#hirstcoloradoadventure Day 1

I've been a little radio silent over here on the blog the past week because we were on our big Colorado vacation! Here's a little backstory to our trip: for 2 summers, Stephen interned in Denver during college and fell in love with CO. He decided not to pursue a job out there after college because I'd be in FL for another 2 years. Thankfully, all worked out and we got married ;) Anyways, for as long as I've known him, he's always talked about wanting to take me to CO in the summer because it's beautiful and the weather is amazing. We knew it was going to be an expensive trip and one we'd want to do before having kids so we decided this year would be the best year to make it happen!

With planning our trip, Stephen knew the majority of places and hikes he wanted to take me to but we also have a lot of friends from CO who were major helps in planning the trip. We knew we wanted to see as many "big" cities in CO as we could so we ended up devising a mountain road trip; Denver -> Vail -> Glenwood Springs -> Apsen -> Breckenridge. This actually worked out perfectly as most of the cities were only 1-2 hours apart and we were able to make stops for the longer ones.

I will warn you, all of my posts will probably be pretty picture heavy - I was a FL girl in the mountains for the first time ;)

It was cheaper for us to fly out of Ft Lauderdale than Orlando so after work on Friday, we loaded up and headed down to my BIL & SIL's house so they could take us to the airport in the morning. It was fun catching up and getting to see our niece again! Saturday morning, we were up early and ready to go! I must admit, I was quite anxious the first day because I had no idea how we'd react to the higher altitude once we were outside of Denver.

We arrived in Denver around lunch time so Stephen wanted to take me to his favorite pizza place in the area he works at when he travels up to CO for business. It was super delicious and once we were stuffed, we drove around and saw the areas he hung out the most during his internships. Afterwards, I was exhausted so we headed over to our hotel right outside of downtown Denver in Cherry Creek for a quick nap before heading out for dinner. We didn't realize the ah-mazing shopping that Cherry Creek had - had we known that, we would've gotten out the door faster!

We ate dinner at North Italia (which was delicious) before heading over to Wash Park to see the sunset. After walking around Wash Park, we went back to the hotel in hopes for a good night sleep because we had a big day on Sunday!

Day 2 was going to be our biggest day but we knew if we could conquer it, we'd be fine the rest of the trip! More to come...

Linking up with Biana.

Our Home: One Year Later | Guest Bedroom & Bathroom

Let's be real, our guest bedroom didn't change much at all (if anything) over this past year but the bathroom had a few updates so I figured it should get an update post.

You can see my original post here.

I still need to switch out the hot pink sheets for red ones

Linking up with Jessi.

Weekending

Honestly, this is going to be a boring weekending post. To sum things up: we spent a lot of time at the house getting things cleaned, watching the Olympics and getting things ready for our CO trip!

Friday, Stephen made the great suggestion to get Chinese take out. So we ate Chinese and cheered for the USA in the Olympics. Sine it was Friday, we decided to stay up late and watch the Olympics but we didn't make it past 10:30... we're so exciting lol

Saturday, I got up and watched some more of the final season of Gossip Girl and ironed. Later that morning, we headed over to a park at the beach for one of Stephen's friends birthday parties. We hung out some and Stephen manned the grill. After everyone ate lunch, we headed out and ran to Old Navy. I desperately needed a new pair of white jeans (mine are from high school and after gaining weight, I definitely have a harder time fitting into them lol) and I know Old Navy does BOGO free jeans every once and a while so I've been holding out for that before buying a pair. I saw the email that BOGO was going on and we had to stop by. I was able to snag a pair of white jeans and a fun pair of regular jeans with some ripping (I sound like an old lady saying that ;)).

While there, I saw this tan jacket and fell in love. I hate buying things full price from Old Navy, but I haven't seen their military jackets go on major sale in the past. I did what I never do - I tried it on "just to see" and loved it. I knew it would be perfect for our CO trip so thankfully, I remembered I had some birthday money from my aunt and was able to get it ;) I cannot wait to wear it on our trip!!

After we got back, Stephen worked on repairing the roof in the garage while I finished up ironing and then did some monogramming. It was so nice outside so after dinner, we went on a quick bike ride. All I have to say is that I cannot wait for fall!! Then we spent the rest of the night watching Olympics and when I say the rest of the night, we passed out at 9:45 on the couch... lol

Sunday was the usual, church, grocery shopping, laundry. I started packing for our CO trip and finally (after months and months) finished Gossip Girl!! It got annoying during the middle seasons but the last 2 were fairly good. I couldn't believe how it ended but I was really happy with the finale. Now I'm supper bummed I'm saying goodbye to the Upper East Side ;)

I hope everyone had a great weekend and I do have to apologize for the lack of pictures in this post.

Linking up with Biana.

Five on Friday: Olympics Edition

One
We've been loving watching the Olympics but we're so annoyed it doesn't come on NBC until 8pm! How are we supposed to watch gymnastics when they show half of it and then show the rest at like 11pm? We go to bed at 10pm so we end up missing a lot of it. Hopefully they'll play more during the day this weekend.

Two
We really enjoy swimming but now I'm kind of over it... how many times do we have to watch the same thing over and over? But the competition is exciting to watch! We were dying because the other night, we were watching swimming and Stephen made a comment about how he was glad he knows Phelps wins - thinking it was pre-recorded. I burst his bubble and told him it was live - at least he predicted will because Phelps did win ;)

Was this not the funniest thing ever!? I get the biggest kick out of the commentators

Three
We got to watch men's diving and it was amazing!! I love watching diving and gymnastics because I just can't get over how those people do what they do. We were so happy the US men won silver on synchronized platform diving. They also did an amazing job sharing their faith and talking about how their identity isn't in diving - it's in the Lord. I feel like a creeper but I'd love to be friends with David's wife - they just seem like such great people :)

Also, did anyone see how the diving pool turned a nasty green color? Great job running out of chemicals, Brazil!

Four
I don't even know what to say about the women's gymnastics team... they are simply perfection! First of all, I am just so amazed at what they can do - I can't even do a awful cartwheel lol Second, they're crushing it against all the other countries. All gold?! So much fun to watch, even though we haven't gotten to watch all of it.

Five
This doesn't have to do with the Olympics, but our AC went out last Thursday and thankfully, we replaced it on Monday. Stephen was amazing and literally helped the guys out and replaced our unit. I was one happy wife when I came home from work to a cool house. The house ended up getting so cold the last few days, it felt like Christmas! Now it's leveled out better so it's not as cold but we realized the dehumidifier makes it feel like fall/Christmas lol

Our Home: One Year Later | Living Room

This room is one of our biggest transformations - I want to spend all our time in here because it's so bright and airy, yet I don't want to mess anything up! This room was completely empty when we moved in - minus the canvas that we had leaning up on the wall. We had a specific vision for this room and I think it really came to fruition!!

I knew I wanted winged back chairs for this room and Stephen got hooked on the French style - we felt these chairs were the perfect combination! We don't have a lot of lighter colors throughout the house so I know I wanted to use a lot of color in this room.

Here's a before picture to show how empty the room was when I first shared it:

I think I'd like to add a small table in between the chairs

We want to either build or buy a bench for under the pictures for this wall. I think it will really help our guests with taking their shoes off and putting them back on. At some point, we'll add pictures or something on the angled wall to the right.

We need to take more pictures to fill these frames lol

You can find my original living room post here. Feel free to ask where I got things :)

Linking up with Jessi.

Weekending: Camilla's Baby Shower

This weekend has been quite interesting to say the least... Thursday, I took off of work to take Stephen to get a small procedure done. When we woke up that morning, it was super hot and our thermostat was out of batteries so I had Stephen replace them before leaving so the house would be cooled down by the time we got back. Well, we got back and the house was still hot - I knew then we had a problem. Stephen thought he could fix the problem so I have him 1.5 days to work on it and once he exhausted all his options, we finally called someone and found out the whole unit was toast.

Friday, I worked from home (I should've gone over to Starbucks so I wasn't in the heat) and Stephen got quotes for a unit replacement. Thankfully, we'll have someone out today to replace the unit but goodness, you never fully appreciate something until it's gone! We were so happy that evening because we met our friends for dinner - we hadn't seen them in a while and we couldn't wait to get out of the heat! We had a great time catching up with them and trying a new restaurant. Unfortunately, it was hotter  Friday night than Thursday night and I had a rough time sleeping.

I was up early Saturday to head over to the Southwest coast of FL for my best friend's baby shower! Thankfully, one of our friends lives in Orlando and was able to drive me down there - not sure if I would've made it if I had to drive by myself and we had a fun time catching up! The baby shower was soo sweet and the epitome of Camilla and baby Eloise :) Her mom threw a tea party and my friend, Amanda, came up with some great games!

The bridesmaids together again (minus 1)

It was so much fun seeing everyone again! The last time we were all together was Camilla's wedding, last May. Before we knew it, it was time to make the 3 hour trek back to Orlando. I got home late that evening and Stephen had a friend over to watch the Olympics (poor guy had to deal with our heat). We hung out for a little before his friend left and we decided to sleep on the floor in our family room because that was the coolest room in the house.

I cannot wait to meet baby Eloise!!!

Isn't she the prettiest mom-to-be!?

Sunday, we went to church and then stretched out our time away from home with running errands at Target and Publix. After getting home, we set up shop on the family room floor trying to stay cool and watched the Olympics. I never anticipated how rough it'd be in August in FL without AC... I have no motivation to do anything but sit under the fan. The heat literally takes everything out of you! Even though it's been a hot few days, I am thankful that we can afford the AC work, I'm not pregnant and dealing with this, we don't have young children sweating inside and Stephen already had off work Monday so he can take care of things!!

I hope everyone had a great weekend!! Linking up with Biana.