So with a new year comes a chance to start fresh and I’d love to be better about keeping loved ones up-to-date on the happenings of my life, so I’m going to try and get back into the world of blogging. After all, I have a baby now (what! yes, I gave birth to a tiny human in 2014) and that’s what my loved ones want to read about (although I’m not sure about posting her pictures all over the internet, a post to come about my thoughts on that). I also love looking back at my older posts, so I’m getting back into blogging for my own pleasure as well, as this space is like a journal of my life.

On a very random side note – I would like to record that this is the day that I won in a battle with the airlines! While using miles, they tried to beat me making me use more miles than I hoped to use and then a few days later making the flight available at the cheaper miles rate. I wasn’t having any of it and calling to voice my displeasure with this tricky game they play worked in my favor. This needs to be recorded in history because this will likely never happen again, I probably got a hungover agent who just wanted to shut me up. Either way, it was a great way to kick off the year!

More to come on things going on around here…looking forward to recording the happenings of this new year.

Photo from Hiram Bingham’s exploration

After a couple adventures in Europe (Spain & France) and our amazing honeymoon in New Zealand (Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6,), its time to take an adventure south. The plan is to explore Cusco and the Sacred Valley as we make our way to Machu Picchu and finish out the adventure with a couple days in Lima.

If you haven’t see the PBS program on Machu Picchu, I highly recommend checking it out. We saw it a couple years ago and just re-watched it this weekend. Countdown has officially begun, can’t wait!!

My husband and I are in hibernation mode over here! It’s too cold, there’s snow almost every week and while waiting for spring to arrive, we are binging on Breaking Bad. What an awesome show, interesting plot, great cast of characters and my hometown ABQ! I love seeing Albuquerque getting some air time and its fun seeing places I know, like the car wash Walt works at in season 1, we use to go there when I was little.

We are halfway through season 3 already. I’m sure we will be done by the end of the month and hopefully by then it won’t be so dang cold out anymore!

… reflecting on the life of a great man, who left this world far too soon. MLK is such an inspiring leader, take a moment to read/watch some of his speeches, his words will move you.

… finished all the final touches for my husband’s birthday extravaganza.

… I’m also using MLK’s quote as an inspiration to keep up my winter running. There is a half marathon in Delaware coming up in March that my husband and I also say we will run. I think this is our year.

… slightly obsessed with the band Haim, I’ve been listening to their album on repeat for weeks straight. They play in Philly in May, not sure I can wait that long to see them live.

… realizing that I did a similar blog post only twice last year, one being January 15th, guess this is my thing in January.

… we are trying to decide where to go on our next travel adventure, somewhere in Central or South America. Any recommendations???

… sad that the fire station on our block moved over the weekend to their new station. I’m going to miss the fire engine going down our block and saying Hi to the guys on my daily walk with Daisy, their absence is already noticed.

… looking forward to a short work week!

Tootles!

When I look back at some of the goals I’ve made over the last few years, I few of them are achievable goals that can be tracked and measured, like saving money. But more often I find my list is full of good intentions of how I want to live my life. I’m a detailed person and lover of making lists, so I still have a few monthly goal lists and projects to try and complete by the end of the year, but I also want to ensure I don’t get too lost in the details and lose sight of things that make life enjoyable (although crossing off things on my to do list is quite fun). This year I thought I would change things up and declare a few of my intentions for 2014.

* Invest in me – I make a lot of promises to myself that I don’t always follow through with – this year I’m going to keep those promises and invest in my mind and my body…

* Spend time doing things I enjoy (with people I enjoy spending time with) – read, cook, photography, running, learning french, having fun, being silly, laughing often…

* Explore – whether it be discovering new places or revisiting old, I just want to get out and explore as much as I can…

* Spend time with family and friends  – last year I was able to visit a lot of family and spend some fun weekends away with friends. I’m always trying to do more of this…

* Unplug – some people would say I already unplug a lot because I’m horrible at responding to texts quickly and don’t always answer my phone, but I do want to be make an effort to cut myself off from social media and celebrity gossip sites from time to time and instead catch up with friends on the phone or write good old fashioned letters/send cards…

Do you have any intentions for 2014?

image/Piece Of Cake

Our crazy NYE

There’s something almost magical about a new year, getting a blank slate each year to do new and exciting things. 2013 was another great year, a year to spend with family, enjoy places we’ve been before and gain a greater appreciate for all the great things we have. 2014 is looking like its going to be a year of new adventures, I can’t wait!

I’ve given up making annual goals in the new year, but I might give myself monthly goals to work towards (working on my January goals now). I’m going to try and take a photo a day again, its such a great way to capture everyday life and its fun to look back on. In 2012, I took a photo a day, but that was my 4th attempt, so here’s hoping my 5th attempt is also a success.

Hope your new year is magical, happy and fun!

Evening walk

Yay snow! Yay snow before Christmas! Yay snow before Christmas in Delaware because this never really happens!

We had a few snowy days here in Delaware, which is not very common for this time of year. I love the snow, its so pretty, but it can be quite a pain in the a*& too. This past weekend I was in NJ/NYC with some of my girlfriends. We had a great weekend, except for the hour drive from the train station back to Delaware on Sunday turned into a 6 hour drive because it snowed like crazy here in the Philly region. Saw plenty of cars that ran off the road, luckily I was not one of them. And luckily I had my girlfriend with me to keep me entertained for hours as we inched our way home. All that being said, I’m still hoping for a white Christmas!!

Last weekend, I was going through some of my photos to print out a few things for the house and came across some amazing photos from our adventure in New Mexico over the summer. Being a proud New Mexican, I had to share a few photos. I may be a little biased in my thoughts on New Mexico, I was born there, my family still lives there and I’m so happy to be able to visit this great state often. Biased or not, New Mexico is awesome, there are so many places to see, things to do, green chile to eat, its completely underrated.

Fort Union

Tent Rocks

Frijoles Canyon – Bandelier

Ok, now back to cold weather reality and trying to come up with a Christmas wish list. Hope you had a nice Thanksgiving weekend!

Happy December!

One thing we did not do this year is go on a overseas adventure. I didn’t really blog about our last overseas adventure, but last October we went to Girona, the Costa Brava and Barcelona in Spain and Cathar country/castles in the Languedoc region of France. Basically we rented a car and explored a corner of Spain and a corner of France, it was an amazing trip.

Here’s a few pictures from our adventures:

Girona, Spain

Best meal ever!

Château de Montségur

Pyrenees Mountains

Montserrat

La Sagrada Família

At Parc Güell

At Olympic Stadium

Happy November!