Holidays

I love the holiday season and while I look forward to it every year, I also am amazed by just how fast each year flies by. This year is going to be wonderful as my family will be flying up to spend the week in Seattle. I have lived away from my family in Utah for 9 years now and have spent nearly all the last 9 Thanksgiving without them. I worked 8 years for Sprint (in retail) which meant I worked the day before and after Thanksgiving and long hours during the holiday season. Jason often had to work before and after Thanksgiving as well and since I do not know how to cook, we spend Thanksgiving at Salty's on Alki. It's perfect for us, no cooking, no cleaning and just enjoying yummy food while spending the day together. Salty's features a wonderful Thanksgiving buffet in their beautifully decorated restaurant featuring fantastic views of Seattle. They serve all the traditional foods of Thanksgiving and so much more-- including seafood! I, myself am not a huge turkey fan so I am very happy to feast on Dungeness crab and Prime Rib instead!
Since I am still not working, my dad, mom, and both of my sisters started planning their Thanksgiving trip to Seattle months ago. My dad is an AMAZING cook and looked forward to preparing dinner at our house. The last time my mom, dad, and sisters were all in town at the same time was for my wedding- so quite a special treat! My family loves to come visit and we do so much tourist-y stuff when ever they come. My dad is the type of cook that way over-plans for meals. If there will be 10 of us, he will cook for 20! All the planning, shopping, and prep for Thanksgiving would take up the vast majority of their trip so we decided on Salty's. That way we can spend the maximum amount of relaxation time together. We will still cook meals at home but this will be nice because we won't have the added stress of all that goes into Thanksgiving. We have many fun things planned (mostly including eating at their fav restaurants) and our first visit on the Santa Train so stay tuned for pics!

525,600 minutes

How do you measure a year? (gotta love 'RENT')

November 6th 2011 marked one year since I lost my job. I had a list of goals I wanted to accomplish if I were to ever become unemployed including: Zumba every day, take Savannah to and from school ON TIME each and every day, lose weight, have a squeaky- clean house, go to school to become a nurse, prepare and cook nearly all meals at home, and not miss any more moments with Jason and our girls. I am sad to say that I have only done about 2 of the things on my list; start school and not miss any more family moments. But, I am happy for the memories we have made over the past year. We are so blessed and have so much to be thankful for and for once, I am not too busy working to enjoy it all.

Looking back on the past 525,600 minutes I can't believe how fast they went by. Not going to give up on my list though because it's better late than never!

Looking ahead to the next year (and beyond) I still have much to look forward to and will be working on accomplishing goals from the first year.