Good Luck Patrick!

Wow, I can't believe it's already February (it's hard to believe since it's 81 degrees here today)! It's been a while since we last updated the blog as the month of January wasn't too exciting. This last week I've had a cold and have been working really hard not to pass it on to Patrick. I would hate to give it to him since this Sunday (the 8th) he has a 10K race that he's been training for. He has been really looking forward to this race. The race course goes through Chinatown and up the hill around Dodger Stadium. It benefits the local asian communities' schools in honor of the Chinese New Year. I will make sure to take pictures for the blog. Wish Patrick good luck for his race!

Home for the Holidays

Patrick and I recently returned from spending the holidays in Portland with our families. We were there for 2 weeks and arrived the night of the giant snow storm. We were one of 4 flights allowed into Portland that night. As we were landing at the airport and I saw the runway covered in ice with snow blowing across it, I thought "Wow, I can't believe they let us fly in to this." Patrick and I have seen a lot of snow in both Colorado and Boston, but we have never seen that much snow in Portland. We were planning to go to the mountain while we were home, but there was really no need (not to mention you couldn't even get up there due to all the snow). We saw plenty of snow!!! The timing was a little inconvenient as it was right before Christmas and Patrick and I needed to get out to buy gifts, but it was still really special to have a white Christmas and be a part of the craziness.

While in Salem, visiting Patrick's grandma, we heard about a Dunkin Donuts that still existed. A little history for you... All the Dunkin Donuts on the west coast closed many years ago and at the time we never gave it a second thought. While living in Boston, however, we fell in love with Dunkin Donuts coffee. So for the last 2 years living in California we have been craving Dunkin coffee. You can buy it at the grocery store but it is just not the same as getting it from Dunkie D's. So, we were soooo excited to hear that there might still be one in Salem. Patrick's dad drove us down there in the snow to see for ourselves (we also found out that Patrick's dad worked there a long time ago making donuts). Well, it turned out to be a donut place but it was called Daynight Donuts. Every thing on the inside looked like Dunkin Donuts, so we went in to see what the deal was. Apparently they used to be one but no longer. They, however, still had all the Dunkin Donuts napkins, sugar packets, cups and coffee. So, here is a photo of us standing out side Daynight Donuts with our Dunkin Donuts coffee:

The closest we've come to a Dunkin Donuts in 2 years

While at home we visited friends and family, spent a day in Portland, froze our butts off, ate lots of cookies and gained weight. All in all, a great holiday season! Happy new year to everyone!

Here are a few more photos from our time in Oregon:

This picture doesn't do it justice. There was so much snow!

A night out in Portland

The riverfront in Portland

Festive Christmas pic

Hanging with the girls our last night in Portland. We had to take a picture with our newest addition to the group.

Looking Good

This last weekend Patrick's work had their holiday party. It was held at the Peterson Automotive Museum in Hollywood. We got to see some pretty cool cars (once we got there... it took us 1 1/2 hours to go 17 miles). My favorites were the old convertibles, but they also had a car that was used in one of the James Bond movies. Then the dinner was held on the roof of the museum which had a great view of the city lights. It was a great opportunity to get dressed up and since we were looking so snazzy, which doesn't happen often, we made sure to get a picture.

That's right, it's a holiday party outside in December. How weird is that?

Mmmmm Turkey!

Well, Thanksgiving has come and gone and our best friends are back in Denver. We're going through Dawson withdrawl but definitely NOT turkey withdrawl. We have eaten turkey every day since Thanksgiving and still have turkey in the fridge and freezer.

We're now looking forward to coming home for Christmas. It is hard to believe it is December, though, since it was 82 degrees yesterday. Patrick and I have been listening to Christmas music for weeks to help us get in the holiday spirit (we need all the help we can get, since palm trees and heat sure don't say Christmas). The countdown to flying into Portland has begun! Just 20 days!

Here are a few photos from our Thanksgiving Extravaganza:

Traditional pic of all 4 of us with our turkey. Well, it's supposed to be all 4 of us!

Old Town Pub Crawl

The four of us together again!

What are you Thankful for?

Every Thanksgiving, we get together with our best friends Pat and Lindsay and make an awesome Thanksgiving dinner. It's tradition for us to be together on Thanksgiving, and before every Thanksgiving dinner, we go around the table and say what we are thankful for. This year, we thought it would be fun to share what we are thankful for with all of you.

We are thankful for our amazing friends and family (that would be you!) and that everyone is in good health. We are thankful that in the last year we have gotten in better shape and have a lot more energy for life. We are thankful that in this bad economy Patrick has an amazing job that he loves and we can afford a comfortable life. Yes, we have to cut back on things but we have everything we could possibly need. We are thankful for the possibilities in our lives and the unexpected in life, in general. We are thankful for each other, because after all these years, we are still having fun.

I could go on and on. It makes you feel good to reflect on all that life gives you. So, what are you thankful for? Big or little, we want to share in your thanksgiving!

Life in SoCal

Well, it's a couple weeks into November and we're still using our air conditioner, the surrounding areas are burning and we had a couple small earthquakes this morning. Oh, to live in Southern California!

This past week the temperatures were in the high 80's to mid 90's and the Santa Ana winds were blowing. We always enjoy the winds except when they lead to fires. Yesterday, when I dropped Patrick off at the skatepark and went to the gym, you could tell the air quality wasn't good due to all the fires. Just in the hour I was at the gym it got so much worse; the sun was disappearing in all the smoke and the air glowed (it is a really eerie feeling to see the sky like that). I decided I better go get Patrick because it wasn't healthy for normal people, but with Patrick's asthma, it could be so much worse. We both could feel the smoke burning our throats and even for me it felt like it was harder to breath. In the two years we've lived here, this is the worst we've ever seen. You couldn't even see the mountains that were only a mile away.

Needless to say, we went home and hide in our apartment the rest of the day, where we could breath our nice, filtered, cool air. Gotta love air conditioning, even if it does cost you a fortune in the summer down here.

*Patrick and I are sooooo excited to be going home to Oregon for Christmas. It will be wonderful to get some nice cool, clean air into our lungs.*

Happy Halloween!

Patrick and I love Halloween! The other night we carved our pumpkins in preparation (they're already molding, so we'll be throwing those out today). We bought a bag of candy to hand out in case we got some trick or treaters and we've been listening to Halloween music for the last couple days.

Since we didn't have anything else to do on Halloween, we decided to have our own Halloween party, just the two of us. Patrick made some scary snacks that were delicious. We had monster mouths, brain, zombie fingers, bloody mummy toes and worms in dirt. Yummm! I dressed up as a 50's housewife and as part of my costume I had to bake some cupcakes (What? It was part of my costume). We were really hoping for some trick or treaters because we haven't had any in 8 years. But, once again, we got no one. We're just glad we didn't get a lot of candy.

We watched a scary movie, ate our scary snacks and had a really good Halloween overall.

I designed the pumpkins and Patrick carved both of them. He did a good job.

Spiderweb cupcakes

Patrick's creations!

Hey, save some of that brain for me.

I really wanted some trick or treaters so I could answer the door in my costume! Totally bummed.