Newport Beach Escape

Raleigh and I had an awesome weekend in Newport Beach, CA. We have lived down here now for a year and a few months, and have never really explored the Southern California beaches. We were there for only about 24 hours (Sat-Sun), but we had a blast. Raleigh found us a really good deal at the Hyatt, so we stayed there, and shopped at Fashion Island, went out to eat, even ordered room service for breakfast! Neither of us had done that before and I told Raleigh that since he found such a great deal for us, we could splurge a little. We spent Sunday morning reading on the beach and just talking. It was beautiful weather, and just an overall great weekend!
Room service for breakfast!
Here I am holding up my iPhone next to the gigantic one! I love Apple stores. :)

Raleigh and me at the beach. Raleigh and the biggest donut we've ever seen- of course we had to buy it and eat it!

Working Outside

It's been amazingly beautiful here. For January, I can't even believe it! Yesterday I decided that while at work I was just going to grab my laptop and go downstairs to the coffee shop right beneath us. I took this picture with my phone while down there. It was such a pretty day I just couldn't resist! While I'm thankful for the amazing weather, I still miss the seasons! But I'm such a deep Oregonian at heart. :) Still, absolutely beautiful.

Surveys

Have you ever been given a survey to fill out from a store? I've gotten so many, and recently I decided to fill a few of them out. That's when I realized you can actually get something back from them! Here is a list of things I've received just from filling out surveys:

Free tall drink at Starbucks
20% off of an item at GAP
$10 gift card to Cheesecake Factory

And many more things! So I just thought I'd give my little shout-out for surveys that give you free things! I'll be thanking it when I enjoy my free piece of Cheesecake. :)

The Drive Home

Here we are in front of the Rose Bowl while it's happening inside!!


Raleigh took this picture. Isn't it funny? Looks like I'm going to swallow that semi!
Here I am in the nasty hotel.



So I forgot to add stuff about our drive home! We left on New Year's Eve in the middle of the afternoon and wanted to get to Sacramento. Well, it was getting late and we were getting too tired so we stopped in Redding, CA. We found a Motel 6 and it was cheap, so we decided to just stay there, since it was only for a few hours for us to sleep. The room was probably the worst I'd ever stayed in (experience-wise, too). It smelled like smoke, even though it was non-smoking, we got woken up by drunk girls yelling profanities outside at 2am (since it was New Year's Eve), and the next morning I woke up to Raleigh coming in and telling me that the toilet had just overflowed. We couldn't get out of there fast enough! We survived, but next time we'll think twice about getting the cheapest available place.

On our way home we were driving right through Pasadena as the Rose Bowl was starting. Raleigh is adventurous (me not so much) and wanted to pull off and try to find a parking place then just go walk around. So I went along with it, even though we were just two hours away from home and I just wanted to get back! Somehow, we got into this parking lot right next to the stadium, and we didn't have to pay anything. This was a miracle, since we saw parking for up to $50!! We got to walk around the stadium and could hear the crowd roar and everything. It was invigorating. A good way to end our trip. :) That's about it! We made it home safely that afternoon, despite all travel adventures.

Christmas adventures

Kristina, my mom, and me with popcorn balls.
Raleigh got an iPod for Christmas!
Popcorn balls..hmmm.
David, Kristina, me, and Raleigh out in the snow at my parent's house.

Ok so Raleigh and I didn't exactly have a normal Christmas this year! It was kinda crazy. We were scheduled to fly out of LAX on the 22nd to go to Portland. It was early in the morning, so we stayed the night in a hotel the night before. So, we arrive early and so far so good on our flight (even though the 2 days before, all flights in and out of Portland were canceled!). I'm optimistic, yet not holding my breath. I even got interviewed by a KTLA news lady! About 40 minutes before our fliht is supposed to take off, it gets canceled. So we are still in this same line (the one to just check our bags) and have to just stay there and wait until we get to the front for them to do anything. And our line gets worse- there was a 30-40 minute period of time when no one got called to the counter! It was very frustrating. After 3 hours of waiting, we get to the front and the lady is looking for flights to put us on. We ask if she can put us on a flight to Eugene, Seattle, or anywhere in the Northwest. She can't. So we ask if we can be put on other airlines- NONE are available. We ask if we could fly out of another airport in Southern California- still can't. Next available flight was on Christmas Day. So, we get our money back and hop in our car to drive! The roads were totally fine until we got into Salem. Needless to say, we made it before Christmas and had a great time with our families. We were up there for about 8 or 9 days. It was great! Thanks to both our families for hosting us and being so great! :)