Life in the Emerald City

Today I came home and let the dogs out of their kennel as usual.  Mackenzie must have been thinking about her left overs from last night all day, b/c she immediately went over to her regular eating place…the chair!  She’s a princess, I know; we put her food on the chair so Madison doesn’t eat it before she can…Madi will eat everything in the time it take Kenzie to eat her first bite!  So, we put Kenzie’s food up on the chair and she eats there now.  Usually, she never finishes her food and we just place her bowl up on the tables in front of the chairs. (We’re lazy, I know).  So today, Mackenzie figured out how to put her paws up on the table and get at her left over food.  Not that we mind that much (although now we know we can’t leave human food up there), but it’s always better the dogs don’t get up on the tables where we eat!  So, here are a few good shots of Mackenzie, enjoying her leftovers while learning a new trick!

Sneaky Mackenzie builds a bridge to her leftovers!

Doh! Mom caught me!  He he!

In other news, I made a great new soup today…Eggplant Tomato!   MMMMMMmmmmmm……  I’ve posted the recipe on my food blog, La Cucina della Vaniglia.  Check it out if you up for an easy, but very good soup!

Tomorrow starts the Gator football season with a home game against Hawai’i.  Wish us luck!!

Ciao!

The wedding website is finally complete!  Whew!  We’ve spent so much time reworking it and not liking it, then reworking it and not getting it finished before the save-the-dates went out, then reworking it again…geez this has been a LONG process.

Nevertheless, it’s finally done! So, GO CHECK IT OUT!!!  http://wedding.ensbell.net I know you’ll love the title!!

Yesterday Sean and I spent the whole day working on getting all the material up there and then sorting out in a manner we both liked.  We think it looks really great and hopefully it will be useful to our friends and family members!  Let me know what you think and please join the mailing list so we can keep you up to date as the wedding gets closer!!

Back to work today and tomorrow, then the gym, grocery shopping and laundry…my life is so full!  We are doing well though, very happy in California, dreaming about our next adventure!  Speaking of…

We are considering slimming down our posessions, purchasing a sailboat, and living while cruising on the seas for a while.  We will be taking some sailing lessons and looking for suitable sailboats over the next few months.  We hope to be on our new boat by the end of the year!  More to come on that later!

In the mean time, we will be working on starting a new business together and getting my dog business off the ground.  Things are definitely NOT boring in our lives.  Wish us luck and we’ll keep you posted on how things progress!

Ciao!

It’s been an uneventful couple of days around here, so why don’t I send you over to my food blog for a yummy recipe for Squash Soup!  Check it out at my  La Cucina della Vaniglia!

Ciao!

Yesterday Sean and I celebrated our 4 year anniversary as a couple.  We chose to sleep in on a lazy Sunday morning as we don’t get many opportunities to sleep in.  After noon, we got up, showered and dressed for a fun day of good food, drink and friends!

We started the day at the Ambrosia Cafe for their Champagne Brunch. 

All in all, I’d say the food was about average and the outside patio had little air circulation, so it was very HOT!  However, it wasn’t overly expensive and Sean and I left with satisfied tummies.  From there we headed to Ed Cox’s house for an afternoon Bar-B-Que.  A very charming little beach cottage make-over in beautiful Santa Monica.  Ed Cox is a former roommate and now very good friend of Sean (and me).

We started with the Fantasy football draft, which turned out to be a lot more exciting than I had expected.  Basically there are ten people in our league (most of them former Gators) who’ve formed teams (i.e. chosen names) and we each get to choose a player one at a time for 14 rounds.  Then every week we choose 9 of our players to play against one of the nine other ‘fantasy’ teams.  Based on how the players do in real life (which means we of course have to watch all of our ‘fantasy’ players’ performances) determines how well our fantasy team does.  It is all very confusing to me, but it gives me a reason to watch more than just Gator games and root for other players than just Tim Tebow and Percy Harvin (a.k.a. The Greatest Players of ALL Time!).

So, after the draft is finished, Sean and I take a think break.  We headed over to West Marine for some window shopping and Ralph’s for some much needed chocolate bites!  Then, on to the party…

Sean and I pose for a close-up.  The flower in my hair is from the BEAUTIFUL bouquet of roses Sean bought me this week!

Our party hosts, Ed Cox and his girlfriend, Jessica.  I caught them in an awkward hugging motion, but you can see we were all having fun!

Party guests…sorry, there were too many great conversations and laughs going on for me to remember everyone’s names, but they were all very nice and it was very nive to meet all of them!

The Bar-B-Que was very laid back with great food and awesome wine!  Thank you Ed and Jessica for helping us have a wonderful celebration and for the great atmopshere and conversations.  As for me, I’m off to bed to get a new week started of right! 

So it’s August, the end of August at that, and when I first started this blog back in January I imagined there would be many more posts than I’ve actually done.  But I’ve been a slacker, one trait I’ve mastered, and I haven’t kept up with my blogging.  I am making a second third fourth attempt at blogging. Here goes:

Today Sean and I celebrate 4 wonderful years together as a couple.  We can’t wait for our wedding in November, but we still enjoy celebrating our dating anniversary.  Not quite sure what we’ll do yet, but that’ll give me something to blog about tomorrow. We recently moved to Long Beach, CA, so there’s plenty of places for us to explore!    Speaking of moving…

We moved here in June b/c Sean took a great job with Boeing as a Flight Test Engineer.  Maybe I’ll post the trip in a later blog post next week.  We took lots of photos and the drive went well for most of the trip!  Anyway, Sean’s working and loves his job, meanwhile I am working at Chez Allez as a day chef.  The restaurant is a small breakfast/lunch cafe with an American Bistro style.  I love it as well, so yay for jobs!

Right now we live in a very small studio apartment, but are looking into buying a boat.  A sailboat that is.  We are considering moving onto the boat for a year or so, waiting out the market for our house in Gainesville to sell.  Anyway, still working on all that…I’ll keep you posted!

Alright, well I think that a good place to start…lots to catch up on…my new goal is a new post every other day…we’ll see how well I keep up with that!

…Jeez this is just like when I start a diet…