I share my birthday with my mom (January 21) and we typically like to do something together around that time to have a joint celebration. Conveniently this year my good friend Jessi was having a birthday party the following weekend in her hometown of Santa Cruz, so I stretched my birthday celebration into two weekends by convincing Brandon we should make a weekend out of Jessi’s birthday party. For my birthday celebration with my mom, we had a Saturday filled with pampering, the wine exhibit at the MoMA, some coffee time at the rooftop sculpture garden, and then dinner on Belden Place; it was fantastic!

For the following weekend, Brandon and I rented a car and drove down to Santa Cruz where we stayed at the modern Dream Inn, right on the beach. These photos are all views from our room.

On Saturday after we arrived, we wandered along the boardwalk for a bit of nostalgia (I forgot my camera! UGH) before we headed back to our hotel room to get ready for the party. I ended up falling asleep, I guess I was lulled due to the waves crashing. When I woke up, it was sprinkling and foggy but it was a good excuse to not feel bad for just wanting to hang out in our room. We had a great time at Jessi’s party, and then headed back to our room with enough time to enjoy the hotel’s hot tub before it closed for the evening.

After our hot tub excursion, we snuggled up in our room to watch some TV and listen to the waves crash. In the morning it was drizzling and we decided to order breakfast room service to eat on our covered balcony. Luckily for us it stopped sprinkling right as the food came, so we were able to soak in some sunshine while we ate food and drank our coffee.

After breakfast the sky looked threatening, so we just sat on the bed, balcony door open and music on, listening to the waves and reading.  It was a glorious morning of relaxation!  I realized that we should do these mini-escapes more often…it was just what the doctor ordered after some hectic weeks at work.

I’ll have a more extensive post soon, but the short of it is that Brandon and I had a fantastic (and extremely relaxing) weekend in Santa Cruz, listening to the ocean waves and celebrating birthdays with friends.  It doesn’t get much better than listening to the waves crash all night long after a soak in a hot tub…

Isn’t it gorgeous?

Anyway, enough about that!  Time to rewind time back to Thanksgiving.  Brandon, my parents and I went to Yosemite for a wintery Thanksgiving escape.  We were lucky because there was a snowstorm the few days before we arrived, so there was a thick blanket of fresh snow.  It was so absolutely beautiful and serene! As I’ve started writing this, I realize it’s going to be a 2-part post…I have WAY too many pictures to post them all at once!

We arrived Thanksgiving day, and just laid low at the Tenaya Lodge, drinking wine, playing games, and eating.

Friday we got up early, rented some snow shoes, and trekked out to Mariposa Grove to catch a glimpse of some giant sequoia trees. The road was closed out to the grove, so we had to hike in and then snow shoe around once we got there. It was breath-takingly beautiful!

It’s hard to see, but the snow was sparkling like mounds of sugar.

The fresh air, the beautiful scenery…it was the perfect day.

Note the red arrow–that is Brandon standing in front of Grizzly Giant. They aren’t kidding around when they say those trees are giant…

After our invigorating hike we went back to the lodge to clean up, play more games, drink more wine, eat more food, and watch the Oregon Ducks play. That’s all you get for now! More to come on the Yosemite trip…

One of the days we braved the road to Hana to see the lush side of the island–it’s a little like Jurassic Park meets the most curvy road ever. Seriously–check out the Hana Highway on google maps and zoom in. It’s ridiculous. For those of you who know me very well, you know I get motion sick pretty easily, so I was a little apprehensive but this road is SO curvy that you have to drive really slow. That, plus I was armed with some Dramamine, so all was okay.

The drive was beautiful, rainy at times, sunny at others…

We stopped at Haleakala National Park to see the Seven Sacred Pools. We hiked in, but it was incredibly windy (and I didn’t have my suit on) so we didn’t swim. The pools also were pretty dry at the time, and full of people. It was still beautiful though…

We decided to drive out the south side instead of trekking back on the Hana Highway. A park ranger at the Park assured us that the road conditions were ideal for taking the south road, so we decided to go for it. The road was…hairy at times, but overall it was much better than taking the Hana Highway again and it was fascinating to see the other side of the island. Almost immediately, the terrain went from lush and green to dry and dusty. The road is mostly paved, but there is a large dirt section that is quite rough/bumpy, and it takes you right on the edge of some sea cliffs. Lucky for us, we made it without incident. I would definitely recommend checking with a park ranger before venturing on this road.

After we returned home, it was time for a lovely sunset stroll on the beach…

I love these next two photos, because it almost looks like the light on the clouds is coming from within…

More to come…I have one more day of digital photos to show, and then there will be some film photos once I get them developed…

Anyway, rewind a week. We left for Maui last Saturday, where we stayed at a vacation rental in Kihei right across the street from the beach.

The weather was gorgeous, as was the island itself. I can’t even begin to describe how much I love hot weather–dry, humid, I love it all. My hair also loves the humidity, so that’s an added bonus. Feeling warm through to my bones is just the best feeling. While the others sought out the shade, I sought out the sun every chance I could.

Brandon and I took walks on the beach almost every morning and every night just to soak in the scenery

We ran into this sand art along the way

We also took a day to explore Lahaina and Ka’anapali beach

We made a stop at a bar my parents went to on their honeymoon–it used to be The Rusty Harpoon, but it’s now the Cane & Taro–the Rusty Harpoon moved down the beach. We decided we should visit the spot as opposed to the place that carries the name, so in honor of my parents we had some drinks at the Cane & Taro.

Yummy!

I love Hawaii…more on the trip to come later! For now, happy Friday!

the view from our room

brandon’s mom painting

the supplies

my friend, the cow in the field next to our room

tide out time

After the tide pools (we had to leave before I got too angry and upset at the people disturbing the sea life and taking things out of the water), we took the “coastal route” back to the inn. What a beautiful walk through the trees along the cliffs!

And yes, that is us. Photo courtesy of 10 second self timer and a little sprint.

Now, since the weekend was sort of Brandon’s present, I wanted to do something a little special to make it feel like a true birthday celebration weekend. Since it was Brandon’s 29th birthday, I decided to give it the theme of “30 things for us to do before you’re 30.” With some inspiration from my friend Jessi, as well as this post on Jordan Ferney’s blog, Oh Happy Day, I started brainstorming how I could display the 30 things.  I scoured Chinatown to find a colorful string of lantern lights before we left (success!), and then got some place cards and number stamps from Paper Source. On each card I wrote one activity for us to do, then stamped a number on and put a string on the card.

I had to quarantine Brandon for a while at the hotel while I assembled the lanterns, strung them up, and hung the cards on them. While it took longer than I had hoped, the end result was perfect! It ended up better than I thought it would, and Brandon was pleasantly surprised. All in all, it was the perfect weekend.

Our hotel was adorable and amazing–we stayed at the Seal Cove Inn, where we had a balcony, fireplace and jacuzzi tub in our room.  Talk about luxury!  The place was every bit as welcoming as it seems on the site–I was torn between wanting to get out to enjoy the outdoors and wanting to just hang around our room and enjoy the amenities.  Now for some photos from our weekend (warning: there will be a lot)…

Before we were able to check into our hotel, we took some time to wander around and see the sights

notice the name on the boat (ahem Joanne)

Alright, I’m going to do this post in parts because I have way too many photos I want to share!