A Camping We Went!

As you all know we took a mini camping trip over the weekend!! Even though the camping trip got cut short and we came home Saturday afternoon I still managed to take plenty of pictures to share!!

We had a great campsite this time. it was pretty cozy and was the perfect size for the 7 of us (yes I count our dogs). Since I packed the car and ended up hurting my back I let Chuckles handle most of the unpacking and all of the setting up at camp. I never help with the tent so that wasn't a big change, he just seems to work better on his own :)

After we were all set up and ready to relax Justin built us an awesome campfire. It wasn't really cold or anything like that, heck I spent the whole night in shorts, but we figured why not, it was after 8 and the sun was going to be going down soon!!

After a very crappy night of no sleep on Friday we decided to go home Saturday in the late afternoon. But we decided to do as much as possible to enjoy our camping trip on Saturday. While Chuckles, Angelina, Justin, and Bianca went to play mini golf I hung out at the campsite with the dogs.

Buster keeping watch!

While they were all sweating it out in the hot weather and hitting up the mini golf course I indulged in some leg tanning and magazine reading. It was heaven

Roxy took advantage of the peace & quiet and slept!

After they returned sweaty, hot and tired from mini golf Angelina and I took Bianca up to the pool! It was about 98 degrees so cooling off in the pool was exactly what we needed!! It was so refreshing and we even got to lay out for awhile and tan before the bee's started to take over the pool area. Me = not a fan of bees.

Can you find the photobomb?

We are so lucky to have a great campground that's only 40 minutes from the house. You get forestry while at the campground and then you get to see all of this on the way home...We definitely live in a beautiful area!!

And of course as soon as we got home, got the car unpacked it was shower time!! We always keep the dogs outside until we are ready to go inside and throw them in the shower!!

Look at how stinkin cute Roxy is after a bath?? She gets so fluffy!!

After showering it was time to relax!! We decided to keep the remainder of the day really chill! I caught up on blogs, Pinterest, and email while Chuckles watched TV. Then we hit the sack at probably 8:30. Overall it was an interesting weekend and definitely not our best camping trip but that's okay. My back was so thankful to sleep in the comforts of our own bed!!

A Camping We Will Go!

This past weekend we were lucky enough to head out of town for a fun filled camping trip!!! We went out to the KOA in Cloverdale, CA with our awesome friends Angelina, Justin, and their daughter Bianca!! 

Just wanted to share a few photos of our fun weekend!! 

Here everyone is setting up camp!!

Since I pack the car and haul everything out from the car Chuckles is in charge of setting up the tent, as well as all the cooking!!

It was super windy when we got there, and ALL NIGHT LONG, so Chuck had to get Justin's help in setting up the final part of the tent, which kept trying to blow away!

Me and my Homeslice getting ready to be lazy while the boys took care of everything the rest of the night :)

After we got all set up, Justin started a camp fire and Chuck cooked up dinner. Burgers for us with pesto pasta salad and macaroni and cheese for Bianca!! Check out our new camping stove that we got as a wedding gift! According to Chuck it's AMAZING and so much better than BBQ-ing everything. Of course I'd have no idea cause other than toasting marshmallows I don't cook all weekend! :)

 Angelina and I super comfy in our camp chairs around the fair! Excuse the haze the wind kept blowing smoke everywhere!! It was such a nice relaxing night by the fire!!

All ready to start roasting marshmallows!!

The next morning we were all up bright and early! We were up around 7 cause A. A jerk in the camp spots below us was yelling at his kid and B. Once the sun came up it got super bright in the tent!!

Chuck immediately starting making us some yummy pancakes and bacon!!

And Angelina and I started the day off right with some champagne!!

The dogs did so well considering this was their first tent experience. We've always done a cabin when we've taken the dogs (or rented an RV like at Manchester Beach). They were all about laying in the dirt and Buster kept a watchful eye over our site!!

Saturday afternoon Angelina and I took Bianca to the pool which was so awesome!! We spent a couple hours in the water catching some sun while the boys chilled at camp. Then we all walked up to the store and got some ice cream to cool down!!

This was my outfit for our walk (hey we are camping) but everyone gave me crap for it! They even tried to get me to change my shorts but I had to rock them!! 

Saturday evening, once the sun started going down the dogs crapped out on us! Both were so pooped from fun activities!

I don't think Buster slept at night cause of all the noise from the wind but he sure crashed when we were relaxing at camp!!

Here is me and the hubs!! Yup I love saying that!! :)

Saturday night we had an AWESOME dinner of green beans, rolls, steak and pesto pasta salad!! Needless to say we were stuffed full from all the awesome food!!

You're never too old to play a childs game right?? While sitting around the camp fire we got to talking and the topic of Chubby Bunny came up!! Have you ever played?? Well you stick a marshmallow in your mouth and say Chubby Bunny. Then you keep adding marshmallows until A. You can't fit any more in or B. you can no longer understand what you are saying when you say Chubby Bunny!!

Justin and I were the two competing and he definitely won! Angelina had me laughing so hard (cause she was laughing at us) I ended up spitting all my out before I got my 6th one in. Justin got in 6 and attempted 7 before he lost it :) It was so fun though!!

Sunday morning we got up and got packed because it was going to be HOT HOT HOT that day! We had an amazing time camping though and boy did we get tan!!

Another fun camping trip at the Cloverdale KOA. Seriously if you live close to this area go check it out! We are actually going back in July for some more fun in the sun!!

Happy Trails Everyone!!

2011 Wrap Up

Boy oh boy did the last couple weeks of December fly by! I couldn't even make time to post but I'm back and ready to start 2012 off with a bang! First things first - lets do a recap of my 2011 Goals.

1. Dress up for work 4 days out of the week. (We have a pretty lax dress code but I want to start dressing more business casual instead of jeans everyday) - FAILED! I tried but then I shrunk out of my pants and have been waiting to buy new work slacks. When you don't need them for work it's hard to justify spending the money on new work pants. Plus I realized I'm very lucky to get to go comfy to work so I am taking advantage. Point in fact - today I'm in sneakers, jeans, and a sweatshirt!


2. Work 40 hour workweeks!! I am sick of working extra hours so this year it's 40 hour work weeks (Overtime ONLY when absolutely NEEDED and NEVER on a Friday) - ACCOMPLISHED! This year I only worked a few hours of overtime when it was absolutely needed! I wish I could say I never did on a Friday but it turns out Fridays are the best times for me to work overtime. I accomplish way more and then I get to go home and veg with the honey!

3. Lose 2 dress sizes by Summer (3 by Christmas) - Somewhat Accomplish/Somewhat Failed - I lost 2 dress sizes but not until October. I am almost down one more but alas, I did not meet the goal by the end of the year. However - I lost 53 lbs this year and started excercising 3-4 days out of the week! That to me makes up for the dress size.

4. Read 2011 Book List - ACCOMPLISHED! Yes the side tracker says I didn't but if you notice my original 2011 Book List was 46 books and I read 49 this year!!

5. Clean the house top to bottom every week! - HAHAHAHA FAIL!! This was definitely a wishful thinking goal. We just got so darn busy that it didn't happen. I will say though we have a new cleaning goal for 2012 that is totally attainable! Stay tuned...

6. Take Buster to Camp Bow Wow twice a month - Half Fail/Half Accomplished! This one is half and half because we did take him twice a month and then I started excercising and started taking Buster 3 days outo f the week. The Camp Bow Wow was to give him some excercise but once I started walking him we stopped taking him twice a month. He still goes but since it's expensive we cut back!

7. Finish my bookkeeping certificate - ACCOMPLISHED!!

8. Finish up the Home Improvements (List coming soon) - With the wedding planning (and saving) we did very minimal work on the house, which I knew would happen. In case you forget I made my goals before our engagement, which definitely put a damper on some goals, but hey there's always this year right....or next year :)

9. Scrapbook 2 layouts a month - ACCOMPLISHED! I successfully scrapbooked at least 2 layouts a month!

10. Finish my Hawaii album - FAILED!! I completely forgot this was a goal until yesterday. Where I spent all afternoon working on it, with only one layout left to do I am positive it will be finished before the end of January.

11. Spend more time with friends - ACCOMPLISHED! In fact I overbooked myself too much in 2011 and started hating making plans. While I love spending time with friends I found myself overly stressed over life and committments so this year my friends - Yes we will spend oodles of time together but I'm going to say No a lot more to give myself some downtime!!

12. Date night EVERY week! - FAILED!! We were extremely good at this until Chuckle's got his new job, now it's like date night every single night and weekend!! Plus when the weather got cold we wanted to stay home! But we always make sure to do something on date night, whether its playing games at home or at least going out to eat.

13. Take a FUN vacation - like Hawaii, Vegas, Disneyland, or a Cruise - This got put on the back burner due to our engagement. But we PLANNED our Honeymoon for this year so I think it counts!!

14. Go camping at least 4 times - Again with the engagement we decided to cut back costs and we lost quite a few weekends, BUT we went 2 TIMES!! So I deem this an accomplishment! Once just us two for our big vacation and then once for the Annual Campfest! Both times were so much fun! 

15. Celebrate our Anniversay (we never do cause I am so not into those things) - ACCOMPLISHED! We went to the Melting Pot and had a great experience! So great we are going again this year! WOOHOO!!

I hope everyone had a wonderful 2011, a Safe New Years, and most of all that you completed your goals you set out to complete!

For this year I am going a little more specific and probably a few less with the weddings (yup my Seester is getting married this year too) taking up all our time :)

Happy New Years Everyone!

Calling All Campers - CAUTION PICTURE HEAVY

Ahhhhhh - Vacation! Is there a better word?

Chuck and I were so excited to take our vacation this July as we were trying out a "new" KOA. New for us, not new for them! We took a few days and headed up to the Manchester Beach KOA in Mendocino!

We rented one of these :-)

Which was FABULOUS!! I've done tent camping and RV camping as a child but Chuckles had only ever tent camped and had only spent a brief amount of time in my parents RV. But after this trip he was hooked. Since the weather was very cold at night he was extremely excited to get into a nice warm trailer with a real bed!

This KOA had this amazing sign right across from our camping spot! 

So of course we took the dogs! This was more than just a dog walk my friends it was a massive dog park.

Normally we stay away cause Roxy does not normally do well with random dogs but since there were not a lot of campers we got to take the dogs twice a day each day we were there!

Buster was in heaven as soon as he was released and we threw the ball! Yes he is that dog from Eddie Murphy's Doctor Dolittle!

And to our suprise little Miss Roxy took off like a bat out of hell and barely stopped to breathe! She seriously ran all over this place, no ball needed!

After putting in some quality time at the dog park we still wanted to go on a walk around the KOA and they had this pretty view! Unfortunately the beach directly connected to the KOA is a "No Dogs" beach so we never got to step foot on sand but we felt the coastal breeze, heard the waves, and still got pretty pictures!

After our long walk we took our pooped puppies back to camp where the temperature did not improve. So Roxy got herself all wrapped up and took a nap

While we got out the Yahtzee, the beer, and our food to BBQ!! Despite the cold on the first day we still had a blast and the next day it was sunny to the point where we both got a little sunburnt!

Because of the chilly weather we decided to start our campfires at 6 and ended up each night in the trailer in between 9 and 10. What really blew our mind was that even at 9 when we'd head inside it was still bright out. I'm not talking super bright but enough light out that we didn't need a flashlight!

Of course we had smores!

The next day was much better! We spent the morning at the dog park along with a nice walk, then settled back at camp in the brilliant SUN!!

Look at how happy Buster-Roo is! He was exhausted but he just loved the dog park and he loved spending the whole day outside!

I of course spent some quality time reading my book!

While Roxy sunbathed!

Chuck bbq'ed us some Bacon Chicken Sandwiches for lunch - SUPER YUM!

Then after another campfire we retired our sunburnt faces to get a good nights sleep before heading out the next day!

The ride up we took one road but had the pleasure of traveling down HWY 1 for the ride home and took in the beach scene the whole way home!

Don't worry we were at a complete stop! While we were both sad to be leaving camp, we were also happy to be heading home!

Roxy was ecstatic! She doesn't seem to be a big fan of camping!

And Buster seemed to be in the same boat as us, sad to be leaving the beautiful outdoors, but he was happy to get home and slept all afternoon!

I would highly recommend the Manchester Beach KOA! The location is gorgeous, the staff was extremely friendly and helpful, and if you go you might as well rent the RV cause it was awesome! I did miss our cabin camping but at the same point we would have frozen our butts off at night!

All in all a great vacation that was too short (aren't they all) but we cannot wait to go back and spend an entire week here!!

I hope everyone has been able to take a vacation and get away this summer or that you will be able to before the summer leaves us!