zoo & aquarium - San Diego

These are just some of my favorite shots from my visit to the San Diego Zoo and Birch Aquarium. It was such a great visit, and I can't wait to go back someday soon!

downtown san diego.

Our first day in San Diego, Andy and I spent the whole afternoon by ourselves wandering around downtown - the Gaslamp district, Harbor Side, and wherever our feet took us (until our feet gave up). The above pictures our just a sampling of those I shot on our journey. I also have more pictures to come of our time at Torrey Pines, the zoo, and more! They'll  be posted over the next couple of days. 

californian dreamin'

While skipping through rocks in La Jolla, CA, one can find some furry friends or ones with gooey tentacles. Either way, it's a great way to spend they day until the sun begins to set and the chill comes in. Then it's time to head to a cozy cafe and enjoy great food, great friends, and great times. 

san diego.

I'm currently in San Diego with Andy and my family right now. It's a vacation/scoping out possible grad schools trip that has mostly been vacation. Been here for a couple days now - been to the beach, the zoo, the aquarium, Scripps Institute of Oceanography, and the Gaslamp district downtown which means there are lots more pictures to come. I return home next Tuesday, so for the rest of my time here there will be a whale watching trip, visiting family, and maybe a bit of geo-caching with a family friend.

Although being here reminds me a bit of my graduate school state of limbo currently (haven't heard from any of my schools, yes or no, yet), I still think I needed a little bit of vacation so I wasn't just in front of my computer waiting, waiting.

weekend getaway.

This weekend, Andy and I took Friday off and headed down to Austin to meet my parents for a weekend of fun in the sun. We spent Friday at Schlitterbahn which is a waterpark just outside of Austin and is tons of fun. 

This picture pretty much sums the day up. Lots of floating around lazily to avoid the extreme Texas heat. Schlitterbahn is actually made up of three different parks. The water of one, the original park, is supplied completely by the river that runs through the small town. There's even a intertube ride that takes you out onto the river for a short float. It's kind of chilly, but it's so much fun. The other two parks are more new and full of more thrilling rides like water slides. Anyway, we had a great time. At the end of the day we were all pretty tired. But not too tired to head back to Austin and check out the famous bat fly out from the South Congress St. Bridge. These bats live under the bridge all summer long and make up the largest urban bat colony in the world. It's really quite exciting to see them all fly off down the river at dusk. We were below the bridge, but here you can see all the people standing on the bridge as the bats take off.  A quick shot of underneath the bridge where you can see some of the bats flying around underneath the bridge before they take off down the river on their nightly hunt.

The weekend was a blast. It went by way too fast and I can't believe my parents have already headed home. This week is already bound to be busy. My new roommate is moving in this weekend and then on Monday I have my GRE exam. I'm just trying to get all last minute cleaning and studying in. Wish me luck.

new friends.

I found Disney World was a great place to meet new, super friends. I think Mrs. Incredible might be hitting on Andy a bit. 

I'm in a bit of a craft block right now. I'm wishing I had the skill and money to sew one of the purses in the patterns a friend of my mom's sent me. Actually, right now I'd settle for just understanding how to even use the pattern. I keep the patterns displayed by my sewing machine to try to inspire myself to try one. Some day, some day. In the mean time a pair of slippers is slowly coming to life - hopefully they'll make a new, comfy friends for someone's toesies. 

disneyworld

It's about time I got around to posting pictures from the Walt Disney World trip, I know. So here they are. These are only a very small sampling of all the pictures from the trip. All of them can be found here, here, here, and here on my facebook. I don't think you have to have a facebook account to view them, but let me know if I'm wrong. 

Overall it was a great four days and exactly what I needed to forget about all the craziness going on here. 

new haircut.

I'm in Dallas until Wednesday, when Andy and I fly to Orlando (Disneyworld!). In the meantime, we're just hanging around here enjoying our time off and trying to relax a little bit after all the drama and everything that has been happening lately. So for about a week and a half there will probably be very few updates from me as I'm not crafting and just being a bit lazy. I'm still around though.

I also got a new hair cut today! Always got to look great for your trip.