Wanted to wish my best friend since 8th grade ASHLEY LAWRENCE a very Happy Birthday! Ashley, I hope you have a fabulous day and an even better year ahead. I have a feeling this one is going to be the best one yet 😉 !
So thankful for our 20+ years of friendship…you mean the world to me and I love you so much! ❤ ❤
Happy Happy Birthday Bestie! 🎉🍾 🎉🍾
Xo
Helloooooooooo! Happy Sunday night! Hope you all had a wonderful weekend and are gearing up for another week. This post is a little long over due but here’s all about our weekend in Colorado from earlier this month.
We caught an EARLY flight out of Orange County on 10.6.17 to Denver Colorado for one of Chris’ friends from PA schools weddings. Luckily, our dear friends Jess & Dan were also joining us on the trip. #McDahlins (combo of our last names), how we refer to the four of us and our hashtag for any time we are together. Here’s a snap shot of what we did over the course of three days!
10.7.17 — Downtown Denver & Red Rocks
After we arrived in and got our rental car we headed to downtown Denver and straight to lunch at 5280 Burger Bar. One of my students from SJSU told me about this place a few years ago when I was in Denver for a conference and it did not disappoint. Just as good a few years later! Yummmmm! After lunch we walked around some (weather was 73* and just perfect) and then went over to the Colorado State Capitol. I did this last time I was in Denver for that conference, but it’s so worth it to go again. Located at the capitol is a step that reads “One Mile Above Sea Level.” I learned last time, that where it reads this is actually not the true one-mile marker. Ha Ha. The inscription was made based on measuring techniques from 1909, by students of the University of Denver. Originally, a brass cap was installed to commemorate this first measurement, but after the cap was stolen seven times in a matter of 38 years, the state carved the claim into the stone step itself. It turns out that the true maker of “one mile above sea level” is on the 13th step — we took note and of course lots of pictures!
Next we headed to our hotel in Ken Caryl and relaxed for awhile before we headed to Red Rocks Amphitheater for a concert. Going to Red Rocks has been on my bucket list for a looooong time. Luckily I got to visit when I was in Colorado a few years ago for that conference I keep talking about. We did A LOT while we were conferencing haha. Now show, but we walked around, had lunch, went to the museum and took tons of pictures! This time, we saw a SHOW and O.M.G. it was unbelievable!!! Kinda random, but we saw the X Ambassadors and Weezer. Although it wasn’t DMB (my favorite), it was a freaking incredible show! We’ve seen Weezer before (in Santa Barbara actually) and I wasn’t a huge fan of the X Ambassadors. After this show, big fans of both! They killed it!
Red Rocks is a stellar venue and the acoustics are crazy good. We can’t wait to come back for another show. Hopefully it will be to DMB haha. 🙂
10.8.17 — Hiking, Golden, Co. and a wedding!
After breakfast we decided to do a little hiking and found a great place just down from our hotel. We ended up at South Valley Park in Littleton, Colorado. Hello gorgeous red rocks and yellow aspen trees! I love fall; I love Colorado; and I love the Colorado Aspen Trees! While in Colorado, I was really hoping we would get some fall weather (not much of that in CA so far) and get to see some of the changing tree colors…well we sure did! Gosh this place was just beautiful! I couldn’t get over all the natural beauty and stunning red rocks! We saw so may people out hiking — kids, dogs, all kinds of people! Could totally see US doing that if we lived in CO. Hint hint.
After hiking through South Valley Park we headed to Golden, Colorado to check out the town per Heather’s recommendation. Golden is the most adorable town! It’s named Golden — Where the West Lives and it really lived up to all it’s charm! Golden is known as a Gold Rush town and also the location of Coors Brewery among many other way cooler breweries. After walking and exploring a bit, we grabbed delicious sandwiches from D’Deli and ate lunch by the river. Then we wandered over to a super cool brewery called Barrels & Bottles. My husband seriously always finds the best places for us to check out.
Next up was Heather & Corey’s wedding!! Heather, Chris and Jess are all friends from PA school. We were so excited to come out to Colorado for her wedding. A few years ago we saw Heather at Jess & Dan’s wedding so it was really fun to be at her wedding now. Heather and Corey got married in one of the most beautiful locations I think I’ve ever been at for a wedding. Arrowhead Gold Club in Littleton, Colorado was breathtaking. They got married against the most beautiful backdrop. I can’t wait to see their pictures because they are going to be fabulous! The views were just stunning. So gorgeous and such a perfect October day for a wedding. We were warned that we might see some wildlife during the ceremony, but we didn’t end up seeing any haha. These pictures don’t even do justice for how beautiful it was! ❤
Viewwwws for daaaaaaaays! So great. Heather looked beautiful and I LOVED her dress! The ceremony was short and sweet, so we got right to the party! There were also a few other friends from PA school (Erin and Suzanne) so it was great to catch up with them too. Per our style, we shut that party down! Danced all night and kept the PAR-TAY going! We had an absolute blast and it looks like Heather and Corey did too! So happy for you both! Congrats again! ❤ ❤
During the day we heard there was a winter storm coming, but clearly from the gorgeous wedding photos it hadn’t arrived yet. By the time we left the wedding it was a massive wind/rain storm! It was crazy getting back to the hotel and we got totally soaked. I was not so secretly praying for SNOW and to be stuck in Denver all week haha. Got part of my wish…because the next morning we woke up to freaking SNOW! Not just a little snow dusted on the ground but serious SNOW. SNOW. SNOW!
10.10.9.17 — SNOW = dream come true!
Monday morning was like Christmas morning for me! I was so excited to be waking up to a real Colorado snow storm. They have a saying in Colorado, “if you don’t like the weather, wait a minute.” Well we sure got a little of ALL the weather in Colorado this weekend — sunny/ warm 73*, a little cool fall type weather in the mornings, rain/wind and then SNOW! Jess and Dan weren’t too impressed with the snow, but I was digging it! I was excited to even clear off all the snow from our car! I think that proves I’m ready to MOVE to Colorado. Of course my husband was wearing shorts. Can’t take the CA out of that guy!
We had an absolute BLAST in Colorado and I can’t wait to go back soon! Seriously, I’m ready to move! I know we just moved to Santa Barbara, but Colorado would be super cool too! 😉 I know we might have to wait on that move for a bit, but Chris did like Colorado so that’s a huge plus!
Found the BEST hat at the airport that I just had to get. I may be a CA girl, but I’m ready for living life in Colorado! ❤ I mean look at that HAPPY face!!
Hope you enjoyed reading about our adventures in Colorado. Have a good Sunday night and a great Monday!
Xo
Hi friends! We made it to Wednesday. Yippieeeee!
Today’s the LAST installment of my pictures and updates. Here’s 3 of 3!
8.4-8.6.17 Fiesta with the Dahlins
Our FAVORITE visitors were baaaaaaack! Excited to have our friends Jess & Dan (Izzy too) back in town for FIESTA! Old Spanish Days or Fiesta is an annual event that provides an education of the history, customs, and traditions of the American Indian, Spanish, Mexican, and early American settlers that comprise the rich cultural heritage of Santa Barbara. You can ready more about Fiesta here.
Our weekend consisted of more pool time, walking with our pups (they are the three best friends), drinks and dinner at our favorite sushi place, Arigato! After dinner, we walked down State Street cracking confetti filled eggs (cascarón) on our heads and checked out all the FIESTA happenings. And of course, to get CHURROS!
Mission ACCOMPLISHED!
So glad to have had another weekend with Jess & Dan. These friends have really turned into family. Thanks for visiting us again! ❤
8.20.17 DISNEYLAND
Last year we went to Disneyland to celebrate the 60th Diamond Celebration and we went again this year to see the Main Street Electrical Parade. Looking at the dates, we were at Disneyland at almost the exact same time two years in a row ha ha ha.
Disneyland is one of those places that I will always just LOVE! Thank goodness Tof (Chris) loves it just as much as I do. No matter when we go, who we are with or how long we are at the park, we always have a great day! ❤ ❤ This time, we got some sort of special pass with our tickets (we paid for this) so we got to take a bunch of photos in all the photo opt places around the park!!! Ahhhhh! So awesome! After, we got to downloaded them for free! Guys, I pretty much wanted to die! DREAM. COME. TRUE. I looooove taking pictures while at the park, so this was super awesome! Man my hubby knows me so well! ❤
I’m so glad we were able to squeeze a Disney trip into our busy summer/start of the school year and got a chance to see the Main Street Electrical Parade. The parade was SO GOOD and so worth seeing! Just like how I remembered if from when I was a kid! I have to say though, the best part of this trip was doing with with our NIBLINGS!!!! Kristin, Brian, Colton, Kendall and Madison drove up from San Diego and came to the park with us! At first we were just going to meet them for dinner at Downtown Disney, but they ended up getting season passes and joining us at the parks. We had an absolute BLAST with them! Colton is 5 and the twins are 3. Oh my, they are such little people now and are at such a fun age. They couldn’t get enough of Aunt Risa and Uncle Chris! It was awesome spending time with them and taking them on some of our favorite rides! They seriously made my heart so full. ❤ ❤
These pictures don’t quite do justice for how much FUN we were having! Love those kiddos more than words can express. We had such a great day together! ❤
At the end of the day, we were there for 16+ hours, ~22,922 steps, walked almost 10 miles and managed to visit both parks! We had so much fun with our niblings and really hope to do another trip with them soon!
Love this picture! Quick look at what life with 3 kids might look like…ha ha ha ❤
A big THANK YOU to Chris’ moms neighbor Amy who hooked us up with the park hopper tickets, AGAIN! Amy is the sweetest women in the world and any time she gets the chance, she gets us tickets. THANKS AMY! We had an extra magical and wonderful day at the Happiest Place on Earth!
To view our other trips to Disney, check out posts from 2016, 2015 and 2014.
P.S. Now that we’re back living in Southern California maybe we should get those season passes again! Hubby, please?! Apparently this is the 1st time EVER that CA Adventure has decorated for HALLOWEEN!!!! Um, we must go! I really, really want to see the parks all decked out for Halloween. We both love Halloween so what could be better?!?!?!
8.27.17 Parents Visit
So excited to have my parents in town for the weekend along with their pups, Spanky & Rascal! We played it super casual and laid back all weekend. Walked our pups, went out for breakfast, got drinks at Beachside Bar Cafe and of course, had dinner at Arigato. My parents, especially my Dad LOVES Arigato. During dinner we were trying to remember how we first stumbled on this restaurant and couldn’t for the life of us recall. Regardless, we LOVE that place and it’s always a favorite dinner spot for visitors.
On Sunday we had a delicious French breakfast at Renaud’s Patisserie & Bistro and headed over to the Santa Barbara Mission to walk around before my parents headed back up north. Loved having them in town! So miss them and can’t wait for them to come back (next weekend) to visit again.
Ok friends, that’s a wrap (FINALLY) on all our updates! Hope you’ve enjoyed.
Friday IS coming!
Xo
Ohhhhhhh Monday………..we meet again. Struggling today. Need. More. Coffee.
OK, back with more pictures and another update. Here is update 2 of 3, enjoy!
7.1.17 Beach Life
Our pups, Emma & Dash are settling in just fine with their new life living by the beach! When we can, we love to walk them at the beach and let me enjoy going in the water. They LOVE IT! The only downside is after the beach it’s bath time ha ha ha. I also got a pretty sweet (used) beach cruiser. Now I’m really fitting back into the SB lifestyle.
7.4.14 Happy 4th of July
HAPPY 4th of JULY!!!! Celebrated with Eva coming over for some pool time and a BBQ before heading to Girsh Park for the fireworks show. This year was a little more low-key and relaxed. In 2016 we were celebrating my sisters wedding with a full weekend of events and celebrations. Regardless, we still had a great day and love celebrating the 4th of July!
7.15-7.18.17 Sister Visit
SISTER VISIT!!!!! Ari & Brian (along with their pups Muddy & Hazel) came to visit for a long weekend! On Saturday Joleen (Ari’s college bestie) came up and joined us for a weekend of FUN. We spent a lot of time at the pool, eating pizza, drinking and just enjoying summa time in SB!
7.17-7.18.17 Jack Johnson at the Santa Barbara Bowl
Night #1 7.17.18
For my birthday, my sister Ari and her hubby Brian surprised me with tickets to see Jack Johnson at the Santa Barbara Bowl. I was totally surprised and super excited to have tickets not only for one night but two! Funny story, I purchased tickets for night #2 with just Chris having no idea my sister go tickets for the first night. I had no idea why Chris didn’t want to go the first night of the show…now I know why! Ari and Brian were getting us tickets for my birthday!
Seeing Jack in concert is always a blast and seeing him at the SB Bowl just makes it extra special! Jack went to UCSB (GO Gauchos) and has a lot of songs that have to do with UCSB and Santa Barbara. Special guests the first night included ALO!!!! These guys are amazing and so much fun! You also can’t beat an outdoor amphitheater. Great atmosphere, awesome acoustics and just an overall awesome venue.
The first night we were in the general admission area. We were up front and ended up being super close to the stage. Ahhhh. So awesome and such a great experience. Really glad my sister and brother-in-law were able to visit in SB. Thanks for the belated birthday present! Love you guys! ❤
Night #1 7.18.17
Who doesn’t love going to a concert two nights in a row?!?!? We clearly don’t mind! Ha Ha Ha. For night #2 we had seats. Not to sound too old, but we were really glad to have seats the next night. After having to stand the night before for so long our old legs were tied (we feel so old hehe). Jack put on another killer show and really rocked the house! So glad to have seen him and for two nights!
Ok that’s a wrap for my second series of blog updates. See you back here on Wednesday for the final installment.
Thanks for reading and have a great start to your week! Let’s do this Monday!
Xo
HELLOOOOOOO friends…TGIF!
We made it. Happy, happy FRIDAY!
I’ve been horribly behind in posting to my blog. Things have been busy (I know that’s not an excuse), but this seems to happen every summer ha ha ha. I just get behind, caught up with other stuff (lots of visitors this summer) and then BAM September comes and it’s like where did summer and my blog go?!?!?!?
Since so much as happened lately, I decided to do another update with pictures and quick blurbs. I did this last year and that seemed to work. Looks like there will be a total of three posts again for this series. Here. We. Go!
5.27-5.29.17 Memorial Day Weekend with the Dahlins
VISITORS!!! So excited to have our dear friends Jess & Dan in town for the long Memorial Day weekend! Our weekend was filled with pool time, hikes by the beach with our dogs, lots of drinks and dinner at our favorite sushi place, Arigato! So glad to have Jess & Dan as friends and am so very thankful they could visit us! ❤
6.3.17 Ashley & Anthony’s Engagement Party ❤ ❤ ❤
My bestie is GETTING MARRIED!!!!! So excited for my best friend to be marrying the love of her life. We couldn’t be more happy and excited for Ash & Ant. March 2018 seriously can’t come soon enough! Had a blast at their engagement party in Santa Cruz. So glad we could come up and celebrate with everyone. Got to catch up with so many HS friends. Let the parties/celebrations begin! LOVE you Ash & Ant.<3
6.12.17 NEW Job at UCSB
First day at UCSB in my new Academic Advising gig. Excited to be back on campus and to be working in the College of Letters & Science. Here’s being back “home” and to a new adventure!
6.24-6.25.17 Visit with the Gangais
So happy to have have the Gangais in town and to show them Santa Barbara! Lilly and I met while I was working at SJSU. We became fast friends and our hubby’s hit it off too. Since moving to SB we’ve really missed seeing them/hanging out on a regular basis. Back in San Jose, we spent many a Friday nights getting dinner (Sushi 2-2 Train was a favorite) bowling, going out for drinks and having lots of laughs. While there were here we did it ALL. Even though we know SB, it’s still fun showing friends around and playing tourist in our own town. Love and miss you Lilly & Chris! Can’t wait for another fun filled weekend sometime soon.
Ok that’s a wrap for this first series of blog updates. Hope you enjoyed. Have a great weekend and we’ll see you back here next week for more updates!
Xo
Happy Thursday everyone! I’m a little late in posting about all the weekend celebrations, so here we go!
2.17.17 (My actual birthday) 
HAPPY BIRTHDAY to ME!
Like I’ve shared before, my office is really into decorating, especially for birthdays! When I got to work my office was completely decorated with lots of festive bday stuff. Cynthia does a great job decorating for birthdays and planning something for the birthday people. I get to share my birthday with my work wife/bestie Ashley so it’s even more fun! This year there was breakfast and coffee for us. Such a great way to start a Friday! For lunch a bunch of us went to get pizza at Sammy G’s. This place is so much fun and reminds me a lot of some of the places in Isla Vista. If only we could have gotten pitchers of beer…we’ll have to save that for an after work happy hour haha. Unfortunately, we had a staff meeting later in the day but it turned out to not be very long and we had yummy bundt cake from Lilly! Score!
My co workers made us both feel so special! Thanks for such a great day everyone! Love you!
After work Ashley and I went to get all of our free birthday treats! First we got free slices of cake from Susie Cakes. Then it was off to Kendra Scott to design the ring below that we bought for each other as our birthday present. And to end our afternoon of free gifts, we got Bubbly Bears from Sugarfina and our birthday gift from Sephora. So many birthday treats! We really brought home quite the collection of gifts. Loved being able to spend some quality time with my work wife and bestie! Happy Birthday Ashley! ❤
That evening, the hubby and I went out for sushi at one of our favorite places, Sushi 2 2 Train. Our friends Chris and Lilly introduced us to this place. The owner Sang is such a great sushi chef and we always have a blast when we go here. I even got a special birthday sushi roll with a candle. How awesome is that?! After dinner it was back to the house for that slice of cake and presents. Thanks Tof for making my birthday so wonderful! You and the pups spoil me! Love you!
2.19.17 Wine Tasting at Bella
On Sunday we spent the day at our winery, Bella Vineyards & Wine Caves located in beautiful Healdsburg, CA. To continue the birthday celebrations, we decided to sign up for a tour at Bella and bring some of our friends with us. So glad that Chris & Lilly and Ashley & Erwin were able to join us on this trip! On the way up we stopped at our favorite place, the Dry Creek General Store. They have the best sandwiches, cheese selections and other yummy treats! Since it was raining, we had our picnic lunch inside the store which ended up not being that busy (probably because of all the rain). Our tour at Bella wasn’t until 1:30pm so we had a little time to relax, shop and enjoy some good food before doing our tour and wine tasting.
After lunch we headed over to Bella for our tour and wine tasting. We didn’t get to do a lot of the outdoor part of the tour since it was so rainy. But, we did get to go deeper into the wine caves (yes!), hear more about Bella’s process and take tons of pictures! Bella has this private tasting room that I have always wanted to go into. Well guess what?!?!? That’s were we got to do our private wine tasting!! Not only did we have an awesome wine flight, but we also got to do a barrel tasting. Since it was my birthday, I got to remove the “bung” (cap to the barrel) and then use the wine thief to pour samples for everyone. This was so totally cool! Did you know that a barrel can hold 300 bottles of wine?!?!?! We had no clue. We got to taste from two barrels and they were so delicious. The first one was a Lily Hill Zin and if we could have rolled that bad boy to our car we would have! Seriously so good! I think it might be in our fall shipment, so we will be on the look out for that one! After we finished our tasting and taking even more pictures, we were actually able to stay in the private room and have more wine and the rest of the snacks we brought with us. Yes! We felt pretty special being in our own private room. Chris and I have always wanted to do a tour and be in the private tasting room, so we were beyond grateful to have finally done this! We had such a great time, that we ended up closing the place down (they close at 4:30). Here are a bunch of fun pictures from our day at Bella.
There is nothing better than a relaxing day enjoying good wine and spending time with really great people. Thank you guys so much for spending a rainy day with us at Bella. We had an absolute blast and love you guys so much!
After an awesome day at Bella, we then had dinner with my family to celebrate. So much good food, desserts (2 cakes!) and more presents. Love my family so much. Certainly felt the birthday love this whole weekend! Cheers to 33! 🙂
Chris was off on Monday and I took a vacation day. Thank goodness because we spent the day recovering from such a fun weekend. We were also hit with a huge rain storm so it was perfect weather for just hanging around the house and relaxing.
Hope your week is going well…Friday is almost here! Thanks for reading!
Xo
I’m back! Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas with family/friends and celebrated the New Year in style! Isn’t it just crazy how fast the holidays come and go…and now it’s 2017.
We’ve been traveling a lot over the holidays, hence my mini-break from the blog. Here’s a quick recap of our holidays:
12.23.16 On Friday I baked a ton of cookies during the day (since I had the day off-yes) and then we made a little Christmas dinner with a small meat roast from Trader Joe’s, potatoes and veggies. After dinner we went to the Sharks game! Love when Tof gets free tickets from his patients! Can’t pass up a game when free tickets are involved.
12.24.16 Since we were going to be with my family later in the day and then in the car on Christmas, we opened our present today! Tof made a big breakfast (waffles) and we enjoyed a relaxing morning drinking coffee and opening all our gifts. ❤
We spent Christmas Eve with my family; just the six of us (mom, dad, Ari, Brian & Tof) oh and 6 dogs! For dinner we had our traditional Christmas Eve meal, which consisted of ham, Grammis potatoes, sauerkraut and plenty of mulled wine. For dessert we ate a bunch of Christmas cookies and then opened presents from my parents and our Secret Santas.
Our family sure is growing with the addition of Ari and Brian’s dogs, Hazel and Muddy!
I think Hazel and Muddy are fitting in just fine! Love all these sweet pups! ❤
12.25.16 Christmas morning we got up bright an early (like 6am) and got in the car to head to Southern California for Christmas with Chris’s mom. We caught a beautiful Christmas sunrise that was just stunning! The roads were so quiet that early, so it made this sunrise even more majestic. What a great way to start Christmas! ❤
On our way down via Highway-5, The Grapevine had SNOW! Last year there was also some snow, but this year there was a TON. So much snow that we just had to pull over and let the dogs check it out! Check these awesome pictures! Emma LOVED the snow, Dash was a little hesitant at first but also thought it was pretty cool And yes, that would be y hubby in SHORTS and SANDALS in the snow haha.
Looks like we’ve got SNOW!
Funny how those oh so white mini schnauzers don’t look so white in the snow haha. Can’t wait to take them to the snow again because they really loved it!
We got down to Huntington Beach in pretty good time (around noon) and spent the rest of the day just relaxing. Later we watched Sully (love Tom Hanks), had our usual Christmas dinner of prime rib (so good) and then opened presents. I missed my family, but loved being able to spend time with my other family :). We took lots of pictures and then headed to bed.
P.S. Best gift from my hubby…t-shirt from the best movie ever!! Good job!
12.26.16 On Monday we went to San Diego for the day to visit with Tof’s sister Kristen and our niblings! I can’t believe how big Colton (5), Kendall (3) and Madison (3) are! Such cuties and so grown up already. They are at a really fun age and just wanted to play, show us their rooms and spend some quality time with Auntie Risa and Uncle Chris. During our visit we also found out we will be aunt and uncle AGAIN in June because Kristen is pregnant with baby #4! ❤ ❤ ❤
So hard to get pictures of these kids because they are so active! Can’t believe come June there will be FOUR of them! So happy and excited for the growing Cline family! ❤
12.27-12.29 On our way back from SoCal we usually stop in SB in order to break up the drive home. It’s always great to spend a little time in SB and see old friends! Thanks to Eva for letting us stay with her.
We ❤ SB
12.31-1.1.17 On Saturday we headed to see our friends Jess and Dan in Oakdale, CA. I think this is our 4th NYE that we’ve spent together…par-tay people! In the past, we’ve gone to these big NYE party, but for the past two years there have been no parties. I think the guy who throws them is done. No problem for us; we create our own party!
After getting to Jess and Dan’s, we hung out for a little, had a yummy cheese/meat plate and then took our pups to the dog park! Those pups had a BLAST and loved running around/playing with each other! Check out these awesome pics! Such a great way to spend the last day of 2016.
After the dog park we played Spades (for hours), had a delicious fajitas dinner and played The Voting Game (which I won during my coworkers white elephant exchange) before the big countdown.
Couldn’t imagine ringing in the New Year with anyone else. Love these peeps so much and feel very grateful for their friendship! Hope you all had a wonderful NYE filled with friends, family and plenty of champagne.🍾 🍾
So that’s a wrap of all our holiday celebrations! Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and I will you a fabulous New Year! All best for 2017!!
Xo
HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE! CHEERS TO 2017! 
Hope you all had a wonderful evening last filled with friends, family and plenty of champagne. Here’s to a brand-new year, one that I hope is filled with LOVE, PEACE, HEALTH, PROSPERITY, and HAPPINESS! Wishing you all a fabulous New Year! All best for 2017!!
Xo
Wanted to wish my best friend since 8th grade ASHLEY LAWRENCE a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!! Hope you have a fabulous day and an even better year ahead! So thankful for our 19+ years of friendship…you mean the world to me and I love you so much! ❤ ❤
Happy Happy Birthday Ashley!
Xo
Happy Tuesday everyone!
Completed another one of our holiday traditions over the weekend…looking at CHRISTMAS LIGHTS!!!
Looking at Christmas lights is something that I’ve been doing since I was a little kid. It became a tradition in my family growing up and now I’m doing it with my own little family schnauzers included! Last year I didn’t really blog about looking at lights because just the hubby and I went. I got a really nasty cold, so we had to cancel with our friends. But, you can read all about 2014 and 2013.
On Saturday 12.17.16 we got together with some friends and had dinner at Willow Street Pizza before looking at Christmas lights over in Willow Glen. I seriously LOVE all of the decorations in the Willow Glen area! So totally charming! And the story behind it is even better! Just a little refresher, each house is given a small Christmas tree to put on their front yard to decorate. You can read more about the history of the Willow Glen Yard Trees, truly a lovely story. Seeing each house with a charming little tree on the front lawn in addition to whatever other decorations people put up is just magical.
The following pictures don’t even do this place justice! It is always so beautiful and so much fun. It was pretty cold Saturday night, so there weren’t as many people out there. Perfect for the four of us and our three dogs! I love that people get so into it and everything looks so festive!
Each street has a “theme”…this one had these adorable lighted Christmas trees you walk under. Too cute!
There is also a huge sleigh and this GIANT reindeer that are “pulling” the sleigh…this takes up lawns of multiple houses and looks super cool when you look down the street!
If anyone is still looking for places to look at holiday lights I highly recommend the Willow Glen area. Here is a map of the charming holiday lights. We will probably be taking a stroll or drive down Eucalyptus in San Carlos Christmas Eve with my family. CAN’T WAIT to see even more Christmas lights!
I’ve mentioned this before…but one of my goals/DREAM is to someday live on a street like the ones in Willow Glen or Eucalyptus in San Carlos. It would be just so much fun to go all out for the holidays. Someday…
Only FIVE more sleeps til Christmas and only TWO more days of work until break! Oh my goodness…so excited!
Xo
Sweet for Certain 