i am a girly girl. a runner. a daughter. a fashionista. a sister. a disney princess at ♥. a lumberjack alumni. a country girl. a coffee addict. a friend. a chocolate lover. a reader. a jeans, t-shirt, and flip flop girl. a movie goer. a grad student.
it was the middle of may when my brother came home for a normal weekend and told us that he would be leaving in 45 days for his next deployment. it was one of the first things he said to me when i got to my parents house as he stood there hugging me with his feet on top of mine so i couldnt kick him when he told me. being in the military we always know theres a chance and it can happen rather quickly. last time we got rather lucky since he was stationed on a boat and wasnt in the middle of everything. this time he was headed to afghanistan. 5 days after he got back to base that weekend he headed into a 30 day training in the desert, went back to camp pendleton, then left 2 weeks later. this whole deployment was different than last time. it almost didnt feel like he was really gone, we hadnt really been talking much before he left for the training so when he left it felt like a continuation of that. it wasnt until just before he got extended (yes that happened!) we really started talking. now for most of the 1st part he was out in the middle of nowhere without power, none of us heard from him. but when he got to camp leatherneck my mom and his gf kelsey heard from him all the time, me not so much, my dad either. once he got extended for another 2 months i really started hearing from him more mostly through text since that was the only way. by the time he was headed home we finally were back to normal. ps my brother and i are super close which is why this was so weird.
we had heard the end of november rumors for awhile but it wasnt until the tuesday before thanksgiving that we got the official date and time of december 2nd. he was really coming home, just in time for the holidays! my parents booked a great resort/spa in dana point for the weekend, we would leave from vegas saturday, he came home sunday, then the 4 of us would all drive back up to vegas together so kyle could take care of a few things here. so for the 3rd weekend in a row my parents and i piled into the car to head back to southern california! after a detour through pasadena to visit stats (the best christmas store ever!) we got a phone call from kelsey that they werent coming home till monday night. now we had heard from kyle they were delayed because of weather but only by parts of the day, not a whole one! so here we were staying till monday with nothing to do on sunday. as we were driving by knotts berry farm i said outloud wouldnt it be fun if we could just go to disneyland tomorrow instead. just to see what happened. next thing i know im looking up ticket prices and trying to find somewhere for my dad to go golf for the day while my mom and i go to the happiest place on earth during christmas time!! i called my friend nate and his wife katie because they had annual passes and told me anytime i wanted to go just to call. they said they would meet us there in the afternoon, we were really going! the next morning we had an amazing breakfast at the resort and were kicking my dad out of the car at the second golf course we found so we could head up to anaheim. we got to disneyland sometime around 10a and planned to spend the whole day, so we did!
bring it militray! we are still gonna have a great weekend:)
love.
santa!
she asked if we swam there hehe.
it was misty and dreary but still busy. we got to ride all the rides we always do and had lots of delicious snacks on the way, hello disneyland churros! the christmas parade was so fun then nate and katie joined us for the afternoon. it never really opened up and rained, just misty enough to make you wet. that wasnt going to break our spirit but was enough to cancel the candlelight ceremony mid-way through and prevent it from "snowing" on main street after the fireworks show. we had a blast! i am sooo glad my mom said yes to going:) plus i got to cross something off my bucketlist, visit disneyland at christmas time!
nate and katie:) oh and my very stylish poncho!
3 of our very favorites!
i love gingerbread men! especially chocolate-covered mickey ones:)
such a pretty castle!
finally it was monday morning and i was up ready to go for a run when i looked outside to see it pouring outside. so i headed back to bed for another hour before breakfast. we were just finishing up, getting ready to head to base when kelsey called and said we needed to slow down. they hadnt even landed at march air force base yet, let alone start the 2 hour drive south to pendleton. so i headed back upstairs to lounge in my amazingly comfortable king size bed a little longer.
the view from my balcony.
at about 11a we finally couldnt wait any longer and knew that he was at least on the buses headed south to us. so we headed to base and the parade deck already had families there for us to hang out with. pretty soon after we saw the buses go by as they headed to the armory to check their weapons and get room assignments for the barricks. we were pretty good at entertaining ourselves at this point and watching the vehicles rolling in with weapons and bags gave us all stuff to talk about. everyone kept saying the check in process would take 2 hours, but luckily we knew better from the last deployment return. not even an hour later the motorcycle brigade was headed onto deck!
our traditional homecoming pic!
right behind them was our guys marching in for formation. we had to stay behind the flags set up until they were released, we were of course right on that edge. as they marched in we kept trying to find him in the 2nd group but they all look alike! before we knew the commander was calling out platoons and asking all accounted for? with a response as yes sir. then, finally...dismissed. except we still hadnt found my brother yet! luckily he found us and bee-lined right for me. first hug!! he made the rounds to everyone and tears were flowing freely.
after pictures it was time to grab the stuff and get the hell out of there. he had too much to just take on his own so we of course volunteered to help. dang his stuff was heavy!! the bag i took was probably a good 60+ pounds. we didnt care he was home.
one of the best.
food was a must pretty soon after so we headed to el torito for lunch and then the road home fairly quickly after which of course meant margaritas for kyle and i ;) it was cool to have him come home with us and hear all the stories over time. we also found out the real reason he was delayed! the pilot was making a u-turn on the runway and didnt turn fast enough then running them off the runway and into a massive snowbank!! we plan to blame the pilot for quite awhile. he was only home for the night then back to base tuesday night. the 18th-27th though he will be home for christmas leave! we are so thankful he came home safe, god bless our troops near and far.
total run mileage: 72.65 miles highest weekly run mileage: 27.96 miles # runs: 13 # rest days: 17
# xtraining workouts: 2 <-oops.
favorite run: ragnar for sure. ok that may be a few runs put together, but man it was cool:)
most hardcore run: the run i did right before ragnar. it wasnt particularily difficult, my head was just all over the place and my body was really not loving that i drug it out of bed that morning.
current reads: back to being a big slacker!
current shame-inducing guilty pleasure: falling asleep with the tv on and sleeping diagonally. i know it sounds silly, but i couldnt do either at my apartment! sleeping right down the middle while friends plays in the background are seriously two of my favorite things:)
current obsession: christmas music! omg its everywhere and im totally in love. ok i wasnt in love until the end of november, but now i listen to it everywhere!
current drink: water and wine, ha! im trying to learn to drink it and i think im doin a pretty darn good job:)
current song: goodbye in her eyes by the zac brown band. current wish-list:clothes that actually fit. i always thought i would be so excited if my clothes were loose or needed a belt. then it actually happened and now i am beyond frustrated that nothing fits. it would be much easier if i had some extra cash running around to start replacing, but that whole adult thing keeps getting in the way, ha!
current need: to stay in the moment. sometimes i get so worried about what the future might possibly bring i forget to love the moment im in and i have been having some really great ones too, no matter what im feeling at the time.
current triumph: getting to my last class!! i am soooo close to done people. january 12th is coming sooo fast, 41 days to be exact:)
current bane of my existence: my final paper. its 30 pages people, really?! 30 pages. its due january 9th so i have lots of time to work on it, but its going to take a lot of work between now and then. theres lots of things going on between now and then too with holidays and family that its going to really put me to the test!
current goal: to combat the holiday weight gain. it sounds a little silly but i learned such great things from joanie i need to not waste them over the holiday season. plus i feel really good about all my progress, lets not let the holidays burst that!
current indulgence: coffee. frilly, girly, sugary coffee to be exact. that’s actually 2 months in a row, oops:)
so in all of my november craziness i got to attend wedding #4 of the year for my brother from another mother, scott. i have literally known him since i was in 3rd grade. he and my brother grew up together from pre-k. scott was always part of the family and pretty much my brother. while he and kyle took very different paths after high school, somehow they ended up doing the same thing! see kyle didnt attend college right away and then joined the marines at the age of 20 (ps i cant believe he has been in for 4 years already!). scott went straight to the naval academy at anapolis and upon graduation decided to also join the marines! weird, i know. about 6 months ago (give or take) we got a text from scott that he was engaged! he had met a great girl named kelly through a friend at the naval academy and get this, they literally grew up 7 miles apart from each other in california! of course we would be at the wedding we told him after learning it was sometime in novemeber. as luck would have it landed the week before thanksgiving so we were going to head down south 2 weekends in a row haha! but there is no way i would be anywhere else:) we left for southern california saturday morning since the wedding was on sunday afternoon. since we would be back down there a few days later we decided to only stay the one night. upon arriving we went to one of my favorite places, el torito! now i know its more tex-mex than mexican food but i dont care. i love it anyway:) we milled around in a big shopping area till we could check into our hotel later that afternoon and actually got rained on! and you thought southern california was always sunny, ha.
that night we met scotts parents for dinner at their house. i havent seen them in, well a lot of years, and it was time to catch up. we got a quick glance at the groom on his way in and out the door for dinner with the guys:) dinner was friggin delicious, as always! it was fun to just hang out and catch up.
the wedding wasnt actually until 3p sunday so we got to sleep in quite a bit that morning. we scored a late check out and just hung out in the morning. about noon we milled around to getting ready and then went to olive garden for lunch around the corner. the wedding was literally 8 minutes away from the hotel so we took our time. kelsey (my brothers girlfriend) met us there so we could all travel to the wedding together. it was still a little hard for me to believe that scott was getting married!
the reception was at a beautiful park that looked over all of fullerton and brea. it was outside and just pretty all the way around! it was a country wedding theme with the girls wearing brown cowboy boots, the boys in suits rather than tuxes, and the bride wore red cowboy boots underneath an ivory dress with pockets:) scott wore his dress blues and looked so handsome. they are so grown up now! my brother was in the wedding, but being deployed he couldnt exactly make it haha. scott actually kept him in the wedding and during the ceremony they said a prayer for him and all our troops abroad (most of the groomsmen were also military). can we say serious tears?!
after the first kiss as husband and wife it was time to celebrate! we headed off to the reception while the wedding party took pictures. they had super cute little appetizers and an open wine/beer bar! i did get a little sad and pretty teary eyed as i watched them taking pictures, i wont lie. it was a little tough to go to this one by myself so soon after the breakup. i knew we werent ready to get married, but just felt even further away from having that in the moment. thank goodness for the wine!
luckily kelly had put myself and kelsey at the kids table with people our own age and my parents at an adult table. it was fun to hang out with everyone and catch up with scotts brother, jeff. i hadnt seen in a really long time, along with a few others at the table. dinner was delicious and everyone just seemed so happy! i finally got to meet kelly and hug scott as a i now married man:) she was so super nice and was so excited we could finally meet, i guess shes heard stories lol.
i scored a passenger seat in the car so i could have as much fun as i wanted at the wine bar! the guys at my table were very gentlemenly and i never had to refill my own glass:) we danced and gathered around to catch the bouquet, all the fun traditional wedding things! way too soon though we had to head home. all 3 us had to work the next day and it was a 4 hour drive home:/ we found scott (who had changed into a suit like the other guys lol) and kelly to wish them good luck and to say goodbye. this one seemed harder as we really didnt know when we would see them again. they were headed out on a mini honeymoon and then to beaufort, north carolina where scott is stationed. ps that is where the movie walk to remember takes place! then in januaryish scott is getting deployed for a year and kelly will head back to california to be with her family while he is gone. they are too cute and going to be adorable to watch grow married together!
