Living Life in LV: 2014

Okay, so I got really busy after coming back from vacation over the week of Thanksgiving and I totally let my blog fall to the back burner. I was thinking about new posts to write up but when it came down to it I never sat down and wrote a post.

Annnnd, my computer broke. Like dead, unrecoverable broke. I had to get a new one and start everything from scratch. Chris is constantly reminding me to back up all of my things to our server and I hadn't done it in a while so I lost most of my music and books and I lost all my pictures. Then, like typical husbands do he had to rub it in for a few days. That whole process was really discouraging.

Anyway... Let me tell you about my vacation. Chris and I decided to take a cruise to the Eastern Caribbean. The boat departed Miami on November 22nd, the Saturday before Thanksgiving. We decided to leave for Miami a day early and stay there overnight on Friday. Our flight was set to leave at about 10:30 am that Friday morning and we had a short (70 minute) layover at LAX. Well, our flight from Las Vegas to LA was delayed by 65 minutes. When we finally got to LA I booked it to our gate and the plane was still there but the door was closed so they couldn't let us on. Chris and I walked to the customer service desk with about 7 other passengers who missed the same connection that we did. Luckily or unluckily depending on how you look at it We were able to get on a red eye later that night that routed us to Miami through Tampa.

So we set off to figure out how to kill 10 hours at LAX. Chris had the idea of paying to get into the Admiral's Club, American Airlines' first class lounge. It was probably the best $100 we spent the entire trip. The seats were much more comfortable, and they had various snacks available as well as beer and wine. So Chris and I both pulled out our tablets and marathoned some shows on Netflix.

After about three hours I looked up from my episode of Grey's Anatomy to see Chris Martin from Coldplay standing about 40 feet away from me. Of course I try to tell Chris without attracting any attention to myself and I apparently elbowed him in the side a little too hard because he says "Ow! What?" pretty loud.At that point Chris Martin looks up from his phone in our direction and I literally wanted to die. I tried to take some stealthy pictures but none of them turned out very well.

This is the best one that I got.

He only stuck around for about an hour before he left to catch his flight.

So we finally catch our flight to Tampa that night at 11:30. THAT is a long miserable flight, let me tell you... It sucked.

Then we make our connection and finally land in Miami the following morning at 8:30. Chris convinced me to take this picture while we waited for our bags. It was a "We Finally Made It!" picture.

After we took the picture the carousel started spinning but only one of our bags came out. Then, I broke. I was done with the whole experience. I started to ugly cry in the airport. I let Chris handle the claims process for our missing bag and after about 30 minutes the carousel starts to spin again and imagine my confusion when my missing bag is the first one to come up. Apparently it was back there the whole time and someone just forgot to put it on the carousel.

After that we caught a cab and headed to the cruise terminal. Once we finally got on the boat everything was great. We had a few sea days to get out of the way first and those were nice and relaxing.

My birthday was the 24th, which was that Monday. We decided to eat in the Steakhouse for dinner that night and I had the second best filet I had ever had in my life. The cruise line left a note in our room the first day wishing me a Happy Birthday and I was able to redeem it at the restaurant for a slice of birthday cake. Our server was nice enough to take our picture.

The following day we pulled into St. Maarten. It really was a beautiful island.

Chris took a picture as is was raining. Can you see the double rainbow?

We were the second people off the boat that morning and the first people on the beach.

After we hung out on the beach for a few hours we went back to the boat to change out of our wet bathing suits and get ready for our excursion that day. We got to race sailboats. This was something that Chris really wanted to do and while he had an active job, grinder (which I believe moves ropes that allows the sail or move... or something.) I got to be the bartender. Woo-hoo! And the time keeper. We had a lot of fun even though we lost our race and I got extremely sunburned.

The next day we were in St. Thomas.

We got directly off our boat and onto a smaller one that lead us on a snorkeling expedition. Our first stop was to Sea Turtle Cove where we got to swim with , you guessed it, sea turtles! It was a really amazing experience. They warmed us before we jumped into the water the sea turtles are endangered and to make sure that you on't get too close and that you definitely don't touch them. If you touch one you could be fined up to $20,000. This cove was packed with other boats leading snorkel expeditions as well and we found the first turtle rather easy. It was just chilling on the ocean floor eating sea grass. Once a very large group that was gathered around it left to go explore further it swam up to surface right in front of Chris and I. It was so awesome! After that we went to Shipwreck Cove which was cool but not at cool as swimming with sea turtles. The shipwreck was moved constantly throughout the year due to the storms that occur in the Caribbean so nothing was really growing on the wreck.

The next day was Thanksgiving and it was a sea day. We were able to relax and hang out in the pub on board and watch football. The dining room was serving a very nice Thanksgiving dinner with all the traditional foods. The turkey that was served was amazing.

The next day we docked in Nassau in the Bahamas.

Practically everyone that we talked to was heading to Atlantis.

We decided to stay near the boat and do a little bit of shopping. Once we were done we quickly changed into our swim suits and went to the pool. That was the best time to go because almost everyone was off the ship. There was no line for the water slides. It was nice and quiet.

Later that night Chris went and did the ropes course.

And I took pictures of the sunset.

Annnd a selfie.

The next day we got off the boat pretty early and headed to the airport.

Goodbye Miami!

The following week was full of laundry up until Friday. I got some cash and gift cards for my birthday so I went shopping at Downtown Summerlin with my friend.

Remember this weirdo?

This is my friend, Danielle.

We did a ton of shopping that morning and she helped me pick put a few cute clothing items at my favorite clothing store Torrid. Then it was off to Sephora! I wanted to pick up the new Naked On The Run palette and few few things from Bite Beauty. I have recently fallen in love with their line of lip products.

The following day I spent 6 hours at church for the Christmas play rehearsal and then I had a little belated birthday get together with my friends. We played some board games and had some cake. It was really nice.

The following weekend I had am 8 hour play rehearsal on Saturday and the play itself was on Sunday night, Everyone did a great job and it was great to hear the young people in our congregation speak about Christ's birth.

I had a wrap party last Friday where I got together with my friends and we wrapped presents together while sharing some wine and some good conversation.

I was off this past week from work I got was so excited to bake all day on Monday. I literally baked for 12 hours and watched a ton of Christmas movies while I did it.

I made a mess...

Even though I tried to keep up with the dishes as I went it was still a pain in the butt to clean up.

I made Oatmeal Butterscotch cookies, Cherry Cream Cheese Bars, Lumps of Coal (Cocoa Krispie Treats with Oreo), Almond Joy, Samoas (like the Girl Scout Cookies), and Fudge.

On Tuesday I picked up my Prime Rib from my local butcher and ran a couple more errands before heading to my bestie, Lyn's house. I need to get out so The Hubs could wrap my presents.

Wednesday was Christmas Eve and Chris and I made dinner together. It turned out amazing!

Prime Rib with Chive Horseradish Sauce, Garlic Parmesan Mashed Potatoes, and Green Bean Casserole.

After dinner we went to Candlelight Christmas Communion Service. Try saying that three times fast. It was a really beautiful service. The Christmas Choir did an amazing job with Worship throughout the entire service.

Christmas morning was great.