May 30 - Duck Day 2

I have one more post I'll do to show the ambiance and general madness of the area. The beach was PACKED with YSAs. Other families on the beach would stop us and ask where we all came from. When explaining that we are a group of 20-30 year old students and professionals from the DC area they would always say "Oh so you're on a spring break type trip?" The answer to which is no... So so very different from traditional spring break. Clue #1: not a red cup in sight.

Antiquing after church!

Me and Dawn! Sad tan lines she got from VB the day before... but the championship title must be worth it right?
SISTERS!



Great group pic photography by James.
Switching it up a bit.
Crab hunting at night!!! So scary.


See also Court's post.

May 29 - Duck Day 1

Although the weather report was scary...
There hasn't been a cloud in the sky! I could not ask for a better beach weekend.
A glance at 929 Corolla Drive. CZ and I have been scoping out houses all weekend that will fit the entire JAZBAND group. Oh man we found three perfect options so get excited. We WILL be descending on OBX soon, I am using the methods of The Secret as we speak.

Courtney and Kirstin were nice enough to join me! I am SO GLAD they have been here to share in all the hilarious moments.
CZ and me on the sand. She's a big hit out here. Everyone says they can see the resemblance between us and they're excited she's here for the whole summer. Me too!!
I played approximately 7 games of volleyball in the tournament. Our team did pretty well!

Ultimately, we fell to Dawn and Michael's team (and the others I play with on Monday nights). They went all the way and won the golden volleyballs! Woo!!

May 27 - Friends in town!

Founding Farmers is a really great restaurant. You should try it.

Frozen Yo is my favorite. Although, I received depressing news that they will no longer stock Reese's peanut butter cups as a topping. Our relationship might not be as long lasting as I had hoped...
Just in case you need some, H&M is now selling overalls. For reals.

On the way home, the sky was all lit up with the biggest lightening storm I have ever seen! Kirstin and I stopped at the Jefferson Memorial right when the lightening storm turned into a full on rain storm. Her shirt is really only supposed to be one color, but we ran from the car (barefoot) through the rain and got surprisingly soaked.

It was one of those "step back from life and feel overwhelming gratitude for getting to have such a cool life right now" moments. The whole setting was remarkable.

May 26 - On the corner of 14th and G St...

Stuck on the corner, that is.

Out of gas.

Me, Kirstin, CZ, Kelsea, Melissa Richmond.

To be continued...

(PS if you look closely, you can see I scraped out 254 miles from my 20 gallon tank! Do the math. Not awesome...)


Post edit: Yeah, a cab ride and a gas can later we got out of there. Oh what a long day!

May 23 - I love being an aunt.

And these two just melt me!!
Really, you should hear them talk. They are so darling.

Family really is pure happiness to me.
I am so, so lucky.

May 22 - Ridiculous baby names and an irresistable frying pan.

I know I really shouldn't judge... Maybe someday I'll eat my words?

I suppose it is possible that when choosing my child's name, I will shake up the bag of Scrabble letters, pull out my allotted 7 tiles and make the best of it. (Things CAN get desperate with my indecision...)

Remember when I shared this with you last summer?
The updated list is out.

Here's a sample, of what some people
(at least TWO! had to agree on each!!)
settled on as The One for their tiny, swaddling child:

Taylee
Taedyn
Kayven
Bekett
Kissera

Click here to see the rest of the annual name report from Idaho.

Then come back and please share, which is your favorite?

***

Also, tonight I made my regular Saturday night grocery store stop
(which makes me nostalgic for the 30 minute lines at Smith's in Provo...)
and because I was really enjoying my book on tape
(Catching Fire, the Hunger Games sequel...)
I decided to walk down every single aisle.
Thank goodness I did because while exploring the usually-skipped bread aisle
(Obviously, I grow and grind my own wheat and then knead and mix by hand with eggs from my backyard chickens. You don't? Oh....
Actually, I just can't make it through a loaf before it molds which makes me cranky so I skip it entirely.)

I came across this little darling:
I don't know if it was the French on the packaging,
or the little feet under the egg,
but suddenly I had to have this mini pan.
And English muffins.
And cheese. And ham.
So I could make a perfect little one-egg breakfast sandwich.

You totally understand, right?

May 21 - Happiness is

A pedicure after work.

And the beginning of my summer sandal tan.

May 19 & 20 - Scraping the bottom of the barrel...

Whenever I make a renewed effort to blog, I get to this point and really struggle to find ANYTHING to talk about.

Especially when the most thrilling part of my day was walking into the Commons at work, to find trays of chips and salsa, free for all. Dinner = check!

The second most interesting thing I did was gather all the mail piled up on my desk from the last 3 months, pretended to glance through it, consolidated it all into a new, bigger bag, which I then stashed UNDER the desk. Progress.

No but seriously, I have nothing to share.

Unless you want to hear about how Dawn and I can't stop watching Jane Austen movies when we REALLY should be sleeping.

Or about how I wake up every morning with so much pain in my back that I hobble around like 200 year old slug. And yet I do nothing about it because I still don't believe doctors are real.

Or about how my closet condition is so desperate that I might just burn it down and start over. Winter clothes still on the shelves and hangers and in laundry baskets, summer clothes in boxes "ready" to rotate in, all sorts of dry-cleaning and clean laundry and dirty laundry, no will to organize because I can't remember if I'm supposed to hang my t-shirts or fold them in stacks and should the cardigans be separate from the pullover tops, or combined and color coded? What fits and what needs mending? Which skirts should be grouped on which hangers, and which will stretch out if hung, and should I iron all the linen before I add it into the mix? All the decisions are literally crippling me. Haha, it makes me laugh to think how revealing and ridiculous this is.

Anyway! CZ comes to DC on Monday, wooo! And, I have a trip to Utah* planned in June, woohoo! (*Get ready Wiley's!)

May 18 - And $50 later...

It's time to exit the building. Oh Target.

I know you all know what I mean...

I went in to RETURN something, haha.

Oh well. Have you seen their Dwell Studio pillows? Adorable.

May 17 - Drizzling inside and out.

Crazy rain outside of the Santos Aquarium

Today it rained.

All day long.

I love cozy, rainy afternoons.

And the rain seemed to fit my general mood.

But

Things are seriously looking up!

This is going to be a fantastic summer.


Tonight I joined the group which plays volleyball on Monday nights.

It was so fun to play again.

Totally worth the bruised knees I'll sport through the rest of the week!

May 16 - Back to Reality...

Sort of.

I landed back in DC early this morning.
Oh man is it hard to be back to real life.
I love to travel, and I usually love coming back home most of all.
But this time it was hard.

I've had the trip of a lifetime.
Seriously, it was perfect.
And an experience like that has you questioning your whole life...

(Wait, what am I doing?
How can I get that carefree feeling back again without sacrificing ALL adult responsibilities?
Can I please just move to a cave without any worries?)

All that is just to say, I have been sleeping today!!

And apparently, I did a lot of sleeping in Brazil. There are a few photos of proof...

Goodnight all!
Here's to hoping I can make it through all my work emails tomorrow...

May 15 - Monkey Island!

Monkey Island could also be called Monkey Rehab. This center rehabilitates monkeys who have been previously captured and kept in peoples' houses, helping them learn how to live in the wild again. There were so many cute pregnant monkeys or new mother monkeys with babies on their back.

Red-faced monkey wanted the nut in my hand.

Here is (what I call) Mr. Aussie Shorts. Him and his wife were a part of our group for many of the adventures. His shorts were always way too short for the climbing in and out of boats... Trust me on that one.

Leaving Antonios with my Book of Mormon before leaving the lodge.
(Not sure which he'll value more, that or all the iphone tips I showed him...)

May 14 - Paprika and gators

This morning, our guide Antonios led us on a trek through the rainforest, pointing out various plants and bugs and making me nervous. Our native guide made me a crown out of palm leaves. Then the native guide led us to a tree with a nest of bullet ants. I'll leave out the rest of the story, but let's just say one member of our group had a swollen, throbbing finger for the rest of the day... The whole thing was entirely terrifying to me.

In the afternoon we visited a native village and were treated with a dance from their Indian tradition. Antonios helped me get in the spirit by painting my face with paprika. Who knew spit and paprika would be so hard to wash off...

In the evening, we went gator hunting. Or cayman spotting. Have you ever heard alligators referred to as cayman? The guides insist cayman is the English word for what they were describing. I'm not convinced... Either way, by the end of the night I had held a baby cayman, upping the count of wild animals I came in close, personal contact with in Brazil.

Do you see this little slice of heaven? At the back of EcoPark, they found a huge, bowl-shaped slab of red granite which connects to a stream coming from the forest thus creating a small, fish-less, fresh-water pool. It was a seriously magical place. Especially the morning I hopped in during a rain forest downpour.

May 13 - Amazonian Crash Course

What a full day!! (And yeah, a full, humid, lame outfit day... Don't judge)

I'll do this mostly with photos...

First stop, Meeting of the Waters.
The Rio Negro (black on right) merges with the Rio Amazon (brown on left). They run side by side for 5km without mixing. Strange right?

Homes floating on the water. The water level varies by several meters from winter to summer.

Visiting a village on stilts. Each little village had a school, a church and a bar.

Suspended vegetable garden. Awesome right??

Holding a sloth. Very soft. Hopefully flea-less...

This is a Rubber Tree. It oozes latex and was the source of serious cash for the Brazilians/their colonizers until a British guy stole 70 Rubber Tree seeds and started growing them elsewhere. Thus ended the rubber monopoly, and Manaus' prosperity.

The droppings under a tree. This really doesn't capture the color properly.
Holding a 7 ft. anaconda. Uncomfortable, can you tell?
Quick stop at some real life lily pads.
One full day in the sun = trailer park looking farmer tan :-(
(click to enlarge or zoom)

Would you like to be pregnant in the Amazon? Me neither... P.S. She's definitely no more than 15 years old. Likely on her second kid...

Sunset.