Hey guys! I’m back!! It has been a busy few weeks around here.  I went to Mexico with my girlfriends, Cleveland for a wedding, and work has been busier than ever so I have not had a moment to sit down and blog.  Hopefully this week will be a little slower with the holiday coming up.

But I’ve got to show you pics from our trip to Mexico.  It was a blast!  We left on a Friday to head to Puerto Vallarta.  After a long afternoon of traveling, we were pretty excited to finally be there!  View from our room.

The first night we went out to a late dinner on the 4th floor of this building.  It was the most gorgeous view.

We could even see the fireworks from down at the ocean.

The restaurant was a tapas restaurant so we all split a LOT of dishes.  I like trying everything so it was fun.  The food was phenomenal!  Something else quite hilarious happened while we were at dinner at 10:30pm… I got stun by a bee!!! I had to pull the stinger out and ask for a bag of ice at the restaurant. LOL…

The next day I hit the gym bright and early.  I know most people take vacation as a time to relax and not workout, but I love working out in new places.  And the gym at our hotel was super nice.

After breakfast, a couple of us headed to the beach while the others went shopping.

I finished two books while we were in Mexico and it was amazing.  I don’t get to read that often anymore because of our busy schedules, so this was such a treat. 

We had lots of pool time.  The weather was amazing the whole time we were there. 

Ready for another girls dinner!

Our friend took us to this beautiful restaurant on the beach!  We got front row so we had a great view of the sun setting while we ate. 

We shared a few salads and appetizers to start.

So pretty. 

I had this delicious seafood dish with quinoa and it was sooo good. 

Doesn’t get much better than this.

The girlies!

After dinner we walked around for a bit… then I saw this and just about died.  This dog at the bar… it looked like he was just there by himself living life.  So cute!

Puerto Vallarta!

We ended up at this bar with a huge swing out front.  That’s my friend up there.

Too funny. 

A perfect first two nights in Mexico!

I am off to get ready for work, but I’ll be back with part 2 soon!! 

Questions:

1. How was your weekend?
2. Have you taken any great trips lately?
3. Any plans for the 4th? 

Heyyyy friends!! Long time no talk.  It.has.been.quite.the.week.already.  Geez, I am ready for Friday.  Are you?  I’ve got a few updates for you and this will hopefully explain why I have been a little more absent than normal.  

Before I start, let me preface this by saying… I am A-okay and feeling much better.  Last week on Monday I started not feeling well (tummy issues…again).  I was certain I was going to end up in the hospital, but thankfully avoided it.  It was a very stressful week at work with a few changes that occurred and this was just bad timing.  I felt horrible all week and didn’t end up eating more than a small smoothie each day (if I was able to get it down).  I was super nauseated, in a lot of pain, and my stomach was very distended.  You could hear gurgling sounds from my tummy across the room.  Obviously this made me very nervous so I made an appointment to follow up with the surgeon I saw here when I was in the hospital.  In a nutshell, he said we needed to start all the tests again that I did last year because things could have changed (colonoscopy, small bowel follow through, CT, etc.).  While I know they have to do this and I want to avoid surgery, it is frustrating just having to deal with these symptoms or be admitted to the hospital (all while trying to work a very demanding job).  I went home from my appointment feeling super defeated (and a lot more stressed).  Over the weekend I still felt horrible and ended up going to a nearby spa to get an IV (saline + vitamins) since I hadn’t been able to eat or drink much and was very dehydrated. 

While my tummy was still feeling awful, thankfully the IV made my body feel better.  By Sunday I was feeling quite a bit better and finally had my first REAL food Sunday night.  I took it easy getting back into eating solid foods, eating a little more each day this week.  

By Monday I was feeling back to normal, but you know that saying “when it rains, it pours”?  Yeah well, this has been the story of my life lately. 😉

Monday evening I was leaving work with my lunchbox, phone, purse, and laptop in hand.  I am still not even sure exactly how it happened, but I tripped (over my own foot, I think) and fell hard on the pavement in the parking lot.  All my stuff went flying and my body went crashing to the ground.  Twisted my ankle, banged up my knee, wrist, hip, shoulder, elbow and my face. I don’t even know how that many surfaces could have possibly hit the pavement, but they did.  The worst part was my face… my teeth cut up the inside of my mouth, my lip and above my lip.  My teeth didn’t go all the way through, but blood was gushing everywhere.  I quickly drove home with every napkin in my car on my face catching the blood… yuck!  I didn’t think it was too bad, but when I got home my husband said I needed stitches.  We drove to urgent care…

The doctor agreed I needed stitches… on the inside and outside of my mouth.  She said I might want to go to the ER so I could see a plastic surgeon since the stitches were on my face… but I said just do it (and please do a good job ;)).  After 5 rounds of numbing my mouth (it would NOT numb up), and my husband exiting the room to avoid puking (ha!), she stitched up my mouth and face and we headed home.  I iced my face all night and tried (and failed miserably) to get some sleep.  

Tuesday was rough.  My whole body was SO sore and my head was pounding, but I got through it.  The doctor told me to come back in 5-7 days to remove the stitches on my face (the ones in my mouth will dissolve).  This sounds great, but I leave for a girls trip to Mexico on Friday.  The doctor said to come back to see if maybe the stitches would be ready to come out and if not, I could do it myself (it will be too long to wait until I come home).  🙂 So we will see!  For now, I just look like I got lip injections on one side of my lip. 😉 LOL.

I hope you have had a better week than me! But I am hoping this is the end of my bad luck and it is all smooth sailing from here.  I was going to cancel my trip (because of my tummy, not my face), but since I am feeling better, I made the decision to go (sorry, MOM!).  I am obviously going to be very careful with what I eat (and the water I drink) while I am there, but I have to live my life and I have been looking forward to this trip for a long time.  I am really excited to lay in the sun and have some fun with my girlfriends…and after this last week, I feel like I really NEED this trip.  🙂

Thank you all for the sweet messages, cards, and thoughts.  I am so so so lucky to have you all in my life.  

Just wanted to give you all a little update of what has been going on over here lately.  I am hoping the next update is ALLLLLL good things!!!  Have a great rest of your week and enjoy your weekend!! Talk to you soon! 

Questions:

1. How are things going for YOU?
2. Any fun plans for the weekend?
3. Have you ever taken a bad fall (hopefully when you were a kid and not almost 30 years old like me ;)) ?

Hey friends!!! Happy Monday!! How was your weekend?  Mine was just what I needed… relaxing, rejuvenating, with a side of fun.  We only had a handful of plans on the agenda and it was perfect after a long week at work (even though it was only a four day work week).  Did anyone else feel like the short work week dragged on?  Just me?  Well anyway.. I sure was ready for the weekend.  

See, even Riley thought last week was exhausting. 😉  He literally sleeps like a human with a pillow and likes to be tucked in.  It’s ridiculous and we know it. 🙂

Wednesday night my husband suggested to me and our good friends that we all go play bar trivia so that’s just what we did.  We took the “fun” car and blasted the music.  There is just something about cool breeze, wind in your hair, music up loud, summer night drive.  

Well we didn’t come close to winning at trivia, but we sure did win the the friend department.  Love these peeps.  

Thursday night we had our co-ed rec volleyball games.  Let’s just say this isn’t our strongest sport… but we are improving.  It’s all just for fun for us and another great excuse to see the crew during the week. 

By the time Friday night rolled around, I was ready to hop in my PJ’s and get into bed by 7, but Jonny and I had a date night planned so I cleaned up and got ready.  Our pups are totally fine by themselves all day, but Friday I was just feeling sappy and wanted my babies with me so I told Jon we had to do happy hour and dinner at dog friendly places.  He obliged. We grabbed a couple cocktails at a local bar (I always forget the name) near our house) with the pups before dinner.  

My boys. 🙂

Callie girl may be hiding under the table, but I promise she was happy to be invited.  😉

I just bought a ton of new makeup on Amazon and have been trying different looks lately.  I honeslty used to buy most of my makeup from walgreens and a few staples from Sephora, but Amazon may be my new go-to.  

My sweet man. 

Come on pups, time for dinner!

We went to Braza Brava (we recently went with our friends) because it was so good and they have a nice dog-friendly patio out back.  I started with the beet salad and my husband started with a Cesar.  

I got the salmon and veggies and he got a yummy pizza.  We both really enjoyed our meals and share some wine while just catching up.  It is easy to get into a routine during the week where you don’t get to spend much quality time with your partner so we have been really trying to make an effort to block out this time for just us.  We have the best time eating, drinking, laughing and talking about our future plans.  

Yall, my sleep has been horrific.  So so so bad.  I haven’t been sleeping well through the night then I’ve been taking long naps on the weekends and then can’t sleep again the next night and have been up SO early the past 2-3 weeks.  It is good until about 2 or 3 pm rolls around and I crash hard.  Sorry for that little tangent… it all started because I was up early on Satuday morning so I decided to do a little meal prep.  I made another batch of protein balls to have on hand throughout the week (peanut butter, honey, cinnamon, vanilla protein powder, flaxseeds, steel cut oats and pumpkin seeds).  I just keep them in the freezer and pop  a couple in my lunch box each morning for a snack. 

Saturday I topped my smoothie (ice, frozen banana, vanilla protein powder, magnesium, L-Glutamine, cold brew coffee and unsweetened vanilla almost milk) with the extra mixture, which was a fantastic idea.

My husband had plans to play gold with the boys on Sunday, but ofcourse, he wanted to get another round in too.  He asked me to go ride around in the cart with his while he played.  Seriously I do not get why he wants me to watch him play sports. 🙂  Do other husband’s do this or is it just mine? I love that he has his own hobbies, and I am totally supportive, but like … I want my alone time while you do your extracurriculars. 😉  In all seriousness, I did have fun listening to my podcast and catching some rays while riding around in the gold cart.  I also got the job of looking for lost balls he hit in the bushes… fun times. 

But the course is really pretty so that made up for it a bit.

Jon’s friend brought me over some treats when he piccked him up for gold on Sunday and I was sooo excited.  I love chocolate chips whether it be just a handful or a bag in a recipe.  Nestle has come out with a few new flavors that aren’t available quite yet, but I got early access to try them out.  I will let you know the verdict!!! The 4 new flavors I got are: sugar-free semi-sweet chocolate morsels, espresso flavored morsels, pumpkin spice baking truffles, and peppermint baking truffles.  Yum!!! Any ideas of good recipes to put these babies to use?

More pics from last weekend.  Patiently waiting for our flight at the airport and Riley attacking my face. 🙂

I got the big group picture back from the fam so I thought I’d share with you all.  Love are my people!!

I hope you all ave a great Monday and a great week ahead!!! XOXOXO

Questions; 

1. Favorite thing to bake?
2. Do you like pumpkin flavored things?
3. Do you play any recreational sports/leagues?

Sunday night a few of us went for a sunset cruise on the boat! 

Brothers and cousin!

Riley and I just chillin on the boat and loving life!

Ahhh… the sunset on the water is just the prettiest!

I just love being out on the water.  There is something so calming and peaceful about being at the lake. 

Isn’t nature so beautiful? 

The prettiest sunset ever!

Sunset cruises on the lake make me want to live near the lake again!! It never gets old. 

So stunning.

Back to the house we go.

All the cousins!

We played a few games on Sunday night including one of our favorites, CatchPhrase!  It is always a blast!

Family Pictures in our Family Reunion Shirts!

The whole crew!

Thank you to all our family for traveling to be together for this wonderful tradition.  It is always a trip we look forward to each year!! Until next year!!!

Questions:

1. Does your family have family reunions?
2. Are you a lake or beach or mountain person?
3. Tell me something that is going on in your world this week!

Hi guys!! Who else is loving that this is a 4 day work week?  It is nice that it’s already Wednesday!!  Already looking forward to the weekend. 🙂 

Let’s back up a bit… last Friday we woke up super early for our 6:30am flight.  Once we checked in and checked our bags, we got the news that our flight had been cancelled. 😦  Ugh!!  We quickly spoke to customer service and got rescheduled on the next flight, but unfortunately we didn’t get a direct flight.  We had to fly through Orlando.  Here’s our little boy hanging out at the airport being such a good pup while we waited for our final flight to Atlanta.  Because it was a mechanical issue, we both got flight vounchers so that kinda made up for the inconvenience of arriving later and having a layover.  

Once we arrived in Atlanta we were a little worried about our bags.  Our flight options were to fly through Orlando or Nashville so we picked the one that got us there earlier (Orlando).  They told us our bags would get redirected so we looked and looked for them when we arrive with no luck.  Finally a worker found them on an arriving flight from Dallas.   So random, but we were really happy to have our belongings.   I was so happy to have my clothes and my husband was more excited that his golf clubs made the flight. 😉

We headed to the lake, about an hour and a half from the airport, to meet up with my husband’s side of the family for our annual cousin fest!  

Family pictures at the lake!  

My sweet, sweet boys. 🙂

Every year our aunt gets t-shirts made and this is the 6th annual cousin fest.  We had our shirts on for the big group picture, but managed to sneak them off for our individual family picture. 🙂

Meanwhile back in San Antonio, Callie was loving on our friends and their pup.  It is always so nice knowing she is in great hands when we are away.  

We spent the weekend playing with the kiddos, taking boat rides, reading, podcasting, taking long walks, and eating a LOT.  

This little monkey enjoys being in the sun just like his momma. 

Always somewhere nearby me and I don’t mind it one bit. 🙂

Beautiful views from the house.

We just love being at the lake.

Sweet little cousin playing lots and lots of games with me and the rest of the kiddos.  

Lots of work to make food for a crowd and every meal was delish!

Salad and veggies galore!

Saturday night we played poker and guess who won?? 😉

This is Riley’s favorite spot at the lake.  

On more than one occasion we found him basking in the sun here.

Not a care in the world. 

He likes this spot because he can walk into the water to fetch sticks from here.  Riley LOVES swimming, but he doesn’t like jumping in the water so as long as he can walk in… he is not getting out for hours.  The little kids had a blast throwing sticks for Riley to fetch.  

Love this sweet hubby of mine!! 

One more recap of our family reunion lake trip coming soon!! I hope you all have the best day!! 

Questions:

1. Any Memorial Day traditions?
2. Do you have regular family reunions?  If so, how often?
3. If you have a pup, does he/she like the water/swimming?

Hi friends!! I hope you all had a wonderful Memorial Day Weekend.  Thank you to all who have served so that we can be free.  I am forever grateful for your service.  

We had a long weekend in Georgia at the lake with family and I’ll have some recaps up later this week!  Before we left we had a great week at home with the pups.  These pups and my hubby are my favorites.  The pups end up on my side of the bed ever night, but we have a nightly cuddle sesh before falling asleep.  🙂 I just love them so much. 

This is the usual scene.  Both pups on top of me and me trying to sleep. 🙂 

Two weeks ago I had another tummy scare and ended up having soups and smoothies all week.  Thankfully a few days of taking it easy on the eating really helped and I was back to feeling well in no time.  One of my favorite smoothies: ice, vanilla protein powder, frozen banana, magnesium, L-glutamine, cold brew coffee, unsweetened vanilla almond milk and a little almond butter.  It always hits the spot. 

Riley boy always on momma’s lap.  

I never got into Grey’s Anatomy so my husband and I recently started it from the beginning and we are loving it.  We just finished Dexter, Dead to Me and Killing Eve.  I would recommend all of them!!  Have you watched them? 

Sweet Cal girl always nearby. 

My sweet husband took a tumble off a motorized scooter last weekend in Austin when he was there for a bachelor party.  I made him keep ice on his face the whole week.  He was really happy about it. 😉

Cuddling with this sweet boy.  He will literally sleep anywhere.. it is so cute.

You all know my love for salads.  I have been switching them up a bit to keep them interesting and my latest favorite combination is mixed greens, a broccoli slaw mix, cucumbers, beets, chickpeas, pumpkin seeds, dried cherries, goat cheese and sauteed shrimp.  Try this combo.. its delish!!!

My husband was in the middle of a show the other night so I decided to eat dinner at the dining room table and it made me realize how much I love our dining room.  It’s so homey and cozy. 

I caught up on the bachelorette while enjoying my yummy salad!  Is anyone else watching this season?

I make enough salads for the week on Sunday to enjoy for lunch/dinner throughout the week.  Makes for such an easy and yummy meal without much thought, which is right up my alley. 

Recaps our of lake trip to come!! I hope you all have a great (short) week ahead!!

Questions:

1. Favorite lunch you eat often?
2. Any new shows you are loving?
3. How was your Memorial Day Weekend? 

Happy Friday friends!! I hope you all had a nice week and are looking forward to a nice, relaxing weekend.  This week has been tough.. I’ve not been feeling great (stomach issues again) so I have had to work from home a bit and take it easy on eating and drinking.  The frustrating part about this whole this is that I can feel great one minute and then really crappy the next.  As of now, I am feeling pretty good and hoping this continues.  

Since the last few weeks have been a little nuts with my health, I am pretty behind on my blog.  But here we are so I’ll share a bit of what’s been happening in my world lately. 🙂

My husband has always been into boys poker nights and as of late last year, I learned to play so I have been joining in on the fun.  Well guess what?  The last one was me and 10 boys and I took home the gold! I’m on a winning streak and I like it. 😉

Last Saturday my husband and I headed downtown to see an early movie.  We saw Long Shot and I wasn’t expecting it to be very good, but yall, it was hysterical!!! We both loved it!

My man took me out to celebrate… or shall I say, I took him out to dinner to celebrate with my winnings. 😉 

We went to Bistro 9 since we have been wanting to return since we went with my in-laws when they were in town.  I got the seared tuna and my husband got some other fish special and we both loved our meals.  Definitely one of our favorite date night spots! 

But I have to tell yall a funny story… we took my husband’s convertible our for date night and as soon as we parked, my husband noticed something fell from the tree above us.  Well… it was poop.  A bird pooped on my dress!  Too funny. 

One of our favorite things to do on date night is ride around in the car on new roads with the top down and search for beautiful houses.  So we did just that before calling it a night. 

We had another date night a couple weeks ago at a new-to-us sushi restaurant to celebrate my hubby’s birthday.  He’s getting old. 😉

We split a bunch of rolls and they were all soooo delicious.  Yes, we ate them all!

My hubby wanted to show off his new cowboy boots he got for his birthday.  🙂 

We also had another date night with our friends at Capparellis.  Omg it was soo delicious!! Yes, that is salmon on my salad. 😉 

Our friends bought a new house so we got to puppy sit for a day.  Callie loves Brody and it is so sweet.  You guys all know that Callie is much for of a human lover than a doggie lover, but she may have converted due to this puppy.  Her boyfriend. 🙂

Jon and I took a walk to get breakfast last weekend at Rise Up.  We split the chocolate acai bowl and it was so tasty!!

Riley licking my smoothie cup clean.  He is such a chunk, we love it. 

Can you spy Riley waiting patiently for his daddy? 🙂

The dogs go whereever we go… it is a little ridiculous, we know. 🙂

A few of our friends convinced us to join a coed volleyball league.  Last Thursday we had our first games.  Let’s just say, we need a little practice. 😉

Jonny made us some mahi mahi on the smoker the other night and I roasted asparagus (added lemon and Parmesan at the end) and sauteed mushrooms with chili powder, paprika and a drizzle of balsamic.  So yummy!

Veggies topped with veggie burgers is my go-to when Jon has tennis late during the week.  Can’t ever get enough veggies! Can you see Riley behind all my food pictures? 😉

Last weekend we went out to dinner with a bunch of our friends at a local Italian restaurant, Braza Brava.  It was delicious!!! I got the salmon, duh, with grilled veggies! 

We grabbed a few drinks while we were out too and had a blast just chatting and playing bar games. All the girlies!

On Sunday we took the dogs on a long walk, did some things around the house, then got ready to head to our friends house for dinner.  On the way, Jon asked if we could stop so he could hit some golf balls.  I’m a nice wife, so I agreed. 😉 

Once we got to our friends house, we played lots of outdoor games and had some appetizers.  It was such a beautiful evening. 

The pups enjoyed running around and lounging in the sun. 🙂

Someone was ready for dinner! 

Family dinner time!  Callie waiting for some droppings. 🙂

Some of the boys!

We made a big salad, grilled corn, burgers and salmon. It was all soo delicious!

I even had some leftover salmon to top my salad for lunch the next day.  Yum!!!!

Tell me what you have been up to in the comments!!! I hope you all have a fantastic weekend!!!

Questions:

1. What is one food you have been loving lately? (mine is obviously salmon :))
2. What are your plans for the weekend? 
3. Do you play golf? (I am so bad, but my husband plays as often as he can)