone.
Probably in New Mexico.
I think I ran a little harder after that.

I knew I forgot something....

I kept feeling like I was forgetting to blog something about Idaho. And, ironically, this blog posting is ABOUT forgetting something. Something rather important.
Like checking the gas gauge before heading out on a 4 hour trip.
Please do not ask how on earth I could have forgotten this. I never have before. I certainly wouldn't have done it on purpose. I made it exactly 2 miles outside of American Falls. Now, I checked my fuel gauge 12 miles outside of American Falls, but that didn't do me much good. I just hoped and prayed and ran out of gas.
I had rented a cute little Chevy Aveo from Enterprise (again. I love these little cars.). It is very light and two miles isn't all that far, so I started pushing it. That only lasted about 2 minutes before someone stopped.
Enter Bill & Libby.

Bill & Libby are best friends who have lived together for 5 years. Bill has been married five times. Libby once. Her 18-year old son was shot and killed in November, and she gave me the program to his funeral out of the glove box. Bill & Libby are Mormon, and Libby made sure to tell me when Bill was out of the car that he is such a good man and has never even "offered sex" once. Apparently folks in American Falls like to gossip.
Libby kept saying how blessed I was and how Heavenly Father put them in my path. I'm sure He did.
We drove to their little home, we got a gas can, we filled my car.

On the road again!
Thanks Bill & LIbby!

4 car pile up

So as I was saying, John had a great attitude during the game. But great attitudes will only take you so dang far.
Because we had met up earlier with my friend Vanie (and I stayed with her while he went to the stadium), we ended up driving each others' cars, which has never happened. And every time I drive John's car I think, "Please oh please don't let anything happen to this car..."
So, after the game, John and I were headed to Yogurtland for our frozen yogurt fix. It took me forever to find the car in the parking garage, so John was miles ahead of me when it happened.
I was stopped at a stoplight, and luckily had given the car in front of me about 20 feet so as to not block the intersection. I had been there for about 30 seconds when I suddenly got rear-ended. Hard. I got out of the car and realized I was the first of four hit cars. I motioned for us all to pull over to the side of the road. The car behind me did, car #3 took off to take his pregnant wife to the hospital, and car #4 who started it all was a hit and run!!! Luckily a cop drove by as they drove away and caught her. Haha.
The guys who had hit me were really cool and were actually from the same part of LA as John is from. I actually can't believe I didn't take a picture since we had 30 minutes to just chill and talk while the cop reamed out the other girl.
The girl didn't have insurance so we're still waiting to see what happens with it all. John's car actually looks way better than I thought it would. (And so does the Lexus coupe from LA.)
Our frozen yogurt had a lot more chocolate on it than we had originally planned on.
What a night!!!!

$1000 seats

There are plenty of things $1000 can buy.
Ten pairs of fabulous shoes.
Serious jewelry.
Two trips to Idaho.
Two flights to College Station on Thanksgiving Day & tickets to watch the Aggies play t.u.
A superbowl ticket.
A crappy car.
Some serious furniture.
Or.... a hard lesson on the fickleness of Phoenix Suns fans.
Now, John is a frugal frugal man. He also has the mind of an entrepreneur. Which has worked for him in the past. So last week, John bought 6 playoff tickets for game 6 of the Suns vs Lakers game with the hope of selling them for a little profit. They were great seats, and cost him, ahem, $1400. The thing about this plan is that if he had been in L.A., it would have been awesome. Because Lakers fan love their Lakers no matter what. But Suns fans come and go. And this week they didn't come as much. Despite craigslist and stadium selling, John was out $1000. He sold his cheapest ticket to the hot dog stand guy for $25 and a hot dog!
That left him with two tickets left at the second quarter. So John and I saw the game 6 playoff game. Quite possibly the only playoff game I will ever see in my life. (Especially for the NBA. How on earth I've now been to 3 NBA games and no NFL games is beyond me.)
Now, John's original seats had been lower level but were an entire section apart. So he traded and made like $100 for some upper level tickets together. I don't think we had any idea just HOW upper they were. We were literally two rows from the ceiling. I don't think either of us had ever even WALKED up that far in a stadium. Luckily, the stadium is not that huge and we could still see the players names, numbers, and recognize them. It just took a little while to get used to our aerial view. It was really fun though. It was crazy sitting next to a Lakers fan (I don't know very many) and actually having someone cheer for Kobe Bryant. But our hot dogs were great, the game was very exciting, and I'm actually kind of glad we got to have our $1000 seats. (Kind of).
And yes, John had a great attitude about it. I was very impressed.

What we have here....

So John really had a good attitude about Idaho the whole time. He was very good about acknowledging all of our good features even though it's not exactly a tourist trap. But after driving around Idaho Falls for a few minutes without getting out of the car, Kaitlynn had had enough of touring I.F.
"What we HAVE here," she said "is not a lot of FUN!!"
John lost it. In fact, we all laughed about it for days. John said she could come visit L.A. with him any time she wants.
(Just a quick note of gratitude to the fact that it was forecasted to rain pretty much every day. And it did. At night. It also snowed for a couple minutes twice. And hailed. Which made the 93 Phoenix weather seem like a fairy tale. But, really, it was generally beautiful weather. And it felt great to breathe Idaho air again.)

Merritt's and Idaho Falls

Our last stop in Boise was Merritt's. The duct tape on the seats was a little contrast to where we've been eating lately, but the food was hearty and American and very Idaho. And the cinnamon sugar scones were just as good as ever. When we got to Idaho Falls, we went straight to lunch at the Blue Hashi with my mom, my Aunt Jill, and Uncle Dan for some fabulous sushi (ok, so it wasn't scottsdale sushi, but it was good :-) )
There's not too awful much to say about I.F.. Mostly I showed John my high school and the Falls and my old house and then spent the rest of at my Nana's house (where my parents currently live for the month) and Candice's house. John left the next day to go to Utah and see his other friends and family and I stayed two more days to catch up with my family.
It felt so good to be back in Nana's house again.
And I finally got to meet Perri Marie! She is 4 months old and has the most beautiful smile ever. Which she gives whenever she hears Candice's voice. Seriously. Whenever. (And apparently I was too busy trying to get her to smile and practicing holding and feeding her to actually take a picture. Please don't kill me sister. I don't know how this happened!) I also learned that Tate is the cutest bobble head dancer, and Kaitlynn is a fabulous artist and totally has these long legs that are definitely not from our side of the family.
Here's a few tidbits of them! First, the little dancer:

John holding Tate's head from bopping around while he slept (Candice insisted it wasn't necessary, but...)

The mermaid at the disco ball party:

Candice's family and I went to the Museum of Idaho for the dog exhibit. Kaitlynn enjoyed petting the plastic dogs and Tate enjoyed the kid cabin. Candice and I liked the stamps in the dirt to make tracks of different animals. I think we all had a good time.
This is after the dog museum. These guys are power sleepers!


And my favorite picture. It is my good-bye picture, so it's a little sad, but Tate's "cheese" face makes everything better.

Rick's Press Room

Boise and Meridian are kind of small enough that if something is amazing, you usually hear about it pretty quickly. Rick's Press Room, however, is an exception. This is another place that we saw on the Food Network. Apparently the chef has cheffed in France, LA, & New York City, among others. And then moved to Meridian where he opened this restaurant. You can watch the clip of him on that link. I had never even heard of it, and Jessica is like 4th generation Meridian and she hadn't either so it was quite the adventure. (We actually showed up for lunch and then left when we found out salmon was only served at dinner. We made dinner reservations on our way out.)
So... John & I arrived looking all spiffied up and seven minutes late for dinner, but it was wonderful. Craig, Jessica, AuBrey, and her husband Joe were all able to come and it felt like such a fun reunion to just enjoy everyone's company on a gorgeous day.
Besides the fact that the wings were incredible and I never thought I could love hash browns on salmon set on a plate of mashed potatoes. But it was awesome.
Good times, noodle salad.

Second Day Boise- AuBrey, Baby Erickson, and the Cupcake Store

We didn't have too much planned for our second day in Boise, but it turned out to be crazy busy and very fun. First, I called AuBrey (who I met in kindergarten) to see what she was up to. Since she just had her 6th kid, I thought we could just stop by. But since she had actually just given birth 5 days ago, her mother and mother-in-law were taking care of the kids and somehow she kind of had the day off!
AuBrey met us at Target with her newborn and announced that we had the day to play! So we bought our little things (yeah, I don't remember what....except that now AuBrey and I have the same purse) and then headed to Rembrandt's for lunch.
Rembrandt's is a little church turned into an art gallery/restaurant. And somehow it works. We had fabulous chicken salads to save room for the cupcakes still to come. This is John holding her baby. Who, last I heard, is still nameless. Maybe by now. I love her little bum!
And finally, John & AuBrey were introduced to Lilly Jane's. And we even came on Peanut Butter day. What can I say? They were delicious, the store was cute, and I was thrilled to be between two of my most fabulous friends eating delicious cupcakes. Perfection.

Afterwards, AuBrey went home for awhile while John and I ran to the temple to do initiatories. Now, I had never done this and I thought it would be a quick little thing. But it wasn't. And the cute little temple workers weren't all so awesome at communicating with us so it ended up being a long and somewhat frustrating experience (and peaceful somewhere in the middle :-) ) that ended about 2 minutes before our reservations. It was cool to finally be in the Boise temple though, and I'm so glad we went.

May 19th is the day John met Boise

I love my Boise. I love it uncannily. I think it's great for many reasons, most of which are hard to convey. But I've tried now for almost 2 years to tell John how fabulous it is. He, being from LA, was a little skeptical. He, of course, feels like LA is kind of the center of the universe (and yes, a heck of a lot of stuff comes from there in this country) so he's a little hard to persuade. But somehow I got him to come explore Idaho with me :-)
As soon as we got to Boise, we stopped by my old work at Murphy's, saw a couple people there, stopped at the co-op where we got sandwiches, pasta, and ginger ice cream (still my very favorite) and went to Camel's Back Park. John was shocked by the 4 "bikini girls" laying out in the park in the 73 degree weather. We wanted to take a picture of a girl who was laying as sexy as she possibly could, but we couldn't figure out how to do it subtly. You'll have to imagine just how hot she thought she was.
We hiked up the little mountain where we took this beautiful picture and I remembered how gorgeous it is here.

Then we went to my old apartment and on a tour of most of downtown Boise.
And then 3 hours had passed and we had seen mostly everything. Oops!
When Jessica (my former roommate) got off work, Craig (my other former roommate's former boyfriend) met up with us and we had a divine dinner at the Red Feather, my other favorite Boise place.
Jessica bought a new house in January which is where we stayed. It is out in Meridian and so fabulous. I seriously love it. It was decorated so cute and just perfect. And Zoe, their little Yorkie, was adorable and fell in love with John's ears.

Oh, it was good to be back. :-)

Sunday. The end of a nutty weekend. (This happened on May 16th. I'm trying to catch up here Sorry!)

We cooked cinnamon rolls for breakfast. Out of a can. John's grandma was still totally impressed. And more eggs and bacon in my new skillets. Which are called Green Pans. Which I LOVE!!
Then John's parents drove home, and the rest of us went to church, and then I went to work. For two nights. Until.... IDAHO!!!!

World Peace (This happened today, May 28)

When I walk into an exercise class where everyone's dancing to "Whoop There it is...", I know I'm in the right place.
When the class ends with "Baby Got Back," I laugh thinking this is the most fun I've ever had.
When Native Americans, white girls, black girls, Asians, and Latinos get together to shake it to Shakira, I think this is what the world should be like.
I went to my first Zumba class tonight. I smiled the whole way through. It was like somebody gave me permission to dance for the first time. I love shaking my booty with these 45 girls who spend their Friday evenings sexifying their dancing moves. Oh I LOVE THIS!!(Here's a video of a class. It's not my class. But it's almost as cool.)