30 by 30

I have one year until I turn 30. There are things I would like to have accomplished before then. Here is my bucketlist:

1. Get Married
2. Go on a Hot Air Balloon Ride
3. Have lobster in New England
4. Get another tattoo
5. Begin learning another language
6. Buy a lottery ticket
7. Pay off my credit card
8. Learn to drive a manual car
9. Write a short story or novel. Submit it and frame the rejection letter.
10. Go snorkeling or scuba diving
11. Visit Disney Harry Potter
12. Go on a Day Cruise
13. Take an art/craft/cooking class
14. Go Bungee Jumping
15. Start journaling again - weekly
16. Watch IMDB's Top 100 Movies
17. Visit a Psychic/Palm Reader
18. See Wicked on Broadway
19. Visit a Primary Care doctor when I'm not sick
20. Go to a taping of a T.V. Show
21. Learn a new recipe monthly
22. Go on a carriage ride through Central Park
23. Go whale watching
24. Ride a Motorcycle
25. Create a budget and stick to it
26. Volunteer for 30 hours
27. Swim with dolphins
28. Create a weight goal and get there
29. Go up the Empire State Building & Top of the Rock
30. Get a professional massage

Bonus: Dye hair a fun color

I know some of these things seem really easy, but I only have one year, people! Hopefully I can get it all done. My intention is to blog about each of these things as I check them off.

Do you have anything I should add? Nothing terribly expensive, of course. Gotta budget! :)

The Big 2-9

I am one of those people who believes in taking days off of work for your birthday. So, of course, I took off the entire week last week. I think I planned it pretty well, if I do say so myself. I had a few days to detox from work... then a few days in Nashville with the family... then a few days to detox from that... and then back to work! Ta da! I think it works out smashingly :).

So on Tuesday, Jimmy and I flew down to Nashville with wedding planning on the brain. One of the reasons we went down was to have a few wedding-related appointments and get some things done. Always practical. His mom came with us as well - but she was on an earlier flight, so we met up with her in the airport. But both of our flights were in the morning, so our afternoon was pretty well planned out.

After changing an unfortunate flat tire, we went to Southern Bred for lunch. We have always loved that restaurant and if you haven't gone, you need to immediately. The woman that owns it, Sharon Johnson, is our caterer for the wedding. So it was sort of a working lunch :). We spent the afternoon getting me a new phone (Jimmy's birthday gift to me - a iphone 3g s) and mom a replacement for her dinosaur. Then we went out to Two Rivers Mansion (our ceremony/reception site) to do our follow up look around. Top the day off with dinner at Big River Grill and silly stores on 2nd ave. A great first day.

Wednesday was full of appointments. Actually, the day was pretty set in stone. Morning appt at a bridal place, lunch, another appt at another bridal place, then a later afternoon appt with a cake person... then birthday dinner :). I knew what dress I wanted by about 11am. It was the third one I tried on. Didn't need to go to the other appt, but I did anyway just to make sure. So... dress acquired! The cake appt went wonderfully. Delish! And birthday dinner? Well:

There were crazy birthday glasses and extremely wonderful crepes! My faves :).

Thursday was my actual birthday. I celebrated by spending my day with my wonderful group of girls at Puffy Muffin. Yummm. I love those girls - I wish we lived closer together! Alas. While I was playing, Jimmy and his mom had a meeting with a possible rehearsal dinner place. Such a good fiance, he is.

Thursday night we went out to dinner with Grant and Megan at O'Charlies. I'm addicted to one of their salads, so that was totally my choice. The waitress was.... weird. She decided to become part of the family for the night. But whatev. We had a good time and I got a free dessert:

The waitress said there would be no singing, but Grant couldn't help himself. So that was that.

Friday was our open day to get anything else done that we needed. This turned out to include shoe shopping, dropping my dress at Blake and Mo's house, lunch at Calypso... and heading to the airport to sit around with delays.

All in all, I thought it was a really fun time with the family. I don't think we got everything done that we wanted to, but there was still a lot of stuff that got accomplished. I'm feelin good about it.

Now I have a few more days before heading back to work (oh, I say that and I realize I only have two more. Drat.). But it's been a nice vacation. I suppose it's time to go back and put out whatever fires have happened at work. :)

I know this post was boring - but I just wanted to get all that out there. There will be a much more interesting post soon. Promise promise.