POW #??? Gobble Gobble of sunshiny years past

First off, I can't believe how long it's been since I've posted a Picture O' the Week! Somehow, in all the house selling/buying/moving/watching/obsessing, I'd lost my blogging touch. Well, today has inspired me, partly because this holiday always puts me in a reflective/grateful for memories place, but also because we haven't had any photo-worthy moments lately.

Before I move on to the pic, let me just say how insanely grateful I am for our lives. Rob and I are beyond blessed to have such a solid relationship (I consider myself the luckiest girl in the world to have met and married my best friend!), precious family and amazing friends (and an adorable little furry white guy to boot). We have our health, a beautiful home and loads to be grateful for. I hope all of you dear blog-followers/loved ones also are having a wonderful Thanksgiving! To celebrate, we are having a very non-traditional thanksgiving of going on a hike, going to the movies, and then going to Chinese for dinner. Far ra ra ra ra ra ra ra ra! We normally travel for the Thanksgiving holiday but with the new home and the lack of one job, we are staying put, thankyouverymuch.

This picture is from one of those "travels" in the past, when we scored a free weekend at the Ritz Carlton in Laguna Beach over the Thanksgiving weekend in 2004 - we had to attend a lame-o time share presentation with a snooty guy but it was totally worth it. Here's a photo of us right before Thanksgiving dinner....honestly (and what makes this funnier is we had gone to Jack in the Box for Thanksgiving lunch, bwahahahaha!). Guess this isn't the first year we've gone with non-traditional! Love you all - xoxoxoxoxo

Warming up the house!

Our housewarming party was last weekend and it was such a success, I was WAY too pooped to blog about it! (A sure sign of a hefty party, I'd say). Since we wanted to invite so many people, we decided to have an open house kind of situation, so essentially we had upwards of 60+ people in and out for about 10 hours...whew! It made us feel so proud to show everybody the house, my only beef with the day was it was so hard with that many people to spend time with each and every one...I felt pulled in a million directions. We laughed that it was like our wedding...we didn't even eat until 9 PM we were so busy, and we know it basically takes a major act of God for this girl not to eat, ha!

A few days before our party, we had received some pretty awful/shocking news. Rob's company suddenly laid off 14% of their workforce, which unfortunately included all of San Diego - almost 600 people lost their jobs in an instant. We were both devastated, obviously, and it could not be worse timing with us buying this new beautiful home - we had believed both of us had such stable jobs and I guess it just goes to show you nothing is guaranteed in life so we need to be grateful for everything we do have. Rob has been doing ok - sometimes really scared and worried about the future, but mostly I think he's optimistic and hopeful he will find something better. We had thought about cancelling the party but I'm so glad we didn't - we definitely needed to be around our loved ones and it was such a nice reminder about what is important: relationships in life. We're so grateful to have such amazing people in our lives and we continue to count our blessings for our love for each other, our health, our white furry wonder, etc. So, the party went on!

Setting up for the party, getting the food, drinks and booze all arranged:
My favorite apron:Since we don't have our landscaping done yet, we set up our outside table with a blanket underneath it, and Rob set up our camping picnic tent for another little seating area - it worked perfectly!Here Sean and Carter figure out the mysteries of life: Paige, Sarah and Maria: Here's some work folks, Sean and Rob have worked together 10 years now!. Daniel and Sarah are here with their little guy Noah who is so freakin' adorable. Luckily, Daniel is in finance and already had a pretty solid job lead.
Rob's coworker David: He's such a positive guy. Unfortunately his wife was laid off just 2 weeks before he was, and they have kids to support, but they're both so optimistic and lovely, I was trying hard to channel their inner peace: Here's some of my work friends, Maria, Jeff and his partner Tim. We were all laughing that it was such a strange mix of folks: depressed laid off Biogen-Idec people and a bunch of compassionate therapists - free therapy over cocktails, what could be better? :) More work people: Kris, Jessica, Maria, Jeff, Tim, Mary and her Mom Dora:

Me with my awesome boss MaryLou and her husband (also a therapist at Kaiser) John:
More folks at the party: Us with Dustin and Allen:
Me and Mo: Rob photo-bombing his softball buddies:
And, joining them(Jen, Vic, Erica, Steve, Alanna and Derek (who got engaged the week after our party!): I was so impressed with how many people fit in our place...we couldn't have more than 15 people at the old joint, and even then, it was super packed! How we ever crammed 15 of us girls in wedding dresses in there, I will never know. Our friends Pat and Holly (who incidentally brought the fake lips that were a HUGE hit)
We look like drag queens! Eventually, Rob and his fake lips chased the girls around the house - they were screaming hysterically (and of course begged Rob to do it again and again and again...hysterical!)
Our regular gang were such troopers - we barely were even able to chat with them!
Goodness knows what's even happening here: Finally, at the end, our neighbors came by. It was such a nice way to wrap up the party, hanging out with them and getting to know them better. Rob took a crack at soothing fussy Elie but she wasn't having it, despite his best efforts: Jason and Tara have learned that they're expecting a girl!!! We're so thrilled for them, and it's so fun to watch them getting ready to be parents, Tara had the touch: Rob with a happier neighbor, Zara: Mayur and Zubin: Me, Swati and Saritha:

Party animal got wiped out! He looks how I felt...

Chasing bunnies

Unfortunately, I couldn't get the camera on time to capture his darling little sleep barks, but I at least was able to video Galileo dream chasing some bunnies. Freakin' adorable!

Oops, was it already Halloween?

Been a nutty few weeks and I've sadly slacked on my blogging duties. We actually *gasp* took a year off from our normal Halloween madness and just hung out at the new digs and handed out candy...had a great time but WAY overestimated how many kids we'd get. I swear we probably bought $40 worth of candy anticipating the new 'hood would be packed, and we got all of MAYBE 15 trick or treaters TOTAL!

At the end of the night, Rob had the brilliant idea to just walk down the street to hand out the candy...although I'm sure he looked pretty molester-esque scary wandering down the middle of the road in his afro wig yelling "hey kids, who wants more candy?" Bwahahaha! I was laughing my butt off following behind him, but at least it got rid of most of it.

Here's our new neighbors Matt, Lindsey and their daughter Lilah, all as Yo Gabba Gabba or something (as if we'd know, they had to tell us what they were, but they just cracked me up).
Our new neighbor Zara (on the right) with her buddies.

Another neighbor Mason (with Mom Megan in the background).
More neighbors: Alejandro (the littlest), Anthony and Cristal:
More cuties:

Our friends Sean and Paige dropped by with Sean's Mom Beth and their son Carter (Buzz Lightyear). Rob and Buzz promptly watched some football and then played Buzz flying down the stairs.

Happy Halloween! (2 weeks late). I promise, we'll be back on the wagon next year.

The Childhood BFF visits!

My good friend Nicole, her husband Chad and daughter Karaline all came out to visit last weekend and we had such an amazing time! It was great to have our first official house guests (plus let's be honest, it was great motivation to kick us into high gear to get our spare bedroom all done in time), and it's ALWAYS fun to hang with those guys. Nicole and I have been friends since we were 10 years old and it's always so comfy to be together. We honestly pick up right where we left off, and when I'm not with her, it's like a piece of me is missing. So, needless to say, it was incredible to be together again!

Her sweet daughter Karaline is now 14 months old and has grown so much since we last saw her! She is such a little sweetie, it was a blast to see her little personality growing. She kept us cracking up the whole weekend. She was super into some Broncos beads and an Hawaiian nut lei that she found in our closet, she wore them all weekend and looked like Mr. T.

Poor G tapped into his own inner "T" as well:

Without having dining room chairs yet, we hung out in the courtyard a bunch. Here's Rob and Chad doing some "work". Nerd alert!

We made our first fire in the fireplace! So nice and cozy...

Karaline really dug the playground near our house, she was so cute trying to climb everything like a big girl!

Meanwhile, the guys observed.

On Sunday, we had brunch for our friends to meet Nicole and Karaline (Chad had already gone up to LA for a conference), and Karaline and Bennett played together a bit again at the playground.

Saturday we went to Sea World and had such a great time together. I was impressed that Karaline was actually into the animals and able to stay pretty patient during the shows!

Seeing Shamu:
Watching the Shamu show:

Touching the ice wall:
Looking at the penguins: (or actually, looking at Auntie Beth looking at the penguins):

There was a new baby Beluga whale there, only 4 months old! Such an adorable little chubbs...and she is all gray, apparently they turn white later when they're older. It's actually a sweet little story, she was rejected by her Mom but immediately one of the other females took over and started nurturing/raising her. That female has never had babies of her own, and yet she started lactating and is now nursing the little peanut! Boohoooooo!!!! So freakin' cute. I cannot deny that I was reduced to a puddle of mush while watching her swim with her "mama", so precious.

I sat there and took about 10 minutes of video just watching the little one swim around with "Mama"...but here's the edited version. This is my version of heaven, this makes me so happy!

Someone wants a polar bear. I'm just saying.

Sharks! You pick which one scared Chad:

Karaline seemed into the ray encounter exhibit, she kept waving to them:

Flamingos!

We took Karaline into the little kid play area and we noticed shoes weren't allowed, so Auntie Beth to the rescue: I hopped out there and swapped her shoes for socks...and while I was there, starting bouncing and playing with her, until I got in trouble. Oops, apparently you have to be under 37 inches to play in that area! Hey, what if I'm just a super tall toddler with a glandular problem? Don't discriminate.

And just like that, the weekend was over and we were hugging and kissing goodbye! :( Boo! I was so sad to say goodbye, but will always look forward to the next time...