Who's Engaged???

This past Thursday, May 27^th, Andy proposed to me. I was in complete shock. One might say that after six and a half years I should have been expecting it, but I honestly had no idea it was coming, or at least not on this past Thursday evening. Since we were going camping this past weekend I took off Thursday and Friday for the fun of it. On Wednesday night Andy told me he had a surprise for me on Thursday and I had to be ready at 5pm. I assumed dinner reservations somewhere or he was taking me to see Sex and the City 2 since he knows I really want to go see that movie. We spent the day on Thursday shopping for all the things we needed to go camping. This took us four hours and by the end of shopping Andy was pretty short with me. I was getting annoyed with him for this, but assumed it was because of the long day of shopping, but later I found out it was because of his nerves. I had no idea what he had planned at 5pm until we pulled into the parking lot of The Melting Pot. Now, for those of you that know us you might say “It’s about time he took you there.” The background to The Melting Pot is that he told me six years ago that he would take me there one night since I had never been there and I love fondue. Over the years I have given him a hard time for never taking me and breaking promises, etc. It basically turned into a joke between us. So, when we pulled into the parking lot of The Melting Pot I really thought he was finally following through after six years. It was funny, but I was also pretty excited that he took me there. Then we got seated in a private table with a curtain that blocked us off from everyone else. It was nice and romantic. Following the two and a half hour dinner we proceeded home and Andy was talking about how he had about another hour of work to do when we get home. So I figured I would pack and watch the season finale of Grey’s Anatomy when we got home. By the time Andy got in the house I was in full packing mode. I guess he was kind of thrown off by that and figured he would wait on the couch for me to finish packing. Fifteen minutes later I had my camping bag packed and now I was on a mission to watch the season finale of Grey’s before Andy got done with work. At this point he figured I was in a mode and he would just let me be and continued to park it on the couch. I guess he was thinking “What the hell, you are ruining my plan.” So he thought about waiting until the morning to propose, but decided against that. Once Grey’s was over he told me my surprise night wasn’t over and handed me a card. I was wondering why he didn’t just give me this card at the restaurant…mmmmm. It was a very sweet card that said exactly how he was feeling. I told him thanks for the very sweet card. Then he proceeded to talk as he pulled a box from his pocket. This is where things get kind of blurry for me. I was in complete shock that I don’t even know what he said. Once I saw him pull a box from his pocket my memory goes blank. Of course I said yes and now we are engaged. You think I wouldn’t have been as shocked as I was, but trust me, I was completely shocked. I wish I could remember what he said to me, but that’s ok. I do remember though that Andy was really nervous when he got down on one knee. I was surprised at how nervous he was. He said that he was worried I wouldn’t like the ring he picked out. Of course I love the ring and it means a lot to me that he picked it out and put effort into it. This explains is cranky and odd behavior throughout the day.

Now, we will be planning a wedding and of course I will blog about the wedding planning journey as stressful as it will probably be.

Bachelorette Party = Good Times

This was a great weekend. My girlfriend, Pam, from Oregon was in town for her bachelorette party. My friend Jessica was in charge of planning the party, but was instructed to keep it low key and she really just wanted girl time with her favorite Arizona girlfriends. This meant no strippers, wild parties or crazy dance clubs. I was definitely ok with that; however, it left Jessica wondering what to do for a bachelorette party. Since Pam didn’t want strippers, I offered up the idea of going to a strip tease lesson where we are the strippers for the evening. All the girls loved the idea and Jessica went into full planning mode. We started off Saturday evening at the strip tease lesson. We all had no idea what we were getting ourselves into or if this would even be worth the money, but we all knew we would have a great time doing this since we would all be together. Once we got to the studio we were brought to a room with four stripper poles and the ambience screamed sexy. We poured a glass of wine for each of us to toast to Pam’s upcoming wedding in August. Then it was time to begin. We learned a choreographed routine on the pole and then one on the chair for a lap dance. The pole was a lot of fun to whip around and wrap your leg around the pole. The chair dance was another story. All I have to say it’s a good thing we are all good friends because we had to partner up. My friend Kim was my partner as I practiced my routine on her and she practiced her routine on me. It was hard not to laugh as I was instructed to be sexy as I did my lap dance for Kim. Mmmmm…let’s just say it was hard to be sexy for Kim. I must say that the pole unleashed my inner-stripper! It was very difficult to say the least. It made me realize that strippers do really work for their money. We were all completely sweaty when our hour was up and knew we would be sore. It was a solid workout. My knees are bruised and swollen today and I believe it’s from my pole routine where you ended kneeling on the floor. I must have been landing too hard, but didn’t realize it when I was doing it because I was more into my routine that worrying about my knees. Here is a picture of the bachelorette with her pole.

After our sweaty workout we were able to change so we could head to Pam’s favorite wine bar. This was the place she frequented a lot while she lived here. The lady that was working at the time remembered her and they were able to catch up. We got a bottle of red wine to share and then headed to the patio so Pam could open up her bag of adult toys that we got her. I know she wanted low key and nothing typical of a bachelorette party, but we couldn’t go without giving her a goodie bag of naughtiness to take back to Oregon.

After the wine bar Jessica had reservations for us at Bobby’s restaurant. It was my first time there and let me tell you that Jessica gets a big Kudo’s for picking this restaurant for the evening because the food and the ambience was just amazing. Of course we got another bottle of wine with our food and continued the girl chit-chat.

I must say this was the best bachelorette party ever. It was not tacky at all. There were not penis straws, blow up dolls, shots, puking, life saver t-shirts or ridiculous trashy games. This was a first class bachelorette party and a huge round of applause to Jessica for planning such a fabulous get together for Pam’s party.

Here is a picture of us at the wine bar.

Zumba

I finally made it to Zumba last night with my friend Amber. I have been trying to join her on her Monday night workouts, but work has been in the way. Yesterday I made sure I was going to make it and not miss because of work or anything else…I was determined to make it to class. As I was heading to class I really had no idea what I was getting into, especially since I haven’t done a workout class in the past three years due to all my health issues. I did Google Zumba and learned that it was an aerobic Latin dance workout class or something like that. Still that didn’t help me understand what I was about to do to myself. I made it to the class and realized it was PACKED full of people…almost too packed. I think they need a capacity limit because, as I noticed, some people don’t know how to stay in their own “space” and feel the need to enter their neighbor’s space. Well, I quickly got over that issue about five minutes into the class because I was so busy watching the instructor to get the moves down that I didn’t care that my neighbor had no sense of personal workout space. I mean I didn’t want to look awkward on my first day of class so I was just intently watching the instructor as I followed all her moves. I looked at the clock when there was a pause in between songs and noticed we were only 15 minutes in and all I could think was “how am I going to make it until 6:30?” Then Amber and her friends mentioned how the instructor was a sub and the usual Monday night instructor was much more tough and they were finding this lady easy…really, people! I think they were just trying to show off as I had sweat dripping down my back, face and everywhere else it could slowly trickle down my body. I suck it up and keep going as I watch the very sexy Latino instructor move and shake her hips very smooth. As I kept up the routine I was thinking how I am nailing all her movements and I got this down and I am not too shabby at this. In fact I think I am moving my hips and everything else just like the little Latino instructor. I looked around the room and was impressed with my first day as I notice others who look awkward with their hips and have no control over their body parts. I am feeling pretty good about myself and my quick learning ability until I decided to look in the mirror…reality check! Nope, I did not look anything like what I was envisioning with my hips shaking just like the instructor…who makes it look so easy by the way. Instead I looked just as awkward as everybody else in the room. I just had to laugh at myself as I thought it was funny that I actually could be that smooth at Latino dance aerobics. Instead of facing reality I decided that it was best if I just went with how good I thought I was doing instead of watching my awkward self in the mirror and face reality. It was good times and I had such a good workout that I was in pain today from my neck to my toes. It was such an awesome feeling again to get back to a workout class just like the old days, but just a little rusty. No worries as I will get myself back into shape as I am hoping to join Amber for future Zumba classes. Watch out instructor, here I come!

Thinking Of A House Cleaner

I didn’t think I would need a house cleaner, or at least not until we moved into a bigger home; however, lately I am thinking I need one. These past few months Andy and I both have been working so much that it’s just becoming too much to also clean on the weekend too. I mean I work a lot all week long and then put in hours on the weekend too. It takes about three – four hours to thoroughly clean this house. Now, the last thing I want to do after working many hours during the week is put in more hours cleaning the house and that does not include laundry. I feel that after cleaning the house, doing laundry, going grocery shopping and working this weekend I didn’t have a weekend. This is not the first weekend it has been like that as this has been happening quite a bit and I am just exhausted and would like to enjoy a weekend. Andy is in the same boat as me when it comes to work. We both have turned into little workaholics. I am not sure where this came from but it is what it is. I would like someone to clean the bathrooms, vacuum, clean the baseboards and dust once a week. I am thinking that with our small house it can’t cost too much. I would kind of feel sad, or like we are high maintenance, that we hire a house cleaner to clean this tiny house. I mean this house is small and we should be able to handle it, but I just don’t want to spend a chunk of my weekend cleaning anymore. I am not ready to sign on the dotted line with a house cleaner, but I am certainly thinking about it since I am not sure how much more I can do this.