Birthday gift #1

What a great time Tara and i had! It all started at 7:45 am on Monday morning (after Tara was 45 minutes late) she texted me to tell me she was here to pick me up so i grabbed my bags and headed out the door. taped to her passenger window was an envelope marked clue #1. I opened it and all it said was Cashmere. The only thing i knew from that was that it was a town.... of course i had no idea where that town was or what we would be doing there. So we headed out on the road taking 522 to Monroe and then heading over the pass. half way over the pass Tara gave me another clue to look under my seat.Under my seat i found a water proof camera and another clue to look in the center console of her car. in there i found a small box containing a charm, for my bracelet she got us all when we went to Vegas, of a raft.... this is when i started to realize what we were doing... with that charm came another clue that said look in the glove box. in there i found a folder that told me that we were heading to Cashmere to go white water rafting which would end with a BBQ steak dinner and then we would be staying at a bed and breakfast in Leavenworth! I was so excited i could nearly cry! what a great gift... and how she presented it was so creative and thoughtful. in this folder she has carefully cut out and presented all the info for the weekend including a little history of Leavenworth. such a great detail to make this trip feel even more special! Needless to say we had a blast.. white water rafting was so much fun and what a perfect day for it! the sun was out and the river was a perfect temperature! we shared the raft with a couple and a family. the family was really great and the daughter who was about seven I'd say totally loved hanging out with us! the couple however were quite annoying. the women would get all pissy because she would get splashed! What the hell she was doing white water rafting i had no idea! but we didn't let them ruin our trip! after the trip we headed to Leavenworth and explored the shops a little bit. it was so much fun to go though the shops. we bought some cheese and sausage for the night and then headed to Safeway for some bread. we then headed to the B&B. It was a little awkward at first because we were basically staying at someones house (we were the only guests) but we were shown our room and then basically left alone which was great. we had full run of the down stairs where we had a big screen TV and a comfy couch. we hung out and barely staid awake to watch two movies. The next morning we woke up early... boy was it hard but we had to make it to

breakfast at 8am because they were making it basically just for us and boy would it have been rude to not go plus that is the whole point of staying in a B&B but boy was it hard getting up. The breakfast was so yummy! we had egg pie with potatoes and bacon and fruit and sweetish pancakes with homemade jam which was SSOOO good! everything was delightful! we sat and ate and chatted with the couple who owned the business for a while and really got comfortable with the whole B&B idea. After breakfast we headed over the Lake Wenatche
state park where were used to go camping every summer as children with my family and hers once or twice. It was so fun to see the old area even though the weather wasn't so great. after that we went to our all time favorite restaurant... the 59r diner! what a great place and not a thing had changed. we sat in the booth right in front under the Elvis memorabilia and feed a few quarters into the juke box and ordered a couple peanut butter shakes! we sat and reminisced about our trips here ever summer and then got in the car and headed home... tired from the whirl wind trip we had just enjoyed!

wakin up early

well here i am awake and dressed before 7am b/c Tara is on her way to pick me up to take me out for my birthday surprise! This year instead of presents i ask each of my friends to take me out for the day for a little one on one time. I feel like i am always trying to hang out with everyone all at the same time that i never really get to hang out with my friends just one on. I need to reconnect with each of my friends and get to know them one on one again. so today is my day with Tara. she is the only one who hasn't told me what we are doing and it is an over night thing so this should be interesting. I'm sure it will be fun b/c Tara is pretty darn fun but also knowing Tara this could be absolutely ANYTHING!!!!

wish me luck!

World traveler

Wel lfor my birthday this year my grandmother gave me such a great and thoughtful gift! She gave me a glass globe paper weight and a london luggage tag. and yeah that doesn't sound oh so exciting but what she said when she gave them to me is what realyl touched me. She said she see's me traveling the world and she thinks the first international place she see's me going is london! I have always wanted to travel and see the world and to have her say she see's me doing that realyl got me excited! Also mat's mom said on my birthday that she see's us as travelers and we won't have kids till we are 30 because we want to travel. These thoughts for us is so exciting for me and i hope that they are right. well since they thought this for us i thought i would compile a list of places i want to go...

*London, England: first on the list b/c it is fun that my grandma thought this would be the first international place i would travel

*Tokyo, Japan: I would love to travel here b/c it would be so interesting to see how the tecnology they have to offer as well as seeing how they mix that with their japanese customs.

*Cabo/TJ, Mexico: i know it seems like such a simple place and so close but it would be so much fun i take a cruise and enjoy the beaches of mexico.

*Amsterdam: This is just seems like a place that would be interesting to go b/c of the "window shopping and coffee houses" they have to offer.. hahahaha i saw i guy with a t-shirt the other day talkin about that stuff.

*Australla: I would love to go here and surf on the beaches.... not that i know how to surf but this would be the best place to try it out

*New York City, USA: Well of course there are places in the US that i want to go too.. .this of course for the shopping and just the excitment of city life

*Miami/disney world, florida, USA: you hear so much about the beauty of florida it would be fun to go anywhere there but of course miami and disney world would be the top of the list

*Coney Island, USA: i would love to go here anytime but idealy on the first of july to really see all the crazy crowds and of course the famous hot dog eating contest!

*Paris, France: i had some resistance to put this on my list b/c it seems like this is on the top of everyone's lists.... it defintly isn't on my top but i know that i would enjoy going there so i'll put it on the list

*The Bahama's: but of course.... who wouldn't want to go and relax on the beaches and enjoy the sun?

I'm sure there are a million other places i want to travel to and i will continue to update this list everytime i think of another place but this is a pretty good start.

My Diet

well i am on my day two of restarting my diet! hahaha god how many times have i started and stopped my diet i have NO idea!! but this time i am really really really gonna do it... i made it through yesterday without pigging out after i got home from work and i think that if i made it through yesterday i can do it all week right?! we went grocery shopping and i stocked up on all good foods and stuff to bring lunches i am making jumbalya and turkey sausage right now so i can eat it before i go to work and enjoy it for the rest of the week. also being on my diet and making food for myself is helping me not spend so much money i swear a quarter of my pay check goes to food at work normally and that is just no good! it is amazing going a couple days without spending any money! i love it!

A fan of positive re-enforcement!

Well I'm back at work now and i haven't had a bad day in the three days that I've been back and sad to say that is surprising... even yesterday when it was crazy busy and i had a slow ass checker till eleven and i could barely get my work done i still was in a great mood! I credit this to positive re-enforcement.... The second day (Wednesday) that i worked our district manager was in the store and he came up to talk to me (first time meeting him) and he asks me when i am going to sign up for 2nd assistant and how much he has heard about me doin a great job and how if i work at it i can work my way up and that it happens fast and all this stuff and i felt so great after talking to him because i always doubt my work and i wonder if anyone notices if i work or if i don't and so on. OK so then yesterday (my third day of work) i got my evaluation. and i couldn't ask for a better evaluation. she said that she really liked my work ethic and that i constantly got my work done and that i was the top PIC since they made me a PIC and then named off all the PIC's in our store and said that with all the knowledge that me being the top PIC is a pretty great thing. I was really proud of myself. So why am i a fan of positive re-enforcement? well all this week i have worked.... and worked hard... usually i will find myself getting tired at the end of the night and kinda slacking on the job and part of the reason i let myself slack is that i didn't think they noticed when i would work or not work so why work.... but with the feed back i got i want to continue to show them that i am a great worker and a loyal employee and i have been hard at work this week and i hope i can keep it up!