Family Dinners

Since we moved just before the new year, it was a great time to institute any New Years resolutions in our new home. I had many resolutions this year, keeping a tidier home, taking better care of myself (the usual) and family dinners. Prior to this resolution, Kyle and I always ate dinner on the couch while we watched tv. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but it made me feel like 1.) we never really talked to each other since the tv was always on and 2.) that we were kinda frumpy by always eating in our laps. So I decided we should start having family dinners at the table with no TV.

Well, we've been at it for a couple weeks now and I could not be more thrilled! It almost feels like we are on a date, every night of the week. We play nice music and enjoy a good long conversation over our meal. Last night we spent two hours at the dinner table because we were so engrossed in conversation. We have both commented on multiple occasions on how much we enjoy our family dinners so this will surely be the norm in our household from now on.

Side note: over the weekend when it rained, and since we don't have any floor mats yet, I threw a beach towel on the floor so we can wipe our feet. Well Lilly has fallen in love with the towel and I can't bare to take it from her. It her new favorite spot to lay. :-)

Moving Madness and Christmas

Well, after a long time of hoping and wishing, we finally moved out of our apartment at Avana San Clemente. And good reddens! We were so sick of the apartment lifestyle with all the inconsiderate neighbors and tight living quarters. We were lucky enough to find a great townhouse for rent on the south end of San Clemente near the golf course that is just perfect for us. It's a nice and quite neighborhood right above the Municipal Golf Course with a beautiful ocean view. Although our unit is just about the same size as our apartment in square footage, it includes an attached garage, two outdoor patios and a balcony, so it feels much bigger. Especially because of the garage, we are very excited for all that storage space.
Although the timing wasn't ideal, we moved in on Saturday right before Christmas. We were lucky enough to have our friend, Brandon Shubunka, come all the way down from Santa Clarita to help with the heavy items like the the couches and the three of us were able to do everything by 5pm. And as much as we are all hating life that day, I think it went fairly smooth.
The next morning we did a little unpacking and repacking as we were headed up to the parents' for Christmas celebrations. On Sunday we made the long trek up north and made multiple stops on the way. First it was a stop at Kyle's grandparent house in Camarillo to visit them since they would not be able to join us at Christmas dinner since Grandma is not feeling so great these days. Although short, it was a nice visit and great to see them. We were all very sad when we had to leave. Next we headed into Santa Clarita to visit the family of Kyle's childhood best friend, Shawn. Unfortunately, Shawn passed away a few years back in a car accident so it is always bittersweet to visit his family. But they are such amazing people the it is much more sweet that bitter. We were only able to catch Shawn's mom, Jaren and brother, Ryan as his dad was at work. There we enjoyed some eggnog and plenty of laughs as we all reminisced on the good times. Then off the the in-laws to drop off Lilly for the night. We were head up to my parents house and since she is not a fan of their dog, Luna, we are lucky to have such great 'grandparents' who are always willing to watch her for us. Finally, we drove another hour and arrived at our final destination for the night, my parents' house. There we spent the night and the following day for Christmas Eve. It is always nice being home because I just feel so comfortable and relaxed there. It was just the immediate family so everyone could just enjoy each others company. Luna always loves when we come over because Kyle plays with her almost the whole time we are there. Those two are inseparable whenever we visit. Luna even tried jumping in the car when we were leaving, I think she was sad to see her friend go. Christmas Eve was lovely, my mom and I baked together, we watched movies and hung out around the house. Then presents around 10pm, which is not the traditional time of 12am, but since Kyle and I needed to leave that night, we started early. After presents, we gathered our things and headed back down to Santa Clarita.
There we stayed at Kyle's parents house and arouse there on Christmas morning. After Trevor and Mandi arrived in their pj's, we all sat down for a lovely French toast breakfast. Then some present and relaxing until it was dinner time. Dinner was lovely and complete with the traditional Thordarson pineapple, everything was delicious.
We arrived back to our new home last night around 9:30pm. It was very strange passing our usual exit on the freeway for the first time. But once we arrived, it felt like home. I think Lilly is starting to realize we live there now too. She slept much better last night and seemed much more comfortable than our first night there. All in all, we are so thrilled for our new home and we can't wait to make it more homey. For now, I gotta run because little Tosh is stirring and he's going to be up soon. :-)

Our First Anniversary Photo Book

For our first anniversary, I wanted to get Kyle something really special so I decided to make a photo book of our first year of marriage. I hopped on Shutterfly and they, luckily enough, had a template for this exact idea so thats where I started. At first I could only work on it when Kyle wasnt working which was very few and far between. But then one day it dawned one, we still had a laptop! So I got to work. By this time unfortuatey, it was already past are actual anniversary, but I told Kyle I was working on his gift and he would be getting it shortly. He initially that my post on this blog about our anniverasry was his gift, since I had been bothering him to use the computer, he assumed it was for that. But after a few days, he stopped wondering what I was doing and just accepted that he would find out eventually. Then, Kyle's gift to me came and it was much more than I ever expected and the fact that I hadnt completed the photobook was a good thing so I could now include photos from that amazing weekend. So now, about two weeks after our actual anniversary, I have completed the photobook.
Enjoy!

Click here to view this photo book larger

The new way to make a photo album: photo books by Shutterfly.

Surprise Anniversary Weekend Extravaganza!! Part 1

Well what a surprise! It all started back about a month or so when Kyle said that we should celebrate our anniversary on the weekend following our actual anniversary. I had no problem with this seeing that it fell on a Tuesday and I knew we wouldn't be able to do anything too exciting on a weekend night. So I didn't put much thought into it after that. Then one day at work my boss let me know of an event he wanted me to attention that fell on that weekend, 9/15. I had forgotten that we had set aside that weekend to celebrate, so when I came home to tell Kyle about the event, he immediately freaked out and said that we had plans and I wouldn't be able to go to the event. Seeing that this was a work event, I was hesitate to tell my employers that I had "plans" and was unable to attend the event. But they were surprisingly understanding and allowed me to miss the event.
On Thursday, the 13th, Kyle emails me a packing list for the weekend... I was a little taken back to say the least. But I played along and got my small duffel bag packed with most the items on the list. I did make some adjustments, like adding lotion and hairspray and also omitted my down jacket seeing that it had been in the hundreds that week and figured anywhere we were driving to would be just as warm.
Then Friday evening after work we hit the road. I knew we were on our way to my in-laws as they would be watching Lilly for the weekend. Mind you, I still have no clue of our plans but I was thinking maybe we would head to Santa Barbara for dinner on Saturday evening or something like that. Well we arrived at Kyle's parent's house and shortly after went to bed. The next morning, around 6am, Kyle wakes me up and says "We have to go, we got a long drive ahead of us." Still half asleep and slightly irritated that he had woken me so early, I put on some comfy road-trip cloths and dragged myself to the car. I wanted to pay attention to the road, but at 6am, I didn't care where we were going so I fell back asleep.
Shortly after, I am awaken by us exiting the I-405 and seeing this:

"WHAT THE...?!?!?" I honestly could not believe my eyes! Even at this point I didn't think we were actually flying somewhere, there was no way... or so I thought. To my surprise, we parked the car and headed to the terminal. Even more exciting that we were flying, we ended up going through my favorite airline, Virgin Airlines. Kyle slyly checked us in and we headed to security. I put my bag on the conveyor belt and just as it slid into the x-ray machine, I remembered i had packed a brand new bottle of lotion and hairspray. I already knew before the TSA even said anything, I was going to be searched. As the gal behind the monitor looked up at me and "Is this your bag?" I replied with, "I know, I'm sorry. I didn't realize I was flying today, my husband is surprising me." She smiled and walked me over to search my bag. Luckily, she was very understanding and I only had to throw away my lotion and hairspray and she let me go on my way. Kyle, I then realized, was also being searched, he too forgot about the 3.4 oz liquid rule in his effort to hide the fact that we were flying. We made our way over the the gate and to my demise, the gate did not show where we were headed, I still was totally clueless! At this point, I had no idea where we could be going. I thought maybe, Las Vegas, but that didn't seem like somewhere Kyle would take us. So i stopped trying to figure it out and I just enjoyed the building excitement. After having breakfast in the terminal, and waiting for a long while since our flight had been delayed, I look up and finally it was revealed:

YAY!! I was SO excited! Kyle and I had been there once before when we surprised me with a trip after he proposed and we LOVED the city. I was so looking forward to our weekend in the city.
We finaly were on our way. We landed in San Fran, what seemed like 20 minutes after we took off, and were ready for some lunch. Luckily, right in the terminal, we found a place that caught our eye:

This place was so cool! Their entire menu was USDA Organic and had all kinds of yummy things to choose from. We had a veggie burger that was filling to say the least. Then we headed to the Bart train to head to our hotel. The Bart was super easy to navigate and our stop was about 4 blocks from our hotel. We arrived at the Sir Francis Drake hotel and yet again I was surprised.
We had had dinner and drinks in the hotel on our last trip to the city, but I thought it was way too fancy for us to actually stay in. Well I thought wrong, Kyle had spared no expense in order to make this an unforgetable trip for me.

Happy Anniversary

Two years ago today, the man of my dreams popped the questions on a hiking trail in one of the most beautiful places on Earth (in my opionion at least), Big Sur, CA.

One year ago today, we said "I do". And boy, do I ever! This last year has been a whirlwind, cant believe how fast it went by. But it has been great. There is no greater feeling than introducing him as my husband and myself as his wife. It just feels right!

I'm sure a lot of you are or have been wondering why Kyle and I choose 9/11/11, the ten year anniversary of the attacks in New York for our wedding day so I thought this would be a good place to explain. First of all, we did not originally want this to be our wedding day (really, who would?).Our original wedding date was September 17th, 2011 but because our first venue fell through, we had to find a replacement in a hurry. Unfortunately, by this time, all the wedding venues we could afford were already booked for the 17th. So we were left with two options, book the Historic Casino San Clemente on 9/11 or postpone the wedding. We decided not to let the tragedies affect our plans and booked the 11th. I must say, I was uneasy about what people may think but we wanted to turn that day into a joyous and happy day for ourselves and our families. And now, 9/11/11 will forever be the best day of my life.
I also wanted to take this time to thank our parents. Without them, our wedding day could have never become a reality. Thank you Mami, Papi, Dan and Judy, for being so supportive and being the best examples of what marriage should be like.
And lastly, to my wonderful husband Kyle, I love you more than words could ever express. I feel so lucky to be able to spend the rest of my life with you. Thank you for loving me!

Let's start a blog!

My whole life I have tried to keep a journal that I could look back on with my grandchildren and share with them that I too was young once but have yet to keep to it longer than a few months at a time. So I recently decided that maybe if I have an audience, I might be more motivated to keep writing. I also kept finding myself wanting to share different stories and experiences with friends and family without a good why to relay a lot of information (pictures, stories, etc), so what better than a blog. For now, that is the only purpose of this blog, to document our lives and to share the things I find interesting but who knows what it may lead to. Enjoy!