Flagstaff or Bust

A few weekends ago, George and I had a weekend getaway to Flagstaff.  It served several purposes and was exactly what we needed.  My mother passed away around 8 months ago and her birthday was on June 27th.  Needless to say, I knew I needed to get out of town and have be distracted. We also needed to desperately escape the Phoenix heat and have some quiet alone time just the two of us.

We booked a cute little vintage trailer to stay in through Airbnb and it took every bit of strength I had not to hitch that thing on the back of our car and take it with us! It was *sigh* completely adorable.  I need to get a vintage trailer stat.

The mornings were definitely my favorite. Waking up lazily taking our time with no internet, TV, or cell phone service to interrupt.

We took one day to venture to La Posada in Winslow, Arizona. I have a HUGE crush on this place. It is absolutely beautiful and, honestly, my pictures don't do it justice. If you are within a 500 mile radius of La Posada just go to it and you will thank me.  Read more about it here. :)

We ate in the Turquoise Room in the La Posada hotel and it was un-freaking-believable. I can't even talk - I am having a moment here.

Here's a few other random snap shots from the trip including the rodeo with my lovely friend Maria and spending some time downtown shopping and eating.

It was the best medicine anyone could prescribe for what we needed and I know I will never forget our lovely weekend in our little trailer.

Tucson Day Trip

I love taking day trips! Here in Arizona we have so many wonderful places to visit. I have only been to Tucson once and it was just to accompany George when he worked a night shift. So we got there around 10:00 pm, I slept in the hotel room while he worked, and then we left the following morning. Needless to say there wasn't much seeing of the sights!

There are so many things to do in Tucson so it was hard to narrow down what we wanted to do.  There are still so many things I want to see so we will have to do another trip soon.

The first thing we did was go to Biosphere 2.

It was AMAZING!  The Biosphere was part of a project in the 90's where scientists lived and researched for a few years inside of this air sealed bubble with different ecosystems. It includes 4 different ecosystems for research - the rainforest, the savanna, the ocean, and the fog desert. It was so cool to be able to experience these different climates and it was like we traveled all around the world in less than an hour.

The other really cool part was just to see the engineering genius that went behind this - between the cooling and heated water to control climate to the "lungs" of the Biosphere to control pressure, it all was so interesting.

After our Biosphere adventure we were starving and needed some food. Thank goodness for Yelp we found this random place to eat lunch. It was called Wings and Rice and you guys - it is seriously good. Whoever thought of the crazy combination between hot wings and fried rice was a food genius!  Seriously unhealthy, but I like to think I burned a lot of calories at our Biosphere wondrousness.

After lunch, we headed to the Mini Time Machine Museum of Miniatures. Seriously, that's its name. It was full of alllllllll miniature things.  I don't think you can quite grasp this. So many many many dollhouses. It was a little overwhelming and got old after a while, but that didn't mean I couldn't take many pictures for your viewing pleasure. :)  Get ready for photo overload...

I think it was about at this point that my husband turned to me and said "I just can't look at another miniature thing, Heather."  Since he was such a good sport about the whole thing we left promptly after that. It's just hard to believe that these are all dollhouses. I wish they were adult sized! I'd be fancy schmancy. 

Have you ever visited Tucson? What are some other must sees for our next trip there?

Honeymoon - Portland Day 7

Our last day of our honeymoon was so bittersweet! We had such a wonderful time; it was so sad to know that it was coming to a close. At the same time though, I was kind of excited to come home and start playing wife with my new husband in our home.

Here came Black Friday! Portland does something pretty cool and does something called Little Boxes. This encourages people to shop in local stores instead of cramming into nationwide stores. This was perfect timing because we were able to find out where all of the local shops were located and also, ummmm, go shopping because it's my favorite. Oh my, I bought so many beautiful hand crafted goodies, it was wondrous.

Here are just a few glimpses of our last day.  I didn't take too many pictures this last day; we were just too busy!

I can't wait to go back again! The best part was spending that one on one time with George after the craziness of our wedding. I love that I can document this on my blog so that I can see and remember the good times any time I want. :)

Honeymoon - Portland Day 6

This day took place on Thanksgiving day! While everyone woke up early to get started cooking, cleaning, and stressing about dried out turkey breasts, this is how I started out my morning...

What an incredible day to visit a new city! Truth be told, I was really sad that we weren't with either of our families, but because everyone else was with their families warm in their homes, we felt like the city was ours! It felt like it was literally us and the homeless people. We took a stroll around town and took in the absolute beauty that is Portland. We just fell in love...

Because it was Thanksgiving, there wasn't exactly a plethora of stores/restaurants open. Luckily after walking for a really long time we finally spied a pizza place that was open! Hallelujiah! We could eat vegan pizza and drink coca cola in glass bottles until our hearts' content. Next door, Powell's Bookstore was there in its huge and gleaming glory open to the public.  This is the biggest bookstore that I have ever been too; floors upon floors of books, gifts, stationary, and everything and anything Portland themed. It's a must see!

Thankfully we were able to find a place open for Thanksgiving dinner thanks to our fancy schmancy hotel's concierge. It was called The Original - it was really fun, it was like an amped up TV dinner from the 50's. It made my little heart skip a beat because I don't like my food to touch and separated out dishes kind of make me a little giddy. Don't ask.

Our honeymoon was quickly coming to a close, back to reality soon. One more full day in Portland and then on our way back to Phoenix. :(  Stay tuned for the details from our last full honeymoon day!