At least tomorrow is my Monday

Well today is officially the last day of my vacation.  Although it hasn't been as relaxing as I would have liked, it certainly has been fun!  Last Thursday morning we left to go to the beach and we got to spend Thursday and Friday at Cocoa!   There was a rocket launch on Thursday night from Kennedy Space Center that we got to see during dinner.  It was quite fascinating.  And we watched the draft during dinner and was exciting to watch Sam Bradford get picked first!!  Then on Saturday we headed over to Tampa for the Jimmy Buffet concert.  It was an all day tailgating experience (and got me really excited for football season).  There was a big group of people from Kyle's work and we all had so much fun.

The girls

The Paynes and the McBrides

Me and my parrot head

the JBL / Gallo crew!

I'm off to the dentist!  Have a wonderful week!  

love

us

Hello vacation!

So my 1 year anniversary with my wonderful job is April 27th and I somehow still have 4 vaca / sick days that I haven't taken.  And little did they know, I was not about to just give them up.  So I am taking the next 4 work days off.  I don't have to go back to my office for an entire week!  The sad thing is I know I am really going to miss it.  I get so bored not working so my plan is to keep myself really busy. My wonderful husband is taking me to Cocoa beach to celebrate, where we will be relaxing on the beach and pretending like we never have to go back to work ever.  And it's good that we are getting out of town because our cable mysteriously quit working this morning and they can't get someone out here until Saturday to fix it!  (and apparently they make us pay for someone to come out and fix their equipment that isn't working...unless we have a warranty that you have to pay extra for.  ugh) What in the world are we supposed to do without tv...well since you asked...KP is play COD and I am blogging.  exciting huh!

I really can't believe it has been a year since I started my job.  I never saw myself working in the legal field, but I really do love what I do.  And it is so interesting, and quite beneficial to learn more about the law.  The attorneys I work for are just amazing and it's so incredible to learn from them and their legal assistants.  I even got flowers from my favorite attorney for admin professionals day!  I really am blessed to love going to work every day.  As crazy as it is around there, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Happy 3 year anniversary to Alyson and Ryan!!  They went to NYC last weekend to celebrate their anniversary and I know they had a wonderful time.  And getting away for them is even more special now that they have miss Laney in their life.  God has truly blessed them with a wonderful marriage and beautiful family!  WE LOVE YOU GUYS!

Hope everyone has a great rest of the week!

Love
a and k

Weekend Recap

This past weekend marks the beginning of what we in the biz call "busy season."  Well the biz being me and Kyle's life!  It is about to get crazy around here with traveling and guests and we couldn't be more excited!

Last week I put together a Team NeJame for the downtown Orlando Corporate 5 K event.  These are the peps from my office that participated!  I did get to meet Nick Anderson and Bo Outlaw - 2 of the founding players of the Orlando Magic!  We walked the course and ended in exactly 1 hour.  Maybe next time I will train a little bit and actually run, but we'll see.  Mr. Payne however pretended liked it was a high school track meet (yes he use to run track and was 90 lbs soaking wet) and finished the thing in less that 24 minutes.  Impressive I know!

Then on Friday night we went to see Dashboard Confessionals at House of Blues.  They are one of our favorite bands and have some really fun songs to sing along to.  So fun in fact my diaphragm was sore the next day from singing so much.  Bet you didn't know that was possible did you!  And the even cooler part was our friend Sarah got us meet and greet passes so we were able to stay afterwards and meet Chris, the lead singer.  She took a picture of me with him, but it's on her camera so I don't have it.  But the HOB is just a fun venue for concerts and there really isn't a bad seat in the house.

Saturday Kyle got up and played golf...for the 3rd weekend in a row.  Man he's got it so rough.  And I did some birthday shopping for my favorite niece who will be 1 next month.  There is nothing more fun than shopping for teeny tiny clothes for a not so tenny tiny baby!  I thought it was hard to resist things for myself, ha, it is impossible to not buy everything in sight for Laney.  Speaking of Laney, I haven't posted any recent pics of her and I think it's about time I did.  

Miss Laney on Easter!

She has starting to babble and even make some words.  She has developed an immediate love for Elmo and its ridiculously cute.  She will carry her Elmo doll with her everywhere and loves to say Elmo!  and Uh Oh!  Can't wait to hear it in person.  I've also been told that she is very close to walking.  It's crazy to think she was only 7 months old last time I saw her and she might be walking the next time I do.

Okay back on track.  Saturday we went to Universal Studios to see Chicago play!  man those are some old dudes, but they still sound exactly the same.  It was fun to hear some of their classics!  However it got me thinking about how weird it will be in 30 - 40 years when our favorite bands now have reunion tours and come back and our kids will be like wow these people are so old and terrible ha.  Imagine Kings of Leon being old and playing all their songs and all us old people singing along while our kids are so embarrassed of us.  

Then today we were really lazy.  Its been overcast and rainy all day so we just went to mall.  Where we actually finally found a rug for our living room, and then put the rug in our living room in the dining room.  For most of you who haven't seen our house that doesn't mean anything to you, but it's exciting for us.  Then we went and saw Date Movie.  We gave it a B -.  It was funny and entertaining at least and good for a rainy lazy Sunday.

Now Kyle begged me to play on the computer for a little while so he can play CODMW2.  I obliged and so you guys get to read all about our weekend!  You're so lucky!

Next weekend we are going to Tampa to see Jimmy Buffett -round 2 -with a lot of friends / Kyle's co-workers.  And I get to take off Thursday - Tuesday to use up my remaining vaca days before I lose them.  Definitely looking forward to that!!  And by looking forward to that I have like 4 Dr appointments because I am really bad at going to the Dr. so I'm going to make it up next week.  And getting a manicure.  That is what I want to do on my 6 days off work.  As long as I do that I'll be happy.  

Hope everyone has a wonderful week!

Easter Weekend with the Bakers

Some our dearest friends, Nate and Morgan, made the drive from Nashville, TN to Orlando to spend a couple days with us over the Easter weekend!  This was their first time out to visit us and we had such a great time.  It is non stop laughter when you get Kyle and Nate together (and Nate's wife is pretty funny too) and this weekend was just hilarious.  We both had Good Friday off of work so once the Baker's rolled into town the boys went and played golf at Bay Hill (4 days after the tournament) and the girls went shopping.  We managed to hit up the mall, the outlets, and Park Ave!  It had been almost a year and a half since I saw Morgan last so we had a lot of catching up to do! 

That night we went to our fav little sushi place on Park Ave, Sakura, for some really good sushi and drinks.  One of Nate's goals for the weekend was to have good sushi every day.  Sadly this was the only day we had sushi but I think he enjoyed it.  Then we just went back to our house and hung out there since Saturday was going to be an early and exhausting day!

Can you guess where we went on Saturday!  UNIVERSAL!  Here are the Bakers in the signature welcome to universal pose.

 And here we all are in San Fransisco Fisherman's Wharf! (We actually just booked a flight to San Fran / Wine Country for our 3 year anniversary and I am SO excited!!! more on that later)

Another must for a photo opp when you visit the Paynes.  You're welcome!

We hung out at Universal for the entire day and had a blast.  Harry Potter Update - it is still coming along, but looking really cool.  They've already transformed the old Dueling Dragons Roller Coaster into the new HP one, but haven't revealed the name yet.  It's cool to see all the lanterns everywhere and they have that big huge flag pole thing set up, but the flags are all still wrapped up.  I am trying to record all the HP movies so I can fully appreciate it when it opens.  

Easter Morning Brunch

The Menu:

Chocolate Chip Pancakes

Bacon

Fried eggs in bacon juice

fresh squeezed orange jucied mimoas

coffee

And we got to eat outside on our patio for the first time!!

Then we headed to Chilis for happy hour!  Only in Florida do they have happy hour (2 for 1) all day every day!  And I realized we went to Chilis last year on Easter.  What a sad tradition!

After happy hour we went and fed some gators at Congo River Golf Adventure and played a round of putt putt.  Then Nate dragged us to go see Clash of the Titans in 3d.  Do not waste your time.  It was terrible.  

Monday morning at 6:21 AM Kyle and I woke up to watch the shuttle Discovery launch!!  It was a really neat thing to see!  And at night it looks really cool!  We're hoping to make it over to Cape Canaveral before they close it down.  Which by the way is really sad.  Pres O is actually going to be here in FL tomorrow to announce something about the program.  Anyway, the Bakers got up and left on Monday morning to drive back to Nashville and we miss them already!  We had a wonderful time with them and can't wait to make the trip to Nashville to visit them.

Also I'd like to say congratulations to our friends Michael and Erica Hallock and Bill and Paige Ross who have both recently found out they are both expecting a baby in November!  We are really excited for you guys and can't wait to meet your little ones!

Hope everyone is doing well!  We miss and love you guys!