The Haight, The Space Needle, The George Bush Library

”My restless, roaming spirit would not allow me to remain at home very long.” ~Buffalo Bill

I'm quite behind on recapping the last three adventures I had during my two months off of work.  So let me fill you in today on visiting the most famous hippie hang out in America, a national landmark, and a Republican President's library.  I'm well rounded, you have to give me that!

The Haight 

My parents and I headed to the west coast to spend a few days eating our way through one of my favorite cities in the world, San Francisco.  And eat we did.  We hit up most of my favorite restaurants, our favorite bars, and Ben and Jerry's.  It was awesome.  We did the Red Bus Tour (which I had never done before and really enjoyed), the Alcatraz Night Tour (which was fun, but freezing!!), and took my mom to do some shopping in Haight-Ashbury (and let her reconnect with her inner hippie).  It was great to get some fun time with them!

Me and Dad at our favorite Irish Pub

Alcatraz Cell House

Bus Tour

Mom connecting with her 1960's past

At our favorite restaurant in San Francisco

Dad singing Jambalaya with a street performer. 

They're cute, those two crazies.

The Clampetts invade the Haight

Boat ride to Alcatraz

Family photo at the bridge.

The Space Needle

After College Roomie's wedding, I spent a couple of days in Seattle with Gonzaga Friend.  I had never been to Seattle before, and I really enjoyed it!  It's a beautiful city, great food, and lots of fun events were going on.  We checked out the Folk Life Festival (TONS of dirty hippies playing random instruments and not wearing any shoes), saw the Chihuly exhibit, went up the Space Needle, and walked all over town.  Plus I got the chance to catch up with Gonzaga Friend, which I always love.  She is one of the sweetest people I know, and we always have the best conversations about life!  Oh, and she introduced me to pepperoni and pineapple pizza.  Yep.  You heard me.  Amazing.

Farmer's Market

Guys throwing the fish

Flowers everywhere!

Original Starbucks

Chihuly Exhibit

Folk Life Festival

Space Needle

View from the top of the Space Needle

Me and Gonzaga Friend

Public beach in Seattle

Sailboat at sunset

The George Bush Library

Poor Cousin Whitney.  We had this big trip to San Antonio planned for her Bachelorette Weekend, but then the oven fire happened and I needed to be here to deal with that, so she ended up coming to my house.  Which is cute and all, but it's no River Walk.  Don't worry, we're working on planning a trip there again soon!

But regardless, I think we did a good job of having a fun weekend around here.  There was lot of of ice cream, giant pina colladas, some grilling, getting dressed up for a fancy Italian dinner, shopping, laying in the sun, her first time to eat Pei Wei, and a visit to the George Bush (the first one) Presidential Library.  I feel quite sure that we were their first Bachelorette Party visitors.  We're crazy like that.

Headed out to dinner

Burgers, jalapeno poppers, grilled corn

Cousin Whitney at the Presidential Library

Replica Oval Office

Cousin Whitney in charge!

Girls Weekend 2011 Blog #7: The Finale

"Life is short, so let's go live it. Ain't no time for wasting time. Days like these, they go by way too fast. Days like these, you want to make 'em last." ~Jason Aldean, Days Like These


In case you missed any of the prior recap posts, just click here to check out the entire trip from start to finish.


What a weekend. New friends, old friends, wine, great food, karaoke, 13.1 miles, 473 pictures, and memories that I plan to keep forever. I might describe it (like I have in the 6 prior posts....) as perfect.

I love taking trips to catch up with friends. I think that this is probably one of the most important things that I do in my life. Why are these trips so important?

Let me explain: 3 years. A year and a half. 6 months.

Confused?

Research shows that it's most difficult to maintain friendships, meaning that most friendships are lost, between the ages of 25-40. This is the times that people are so busy building careers and marriages and family....and if we are not careful, our friendships fall by the wayside.


The list of numbers you saw above? Those were the length of time that had passed since I had seen Georgia Boy, Gonzaga Friend, and the Oklahoma Girls. That's a lot of time. (And you can add 27.5 for all the time I went without knowing our new friends Swan and Word Up Bro!)

I'm lucky to have so many friends from different parts of my life---childhood, high school, two colleges, law school, summer in San Francisco, adulthood---but becuase we are so spread out, it makes it hard. Sure, we talk on the phone. We email. And we send birthday and Christmas cards. But friendships need some face time if they are going to make it.

I've been given a lot in my life. And I don't deserve any of it. But hands down the blessing I am most thankful for in my life are the people in it. And that's why these trips matter. Well, that and the excuse to drink wine at 10:00 am. :)

Before Girls Weekend 2011, I was worried we would never top Girls Weekend 2008. I'm here to tell you, we blew it out of the water. At this rate, I cannot wait to see what Girls Weekend 2012 has in store!

Signing off from the best trip ever....
Xoxo,

Gossip Girls!

Girls Weekend 2011 Blog #4: Sandy Bread

“Our memories of the ocean will linger on, long after our footprints in the sand are gone.” ~Anonymous

Two quick things...In case you missed any of my prior Girls Weekend posts, just click here to see them all! To read Blonde Oklahoma Girl's posts on the trip, click here!

So Saturday was a little bit more of a laid back, play it by ear, low key sort of day. The first reason for this is that we were all freaking exhaused from the insanity that was Napa and karaoke the night before, and the second was that the next morning we would be running and I knew that if I was going to make the 13.1 miles, I would have to behave on Saturday!

We started out the morning meeting up with Gonzaga Friend and heading to the Farmer's Market. I'm telling y'all, if you are ever in San Francisco on a Saturday morning, this is a MUST do! You talk about amazingly fresh fruits and veggies, nuts and honey, baked goods, goat cheese, bread, flowers....you name it, they have it. We had a great time just taking in the beauty of the market and picking out our picnic cuisine!

After the market, we headed for the SF Marathon packet pick up to get our numbers and race shirts. I am pretty darn in love with the half marathon shirt--it's orange (it's fate!!) with the bridge on the front, 13.1 on the back, and the marathon theme "Worth the Hurt" on the sleeve.

While we were there, I saw this tank top and thought it was awesome. TOTALLY kicking myself for not buying it! It says "Half marathon....I like it because it's shorter and I'm lazy like that."
After that, we headed for the beach at the Hyde Street Pier. We had big plans to hit up Baker Beach---probably the most beautiful spot in the City (and one portion of which is a nude beach, which both scared and intrigued the Oklahoma Girls!) but we were starving and tired and decided to just go with the closer option.

We, of course, took some ocean side shots.
My favorite is this one below---Loud Oklahoma Girl and I were attempting to jump and College Roomie was going to take a shot with us up in the air. Well, as we were jumping, the tide came in and we ended up landing in the freezing cold water soaking ourselves. I absolutely love this picture!
The picnic was one of those things that may have been better in theory--you know, in your mind when you sit at home on our couch. We did have yummy food----fresh strawberries, black berries, grapes and peaches, shaved parmesean cheese, jalapeno jack cheese, sourdough bread, salami....but, alas, the wind sort of covered our yummy food in sand.

Things did get better when we moved from the beach to a bench overlooking Ghirirdelli Square, but the sand blasting damage was done. Whatev. In the words of the nice homeless man who we gave our leftover bread too when I warned him it might be a little sandy, "A little salt never hurt anyone." I like people with a positive attitude.
So....we also spent a lot of time on public transportation, entertaining people on the bus with our thoughts on "if we were prostitutes" and "If you select green as a wedding color I am not wearing your dress" type of discussions.
And we ended the night with a "carb loading" meal at an amazing Italian restaurant in Pacific Heights called Luisas. We're talking homeade pastas, wonderful salads, and great wine (of which we did not partake--we were trying to be hard core runners, and our livers were still getting over the day before!)

Stay tuned for tomorrow----race day!

From the beach eating bread, cheese and fruit all covered in sand.....

Xoxo,

Gossip Girls!