South Dakota: {The Badlands}

Ok, I'm finally ready to get back to the blog. We're actually leaving next Friday for another quick little trip, so I figured I'd better get the rest of my South Dakota pictures posted before we leave again!  These are some of my favorite pictures from our day trip the the Badlands, an amazing National Park just east of Rapid City. We were in awe of the dramatic rock formations, and soaked up the beautiful scenery as we climbed around on the rocks. If you ever make it the South Dakota, the Badlands are a MUST. It is a truly stunning sight.

Momma Hags doing what she does best-- keeping us well fed!

Do you like how we picnic? We're fancy, with our tablecloth and all.
We had leftover burgers on homemade buns, fresh hummus with veggies,
and a mindblowingly simple and delicious corn salad.

Sorry sisters, this picture was too funny to not post.
Hahahahaha!

Within a mile down the road it was complete prairie.
The dry grasses seemed to stretch forever,
even though we knew there were more rock formations just down the road. 

The pictures pretty much say it all. Amazing place to visit.

South Dakota: {Hill City}

I took almost 300 pictures in the four days that we spent in South Dakota. That is out of control, but we had fun capturing little bits of our adventures! I am still swamped with work and recovering from my cold, but I had to start blogging this trip before I forgot what we did. I'm going to keep this one short & sweet... here are some of my favorite pictures of some of my favorite people!

Hill City: "Check your guns here"

Learning about trains

Stopping for a bit of wine tasting

They love their guns...

Classy guys at Prairie Berry Winery

The whole gang!

Ok, long enough for one post! Hill City was beautiful, and we had fun eating, drinking, and goofing around together. South Dakota is quite beautiful, and reminds me of bits of Colorado that we enjoyed as kids. And no matter what, being with my family just makes me happy. We're all spread out these days, but whenever we get together like this it feels like we're back 'home'.

Notre Dame Football Adventure!

This weekend we got to go to South Bend, IN for a Notre Dame football game, courtesy of my generous uncle in California. He had entered a lotto for tickets, and ended up getting tickets that he couldn't actually use. A few weeks ago my aunt called to see if we were interested in a set of tickets, and you know we couldn't pass up that opportunity! We had a blast exploring the campus, and experiencing the rich traditions of this historic university.

The campus was full of students and visitors, eating, drinking, and seeing the sights.

The main administrative building was beautiful!
It was full of intricate murals, and had this amazing dome about four floors up.

The basilica was amazing!

After exploring campus, we went to Legends, a bar right across from the stadium.

The band was great at getting the crowd excited... and the crowd was huge! 

They were playing Air Force, so there was a fly over before the game! Too cool!

Go Irish!
(We got shirts before so we would blend in!)

Fun tradition-- they lift the students up and down whenever the Irish score.
They do it as many times as they have points, so people joke about starting
with their heaviest friends first, in case it's a high scoring game.

Touchdown Jesus!

Speaking of high scoring... it was a great day to be a Notre Dame fan!

Thanks again Ron and Anne for the tickets!!! We had a blast!

California Highlights: Part 2

I'm going to keep this one to mostly pictures, with captions. Joe and I have a dinner date tonight, and I accidentally wasted too much of today doing pretty much nothing, which doesn't leave a lot of time for blogging! I will say it was a lovely, relaxing day off... and that I get soooo much more done in my life when I'm busy :) Here are the rest of the highlights from our trip, or at least the highlights we remembered to take pictures of!



Natalie, my cousin Emily's daughter, was so darn cute! She's super smart,
and will talk your ear off if you let her. Here she is in her ballerina swimsuit
and melon smile :)

Emily and Natalie live in Arizona, but they decided to seek refuge from
the dessert heat by coming home for a weekend. Emily and my aunt, Anne,
 made a fantastic dinner on Saturday night.

 

Sunday we were going to hit up Hollywood for a swank and stylish dinner,
but we ended up enjoying our time in Manhattan Beach too much.
We decided instead of rushing home to change for dinner,
we'd enjoy dinner near the beach, and spend a little more time in this
great little beach town!

 

We at at Manhattan Beach Brewing Company, and enjoyed the simple but tasty food.
Since we were on vacation, we had to have beer flights with our meal!

 

This visit we decided to try Malibu Seafood, after a rave review from my cousin.
It was BYOB, beautiful ocean views, and great seafood.  I love the crazy biker
atmosphere of Neptune's Net, but think Malibu Seafood has them beat in the end.



It's not a trip to Southern California without some fish tacos, right? YUM!

Another obvious requirement of this trip... In-N-Out!

Eating too much, exploring all over, and plenty of time in the waves made for a great vacation. It was so refreshing to just enjoy five days together, away from work, bills, and taking care of regular life. We loved catching up with family, and roaming around town without a care in the world!

Thanks especially to Sarah & Sanjin, my cousin and her husband, for loaning us your house and car. We hated being in L.A. and not seeing you and your adorable boys... but we sure are glad you suggested we take over your house while you were gone!

Escape from Reality

Ok, it's been five days, and I think I'm finally recovered enough to post about our wonderful Southern California vacation.  We had a fantastic time relaxing with each other, just enjoying the feeling of minimal obligations and plenty of ocean air. I didn't take nearly enough pictures, but I don't really mind, because we were so 'in the moment' that stopping for the camera would have felt too much like work.

Some highlights of the trip...

 Spending time with much-loved relatives! Delicious food, lively conversation, drinks for everyone. It was wonderful to hang out and catch up with everyone. Thanks to Anne and Ron for hosting our little party!

Soaking up the different scenery. Ocean waves and palm trees are such novelties to us! We drove all over LA exploring, cruising famous streets like Sunset or Santa Monica Boulevards. From West Hollywood to Manhattan Beach, we got to know the city pretty well. Not going to lie, though, I love living in a city where I don't have to drive as much!

Hiking in Runyon Canyon was a great suggestion I got from my hairdresser, who lived in LA for a while. We spent a morning getting a workout while climbing around the hills, people watching and soaking up the views. It was beautiful, and seemed like such a stereotypical California thing to do... right down to the yoga class in the park! We kept up this healthy mentality through lunch, eating tasty vegan sandwiches at Veggie Grill. Then it was off to the beach, which we made a daily priority :)

One day we make the trek down towards San Diego, to visit the much loved Stone Brewery. It was fun to see the brewery, and we had an entertaining and welcoming tour guide. We loved seeing their operations, and didn't mind the tasting that occurred at the end of the tour. They have GREAT beer!

I've just made an official decision that this trip is going to get TWO posts worth of recap. We'll call this post Part One (With Picture Collages).  Part Two will involve iphone pictures, more food and beer, and some silly beach pictures. Midwesterners can be SUCH dorks when we go to the beach! Although I'm not a Midwesterner, for the record, because I was born in Northern California and have lived too many places to really lump myself in with one of them. Just so you know.

For now, I'll go make some dinner, while continuing to dream of living near the beach. It could happen. Right?!