R & J

Sunday, August 18, 2013

hey soul sisters

ashes and kissy came to visit! i absolutely loved having them here so much. i wish they didn't live so dang far away. the first day they were here, we all woke up early and went running together. we may or may not have taken a couple hours on that run, but it is hard to run when you are laughing...i wish i could run with those two foxy ladies everyday. after our run, we got dolled up and went downtown. while on the subway, i definitely enjoyed watching my country sisters get hit on by city boys. LOL! we saw all of the sights (by foot) and ate and shopped--definitely an unforgettable day. the next day, we went running again (i love having running buddies), then we hung out in naperville. rich met up with us for some delicious lou malnatis' pizza and we went to see the new wolverine movie. the last day they were here, we stayed in our pajamas pretty much all day and had an all day slumber party and watched ps:i love you and many other great girl movies that rich just doesn't appreciate as much as my sisters do. i still love him though. we did leave for a short pajama party break and forced kristy to try sushi. she did not like it, but i know she will come around... the sad part of this story is that they left. puma and i were so sad to see them drive away, especially because ashley is going to texas for her mission soon. however, we all agreed that we are going to start having more sister weekends when she gets back...a lot more!

my beautiful babes!

friendship bracelets!

cloudgate/the bean and my cray cray clan

lovin' that blonde hair! but we also hate her for it.

way too much fun...

studmuffin man and me at lou malnatis

party in naperville

dick tracy and ashley

dick tracy and kissy

oh yes...ashley got a fabulous hair cut! she is so pretty!

glamour shots

glamour girl part two

glamour girl part three. the end!

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

HaPPy BirthDay PuMa

puma possin, our best little buddy ever, turned two! i sure love having this furry little crazy thing around me all the time. happy birthday poopa!

ahhhhh she is is the best puppy ever!

Monday, July 29, 2013

Train Concert

She doesn't own a dress
Her hair is always a mess
You catch her stealin' she won't confess
She's beautiful

Smokes a pack a day, but wait, that's me, but anyway
She doesn't care a thing, about that hair
She thinks I'm beautiful
Meet Virginia

She never compromises, loves babies and surprises
Wears high heels when she exercises
Ain't that beautiful
Meet Virginia

Well she wants to be the queen
Then she thinks about her scene
Pulls her hair back as she screams
"I don't really wanna be queen"

Her daddy wrestles alligators
Mama works on carburetors
Her brother is a fine mediator
For the president

And here she is again on the phone
Just like me hates to be alone
We just like to sit at home
And rip on the president
Meet Virginia

Well she wants to live her life
Then she thinks about her life
Pulls her hair back, as she screams
"I don't really wanna live this life", no, no, no

She only drinks coffee at midnight
But the moment is not right
And the time is quite, unusual

You see her confidence is tragic
But her intuition magic
And the shape of her body, unusual

Meet Virgina, I can't wait to
Meet Virginia, yeah, yeah, hey, hey

Well, she wants to be the queen
Then she thinks about her scene
Well, she wants to live her life
Then she thinks about her life

Pulls her hair back as she screams
I don't really wanna be the queen, ah, ah
I don't really wanna be the queen, ah, ah
I don't really wanna be the queen, ah, ah
I don't really wanna live here

yessss it is true...we got to hear train sing that song live at tinley park! he was amazing and sounded so great! some of the songs he covered were hey, soul sister, 50 ways to say goodbye, bruises, drops of jupiter, drive by and one i hadn't heard before but now LOVE called mermaid. i freakin' love live music. happy summer days!

for the mermaid song, train had all these chicsters from the audience up on the stage dressed up as mermaids.

Thursday, June 27, 2013

Starved Rock

we went to starved rock state park with rich's friend, mike and mike's fiancee and my new crazy cool friend, morgan, and their cute boy regan. it was a great day for hiking and the park trails were awesome. thanks for the invite m&m! :)

if you look close, you can see rich, regan and mike

morgan is such a rockin' girl! she reminds me of my friend tushy! probably why i like her so much! :)

Sunday, June 9, 2013

tiger woods

rich has a new hobby. i'm pretty horrible at golf, but he doesn't mind that, and he lets me come golfing with him...when his friends aren't there. ;) rich says he sucks hardcore, but i think he is fabulous at it. his claim to fame though is that he is friends/was room mates with danny summerhays, who is on the PGA tour this year! he makes like a billion bucks now for swinging a club...lucky! :)

Sunday, June 2, 2013

Costa Frica~La Pura Vida

rich and i were the luckiest of the lucky because we got to go to costa rica with the bff of my life, sarah oesterle and her lover, jared. it was about an eight day trip, and it was unforgettably amazing. i cannot stop missing it.

the first day, we all met up at the fort lauderdale airport. sarah and jared had just moved to miami because he got a job with citibank (go jared), so they did not have to get up at 3:30am like us. lucky ducks. the flight to san juan was a little bumpy, but we got to the airport safely and rented a sweet car (after jared and rich did some wheelin' and dealin'). we drove through the jungle to la fortuna the first night, and stayed at the casa luna hotel and spa. it was an awesome resort with a cool view of the arenal volcano. (thanks jared for knowing about air bnb and finding sweet sleeping spots).

the next day, we did some more jungle cruising and got to puerto carillo and rented some surfboards. the waves were ginormous and the guy we rented the boards from was stoned, so i was nervous about taking his verbal instructions, so we did not really do much surfing, but we kinda tried lol! another man that made me nervous was the owner of our hotel, hector. the night we stayed at his hotel, hector drank a bottle of patron and played his guitar all night in the lobby. we all thought he was kinda loco but nice. after we checked out though, we realized he was just crazy. as were driving away on the highway, we saw hector on his motorcycle chasing after us like he was on the fast and the furious. for some random reason, he thought we had stolen his nasty pink towel. obviously we didn't, but he didn't believe us, so he pulled out in front of us and harassed us. sarah and jared, both spanish speakers, told him repeatedly we did not have his pink towel. he wanted to search through our luggage, but we refused and drove off. he didn't chase us again, so we think he may have finally believed us, or he just didn't have enough gas. everyone else was pretty calm about it. i, however, was genuinely concerned we were going to be killed or kidnapped by hector. after working on the west side of chicago, i have a bad habit of assuming people are mentally unstable. i was eventually able to laugh with everyone about it after we were miles away...but i still look behind me occasionally and fear seeing hector...

after puerto carillo, we made our way to manual antonio. we stayed at the jungle creek resort. the resort owners, thankfully, were not crazy like hector, and they actually told us about an awesome waterfall that was about a 3 mile hike. their dog, suzie, showed us the way there. it was an awesome waterfall with a rope swing. we joined in with some local boys who were playing tag. i got bruised and cut way bad trying to keep up with the little speedsters, but it was still fun! sad story: on our way back, a wild pitbull attacked suzie. she was bleeding a little bit, but she was ok after going to the vet and getting a few shots. she was an awesome dog, and we felt horrible about it. the owners said that that living in the jungle comes with risks... rich and i realized puma would never survive a day.

the next few days, we all tried boogie boarding, and rich and i tried surfing again. i got an instructor to take me out and i was able to stand up and ride a wave. :) lyn, my instructor, kept saying, "it is just like a bathtub. no worries!" ahah! i love surfing even though i suck. rich and i also loved watching the surfers. they were hardcore crazy good at flipping all around. i am envious.

after so many beach days, we decided to have a tree day and went ziplining on the longest zipline in costa rica. it was unbelievably magnificent. it felt like flying. definitely worth it. another adventure that was worth the money was going to the savagre river and doing some intense white water rafting. the devil's mouth was a cool rapid. the worst part of our trip was the last day. we all got super sick. i will spare the yucky details, but we blame el avion. we made our way back to san jose eating soda crackers, stayed at a hostel, and then flew home. i guess it was necessary to have some bad with the great. either way, costa rica was costa-freakin-awesome! la pura vida!