Rejoining the World of Blogging

It has been a very long time since I have blogged, which is a shame because this past year has been quite the eventful one. I'm not even sure where to start to catch up on things. There have been a lot of ups and a few downs, but things have been good, for the most part.

So here's a brief catch-up on the goings-on of the Conelly household over the past nine months or so:

• We bought a house, obviously, and have spent a good amount of time decorating and doing minor DIY projects, mostly in the kitchen and dining room. Our current project is updating our framed photos (since our current ones are all engagement/wedding photos) and redoing the collage wall in the living room. I'm hoping to do a post with pictures of some of the little things we've done that I think look really nice.
• Andrew lost his job. Which was a very stressful time for a little while. But we have been blessed with how good my job is, and we have been fine financially. That means that once Andrew finds a new job, we'll be able to save most of his income, which will hopefully get us to our goals faster. 
• We went to Disneyland. This may seem a little frivolous after losing one income, but it had been half paid for before Andrew lost his job, and we had cash and gift cards we had been saving for the trip. The only thing we had to pay for out of pocket was the hotel, which made it feel like a very inexpensive vacation. And it was so much fun to be in Disneyland for Christmas. It's just so pretty. We had such a good time. 

• We adopted a kitty! Andrew and I had no idea we could be crazy cat people, but Bagheera has transformed us. This adorable little fuzzball has completely stolen our hearts and we love her to death. Bagheera is a really fun and rather affectionate cat, and she is spoiled rotten. But I think she deserves it after living in a shelter for six months and being burdened with the name Pink. But we saved her from both, and now she answers to Bagheera just fine. Well, when she wants to, anyway. We're even half considering getting an actual kitten at some point in the future so Bagheera has someone to keep her company, but we'll see.

• We celebrated a fun, quiet Christmas with just the two of us, and it was so relaxing and nice. We didn't have anything big under the tree, but that didn't matter; it was nice to be home together. New Year's was also low-key; I don't even think I made it to midnight. I'm pretty sure I fell asleep on the couch.
• I got a pretty awesome raise at work, which is such a blessing, especially considering it came completely out of the blue. I'm so incredibly grateful for my job and for the company I work for. My bosses care about me and want me to stay and be happy here, and the executives are all so careful in making sure their employees are taken care of. I am incredibly fortunate that I have followed my career opportunities to be where I am today.
• Andrew and I celebrated our second anniversary in the glorious Wizarding World of Harry Potter! We had been talking about this since last year, but when Andrew lost his job, we didn't think we would be able to make it work. But when we looked at our finances, the money was available, so we just went. And it was amazing. Seriously. The expansion with Diagon Alley and the Hogwarts Express is pretty incredible, and I loved every second of being there and feeling like witches and wizards really do exist. I geeked out hardcore and enjoyed myself thoroughly. This trip was only a couple of weeks ago, so I'm hoping to write up a more detailed post once Andrew edits the pictures he took.

And that brings us to the present, which isn't terribly exciting at the moment. Andrew has a couple of solid leads on jobs, so we're hoping and praying that one of them comes through for us. And if it doesn't, he'll keep trekking and keep looking, and we know that he'll find something eventually. We don't have any fun trips planned, so there isn't much to look forward to in that respect. But that's okay. I'm sure we will find fun things to do, and hopefully I will be able to stay up on blogging in the future.

Short Update

So, yeah, I haven't posted anything in over a month. I'm super behind on the family history questions I was answering, and I haven't posted any updates about the busyness of the past four-ish weeks. So here's a short update about what's been going on in our lives, and I promise I'll write more detailed posts soon.

In the past month, Andrew and I went on a Disney cruise to the Bahamas (which was AMAZING and I want to go back RIGHT NOW), had colds for a solid week, and went to San Diego (which was beautiful, as always). After which Andrew threw out his back while moving furniture. This week has been the first normal week in a long time (meaning I've been in the office working every day).

While I'm happy that we're getting back to normal (and actually putting money into our savings account again), I'm also super sad that we don't have any fun trips planned in the near future. But I do gain solace in knowing that Disneyland is a go for December. I'm so excited. Even though it's still nine months away. But it will be awesome when it comes.

And now for the only two photos of the trips that we have uploaded so far.

Waiting at the ship's terminal in Miami, and so happy to be off the airplane.

The beautiful San Diego Temple

Should We or Shouldn't We?

In 2007, I went on a ridiculously awesome vacation with my brother and sister-in-law. We spent ten days exploring New York City, and it was amazing. I loved every second of it. And then I didn't go on another vacation until 2012, when I went to Disneyland with my family. I had so much fun on that trip too, and it was so ridiculously nice to finally have a real break from work. I had coworkers who would ask me why I never went on vacation.

And then Andrew and I got married and went to Hawaii for a glorious week. And then we decided on a spur-of-the-moment trip to Universal Studios Orlando where I fully embraced my nerdiness (and enjoyed every second of it). And then we booked a cruise for our anniversary, which is coming up soon (and oh my gosh I can't wait!). And all of this has simply fueled my wanderlust. I just want to travel all over the place.

And now we have three more trips to consider:

1. San Diego. It looks like I'll get to go for work, which means my flight and at least a couple of nights at the hotel and some food will be covered by my company. So all we'd have to pay for is Andrew's flight and maybe a couple more nights in a hotel. And seeing as how Andrew has never been to San Diego, I think he really should go with me.
2. Washington. Andrew's 10 year high school reunion is this year, and we're trying to decide whether or not we should go. Rather, I'm trying to convince him that we should. It would be really fun, and I'd love to see Washington in a month that isn't super cold and miserable.
3. Disneyland. My brother and sister-in-law are planning a December trip to Disneyland, and they've invited us to go. I think it would be an absolute blast, and I have always wanted to see Disneyland at Christmastime. I've heard it's amazing.

So here are the arguments for not going:

1. I work for a ridiculously awesome company that has offered (basically) unlimited vacation time. But while I don't have to worry about accruing hours, Andrew only has a limited number of days off, which he tries to use judicially. I can't blame him for being concerned about using up all his PTO.
2. We are trying to get into a house, hopefully sooner rather than later. And despite living on two incomes, we are by no means rich, meaning it will take some saving in order to cover a sizable down payment and the closing costs without becoming house poor.

And here are the arguments for going:

1. As DINKs (dual income no kids), we have room to play. And as soon as we start popping out the babies, we will have to pass on a good portion of these kinds of opportunities. I want to take advantage of this benefit while we've got it.
2. These are relatively inexpensive trips, especially to San Diego and Washington. And Disneyland is far enough in the future that we have all year to save for it.
3. How often are we going to have opportunities like these? There are real reasons to go other than that we just want to go and have fun (which isn't a bad reason either). The San Diego trip will cost half as much as it normally would, we have family in Washington we could probably stay with, and we would get to watch my nieces and nephews experience Christmas in Disneyland.
4. We can make Disneyland our Christmas present to each other. It's not like we have kids who would need some sort of Christmas morning awesomeness; we could just have a couple of small gifts under the tree and call it good.

So what do you think? Should we go, or shouldn't we? I'm trying to convince Andrew we should, but maybe viewpoints from other people will help me out.

I love San Diego. So much. It's gorgeous there.

I would really, really love exploring Seattle when I'm not freezing cold and wet.

Just look at it! How magical is that?

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter

Prepare yourselves for lots of pictures. Andrew posted them all on Facebook, but you get to see them again! This time with commentary! Hooray!

We started our trip at the airport, of course. We parked the car and took the shuttle to the terminal. For such a short trip, it was way more convenient to just pay for long-term parking than it was to find someone who could drop us off and pick us up.

Then we grabbed some ridiculously expensive airport food and waited for our flight. I hate the waiting part of trips. And often the flights. The turbulence makes my stomach queasy, and since Andrew and I had to sit across the aisle from each other, we couldn't watch movies together or play any games. Lame. But we survived the flight and made it to Orlando, where we waited for our shuttle to take us to the hotel. We didn't get in until after 1:00 a.m., when we immediately crashed and were up again in five hours.

But waking up wasn't too bad because I knew that soon, very soon, I would be seeing Hogsmeade in real life! Well, as real life as Hogsmeade gets. Our hotel was conveniently located a mere 20-minute walk from the park, so we headed out to take advantage of our early admission to the park. We got to the entrance, used the kiosk to print our tickets, and stood in line, only to be told that what we had weren't the right tickets. We were directed to guest services, where we were told our registration didn't show any park tickets. Ummm . . . that was certainly a problem, and seeing as how we had all our confirmation documentation, we could prove that we actually paid for our tickets. We were finally given comp tickets for the day, and then we had to go to another office to figure out our actual registration. Eventually all was well, but it ate into our park time, so neither Andrew nor I were the happiest of campers.

But then we walked into Hogsmeade and my eyes were filled with this:

Who wouldn't be happy after that?! My mood was immediately awesome and I kind of started freaking out a little bit. It was so cool!

We started our day with breakfast at the Three Broomsticks.

A traditional English breakfast. It was tasty. Except for the black pudding. That was not so tasty.

If you watched long enough, the hog head would MOVE. Magic, I tell you!

A super nice security guard offered to take our picture.

We then headed over to the Forbidden Journey, which we had heard wonderful things about. I was almost more excited—scratch that. I was actually more excited about going inside Hogwarts than I was about the ride itself.

The line starts in the Herbology greenhouse and moves through the entrance hall, Dumbledore's office, and the History of Magic classroom. The portraits on the wall actually move and talk and cross over to other frames. It was incredibly well done. I just had so much fun looking at everything and taking it all in. I loved it, of course.

At night, these words would suddenly appear on the pillars.

The ride itself was pretty awesome and impressive too. It was half roller coaster, half simulated in the vein of Soarin' Over California. There was a lot of movement, though, and going on it after eating a full meal may not have been the best decision.

We then had to go and try the famed butterbeer.

Photo attempt #1: Andrew took too long to take the picture and my mouth got so full of butterbeer that I couldn't hold the pose anymore. This was the result. 

Photo attempt #2: Success!

Andrew only needed one attempt.

Butterbeer is quite possibly the greatest beverage known to man. So good!

We spent the remainder of day one wandering the shops in Hogsmeade, taking pictures of awesome things (which were everywhere), and going on Spiderman and a whole bunch of water rides that left us sopping wet. I was not a huge fan of that last part.

This baby Mandrake was squealing at us from behind the glass.

When we got home, I got such a kick out of seeing purchases from Dervish and Banges and Zonko's on my credit card.

Watching a kid get chosen by a wand in Ollivander's would have been so much cooler had the kid actually seemed like a Harry Potter fan instead of being a sarcastic little bugger.

Pretty sure I was sopping wet by the time this picture was taken. Sorry about that, Mr. Conductor.

After taking a rest in the hotel room and changing out of our soaking wet clothes, we headed back over to the park in order to catch our showing of the Blue Man Group. Neither of us really knew what to expect from the show. I had seen the clips of the percussion and paint, but that was about all I knew, other than that the performers were covered in blue paint and didn't speak. But it was so much more than gimmicks. The percussion was truly awesome, and there was improv and comedy and audience participation, and the whole thing ended in a giant dance party. Instead of streamers, they shot toilet paper out over the audience, and these huge, light-up beach balls fell from the ceiling to be tossed around the audience. It was such a blast. Unfortunately, taking pictures was prohibited, so this is all I have to show for it:

We started out day 2 at the other park, which was called Universal Studios (Harry Potter is in Islands of Adventure). We used our early admission intending to hit up Transformers before the line got to be three hours long, but to our dismay, it was down. So our early admission was wasted two days in a row. But we made the best of it by going on Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem, which was adorable, and the Shrek 4D show, which was not nearly as adorable. We then stood in line for this ridiculous-looking roller coaster, which broke down before we could get on. So we ducked out of line and gave it up as a lost cause.

Andrew wanted to hit up the Simpson's ride, so we headed over there, and he had a good time looking at all the things they have set up there. What he did not enjoy, however, was the ride itself. It is a simulated ride that twists and turns and goes backward and forward and his motion sickness kicked in like nobody's business, so he had to spend a few minutes sitting and sipping Sprite.

After going on a few other kind of lame rides, we decided to head back to Islands of Adventure for lunch at the Three Broomsticks. On our way out, we checked in on Transformers, and it was up and running again! We used our handy-dandy express passes that we had gotten as a compensation for losing half of our registration to avoid the two-hour line. It's such an awesome ride; we both loved it.

Megatron

Andrew was so excited for this picture. Those robots actually have people inside them. Pretty insane costumes, eh?

We headed back over to Harry Potter and got fish and chips (and more butterbeer, of course) for lunch.

I was pretty worn out from the heat and humidity by this point. My flyaways/frizz are awesome, though.

The Three Broomsticks does fish and chips right!

We honestly could not get enough of this stuff. $3.75 a glass? Totally worth it.

By this point, the heat and the humidity were getting to me in a bad way, so we decided to take a break and nap in the hotel. Who knew that 20 minutes could feel like an eternity? My hands were so swollen that I looked like I had sausages for fingers, I was sweating bullets, and I thought I was going to pass out. But I made it back to the hotel in nearly one piece and collapsed on the bed, reveling in the wonderful air conditioning.

That rest was just what I needed to gear up for our last night at the park.We headed back over to Islands of Adventure, and by this time, clouds had rolled in and it was sprinkling slightly. It made the weather quite beautiful, and the park was nearly empty compared to the lunchtime crowds we had just left. We went on the Hulk roller coaster, which was FANTASTIC, and left me with some pretty awesome hair.

What you can't see is the little nubbin left in my ponytail holder at the back of my head.

We also went on the Dueling Dragons, which was also a fun roller coaster in Harry Potter, though the Hulk was better. There were more cool things to see in this line, too, this time all related to the Triwizard Tournament.

We spent the rest of our evening relaxing in the Three Broomsticks and just wandering the streets of Hogsmeade. I really didn't want to leave—it just had the greatest feeling. I felt like Hagrid could stroll through any door at any moment. I really felt like I was in Hogsmeade and that witches and wizards really did exist. But alas, all good things must come to an end, and our trip was no exception. And as spur of the moment as the trip was, and as short as it ended up being, I am so glad we were able to go. I had such an incredible time. I can't wait until they finish the one in LA so that Harry Potter can be a little bit closer to home.

And now, a few more pictures.