The holidays definitely sneaked up on us with many a holiday party and wrapping things up before heading up to Rochester for Christmas. This was our Minnesota year (off to Kansas at the end of this year) and we were fortunate to have all the kids (although me being the youngest at 25, I think my parents are the only ones who call us the kids anymore), grandkids and my parents under one roof on Christmas day. Although pretty chilly, it was nice to have a white Christmas and a few days off from work to just enjoy the company of family and kick back and relax. I took quite a few photos from the week, so I chose some of my favorites to share below.
After returning to Phoenix from the North Country, Sean and I got up early the next day and drove out to San Diego to watch ASU take on Texas in the Holiday Bowl. As a Christmas gift to ourselves we stayed at our favorite hotel, the Hotel Del Coronado, where we honeymooned in 2006. The friends we usually tailgate with for ASU home games, the Steinbergs, were also staying at the Del and we all attended the ASU Alumni Assoc. tailgate together before the game. Even though ASU ended up losing the game, our mini-vacation in San Diego was still a blast. The beach on Coronado Island is beautiful no matter what the temperature is! I was still able to take numerous sunset photos (apparently I can't help myself)! We ate at our favorite restaurants and continued the holiday relaxation before making the trip back to Phoenix right before the New Year.
January and February have seemed to fly by, with a few keep-us-on-our-toes moments sprinkled around. In the middle of the night, sometime early January, we were awakened by our beeping microwave. Sean, being the dutiful man of the house, got up and checked out the noise to find water leaking from the cabinet above the microwave, onto the microwave, and pooled in a saucepan we'd left on the stove top. Thanks to the dumb luck of our frying microwave and strategically placed saucepan, we were able to turn the water off and get a plumber out to our house in the morning. However, our luck ran out there, as we were told we had so many leaks in our 50 year old pipes that we should get the entire house re-piped. In fact, some of the leaks had repaired themselves over time because the water in here Phoenix is so hard (I don't even want to think about what the water is doing to my skin!). So, Sean and I had an early lesson on what savings accounts are there for, and can now boast, "Complete re-pipe in 2008!" on our spec sheet when we go to sell the house.
In February the Super Bowl came to town, so it was fun to read the paper every day and see what celebrities had been spotted at what restaurants, etc. Many of the pre-Super Bowl parties took place in Old Town Scottsdale, which is only a couple miles north of our house. Some girlfriends and I went to the LL Cool J party and concert, which was really fun! The best part was the free admission (courtesy of one of my girlfriends who knew the event director), but it was also fun to do our own celebrity sightings. Alfonso Ribeiro, better known as Carlton from the Fresh Prince of Bel Air TV show, danced on stage at one point and we also saw Joey Fatone of the band NSync. My point-and-shoot digital camera's flash didn't quite reach the distance to make these photos crystal clear, but take a look below...I did my best! The Phoenix metro area had a busy beginning of February because the FBR Open, a fun golf tournament, concluded on Super Bowl Sunday. Sean was able to go out a couple days during the week, and then our friends invited us to join them on Saturday (the largest attendance day with over 160,000 people). The total attendance for the week was over half a million!
As all of you know, Sean's birthday is on Valentine's Day, so as if our December trip wasn't enough, we treated ourselves to another San Diego stay at the Hotel Del Coronado. It was a bit warmer this time and we spent all our time just walking on the beach, sipping drinks in the lounge and visiting our favorite restaurants and a couple new ones. When we were there in December we discovered the dog beach park, which is really fun to walk to and watch the dogs run into the ocean after frisbees and toys. Brinkley is pretty dainty and tends to avoid water, so we don't think he'd like it much...which is probably better because we don't want to know what kind of mess those dogs make in their owners' cars and/or homes afterwards!
Now February is over and it's on to March! Sean and I are both busy with work, as usual, but enjoy our free time on the weekends. Just last night we had dinner with some of Sean's old neighbors and family friends, Bill and Connie Carrison. They were in town for work and Sean was able to take an afternoon to golf with Bill and then we joined them downtown last night for dinner at Kincaid's (a steak and seafood restaurant - delicious!). It was fun to catch up with some Kansas City folks...and the best part was that the weather was so nice we ate outside! And speaking of visitors, Jim, Robin and Katie will be flying down on Friday for a weekend stay full of golf, spa visits, baseball and catching up! We saw Jim and Robin over Thanksgiving when they were here last, but we haven't seen Katie since last spring! We're looking forward to catching up and hearing all about wedding plans, graduation, and all the other exciting stuff happening in the next few months! Rumor has it she's in the inspection process of buying a house, so perhaps that will be a done deal by the time they arrive!
Not much else going on here. Just cheering on KU basketball and looking forward to the NCAA tournament at the end of the month...we have tickets to the Phoenix regional!
Look for an update in a few weeks...I hope!
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