Our Weekend and an Announcement

We had a wonderfully relaxing weekend! It started with our normal Friday night dinner out and grocery shopping. We watched some TV and just hung out the rest of the night. It was very low key.

We spent four hours at the pool on Saturday, and we had it all to ourselves. This happens every summer, and we're not sure why. We have a great pool - it's a 6 lane lap pool with kiddie section. It's clean and has lots of chairs. No one ever goes to it though!! It's like our own private pool, and we love it!

I took a nap on Saturday afternoon while John watched Star Wars. That night, we went to PF Chang's with John's parents. Look what they drove to our house!!!

John's dream came true twice in one week - driving a convertible!! This was a Jaguar, and so sweet! We piled in, parked valet and had a delicious feast at Chang's. It was super fun!

Sunday was church - it was my first official Sunday as a team leader! We went to Lowe's afterwards to pick up a hand sprayer for the bathtub so I could bathe Milo in his new shampoo and conditioner. Poor guy has been so itchy lately, and I think this is going to fix it. He seemed to be happier in his own bathtub with the sprayer instead of a cup of water to rinse him off. After I dried him, I went ahead and groomed him again since I had already done so much. He looks great and smells like violet and primrose!! So spoiled!

It was a great weekend. Hope yours was as well.

I do have a little announcement to make. I've decided to take a little break from blogging for a bit. It's not that I won't post anything, but the posts will be less frequent. I just don't have much to say, and when I have things to share, I feel like I'm being braggy. I still enjoy reading all of your blogs, so keep the posts coming!

Can't Hold Back

Traveling exposes me to lots of different kinds of people. It also exposes me to what people do to pass time. Some people work on their computers, some people listen to music, some people watch movies on their iPads, some people read.

You may remember me mentioning my interest in reading "Fifty Shades of Grey" a few weeks ago. After doing some research, I decided not to. It was appalling to know that so many women in our country are proudly reading porn and talking about it so openly.

The airports were FULL of this book series. All I could think was, "These women should be ashamed of themselves."

This blog post said it best and explains why I won't be reading the series.

Society doesn't accept men openly looking at porn, so why should we accept women doing the same thing? Porn, whether viewed openly or behind closed doors, is an unhealthy thing to be exposed to. It's disgusting, if you ask me. As women, whether religious or not, we should guard our hearts against these types of things.

Protect your heart. Protect your relationship and/or future relationships. Don't read this book.

For Dog People

This is so interesting!! If you're a dog person, you'll know why the sounds during the last few seconds of this video warm my heart and make me want to go straight home to be with Milo.

Las Vegas 2012

We are back from vacation, and we had a blast! Vegas itself wasn't really my cup of tea - they don't call it Sin City for no reason - perhaps I am too much of a prude. After two days of seeing all the smoking, drinking, gambling and prostitution, I was over it. I was amazed at how many people brought their small children into smoky casinos! That's just poor parenting!!

We arrived in Las Vegas late on Wednesday night to meet John's parents and another couple they were traveling with. We took a taxi to the hotel where we attempted the $20 sandwich we had read about online. We gave the clerk the credit card, ID and a $20 bill sandwiched in between during check-in. We didn't have to say a word - she simply gave us the option of upgrading our room to a Petite Suite for FREE! It was a great room, and we promptly went to bed so we could begin our vacation the next day.

We spent our first full day at The Hoover Dam, a chocolate factory and old Las Vegas. It was a lot of fun and so beautiful. We had never seen anything like it before. We couldn't get over how large the mountains and canyons were. We took lots of pictures!!

We spent our second full day walking the Strip and going in all the hotels and casinos. Everything in Vegas is VERY expensive, so we didn't do any shopping, eating at fancy restaurants or going to shows. That night, we tried to see the Pirate show in front of our hotel, but the winds were too high and they had to cancel.

We spent our last full day driving in a Mustang convertible to California!!! We saw:

• The Mojave Desert
• The Sierra Nevada
• The Griffith Observatory and the Hollywood Sign
• The Hollywood Walk of Fame
• Fat Burger - awesome lunch!!
• Calabasas and Dash - the Kardashians' stompin' grounds!
• Topanga Canyon via Topanga Canyon Boulevard
• The Pacific Ocean via the Pacific Coast Highway

The last day was the highlight of our trip and created memories for us that will last a lifetime. We are so thankful to be able to travel and see these kinds of things together. We are even more thankful to be HOME! We don't care to be on another airplane for a year!

Here is a little slideshow of our trip. There is music, so head's up if you're at work.

Enjoy!

Milo Monday

Hello, everyone! It's Monday again, and Mommy says it's a short week for us. She and Daddy are leaving for Las Vegas on Wednesday, and I am going back to Grammy and Pa's for a few days. They sure are awesome grandparents to take care of me so often! We have a great time together.

Daddy "worked from home" Friday afternoon, and I was so glad to spend time with him - just us boys! Once Mommy came home, they left to run errands and pick up dinner. We got to watch our normal Friday night shows and go to bed early because they had Leadership Training at church on Saturday morning. It was very confusing to have Mom and Dad leave so early on a Saturday - we usually stay in our PJs until lunch time! We spent Saturday afternoon playing corn hole in the yard (Mom beat Dad twice!) and taking naps. Mom and Dad went to see "The Avengers" in 3D at IMAX Saturday night, and they said it was AWESOME!! Mom may or may not have a crush on Tony Stark. Can't say I blame her...

Sunday was normal stuff - started with church and my own quiet time with Jesus. After Mom and Dad had lunch at the Farmer's Market Seafood Restaurant, Mommy gave me a bath and a haircut. My fur was getting long and she wanted me to be extra handsome for my stay at Grammy and Pa's. Getting a bath and haircut is NOT my favorite thing in the world, but I am working on being a nicer boy during the process. It's just so hard to understand why Mom won't let me be a wild man with crazy hair!

When we were having MommyDaddy time in bed last night, Mommy felt something hard on my belly. You know what it was? A tick!!! A teeny tiny little tick was on my body! Mom and Dad have me on a flea prevention, but not tick since we don't live in a wooded area and I'm an inside dog. Looks like I'll need to have tick prevention now too. I don't want no bugs on me!!

Hope you had an awesome weekend. Pray for safe travels for my Mom and Dad this week!!

Candle Secrets

I love candles - what girl doesn't!? Whether they're scented or unscented, large or small, I love having candles burning in our home at night. Their glow makes everything pretty. I've learned a lot about candles over the years, and I want to share some of those lessons with you.

Jar Candles
My personal favorite jar candles are Yankee Candles in Fresh Cut Roses or Cranberry Chutney. The key to burning an entire jar is to burn it for the number of hours the jar is wide EACH time you burn it. For example, if the jar is 3" wide, burn the candle for at least 3 hours. This will allow the wax to melt evenly in the candle, and you won't be left with a small hole in the wax with the wick down at the bottom.

Wicks 
Speaking of wicks, it's important to keep these trimmed. Have you ever looked at a candle flame and thought, "Man, that thing is huge! It's going to catch something on fire!" Well, that's because the wick is way too long. Before lighting a candle, trim the wick to 1/4". This will help to keep the flame down.

 

Tart Burners
If you haven't discovered tart burners yet, let me share them with you! I love, love, LOVE these! Yankee Candle sells tarts in the same scents as their candles for about $1 each (so much cheaper than large jars). They also sell tart burners, but you can buy these cheaper if you just buy the store brand. They are usually ceramic or glass. Simply unwrap the tart, put it in the top of the burner and insert a lit tealight candle in the bottom of the burner. As the tealight burns, it melts the wax and fills the room with the scent you've chosen. It typically lasts 3-4 hours. This is a great alternative if you are notorious for leaving a candle burning when you leave the house or go to bed because tealights put themselves out after the wick is completely burned.

The tart will last for 5-6 uses. When you can no longer smell the scent, just put the entire tart burner in the freezer for an hour or so. Once it's frozen, the tart will pop right out of the top. Easy as that!

Tealights
You can buy a bag of 25 tealights for $1 at the Dollar Store. These babies last forever. You can reuse them if you need to, as long as a wick is still present. They're unscented, so you don't have to worry about the scent interfering if you're using it in a tart burner. Use them for tart burners or in small candle holders. They're great!!

Votives
My last candle obsession are votives. They're such pretty little candles and last a really long time - I had one in our guest bathroom last weekend, and after 5 hours, it was STILL burning! The frustrating thing about votives is how the heck you get them out of the candle holder.

Be frustrated no more, my candle loving friends! Before dropping a votive into a candle holder, put a little bit of water in the bottom. Put your lit votive in and let it burn, burn, burn. When you're ready to take it out, it slides right out of the bottom. I thank my wise Mama for this trick!

What do you love about candles? Do you have any secrets you want to share??

Exactly

This is what goes on in my head too.

I am so sorry the blogging has been slack lately. It's the first week in a long time that I've been slow(er) at work, and I'm kind of taking it all in. I do have a few ideas for posts, so stay tuned over the next few days.

In other news, we're leaving for Vegas in less than a week, and I'm finally starting to get excited! Bill Cosby AND The Price is Right are in town while we're there - be still my heart. We've started scouting out deals, making to-do and packing lists. We hit up The Container Store yesterday during their travel sale to pick up a collection of reusable 3 oz. bottles since we are doing quite a bit of traveling these days (thank you to my boss for the gift card). It's so much cheaper (and green!) to just refill these than buy travel size versions of our favorite toiletries.

Our plan for the three full days we're in Vegas are to visit The Hoover Dam, see and photograph all the sights on the Strip, and chill on a private daybed by the pool at our hotel. We'll also see a show, have a fancy dinner, gamble a little bit and maybe hit up a night club like we're 25 years old again. So fun!!

Shame on us, but we're already scoping out our Spring 2013 vacation destination. We think we've found it. It's a tiny little island that I can't wait to tell you all about. It may just be our vacation spot for many years to come.

Ok gang, check back in later!