Belgique

At the end of September, we signed up with some good friends of ours to attend an international convention.  We had been toying with the idea of taking an international trip anyways in 2015, so why not make it a convention?

Two days later, we submitted forms with our preferences. 

 On October 29^th, we found out we were accepted to go to Belgium in July!!  Belgium!  Our first choice. 

It was a very exciting day.  :)

I went out and bought a travel book right away.

And of course, we had a very odd celebratory dinner Wednesday night including Belgian waffles, Belgian beer, and Belgian chocolate.  Because I'm cheesy like that.  I discovered I am not a fan of Rampant IPA.  Especially with waffles.  And chocolate.

My head is still spinning from everything I have to get done before then and all of the planning we need to do.  I did a lot of the planning for our Paris trip in 2009, so it's not totally new territory for me.  I am by no means an expert, but I actually kind of like doing it and I do know SOME stuff.  The first thing I started on was our hotel reservations.  We are required to stay in either Ghent or Antwerp for 7 nights, so I researched the four least-expensive hotel options on our list in Ghent (the convention city).  We emailed back and forth as a group, selected one, and I emailed the reservation request form to Belgium this afternoon.  Hopefully they will get back to us soon with a go or no-go.  This particular hotel is a 5 minute walk to the convention center.  Once we get confirmation, we will be able to take a step back and breathe a little.  That’s a major hurdle right there and will switch us into the ‘confirmed’ delegates status instead of ‘selected’ delegates.

After that will be flights, communicating with the Belgium branch office, and planning our side trip(s).  The side trip(s) and flights will have to go hand-in-hand because we may be flying into one city and flying out of another.

It's very easy to get overwhelmed.  But...one step at a time.  Once we hear back on our hotel, we will move onto the next step.

So for now, I'll leave you with some photos of beautiful Ghent (all from Pinterest): 

C'est très jolie, oui?

Paid

2 years ago, we were in the market for a new car for me.  I wanted a small SUV, or 'crossover' vehicle.  The drivers here in Albuquerque are terrible, and I wanted to feel safer in a 'higher up' car.  So my husband did a LOT of research, and discovered that the Honda CRV had the best overall rating on Consumer Reports for features, safety, MPH, etc.

So we got one.

I pretty much declared it my 'forever' car immediately.  It was love at first sight.   It is comfortable, pretty, and safe.  The back seats fold down at the touch of a button creating plenty of space for our dogs.  It has traveled to Colorado and Arizona and all around New Mexico.  It gets me to work each and every day.  It's large enough that I feel safe, yet small enough that I don't feel like Im driving a bus.  

It only has 26,000 miles on it.  I plan on driving this car until it dies.

Especially because today at approximately 5:30 p.m., we paid it off.  3 years early.  Yep.  It's ours!

I don't think it will really hit me until next month when I don't have to log on to Honda Financial Services to make a payment.  

It's such a good feeling!  

I think to celebrate, I'll take my Lola (yes, I named her) for a nice car wash tomorrow.  :)

Look Up

The week before last, the 2014 Balloon Fiesta took place here in Albuquerque.  This year was especially special because my new work building is RIGHT next to Balloon Fiesta Park.  So each morning last week, I would walk outside to the far end of the parking lot and watch the balloons take off.  It was amazing!

So, here's a bunch of pictures.  They really need no explanation.  

Nice, huh?  Here's the view when I turn around the other way:

My building.  That's how close we were.  It was so nice to take a little stroll each morning!  

One night my husband and I drove down to watch the fireworks.

Another great view!  

I'm already looking forward to Balloon Fiesta next year.  :)

(the froggie is my new favorite shape this year)

Hastings

If you have a Hastings in your town, GO TODAY!  ALL of their used books are $3.99.  Every last one of them.  Only today.  I picked up six books.  One of them I have read already, but it was years ago and I wanted to read it again.  

I officially have enough books to get me through fall and winter!

Target Deal of the Week

My favorite deal at Target this week is kind of an odd one.  It's a cookbook!

I don't check many cooking or recipe sites, because I'm not a cook.  However, one that I've checked pretty regularly since I've been doing Weight Watchers is skinnytaste.com.

Gina Homolka, the founder of skinnytaste, wrote a cookbook!

Normally, this retails for $30.  Target had it on sale for $19.99.  AND, there was a 25% off Cartwheel coupon:

So the price came down to $14.99, then with my 5% off discount for my Target red card, I paid $14.25 for it.  Less than 50% of the original price!  It's a really nice book too, hardbound with tons of pictures.

I haven't made anything from it yet because I just got it today, but the recipes look really good AND there's a whole section of meatless main dishes!

Maybe this will inspire me to start cooking more, ha ha.  

HIMYM

I just finished the series How I Met Your Mother on Netflix.  It was nine seasons (this has taken me years by the way, because it definitely didn’t ‘hook’ me).  It follows the lives of 5 New Yorkers, and is narrated by ‘Ted’, telling his future children how he met their mother.  Ted is considered the main character, he is an architect whose sole purpose in life is to meet ‘the one’ and have kids.  His best friends are Marshall and Lilly (who are a couple), Barney (a single womanizer) and Robin (the ‘newbie’ in the group).

Here are my thoughts (WARNING:  MAJOR SPOILERS): 

Okay, so over seasons 1-8, here’s what happens.

Marshall and Lilly get married.  Ted dates various women (including Robin).  Marshall and Lilly have a kid.  Barney is….Barney.  Eventually he and Robin starting dating, and get engaged. Ted is still single.  And yes, through seasons 1-8 the ‘mother’ is mentioned, but never shown.  Her yellow umbrella is shown multiple times and she and Ted have various ‘encounters’, but never speak and never know they are in the same place at the same time.  Example:  she took an economics class that he accidentally taught when he was in the wrong room at the University.  Stuff like that.

Season 8 ends with the whole clan getting ready to head to the Hamptons for Barney and Robin’s wedding. 

Season 9 is the last and final season.  I am still trying to decide if Season 9 is brilliant or maddening.  Here’s why.  The entire season (all 24 episodes) takes place over a 3-day period:  Barney and Robin’s wedding weekend.  How they were able to pull this off is amazing to me and also incredibly frustrating.  I found myself wanting to skip episodes to just get to the end already, but in this show it’s pretty important not to skip episodes.  Especially during the last season.

The season is packed full of flashbacks and flash forwards, especially in the last two episodes.  In a nutshell, here’s what happens:  Barney and Robin get married, stay married for three years and then get divorced (this is no surprise).  Barney reverts back to his old womanizing ways, gets someone pregnant and has a little girl.  Robin is a successful newscaster who travels all over the world.  Lilly and Marshall are pregnant with their third kid, and Marshall is appointed a judge in Queens.  Ted meets ‘the mother’ (whose name is Tracy) at Barney and Robin’s wedding, they have two kids, then get married, then the mother gets sick and dies.  No, I’m not kidding.  And then, 6 years after her death (we are finally at ‘present day’), with encouragement from his kids, Barney steels the blue French horn (the grand gesture he made for Robin in the very first episode), and goes to Robin’s apartment and they smile at each other and it is implied that they will get back together.

In general, it is a very funny show.  They cleverly weave stories together and have both flashbacks and many, many flash ‘forwards’, which keep you interested and watching.  However, in my opinion it is at least 3 seasons too long.  It probably should have ended at season 6 or 7.  My other big hangup with the show is that Ted and Robin were my two LEAST favorite characters.  And most of the show was focused on them.  So at times it was hard to keep my interest.  I wanted less Ted and Robin and more Lilly and Barney.  Plus, I SWEAR that some of the plot lines were taken straight from Friends.  Oh, how I miss Friends. 

My favorite characters?  Lilly and Barney.  Lilly is  hilarious and slightly crazy and Barney, although he is a disgusting womanizer, is so so funny and even lovable.  Oh, and Tracy was also one of my favorites.  It’s too bad they waited until Season 9 for her to be a ‘regular’.  I mean I get why they didn’t introduce her in like season 7, but she was so likable and quirky and funny.  It would have been nice to have more of her in the other seasons.

So in a nutshell, it made me laugh but I will probably never watch it again.  Nine seasons is a lot, and unlike other shows that have run for that long (Friends, Seinfeld, etc.) this show felt redundant and they just drug it on for way too long.  But it’s a nice ‘fluffy’ show, something to have on in the background if that’s how you watch TV.