the old thanksgiving.

so last year we had a new kind of thanksgiving where we stayed here in vegas and had a few family members come into town. i have to say, it was just ok. we have been going to southern california for thanksgiving every year since the 6th grade and to not do it last year was kind of a bummer. we decided (i think on that day) that this year we would save our pennies and go there without a doubt!

finally it was time to actually hit the road on that wednesday evening. now mind you we had just gotten back from southern california a few days before, but we were going anyway:) we made it just before midnight and mom and i turned in pretty early for our turkey trot in the am! just about the only thing we took from thanksgiving last year was to run a turkey trot. we had so much fun last year and i found one fairly close to where we were this year. 5am came awful early the next day since we had a little bit of a drive to dana point from lake forest. plus we needed to pick up our bibs and park which we knew there wasnt a whole lot of down there. fortunately we were early enough and parked super easy on our way to packet pickup. there was actually a whole expo for the race and TONS of people! i have never seen a 10k/5k so big. it was the 35th year running and people had been turning out for years. we huddled close together since the sun was still hiding in the marine layer and it was pretty chilly. before i knew it we were headed out!

im ready!

the course was a lot of out and backs with almost no hills, yea! we got to see the beach a few times, ran up and down pacific coast highway, and into the state parks as well. i was feeling really good, i mean really good. i kept an eye on my garmin after i thought i went out too fast and was lovin what it said. we were just past the halfway point when i saw few people running back shouting for the park officials to call for help. there was a guy that had collapsed! i wanted to stop but there were already quite a few people around him and even more when i came back the 2nd time. soon we heard emergency vehicle and most of the runners were really great about getting out of the way so they could get to the guy. i hope he was ok, he seemed to be talking a little more the 2nd time i saw him.

we continued on and rounded the last turn around soon to hit the 5 mile mark. i looked down at my garmin and couldnt believe what it said, i could soundly set a new pr even if slowed down quite a bit. of course i kicked it up instead and sped across (well for me anyway) the finish line with a shiny new time! 52:55 flashed on my garmin and i couldnt believe it:) my last 10k pr was a 56:31...thats a 3:30 minute improvement!!! i grabbed some water and spot on a higher sidewalk to wait for my mom who finished with a time of 1:29:30! there wasnt much in the way of food so we headed back up the road a bit to grab some coffee near the hotel. we saw 2 very young looking marines grabbing coffee ahead of us and we went out to thank them after grabbing ours. turns out they were from idaho and kansas, which means they just couldnt make it home for the holiday weekend. instead they had been "adopted" for the day by a local guy for the holdiay! it was so cool and they were sooo young, i mean they looked 12. crazy that my brother looked like that when he was a new marine too.

finishers!
and we got bling:)

after breakfast and a shower it didnt take long for our hotel room to be filled with my aunts/uncles/cousin that were staying at the same hotel. we tend to travel in packs! the rumor was dinner was between 3p-4p but we decided to head over a little early to hang out with my grandpa and naturally where the food is. it wasnt there very long before i had eggnog in my hand, a hill family tradition at thanksgiving, i dont even think i had to ask haha! there was a lot of hanging out, catching up with some big things for us all, and good times with family. dinner was delicious of course and it was so much fun to just be with family. we are loud, crazy, everybody is in everybody else business, and there is always a whole lot of love to go around. it was really what i needed and just easy. that night, after my grandpa kicked us out, we headed back to our hotel room to drink. this is a new occurance for us to be honest. but after my breakup my unlce promised we could get drunk on thanksgiving and he can impart his wisdom on me;) we had a blast, even if i tend to think i can keep up with the boys when i have already had some wine and then switch to jack daniels. the things you think when you drink:)

most of my big, crazy family!

friday morning we slept in a little and i avoided the black friday craziness for the first time in 2 years! we headed to rogers garden instead:) its a family tradition to go every year! everything is so beautifully decorated and really puts you in the christmas spirit:) once finished we even convinced my dad that we needed to go to the beach instead of back to the hotel for a nap! it was super overcast, but beautiful as always.

he tried to splash me so i got even!

later that afternoon we picked up my grandpa and headed to go see lincoln. the theater was friggin packed and we ended up about 3 rows from the front. seriously good movie if you havent seen it! i can definitely see why its there is so much oscar buzz around it. the rest of the family joined us for dinner at pepinos, one of our favorite italian places! most of us were leaving the next morning so it was good to have almost all of us together one last time.

saturday morning we were up bright and early to go to the swap meet!!! i know this sounds pretty silly, but this swap meet is different. its in orange county so its much better stuff than a traditional one. we wondered the aisles and browsed through the endless cell phone covers, sunglasses, and fake plant booths. my parents like to take me with them because i try on all the silly sunglasses and hats along the way! i did however score a really sweet christmas present for my brother:)

one of the best quote aprons ever!

that afternoon before heading home i was able to shoot up to brea and meet nate and katie for lunch! i hadnt seen nate since the summer and katie since the wedding. i was so grateful for people outside my family and some my own age haha! my family is great, but we had a lot of togetherness the last few days. we met at sweet tomatoes (yum!) right near their apartment and literally down the street from where we stayed for the wedding the week before. we spent a few hours catching up, laughing, comparing storeies, and just had a good time. somehow we walked away without any pictures! afterward i got to see their very cute apartment just down the street. they are just starting out and have everything decorated so cute.

this year we switched things up a little and decided to come home saturday night instead. best decision ever! it was nice to have the extra day at home before going back to work. not that we spent it totally relaxing. i ran that morning, probably farther than i should have, then we spent the rest of the morning/early afternoon moving and storing the rest of my furniture from the apartment. it was a big relief to get everything else out and just be done. now i can really move on!

thanksgiving this year was a blast and so different from my last couple. i was really able to just be me and not have anyone else to worry about. plus it was like my family really decided we were old enough to do things like drink with them now haha! good thanksgiving:)

the thanksgiving weekend adventure part 2.

i did not realize how many things happened in such a short amount of time!  continuing on...

after we finished our own black friday shopping we headed back to the hotel to see what the rest of the family was up to.  the original plan was to hang out near the beach friday and then saturday wake up and head to pasadena to revisit memory lane and stats.  when we got back to the hotel we realized that things were quickly changing, as they often do in my family.  there were so many things we wanted to do and just not enough time.  we went to lunch with my aunt and uncle, while deciding to forgo the original plan and go to pasadena/stats that day and go to the swap meet on saturday instead.  i wasnt sure how ready richard was for this adventure, but he was all in, especially with the hour nap we took on the way up while mom drove!

once passing the panda we got lost driving around downtown pasadena trying to remember which street stats was on.  upon finding and fighting with my sometimes lame brother we were ready to enter.  now by this time stats had been built up so much for richard.  we used to go all the time growing up, it was my favorite christmas store on the planet.  it has everything you could ever want in a christmas store.  it was to the point though that i was afraid he was going to be disappointed when we took him in there.  we kept telling him how fantastic and amazing it was, what if he thought it was the lamest place on the planet?  i was so excited to share that and the whole pasadena experience with him, but wasnt sure he was excited at all.  living in las vegas as long as we both have you cant really take a person home and show off your whole life.  this was going to be my chance, the same chance he had when we went to florida over the summer.  it really was the whole weekend, my chance to show off my family and previous life.

once we got into stats he was totally engulfed.  everywhere you looked was amazing displays and more christmas decorations than any place i had ever seen.  he loved it, thank goodness.  we only bought a few decorations, the cash register can total up quite quickly there, but they were going to be great in our apartment.  we later ate at a fantastic italian restaurant with my family, nice to get away from the big huge family.

saturday morning we got up bright and early to go the orange county swap meet.  mom and kyle had decided we should all go together.  i walked across the street from our hotel for coffee and a few breakfast goodies, while richard moved his car into the ralphs parking lot.  there was only 1 vehicle allowed in the hotel parking lot and he didnt want to pay the meter all day to keep it on the street.  so off to the orange county fairgrounds we went.  now this is not your ordinary etchy sketchy swap meet.  this is a magical land with real furniture, serious name brand perfume, sunglasses shops at every other booth, cars, backyard landscapes, socks, california t-shirts, and kitchenware.  i love wandering around this place and if you get there before 8am its free.  this was another place i was afraid richard would not like.  he would get bored or not find anything or think it was all to expensive for a traditional swap meet (which this one in its location is anything but).  but he loved it!

afterwards we decided that we needed to hit rogers garden, another one of my favorite places, but we were hungry.   we needed to hit chick-fil-a at some point that day, because they were closed on sunday, and richard had to have it when were down there.  so we convinced my mom and brother to go while my dad drove up to where we were to go to rogers garden.  he even got a souvenir shot. 

shortly after we joined dad at rogers garden and was totally impressed with all the new things they had come out with this year.  now mind you this is not a place you expect to walk out with a lot of things either.  its more of a look and marvel along with a few things you can actually afford.  richard did however find one of the coolest christmas trees ever, an itree.  like made in conjunction with apple.  you could actually hook your ipod up to it would coregraph the light blinking to the music, it was awesome.  and i got a souvenir shot at rogers garden.

we finished up fairly quickly after, we needed to head to grandpas house for turkey day part 2.  see originally we would do thanksgiving on thursday, well then family started to move to other parts of california or out of state and it became harder and harder to do it on thursday.  so we created saturday as our big official get together out at a restaurant so no one had to cook twice.  we have been doing it for close to 5 years now, expect this year was going to be at grandpas house again, it was a little weird.  we all trekked over there and hung out for the evening.

we left pretty early heading back to laguna and decided we all wanted to go out for a drink.  richard and i stopped at ralphs across the street to move his car in front of the hotel because you did not have to pay for parking after 7pm, and we figured it couldnt be good to leave it over night.  i dropped him off and went to park moms car.  he met me back in the parking lot pissed as all get out because his car had been towed!  he instantly started yelling and throwing things on the floor, and blaming me that i had told him to park in there.  now yes, i will take some responsibility that i did say to park there, or we could go and try to find a place in the neighborhoods above our hotel.  my parents were walking back from parking my dads car and saw what was happening, my dad turned into an instant im right dad mode with, well shouldnt have parked there.  while they were no help i walked away trying to find richard, who was still pissed as all get out at me and the whole situation.  i convinced him to go into ralphs and ask if they know the towing company phone number so we can try and track down his car before we need to leave the next day.  meanwhile my parents came over offering to help and what did we need.  we needed to borrow moms car if we could track down his mostly, and mom offered to take me home the next day if richard wanted to leave that night, which i was praying he wouldnt leave without me.  he called the number they gave him and someone actually answered.  we were able to go that night, which was a miracle they were open 24 hours.  he clearly needed space, still throwing things and really upset, so i went across the street to the hotel parking lot and told him to let me know when he was ready.

no car ride had ever been so silent as it was on the way to the towing place.  after getting lost and finally finding it we had to call someone to let us in.  as if the ordeal wasnt sucky enough, the car is in his dads name and the new registration had not arrived at the apartment by the time we left for the weekend, so we werent even sure they were going to let us have the car.  luckily the guy did not ask for any kind of car info, just ricahrds id and cash.  we got into our respective cars and drove back to the hotel with tears in my eyes the whole time, sure he was going to blame me forever.  i had asked my family if they could give us the room for a little bit so we could talk and they could leave us alone.  they decided they were going to go to wahoos fish tacos and then we could meet up with them to go to the bar.  once we got back he had decided he was going home that night, he needed to work the next day, and honestly i think he was still really mad at me.  i couldnt imagine him driving home like this and without me.  i finally convinced him to sit down with me on the bed and just think for a minute.  well thinking turned into a little bit of talking, which turned into more talking, and crying-on my part.  i had been determined to leave with him, whenever he was leaving.  i felt if he left without me, we would be in serious trouble.  after the talking and the reassuring of both of us and our relationship, thankfully, he decided to stay.  he also dropped being so mad at me, and i finally caught on that it was a lot more at the situation rather than just me (its the natural girly thing to do).  he realized that you can make a mistake and i wasnt going to leave, it was going to make us stronger.  and i realized how much i truly love him and that he was really opening up to me.  this was a big step for us, able to turn something that was potentially really sucky to something that didnt need blame on either person.  besides, we could always blame ralphs and the towing company instead.

my parents came back to pick us up and tried their best to make light of it all.  richard realized they were just trying to make him feel better, and laughed a little, i think he thought they were going to make the situation a blame on him.  he was going to come out, have a drink, or 7 with us and we would go home together rather early in the morning. while out with my parents, brother, and aunt and uncle, we both let it go.  he turned to me at one point and thanked me for being me and caring and believing as much as i did.  i looked at him in that moment and knew that we were going to be ok, we were going to get through this.

we drove home the next day with an uneventful trip.  we also realized this was the first trip we were taking together and would be able to go home together.  no dropping each other off at our own houses, we could go home together.  and that night we would be able to sleep in the same bed, we couldnt in the hotel, we arent married yet, you know.  now it was time for our next adventure, decorating the apartment for christmas, the first one in our place together.