Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Mooney!!

We spent the weekend celebrating the marriage of Alexis and Tim! Despite the crazy weather with timing that could not have been more perfect - the monsooning started as soon as we got back on the limo bus to make our way back to the hotel for cocktail hour and then stopped as soon as we got back - everything went off without a hitch. Alexis covered every single detail, and she was an absolutely beautiful bride! Tim didn't look so bad either. Congratulations to you both! We love you and hope you have an AMAZING honeymoon in Greece!!

Pebble Beach Days 2 & 3 - Recap

Ryan spent the morning playing a round of golf at the Pebble Beach Golf Links. Here he is on the 18th green. He had a great time and shot under 100 (I think a 98).

Since I had no plans while Ryan was playing golf, I decided to take the rental car and drive north about 30 minutes to go back to a produce stand that we passed on our way to Monterey from San Francisco to pick up these. It was so worth it! I ended up buying 3 baskets and managed to finish off one whole basket of strawberries by myself before Ryan had returned from golfing.

On the way back from the produce stand, I stopped in downtown Monterey. The picture below is of Cannery Row in Monterey.

I also visited Lover's Point in Pacific Grove which was over-run with squirrels!

After Ryan returned from golf, we picked up our rental car (see below) and did the 17-mile drive. Just kidding about the rental car. As part of our package, we got to take a test drive of the car below for 2 hours, so we figured what better test drive than 17-mile drive.

One of our stops along the way. If you click on the picture to enlarge it, you can see the seals on the rock.

The Lone Cypress. This tree has survived out there for over 250 years!

During our last day at Pebble, Ryan had an early tee time at Spyglass Hill Golf Course (see below). He said that this course was much harder than Pebble. While he was golfing, I was lucky enough to spend some time at the spa getting a Hot Stone Massage. It was amazing.

Blogging While in California = FAIL

Despite my good intentions to blog while we traveled to San Francisco & Monterey, I was a complete failure. Even though Monterey was really relaxing, I just couldn't find the time to blog, and I was so exhausted from all the sightseeing in San Francisco that I couldn't even think straight! I'm working on some recaps from the trip and still need to finish the honeymoon recap, so it is clear that I have a ton of catching up to do. For now, we're on a semi-vacation in Atlantic City. Being the good CPAs that Ryan and I are, we are here to take a class for continuing professional education in order to keep our licenses current. Conveniently, Ryan found a class that we could take that was located in Atlantic City. Imagine that... Ryan found somewhere to go where he could get an accounting class in AND gamble. Whatever, I'm just happy to get away for a few days. We're staying at the Borgata and after a minor snag while checking in at 9pm (there were not any non-smoking king rooms clean - not quite sure how that happens, but we were able to get an upgrade to a suite, so I guess we won't complain), we've had some cheesesteaks with wiz (Cheese Wiz for those who aren't familiar) from Tony Luke's and Ryan is happily seated at a blackjack table hopefully winning some money. After walking around the casino floor and checking out the minimum bets at the blackjack tables, I decided that I just couldn't part with that much money, so I headed back up to our suite and relax. Here's hoping that Ryan manages to walk away a winner tonight.

Pebble Day 1 - Recap in Pictures

On our way to Pebble Beach, we took Route 1 (the scenic route) and saw this.

Half Moon Bay

Some amazing coastline

More amazing coastline. Yes, we drove over that bridge.

We stopped at the River Inn in Big Sur and saw what we think is a woodpecker.

The view from the River Inn at Big Sur.

We made it the Inn at Spanish Bay in Pebble Beach in time for Happy Hour and listened to the bagpiper that plays every day from 5:45 - 6:30pm.

We sat around the firepits and enjoyed some libations (sorry, didn't get a picture, but Ryan had a mojito and I had a snuggler - a hot chocolate with pepperment schnapps, marshmallows and whipped cream)

And ate pretzels shaped like golf tees.

Then we had dinner at Pebble.

And had our picture taken in front of the famous 18th green.

The View from 15,000 Feet

After a little bit of a rocky 4am start this morning, this beautiful sunrise at 630am on our way into Charlotte, NC made it all better! We arrived at the Inn at Spanish Bay at Pebble Beach this afternoon and it's so beautiful here! More to come soon!

The Resident Carpenter/Woodworker Has Been Busy!

I’ve been pretty lazy busy lately and haven’t had a chance to post about the latest projects that Ryan has finished. We’re heading cross country to Pebble Beach and San Francisco, so I figured I’d at least draft a post while sitting on the 5-hour plane ride. I am now sitting outside the airport in amazing 62-degree weather (without the humidity that hit us in the face when we left for the airport this morning) waiting for Ryan to show up with our rental car (pretty great system if you ask me - he gets the car and I get to hang out with our bags and we don't have to deal with them on the shuttle bus). I’m hoping to also post some highlights from our trip while we’re there, but we’ll see how well that goes depending on how tired I am each day from all the spa treatments sightseeing. Anyway, back to the projects…

The first project is the flower box. We decided to give this to Ryan’s mom for her birthday since she is quite the gardener and loves flowers so much. It has been finished for a few weeks, but I couldn’t post about it until we had given it to her. We spent the past weekend with the LeNoirs playing beer pong to celebrate Linda’s birthday. I didn’t do a very good documenting the actual flower-box-making process, but I do have pictures of the finished product.

The inside is pressure treated wood and the outside is teak.

Up close

What project wouldn't be complete without a "Handcrafted By" nameplate?!

The next project on the list was a mantel for Mom-Mom’s fireplace in her condo. Ryan built the mantel at our house, but didn’t put it together completely until Maryann painted it. We dropped it off on a Friday night and came back on Sunday after the Phillies game to install it.

Putting the mantel back together after Maryann painted it.

Putting the glue on it to put it up on the tile

The "naked" mantel without all the trim

Ryan putting the trim on. You can tell he was working hard by his sweaty shirt!

The 99% finished product. The brown marks are the wood filler that was used to fill in the nail holes. This will be painted over in white by Maryann.

And, the name plate.

Sunflowers!

I came home from work on Thursday to find that my dad had left us some sunflowers from his garden! So pretty! Thanks, Dad!!