Jaimi's Top Ten

Happy Thanksgiving to all of our friends and family.  We miss those that live far away and will be thinking of you today.  We are spending this holiday with our Arizona family and my father-in-law and step mother-in-law as they are in town.  We are going to make grandma's buns and cranberry sauce (not the canned crap) to share at the Siefert's Thanksgiving.

As you may have been seeing on Facebook and blogs, people have been posting their daily thanks.  I decided to do the top ten things I am thankful for today instead of all month long.  Enjoy!

Top Ten Things I am Thankful For

10. I live in a state where we don't have natural disasters like hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and earthquakes.  We have dust storms which are a lot of fun to watch from the back yard and they are relatively harmless.

9. Being able to say I have no regrets in life!

8. Living in a state where the sun is out on average 350 days a year.

7. My career, which I love, as not many people can say that about what they do all day long.

6. Modern technology, because without it my life would be so much more stressful trying to stay in contact with everyone I care about.

5. My fur babies who love us no matter what and who I can't live without.

4. Being able to afford the basic necessities like food, water, shelter and pedicures!

3. Friends who live all over the place, but no matter near or far we stay in touch and stay close.

2. My family.

1. A wonderful husband who is the love of my life and my best friend.  A husband who likes to cook and will do the vacuuming because he knows how much his wife hates to vacuum. 

Baby Extravaganza!

The month of November is the baby extravaganza month for me.  I just went to three baby showers in the past 7 days, one of which I co-hosted.  I feel like the last 19 days has completely revolved around babies.  Besides showers, I have found out I have another friend who is expecting a baby.  Whew...can you feel the baby craze here?  I feel like the universe is trying to tell me something. (No commentary from the peanut gallery, please!) 

I have definitely spent my fair share of time in Buy Buy Baby this month that you would think I know the store in and out now, but I don't.  It's still a very foreign store and a very scary store.  There are so many items in there that I have no idea what they are.  I stuck with the clothes section as that is easy to pick out and actually fun too!  I couldn't stop myself from buying so many clothes that I figured if Andy and I were to have a baby we would be in financial trouble!  :) 

I am so excited for all the mommies-to-be and can't wait to meet all the new babies in 2013!

Good Times in Seaside

I didn't think traveling to Wisconsin or Vegas was enough so I hopped on a plane with my friend Jessica and headed up to Seaside Oregon to throw a baby shower for our good friend Pam.  We arrived in Portland last week on Thursday night and were greeted by Pam and Garrett who so generously picked us up from the airport.  The good times started immediately with chit chat and laughter in the two hour car ride to the coast.  That laughter did not stop all week as it went on so much that my stomach hurt from laughing so much.

Weather
The last time I was in Oregon was in August of 2010 for their wedding and it was beautiful weather, this time I wouldn't say the weather was beautiful...instead I would call it "brisk."  Once Jessica and I arrived at our hotel/cabin room it was freezing so we cranked up the heat and went to bed.  We rose on Friday morning to a sauna in our room.  It was so hot that I opened the door to cool off the place and two hours later when Pam came to get us the room still wasn't cool...hmmm...we didn't do that again!  I am not going to lie...it was cold in Oregon!  It was a high of about 45/50 degrees and would get down to 38 degrees at night.  I was freezing...I froze my butt off.  You would think this WI girl could handle it, but I couldn't.  I was a wimp.  The next time I head to Seaside it will be in August when I know it will be beautiful there.

Our source of heat for the weekend.

Tilly and I snuggling on the couch at Pam's house in front of the fireplace on Friday night.

It also rained on Sunday, the day we were scheduled to head home.  While I was in the shower Jessica decided to take a walk with her leopard print umbrella.  She was already warned by Garrett and Pam that she will stand out like a sore thumb as the locals do not use umbrellas.  This did not stop Jessica as she went for her strole in the rain carrying her large leopard print sign that screamed she was not from around there.  She did get asked twice if she needed anything and one driver actually stopped her to ask if she needed a ride and ended her sentence with "hun."  Now, that is funny.  Yes, I am sure the umbrella made her stand out like a sore thumb, but I am sure the leopard print didn't help her cause either.   Anyway, it was a good story that provided one of many giggles that weekend.

Shopping
One thing I love about the coast of Oregon is all the tiny towns and shops.  Pam took us shopping in Cannon Beach all day Friday.  Cannon Beach is one of the locations where the movie Goonies was filmed and as you blog followers know, that is an awesome movie and makes me geek-out when I am in the vicinity of where the Goonies was filmed.  This was no different!  Besides enjoying the beauty of Cannon Beach I purchased some souvenirs for the girls (Madison and Izzy) and a couple small items for myself. 

Baby Shower
The weekend before the baby shower I got crafty and made artwork that I ironed onto onesies for the travel themed baby shower.

My craftiness with the iron, onesie and artwork!

The 6 onesies for the baby shower!

The baby shower was held at Pam's parents house and was a couple's shower so we limited our baby playing games due to the couples shower theme (or my anti-baby shower game attitude).  I asked their friends to write down tips for traveling with kids and then they had to guess who said what.  This turned out to be a lot of fun.  Following that it was present time.

Pam and Garret opening gifts.

Happy couple!

Then we participated in Jessica's activity of painting PARKS letters for the baby's room.  That was very creative and a lot of fun.  The men did not have to participate as they could go in the other room and watch football.  Following that we ate some more and socialized before we were all exhausted from the weekend and were ready to pass out.

The ladies all tired out posing in front of my crafty onesies that were strung up!

To top off the trip we stopped at Voo Doo Doughnuts in Portland on Sunday before going to the airport.  This doughnut shop is apparently the place to go whenever in Portland.  I am not much of a doughnut fan, but I have heard so much about this place that I just had to go.  Jessica was not on board, but she was a trooper as Garrett drove us there since I was so excited to go.  We all had our doughnuts and then Jessica and I headed home. 

I love Seaside for the simplicity of things and how everything is much more laid back and done at a slower pace.  It's a great place to visit and I can't wait to visit again...in August that is!  I am very thankful for the great group of girlfriends that I do have and extremely thankful for the means to be able to travel and put on a baby shower for such an awesome friend!!

October Overview

Holy crap, I realized that I did not do one blog post in the month of October and that is because we were pretty busy.  I have decided to give you the cliff notes version of the month of October to get you up to speed and you will see why I was too busy to post.

Bought a New Car
So, I said goodbye to the Audi A4 and hello to a 2013 Honda Accord V6.  Some might say that is a step down, or "what were you thinking", but I am extremely happy with my purchase.  It's a beautiful car with a hell of a lot less (aka cheaper) maintenance than the Audi.  I was originally looking at the 2013 A4, but my practical side took over and I purchased the Accord, but of course it is loaded with everything I could possibly get in it.  Hey, my practical side stepped in, but my high maintenance side wouldn't settle for anything but the best.

Get Together with Friends
Our good friends purchased a beautiful new home (aka mansion) and had a "housewarming" party, but didn't call it a housewarming party as that is too cliche.  That was a ton of fun to get together with our amazing friends for some shits and giggles.  They even had this beer pong themed cake for the housewarming/birthday/get together celebration.  How creative is this?

What a fun cake!

Went to Wisconsin
Oh boy!  We took off to Wisconsin for a week, or at least I did while Andy went for a long weekend.  Of course the weather sucked as it was rainy and cold for 5 out of the 7 days.  On my long flight I started to think about moving back to be closer to family, but once I stepped off the plane and my face hit the freezing cold those crazy thoughts were completely destroyed.  I can't live in that climate of freezing (ok, freezing to me) cold with rain and doom and gloom.  While there it was crazy go-go-go.  It was good to see so many family and friends (even though I was exhausted from the go-go-go) and always a great time at the WI Badger football game.

Me, Bobbi and Kelli tailgating at The Stadium Bar.

Andy and I at the end of the daily festivities.

Got Sick
The crazy go-go-go caused me to get sick and I returned to the beautiful state of AZ with a wonderful WI parting gift of a chest cold.  You know, one of those that hurt to cough.  Good thing the dry AZ climate dried up my cough just in time to head to Vegas.

Went to Vegas
As my previous post discussed we went to Vegas for our friends 40th birthday celebration and to see Jimmy Buffet.  Yes, I got home on a Monday from WI with a hell of a cold, got healthy in time to fly out that Friday for good times in Vegas.  I am such a trooper!

Doggy Daycare
Per my previous post, our dogs tried out a new daycare (because they had to and not by choice)  while we were in WI and used the old daycare while we were in Vegas.  They were very well behaved dogs at both daycare places.  We now have a new daycare place close to home that we are able to take them to.  The new place said Madison was quite shy at first and didn't want to have anything to do with the workers, but once she warmed up she was very playful with them in the back yard. I am glad we now have daycare choices and even though Madison can be a pain in the butt sometimes, overall she is a great dog!

We are now in the month of November.  Where does the time go?  I am hoping to be better about posting this month, but we do have a lot going on this month too, so don't judge when I don't do at least a weekly post.

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween (yesterday) to all my friends and family.  I just love Halloween.  It is so much fun to dress up and go out to see how creative others have gotten with their costumes.  Unfortunately, we did not dress up this year.  My wonderful husband did surprise me on Halloween morning with a fun card and bag of goodies.  He is so sweet!

Why did we not dress up...you ask?  Well, instead of being festive this year we went to Vegas to celebrate a friends 40th birthday. 

A nice little representation of the hubby and I on our way to a fun filled time in Vegas.

While in Vegas for a quick weekend we went to the Jimmy Buffet concert to celebrate said friends birthday.  This was a great time had by all.  Here is a horrible pic of us at the concert.

I tried to take a pic of Jimmy, but that did not turn out very well.  Besides the concert, we also shared a couple cabana's with the rest of the birthday crowd.  That was fun just hanging pool side with some of our good friends.  We also went to the piano bar the night before the concert and then on to a mini-club in the Cosmopolitan hotel.  This is one of my favorite places to go because it's not so "clubby" but it is still a ton of fun.

Us at the piano bar in New York, New York.

The most eventful part of the Vegas trip was our travels.  We flew Allegiant Air, which we have never done before.  Let me tell you, this airline brings out Mesa's finest...basically we flew back with the extended family of Honey Boo Boo...you get my point.  Quite interesting.  Normally I might find this entertaining, but this weekend I just did not.  I was exhausted, especially since we had just gotten back from Wisconsin and now we are on another plane.  I am getting too old for all of these travels.