Sarasota Sunsets...

I know I already did the two part recaps to our Sarasota trip (part 1, part 2) but I wanted to share a few of my favorite sunset pictures (so yes, I had to do a separate post... I like to split things up, sue me!).

Anyways, there's nothing like a sunset on the west coast of Florida... actually, I had never experienced a Sarasota sunset before and I was not disappointed! here are a few of my favorite shots from that evening...

how lucky is penelope?

within her first six months she's experienced some of natures masterpieces including a beautiful sunrise on wrightsville beach and now, added to the list - a beautiful sunset on Lido Beach! 

hopefully we can continue to share natures wonders and beauties with her!

Sarasota Sunshine: Days 3 & 4...

[check out our first two days of vacation here]
so after the holiday party friday night - we woke up saturday morning feeling a liiiiiittttttle under the weather [ahem, hungover]. of course, Penny wanted nothing to do with it. she was WIDE AWAKE and ready to play...

we headed out to brunch with my mom and then from there walked around downtown Sarasota a bit, hit up the farmers market [which we LOVED, if you are ever in Sarasota on a Saturday morning definitely check it out!]

then we headed off to the beach for a bit and took in the beautiful sunset...

from there we headed to dinner and walked around St. Armands Circle (thanks Melissa for the recommendations!). we headed back to the hotel, put PJ down and hung out for a bit and then crashed. The next day we woke up and met our friends Mike & Carin for brunch and met their son Mason (aka Penny's future boyfriend). It was a blast to hangout with them for a bit, swap baby war stories and just catchup.

such a fun and relaxing weekend! we had a great (but exhausting) trip home and by the time we landed in ATL Ms. P was down for the count!

luckily she went down easily when we got home and wasn't thrown off too bad from the trip as far as her schedule, mood, eating, etc. Thanks Sarasota for the sunshine & relaxation! DJ has already been back since our trip and I'm looking forward to getting back there sometime in the Spring (more time on the beach, yes please!).

fingers crossed it's sooner rather than later! I would do anything to be in a warm sunny location rather than rainy cold and grey Atlanta right now! BRRRRR... is it Spring yet? anyways, happy almost last saturday night (sunday morning?) of 2012!

Sarasota Sunshine: Days 1 & 2...

earlier this month we took a fun family vaca to sunny Sarasota, FL! we went down for DJ's holiday party and to spend some time with my mom - it was win-win. My mom hadn't seen Penny since she was a week old so it was so fun to watch them together and for her to see how much P had grown/changed in six months. Also, since DJ works remotely it was great for him to spend some time in the "office" and for me to meet his co-workers!

here are the highlights of our trip - there are a LOT of pictures so I decided to break the posts up... get ready...

first up, the flights! yup, it was P's first flight and she was a little champ! she did great the first flight. I nursed during take-off and landing and she slept for the majority of the flight, the second flight was not bad - she wouldn't nurse during landing and cried for the last five minutes or so before we landed but hey, could be worse!

on the plane --

we had a quick lunch with DJ before he headed off to work...

I headed off and checked into the hotel... BEAUTIFUL. just what we needed!

then PJ and I headed to Target to pick-up the essentials (diapers, wipes, baby yogurt, etc.) that I didn't want to fly with. P was beat and she took a little siesta in her stroller (ermahgawd - her thighs)....

we had a relaxing dinner with some of DJ's coworkers that night and then put P down -- we got a little creative... bathroom, nursery? all the same!

the next day we met up with my mom and she was smitten from the start...

mom spent some QT with PJ while I got a much needed haircut...

and then, off we went to the holiday party - which was a blast! so fun to dress-up and have a fun night out on the town (thanks grandma for babysitting)!

so those were our first two nights in Sarasota - another post with our next day of vaca coming up soon!

the sun also rises....

man. after last nights heart heavy post, here's something light and fluffy -- or better yet, bright and beautiful...

one of our last mornings in wilmington we treked down to the beach to wrightsville beach watch the sunrise. I'm so thankful we did this.  I wasn't mentally prepared to take on the task of heading to the beach with a baby [battling the crowds and being out on the beach all day/in the heat did not sound like fun with penny in tow at this age].

but at the same time [selfishly] I didn't want to go all the way to Wilmington without spending some time on Wrightsville Beach [aka heaven]... so early morning trip to the beach it was! here are some of my favorite photographs that I took that morning - hopefully they bring some sunshine into your monday morning - God knows I need it today...

"...there was never a night or problem that could defeat sunrise or hope..." - b. williams

send a little hope and some warm fuzzies my way today.
xo,

hita

back from the beach!

well, hello there. remember that time I feel off the blogging wagon? we headed to the beach for a few days and then when we got back I was trying to balance between getting a shitdone of work done and soaking up my last few days at home with Penny. oy. so - blogging clearly didn't fit in that equation for me, oops.

vacation recap? here goes: it was great! what? you want more details? okay.

we headed to one of my favorite places in the entire world - wilmington, nc [where I lived for four years before DJ stole me away to the berkshires] to visit our sweet friends and to just get out of dodge -- oh and to eat, yes, we go on vacation to eat [and eat we did, YUM]. it was a much needed getaway for us to just decompress for awhile and for Penny to meet some of our favorite people! I'm hoping we can get back their soon [hopefully for a little longer, when we can both truly "take off" work rather than bring our work with us].

also, penny is continuing to be the easiest baby ever [I don't want to jinx myself] -- she slept pretty much the whole ride to and from wilmington and slept through the night every night we were there AND didn't seem to even be effected by the fact that her schedule pretty much got thrown out of the window when we were there -- phew. we are two very lucky people! of course, she had fussy moments here and there but let's be real - she's a three month old baby, what do you expect?! again and again, I just have to say we are so freaking lucky!

now to the part you've been waiting for... pictures from our trip!

so that's that...

we had such a great time and feel so blessed and lucky to have such amazing friends in our lives! 

now off to plan the next vacation...

back and beat...

I'm baaaaaaaaack. and exhausted. and blissfully happy. there's nothing like a wedding of two people you love [that truly love each other] to make you float on air for a few days. our weekend away was so amazing filled with great friends, adorable babies, fun games of phase10, late night laughs and lots and lots of love. but now we're back to reality for a few days before thanksgiving - I am so exhausted that it hurts to breathe - I'll tell you what, traveling when you're pregnant is pretty exhausting and I've done my fair share of it the past few months.

here's a short recap of our weekend in short fragmented sentences/statements: we landed late thursday night and just relaxed with lindsey and phil and caught up for a bit, then we crashed, woke up the next morning and had breakfast with sarah,  mike and christina - our breakfast was amazing [huuuge portions and great food, I highly recommend the Dixie Grill for breakfast if you're in Wilmington anytime soon].

then we had lunch with my old boss Larry at Flaming Amy's aka I was in sheer heaven. catching up with LW is always great as he can make you laugh like no other and he was giving DJ all sorts of "how to deal with a pregnant wife" and dad advice - it was just great. then DJ did some work and I ran some errands around town and grabbed coffee/chatted with my friends Christina and Kara - so great to just chat with old friends.  

that night DJ, Lindsey, Phil and I went over to Larry's and spent time with him and his wife and daughters - I've known his older daughter Emerson since she was born [she's five now] and it's amazing to me that she's not a baby anymore and truly is a little girl - she's the sweetest and cutest little thing [she also told us that the baby in my belly is a boy which made DJ love her even more]. We also got to spend some time with Harper LW's younger daughter  who I haven't spent a ton of time with but who I truly love also - she was such a trip all night, it's so funny the idea of nature/nurture -  how two kids raised in pretty much the same environment the exact same way can be so different. our visit was supposed to last an hour or so and we ended up staying and talking for hours that we stayed right through dinner and ended up just getting Indochine takeout on the way home and eating on the couch in our PJs - all in all, such a success.

saturday I woke up and headed out to Josh's parents house to have breakfast with him and Tiff and make flowers with the bridal party - we made some beautiful bouqets [pictures coming soon] and then went out to get manicures and lunch. I went back to campus and rested for a bit before DJ and I ventured out to the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner - which were both a blast. 

then, sunday was the wedding day! all the pictures we took are on my Nikon which are home but I'll get those up ASAP - the wedding was just perfect and Josh and Tiffani were so happy. I felt good about my "officiating" and was so relieved when I was done that I could cry [tears of happiness] as I was holding them back the entire ceremony! more on the wedding soon -- off to knock some more things off my three-day work week to-do list... more on baby j and hopefully a baby bump picture tomorrow! :)

st pete recap...

so here's the st. pete recap... which honestly isn't too exciting because I didn't take nearly enough pictures... the flight from atlanta to tampa wasn't too bad and we landed and got our rental car -- the man behind the counter at budget was "nice enough" to upgrade us.... what did he upgrade us to... oh yes. grandma's car --

we were driving around in true florida style... grandma style. DJ kept telling everyone he was borrowing his grandpa's car -- he thought it was really funny... I on the other hand, got over the joke real quick. other than the sunset pictures I already shared I sucked at taking pictures -- I did get some of all of  us at the wedding on saturday night...

DJ had a great time with his fraternity brothers and I had a fun time laughing at them all... It was also amusing to hear grown men call each other by their college nicknames. good times all around.

sunday and monday we spent with my mom and had some great food, relaxing times and just caught up. I also realized I didn't take one picture of my mom/with my mom all weekend. I'm the worst.  we did help  her pick out a new laptop and set it up so I feel like I get some good daughter points there [when in reality DJ did most of the work, so he just gets son-in-law points]. It's so refreshing to me and relieving to see how amazing DJ and my mom get along - she has never had anything negative to say about him [which is rare with my mother] and I'm pretty sure she loves him more than me [but he is the nicer one in our pair so I can't really blame her]. anyways, all in all a great trip with great friends and a fun time catching up with my mom. I'm so excited to be back in Wilmington in ONE week to celebrate our last wedding of 2011 [yay tiff & josh!] and to catch up with lots of friends... I'm not going to lie, I'm also looking forward to this weekend of doing nothing [first weekend in almost two months that we're not traveling somewhere - crazy].

...in completely unrelated news, it's 10:40am and I've already eaten all of my lunch. be jealous.

don't forget to signup for the ornament swap! 

back to reality....

as of yesterday we said bye bye to views like these....

...and we're back to reality as of today.

but then again...

only 10 days until we're back at the beach for our last wedding of 2011!

more on the weekend and wedding later this week, for now - time to play catch-up!