another year older

Yesterday was my birthday, but I mostly celebrated on Saturday. I woke up early to make it to a store-wide 1/2 off sale at a local thrift store. As planned, I arrived at 8:59am (opened at 9) and although I was the 5th or so car there waiting, I was the first one in the door. haha. Unfortunately, they had already sold the yellow striped swivel chair and cute picnic basket I was wanting to get (from this outing). I did however have a nice stack of things that I took home.

 After that, I went to an outdoor flea market and picked up this somewhat  psychedelic sheet. Wouldn't it make a cute maxi dress?

I was on my way home when I saw a Green Living Festival so I stopped to check it out.

I met some interesting people. Taste tested a dozen different tomatoes (so so yummy. favorite one was called Yellow Pleated Hillbilly). Got an Arnold Palmer (tea and lemonade mix) and headed home.

Well, I have been wanting to stop and take pictures at a bunch of different spots along the road between the house and town. I was alone so I figured this was as good a time as any. However, it was around noon and very sunny out so not the best lighting conditions. I'll have to try it again sometime.

It was time to get home and get cute. I even painted my toes my favorite color for 'late summer, already have a nice tan' .... tangerine.

Then off to the train depot for Toast to the Canyon! It's a steam train ride to the canyon and back, including wine and appetizers on board.

The seat benches and old luggage made the interior very quaint. Even the tickets, were well designed. The staff was fun and encouraged us to climb up into the engine. I even pulled the very very loud whistle.

And on the ride back to the depot, they let us stand outside and feel the droplets from the steam engine. I highly recommend checking this out next summer (as this was the last one for this year).

I was then on the look out for chocolate cake and ice cream. Not as easy as it might sound, but I did finally find some at a little dive diner.

All and all, a pretty darn good day.

Thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes!!

Birthday Pictures

The celebrating was nice and spread out with multiple birthday lunches and get-togethers with friends and family. I had lunch with my friend Ann last week and had lobster!

(yes...it's 90 degree weather in Kansas, but we were freezing inside the restaurant)

I like to set out my cards and gifts :)

On my birthday, I had lunch in the park with my sister (and quite a few hungry ducks)

I went to Zoobilee for the first time ever.

lots of yummy food

oh my! and this massage was awesome!

a few furry friends

i wore this cute early 80's dress i found at a garage sale the day before.

I had a fun birthday filled with yummy food, being outdoors, and good music.

Sunday, I had chocolate cake with fudge frosting with the family.

And then this week I had lunch with my friend Steve.

Man was I spoiled :)
Thank you to everyone who helped me celebrate

my Bday + home in the barn

I had a lovely birthday in the Outer Banks. I started off the day checking out the one thrift store in town. Nick got to parasail for the first time and loved it.





I had a long relaxing massage, so much so I kept falling asleep. I even did the big jerk right before you fall asleep, and woke myself up. We had a nice dinner that ended with a beautiful sunset.


The weather was beautiful during our stay there, however the very last day was the sunniest. Understandably, we were reluctant to leave :) but none the less, enjoyed our time there.

We made it back to Asheville Saturday night in time to crash. Sunday we spent the day cleaning! Monday, Nick spent the day in a coffee shop working and I got my first chance to navigate myself around town. Thank goodness for gps. The roads here are crazy. One road curves into another road and then into another road and you've only gone a few blocks. Some of the streets don't even have street signs. I feel I only know a very small portion of this city so far, but have not pieced it all together yet to understand the big picture. Of course, I can tell you where all the thrift stores are. :D Oh, and a couple Aldi stores, too.

So we have a few furnishing for the house. We are trying to only buy a few things since we are not going to be here very long and don't want to take it all back with us or have to worry about loosing a lot of money donating it back. So my first task was searching for the few furnishings we need to live here comfortably while we are here. We are still sleeping on an air mattress and don't have a couch yet... so still have a few things to get. But, moving on to the next task of making curtains for this huge space. Our landlord gave me some scrap material to use and I have gotten a little myself. So I have 8 sets of curtains to make. Yikes! I definitely need more material. Good thing I brought my sewing machine. Nick's got a good idea to just do them fast and messy and funky, and not worry about making them perfect. I think he's onto something. I need to get my nesting done and on to more fun things. Like PAINTING!!!

So once I feel we kind of have this place "finished" a little, I'll take some pics. In the meantime, picture a huge room with a couple chairs, a lamp, some huge frames on the floor, an end table and my sewing machine on a table. There you have it.

the Outer Banks

Since we are homeless this week, we decided to spend it away from Asheville. We woke up Monday morning and said to ourselves..."where do we want to go?" We checked the weather all over the east coast. Friday is my birthday and I want to do something unique and fun. A hot air balloon ride has been on my bucket list since I was a kid and thought this would be a great way to celebrate. So then I started searching for Hot Air Balloon Festivals. I think a sky filled with balloons is just so beautiful. There are a few going on in the US on friday, but we didn't want to drive all the way to TX, etc. There are quite a few out east closer to the end of the month. But hey, your birthday is your birthday. AND it's on a Friday this year, too.

We still hadn't decided for sure where we were headed, but figured we better start headin' there. :) So we decided to head to the coast, possibly the Outer Banks. I had never heard of the Outer Banks before. Nick drove first and I was on the internet researching the different islands. What the differences were, and so forth. I was even looking at cheap last minute flights to where ever. We decided on Hatteras Island, NC.

We love B&B's so we looked into those. We didn't make it to town til almost 9pm so we decided to check into a hotel/motel (with good reviews) at least for one night then check out the B&B's the next morning. The bed ended up being more comfortable at the hotel, plus an awesome view of the ocean, pool and hottub, walk right down to the beach, full kitchen, and great price (deal for staying so many nights). So we are staying in the hotel the whole time. And we are staying til Saturday so I'll be here for my Bday. So if anyone wants to come surprise me, ha ha, you know where I'll be.


Nick is working this week with hope of getting some time off Friday to spend with me. I spent the first day being lazy by the pool and at the beach. Yesterday we road our bikes to this old light house that had 257 steps up a winding staircase that we got to climb to the top. Pretty neat. Neither of us are afraid of heights and we did fine climbing it. But a short while after it was all done, we were walking around the museum next to it and we both admitted our legs felt kind of wobbly for some reason. I figure it was the excitement mixed with the exercise that caused it.





Then last night we went for a hike in a coastal reserve. It supposedly took us to the top of a sand dune where we could look down into a "interdunal" pond with lots of wild life. It was so over grown that I didn't even stop to look down because I was sure that could not be what they were talking about. It was a nice trail all the same.


Today we are going to take a ferry (car and all!) to the next island down, and spend the day in a quaint little village there called Ocracoke. I'll be shopping while he works in a coffee shop (for the most part).

Friday we are going parasailing (no, hot air balloon rides available :( ) in the morning, I'm getting a 90 minute massage in the afternoon, and then a yummy diner that night. I haven't found any live music (other than karaoke) that night. I'll keep trying.