The long awaited trip to Phoenix post

**NOTE: it is actually the last week of December and I have sufficiently slacked off all of December on making any blog posts. Ok, to help myself feel better, I haven't really "slacked" per se, but I have really only been at home for about 2 weeks for the month of December, oh, and the one week that I had time I spent the time establishing this new blog address. SO. I digress. Point is: I have tons to update on but in an effort to do that, I am going to back date everything to the more appropriate time. Then, hopefully, by the end of this week (the last week in December), the blog will be up to date and 2010 will start off fabulously.**

So, November 25 we flew to Phoenix.

Sidenote: This was monumental for several reasons...or maybe just one big reason. We were supposed to go to Phoenix on November 27, the day AFTER Thanksgiving and stay through November 30. About 1.5 weeks prior to our trip, Tim found out that he had an all day interview on, GUESS WHAT DAY? November 30. Ugh. He pretty much had no choice but to go because to not go would be to not accept the interview and though I'm not going to talk publicly about this interview right now, let me just say: it was a BIG DEAL.

So, after finding out this information, we had to rearrange our travel plans and figure out the best bet. At one point one option was just to postpone the trip to next spring (seeing as how the last weekend in November was the last free weekend we'll have UNTIL next spring-insane!) This was an option in my frustration because seriously? Has anyone tried to change travel plans on the days surrounding Thanksgiving? RIDICULOUS. But, after choking on how much it was going to cost for changing our direct flights to disjointed flights (meaning direct flight there, layover in Portland on the way home), we sucked it up and decided to go November 25-28.

Going the day before Thanksgiving actually worked out great and it was so fun to be there for Thanksgiving. We got in around 5pm on the 25th and went straight to the hotel in Paradise Valley/Scottsdale to check in. We stayed at the Montelucia resort, thanks to the advice of my friend Jessica. It was AWESOME.

I'm not really one to take pictures of hotel rooms but I really liked this one- the dark wood, dark crown molding, lots of black and red.

And a shot of the entry way into our room.

And the bathroom. Pretty cool.

A shot of Timmy and I before heading out to dinner. And where did we go for dinner that night?! Pita jungle of course! Anyone that knows me knows my infatuation for that place- I LOVE IT. So it was naturally the first place I wanted to go upon our arrival...and it did not disappoint. The resort was having a night before Thanksgiving party with live music, etc. so when we got back we kind of hung around that for a little while. Apparently there were like 1500 people in attendance. I would believe it. I was cracking up at how little the Scottsdale crowd had changed since I lived there... And again, anyone who has hung out in North Scottsdale knows what I am talking about.

The next day, Thanksgiving, Tim and I had plans to head over to the Smith family house to eat breakfast and visit. We were going to just have Thanksgiving dinner with them but we opted to do breakfast instead so that Tim and I could spend some time together since time together has been so few and far between lately. The picture above is of Tim outside of the resort waiting on the valet to bring the car.

After making stops at the grocery store (and Starbucks- in true Seattle-ite fashion), we made it to the Smiths' house where we got to meet baby Brody (adorable- and by far the best behaved 6 month old I have EVER met...) and we got to play with the little girls (Chloe and Cadence) and visit with Ben and Jill. It was so great to catch up with them and to see how awesome their family is! They are great friends.

A picture of us with Cadence, er, Dora. I think after this picture our camera died, sadly. I'm pretty sure Jill has pictures of all of us together, including her. After this, all pictures from our trip are via iphone so the quality isn't the greatest and we weren't awesome at taking pictures.

After leaving Ben and Jill's, we went back to the Scottsdale area. Our resort is about a mile and a half away from Camelback mountain (an intense 2 mile hike). So we parked at the resort and headed to Camelback. It was pretty tough, as I remembered! Tim loved it... it's kind of like rock climbing and it's very steep...and there is a great view at the top. It was such a great day for it- weather was high 70s, sunny, totally clear. Perfect! Only bad thing about it (in retrospect) was that it ended up causing my stupid achilles to flare up again. Ugh.

A picture of me on top of Camelback.

And another with the shot of Phoenix in the background.

This was our view on the afternoon of Thanksgiving. Since I don't live in Phoenix anymore, I don't think that 78 degrees is cold, and is, in fact quite warm. So we spent the afternoon at the pool. It was perfect.

For our Thanksgiving dinner, we went to our own little dinner that was offered by the restaurant at the resort. It was AWESOME. Tim and I both agreed that we should do Thanksgiving like this every year. The food was amazing, we spent probably less than we would have if we had cooked, and there was no cooking or clean up involved. Plus, they had everything imaginable that you would want for Thanksgiving. Even though it was different than most Thanksgivings we have had, it was so nice, relaxing and absolutely perfect

A shot of me sipping my wine. MMM.

The next morning we traveled FOREVER to eastern LA.... actually, just western Phoenix where I used to live. The whole time I kept saying to Tim, "how did I used to drive this far everyday?" It was SO LONG. It took us about 40 minutes, which is about right. But we got to eat at my favorite old breakfast joint while we were on that side of town and Tim ordered the most amazing apple pancakes I have ever had. We then drove through my old neighborhoods before heading back to the Scottsdale area.

A shot of Tim waiting on breakfast.

And a shot of me.

We went on a walk after breakfast to burn it all off and then spent an hour or so at the pool to enjoy our last sunny day in Phoenix (Saturday the weather was expected to turn cold...) It was perfect again! We then headed out to Tempe to meet my friend Jen at a mexican restaurant there. It was awesome!! Again, so great to see such good friends and to catch up. She is great! We then were off and running again to central Phoenix where we were meeting our friends Jessica and Adam for dinner at an Asian fusion place. Dinner was amazing, and I can't say it enough, it was so great to see such good friends, to catch up, to laugh, to enjoy wine. Jessica and Adam are such a great couple and we had so much fun visiting with them. Sadly, we sucked at taking pictures amongst all of the catching up with Jen, Jessica, and Adam. Bummer! After dinner, we had tickets to the Jeff Dunham show. I know, I know, puppets, whatever. But he is a pretty talented ventriloquist and I think it's funny.

A picture of us before the show...or maybe it was in intermission, I don't know. The opener for Jeff was guitar guy. I actually thought he was more entertaining than Jeff.

On our last day, we went shopping in the morning after breakfast and then we were supposed to meet Melissa that afternoon but it ended up not working out. So instead, we headed back to Pita Jungle (I told you I love that place) for one last time...and to kill some time before our flight since we had about 3 hours before we had to be at the airport. We just took our time eating, got dessert, drinks, etc. It was great. We also witnessed a downpour in Tempe. It started to get cloudy/windy while we were eating (and we were outside) and then it just absolutely opened up and POURED, which is very strange for any part of Phoenix. So naturally, we moved inside.

A snapshot of the outside of Pita as we were heading to the airport (you can tell it's darker/cloudier in this picture). As we got to the airport, it continued to downpour- so crazy! We got lucky in that we were able to standby and catch an earlier flight (putting us in about 4 hours earlier due to the fact that we didn't have a layover in Portland). All in all, it was a great (but short) trip. We are hoping to make it back soon to see more friends and to enjoy all that we love about Phoenix. I miss that city and everyone there!