Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Shutterfly's 50 Free Holiday Cards Promotion

Hello all,

Shutterfly is offering 50 free holiday cards for bloggers for writing about their promotion. This definitely appeals to me, as I love both free things and sending out holiday photo cards. In fact, I already have a photo picked out for my cards this year, and I hope you all will like it! It is my hope that people enjoy getting my cards and find them unique and fun. I like sending photo cards as this allows for a more personal touch than picking out a totally ready-made card from the store. Also, this allows people not on the Internet to see a more rcent photo of us. I hope some/many people have kept our cards from the previous years in order to have our pictures.

http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/cards-stationery/joy-to-2010-holiday-5x7-folded-card?sortType=1&fa=2&storeNode=93495 - this card caught my eye with the big "joy to you" writing. People hanging up this card would be able to read the text easily even from across the room! :)

http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/cards-stationery/merry-xmas-2010-christmas-5x7-folded-card?sortType=1&fa=2&storeNode=93495 - this card is nice in that your photo can take up practically the whole front of the card, while still acknowledging the reason for sending said card. :)

http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/christmas-invitations/classic-scarlet-christmas-4x8-photo-card-4x8-photo?sortType=2&fa=2&storeNode=93476&fe=0 - this card is both simplistic and economical at only 32 cents card.

Bloggers get 50 free holiday cards from Shutterfly. Learn more: http://bit.ly/sfly2010

Saturday, August 22, 2009

Vegas trip, post 3

Sunday...

Sunday morning we went to church with Melissa and her family. On the way to church we almost got in an accident. On one road at a 4-way stop had a stop sign, but the other road did not. Matt did stop at the stop sign, but then some lady was ultra-speeding down the other road and after Matt started to drive after stopping we practically T-boned. That was no good. And then the lady in the other car rolled down her window to yell at us and tell us there is a stop sign. Yes, we did see the stop sign, but did you see the speed limit sign?

Church was... ok I guess.

After church we drove around looking for a place for lunch. We found a Mediterranean place!! Greek food!! Yay!!! I ordered pomegranate chicken and it came with rice and Greek salad and hummus with pita bread. It was so good! I wish I knew of a Greek place to eat in Reno.

Then came time for the reason we planned this trip to Vegas, which was my friend's wedding. She got married up at The Resort on Mount Charleston. The ceremony was outside and it was very bright and hot and sunny. But the ceremony itself was nice and I am so glad that God has blessed her with a husband.
Pretty much immediately after the ceremony the photographer started taking still posed photos while the attendants walked in to the reception hall. As people were walking past the bride was saying hi to some people. When she saw me she was like, "Catherine!!! You drove all the way from Reno!!! Thank you for coming, and I will say hi to you later!!" That made me feel good that was recognized me and stuff. It has actually been a very long time since we have seen each other in person.

Reception was OK. It was loud. I am happy to say that this is the shortest photography-after-the-wedding waiting time session we have had to endure out of all the weddings we have been to in the past few years.
Side note: If I would have been to more weddings before my own I *SO* would have made sure my wedding photography session after the ceremony was short and sweet. I know look back and realize we made people wait a very long time, and I feel sorry for them because I know now that it is a boring wait. And also we didn't do anything with our wedding photos anyway so mostly it was a waste of time.

Anyway...
To eat at the reception we had a vegetable/cheese/cracker appetizer and then cake. The wedding party and their parents and stuff did a lot of different dances. For the daddy/daughter dance they did the song "Cinderella" by Steven Curtis Chapman. When I first heard the music come on I said, "Not this song!" I hate the song, but seeing my friend so happy singing it to her dad made me hate it slightly less.
And as promised the bride did come over and see me a couple times during the reception, and her mom came to greet me too. I don't think the rest of her family remembers me. The bride's two younger sisters were both a lot younger the last time I saw them. If I saw them in some random place I would not have known who they were. I think they look a lot different from when they were "kids," and now both of them are stunningly beautiful.

After we left the wedding we went back to my grandma's house for a little while. Then we went and had dinner at Famous Dave's BBQ. They come to the Reno Rib Cook Off every year, but we do not have the actual restaurant in Reno. Dinner was good, and I was ultra-full when we left.

After dinner we drove back out to Sam's Town. I got a coffee at Dunkin Donuts (another thing we don't have in Reno), we played two rounds of basketball in the arcade, and then we saw the laser light/water show they have. And then we went bowling, which ended up being not very fun.

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Monday...

We slept in quite late again.

Then we went and had lunch with Donna and her daughter Jade. We were originally going to go to Beppa de Bupo (you guessed it, another place not in Reno), but it turned out that they were not open that day for lunch since they were doing employee training. So in stead we went to Joe's Crab Shack (another not-in-Reno establishment ;)). We had a nice visit with Donna and Jade over some seafood. Jade is getting ready to start her senior year of high school this year, and yet still when I picture her in my mind I see her as like a 1st grader. I used to go to church with Donna when all her kids were very young, and then did not see her for a very long time after that until I graduated from high school and then during a few of my Vegas visits. It makes me feel old when kids who I met when they were in pre-school (and I was in middle school) are in high school now.

After lunch Matt and I went back to my grandma's house to pack up our things and leave.
Before we officially left town we made one last Vegas stop to Winchell's Donuts. We have practically no donut shops in Reno (and none of the chain ones), and I miss the familiar taste of Winchell's, so we always go get some when we are in Vegas.

On the way back to Reno we stopped in the Candy and Nut Factory in Beatty, NV. I don't know of anything Beatty is famous for really, though their slogan is "The Gateway to Death Valley." At the candy store we left with several bags of things, along with a large fountain soda. Donuts and candy... perfect for people trying to lose weight before they go on a cruise early next year ;)

We made the drive to Reno in 7 hours - woohoo! I like that we have been able to shave an hour off the trip back on our last three Vegas trips (all the online map/direction places say it takes 8 hours to get from Reno to Vegas and vise versa). Now if only we could find a way to shave time off the beginning leg...

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Well, that concludes my travel log from our Vegas trip. I hope you enjoyed reading. Perhaps my wrist will continue to feel well and I can get some more posts up here about daily life...

Vegas trip, post 2

Saturday...

Saturday we did even worse and slept til past 11 AM. Wow. I originally woke up earlier, but since there would have been nothing to do I went back to sleep.

We went out for lunch to Yummy Sushi, which is my brother's favorite place. Except what I ordered ended up being not very good. The last time we went to Yummy Sushi they brought us out something to try and I thought they said it was spicy tuna, except it wasn't at all spicy. So this time I ordered spicy tuna, and it was so spicy that for me it was practically inedible. Also I got some sashimi which was OK, but I should have just got normal sushi. Actually I was planning to get all-you-can-eat sushi, but it turns out this place does not have it. Matt had chicken Katsu for lunch, in case you were wondering. He usually doesn't order actual sushi.

After sushi we stopped by Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf and I ordered a mocha. We do not have Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf in Reno. I don't think it is any better than Starbucks though. I wish Starbucks was not my favorite, but honestly it is for most things.

Then we stopped by Lowe's and picked up a new screen door handle so that Matt could fix my grandma's screen door. She was quite happy to have it fixed up.

We watched a movie or two in the afternoon. My grandma has lots of movie channels.

For dinner that night we stayed at my grandma's and I cooked. :O Ha. I made BBQ breaded pork chops and twice baked potatoes and we had some apple sauce on the side too. I over-cooked the food a little bit, but it wasn't too bad. My grandma wanted me to cook a bunch of porkchops so she could use up some of her freezer stash, and I wasn't sure how much extra time to add with two whole trays of porkchops in the oven instead of the one tray I usually do.

After dinner Matt and I went to Cold Stone for dessert. I got the butterscotch jello pudding ice cream and it was not very good. Matt got the "Founder's Favorite" deal and his was much better than mine. Matt let us switch ice creams towards the end though, which was nice.

After dessert we spend a bunch of time driving around the city aimlessly. Eventually we did stop at Sam's Town, but we were too late to see their laser light show. :( We thought about going bowling there, but neither of us were wearing socks so we decided to pass.

I think that is it about Saturday

Vegas trip, post 1

Hey, guess what? Today I went to the chiropractor and got my wrist adjusted, and I got off work early, and I was away from hand-controlled technology for most of the night, and so late night tonight my wrist actually feels decent! Yay! I can't pass up this opportunity to post a post, even if it is 3 AM...

So, Vegas...

We left for Vegas on Thursday, August 6th, a little after 3 PM after getting off work. I picked up Matt and in stead of getting gas before we headed out, we stopped for gas in the next town which is called Fernley. Fernley made the national news a couple years ago when a dam levy broke and flooded about 800 homes. While in Fernley we got gas and also got Wendy's drive through.

We decided to try going to Vegas through Yerington, which ended up being a mistake. Even though the road leading to Yerington picks up first, it is actually faster to go through Fallon. Fallon is the Nevada town where a large percentage of kids got cancer, BTW. Nevada is mostly government land and small towns, so I guess the small towns want to get their name out for something. ;)

We got to Vegas around 11 or 11:30 PM. I am not exactly sure anymore. Our first stop in Vegas was to have dinner at the Texas Station. That was a mistake though as I was too tired to enjoy my dinner, and I took half of it home plus all of the dessert that came with the meal. After that we headed to my grandma's house, unpacked our stuff, and eventually went to sleep.

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Friday morning we didn't get up til probably past 10 AM. Ah, sleeping in is nice. Matt and I headed out and first stopped by a bank so I could deposit my paycheck and get us some cash. Then Matt dropped me off at Melissa's house, and he went to see the Auto Collection at the Imperial Palace.

Melissa is my bestest Vegas friend, and she has two boys, one who is almost five and one who is 2.5. They are cute kids... especially the younger one. Once upon a time when the younger one was still a baby I carried him around for an entire day during a Vegas visit.

Went to Cost-co and had lunch and she did some shopping with Melissa and one of her kids. Then we went to her house and the kids' dad came home. So we left the kid home with dad and went and got pedicures. After the pedicures we went to a smoothie shop and drank smoothies and talked for a while. Then we picked up the other kids from the baby sitter's and then went to Wal*Mart. Ah the fun things we do. ;)

Then Matt came over to Melissa's house later on closer to 6 and we all had dinner together and ate bacon cheeseburgers. After dinner the adults played Trivial Pursuit 90's. It took FOREVER for someone to win. After the game we sat around and talked for a long while until almost 11 PM.

Matt and I went back to my grandma's house and watched part of a movie and then went to bed.

To be continued next post...

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Been Absent

Hello followers of my newly created blog.

Sorry I have been absent. I have been wanting to write about my trip to Vegas which was two weekends ago now. However, I have recently started a bad flare up of carpel tunnel. :( When I am on the computer too much it gets to where the whole underside of my arm is "burning" from my wrist to my elbow. That is no fun, as I am sure you can imagine. And since I do have to be on the computer most of the day at work (the whole office part of being an appraiser is very dependent on good software and the Internet), that means I need to stay off the computer when I am at home.

Hopefully I will be back soon.

Monday, August 3, 2009

Monday, August 3rd

I do not like months where day 1 starts on Saturday. It is weird to go to work on Monday and have it be the 3rd. Feels like the first two days were missed or something. We label our files based on the date, and sometimes I will look back and be like, "Why don't we have any files for the 1st or 2nd?" Anyway...

Didn't sleep so well last night. Pillows are one of the banes of my existence. Right now my neck does not seem to like any of my pillows. And I don't really want to go buy any more. I have bought sooo many pillows in the past three years. My spine has a ton of alignment issues, which is why my neck is so picky.
Also I have been having some not-very-pleasant dreams lately, and the same theme two nights in a row.

Got a drink from The Human Bean on the way to work. They are a smaller coffee chain that started in Oregon, but now for some reason they are here. Today I got an iced Human Bean Supreme, which is a vanilla mocha.

Work was fine. Not too much going on. I hope it picks up some more soon.
On my lunch break I went to the post office and got a spicy pickle tuna salad from The Spicy Pickle. The tuna salad is not spicy to me though... the pickles they give you on the side are though.

Monday night is currently my favorite night of TV. I like the shows on ABC Family which would be "Secret Life of the American Teenager" and "Bring it On." I loved watching the USA gymnastics team last summer, so it is cool that they made a TV series about promising gymnasts. I am wondering if the girls on the show are real gymnastic hopefuls, and if so, how do they have time to do this show?
I also have been watching the new episodes of "Jon and Kate Plus 8" because I like drama. ;) :D Truly though, that is what sparked my sudden interest.

In the late evening before the sun went down I went outside and picked some weeds. Out here there are evil spikey weeds that attack my feet whenever I walk past them (which is necessary when taking my dog out), so I have been trying to get rid of them. Made some good progress tonight, and hopefully I will get through some more tomorrow.

Big news of tonight is that my husband is working ultra-late. He does computer tech support and tonight he is fixing a server. As I am typing this it is 12:08 AM and he has been at work since 8 AM, which would be over 16 hours now. Geesh. I hope he gets to come home soon and makes it home safely.

Is this blog at all interesting to anyone?

Sunday, August 2

Slept in til 11 AM. Was nice I suppose, but then I thought, "This will make getting up tomorrow hard, as at this point I will have been at work for an hour."

In the early afternoon we went to Starbucks and playing Scrabble with Matt's friend. I lost. I like to win, but I did OK with the losing thing.

After Starbucks we went and ate an early lunch / late dinner at Marie Calender's. I got the California Chicken Waldorf Salad and Matt got the meatloaf sandwich. My salad was decent. I ordered the dressing on the side but ended up not using any as the salad tasted sweet enough without it. Matt was not a fan of his sandwich though. We are not very big fans of Marie Calender's in general, but we went because I had some coupons that expire soon. For dessert we split a piece of chocolate silk pie. Not all that impressive. And the service was quite slow... especially since they had extra servers just sitting in the lobby (really, they did).

After Marie Calendar's we stopped at Trader Joe's and I bought milk, bread, and Balance Bars. Have enough other groceries to make it through our short week at home. Next weekend we will be gone for four days.

Came home and watched the finale the "The Next Food Network Star." Originally we wanted Melissa to win, but then when we saw she has four kids under 4 we were like, "Maybe it would be better if she lost." But she did win and it is sad that now her kids are going to see a lot less of their mom. I wonder why she even applied to be on the show in the first place? Doesn't she already have enough to do in life with her kids and the other stuff they showed her doing?

After that show we didn't really feel like watching TV anymore, so instead we played a bunch of games for a while. We played Scene It, Carcasone, Brain Challenge, and Battleship. We were going to play Scrabble, but it turns out we don't own it. Maybe I will pick up that game sometime soon.

Before bed we watched three episodes of "Friends." I bought the whole series on DVD earlier this year, and the past week or two we have watched at least one episode right before bed. Fun way to end the night.

Those would be the highlights of Sunday. On to another work week...