A Natural Choice: May 2011

Hi everyone! I just returned to Chicago after 2 WONDERFUL weeks off from school. Of course it went by too fast. Time sure is flying by and I'm enjoying every minute...well I have to be honest, I did not enjoy the last two weeks of finals which happened to include TWELVE tests. Not cool, not cool at all. But the best part is I survived and spent two wonderful weeks with friends and family.

Tim and I met out in Palm Desert, CA and spent a few days with my parents and Gretchen. They bought a new place after we had been there over Christmas and we didn't want to wait until next Christmas to see it! We had a fun few days packed with pool time, fab dinners with friends, hiking and catching up on sleep (especially for me!) and celeb spotting...well only one celeb but it sure was exciting, especially for my husband. I flew in on a Friday morning and my sister and Tim flew in the night before. When they came to the airport to pick me up, Gretch and Tim came in to the baggage claim area to greet me. As we were standing there chatting and waiting for my bag, I looked across the conveyor and saw Anthony Bourdain (chef extraordinaire, has the show "No Reservations"). Anyways, Tim is a HUGE fan so I excitedly said, "TIM, look who is across the way!!!" Well Tim turned about 10 shades of red and was so excited! Gretch and Tim went over and said a quick hello, not to draw too much attention. I prefer to keep my distance from celebs, because I like to have this idea of who they are in my head. For example, if I went up to my favorite celebrity and said hello and they were totally rude or mean, I'm sure it would bother me for a bit. Weird I know. Anyways, he was super nice to them and even gave Tim a low-five. Apparently he was on my flight from Chicago, I just hadn't noticed him when I got on the plane. And let me tell you, he is a damn good looking man in person. I know he can look a little rough on his shows, but in person whoa baby! I gave Tim a pretty hard time because it seemed to me that he was more excited to see Anthony Bourdain than he was his own wife who he hadn't seen in 5 weeks... =) I wish I would have had a camera on me to catch that greeting!

I got to spend about a week in a half in Wichita, which was not nearly enough but I'll always take what I can get! Tim and I worked super hard on the house while I was home and on Friday, May 6th we put our "For Sale by Owner" sign in the yard. Sell baby, sell! We've already had two showings and saw a few cars stop to take an info flyer. I know it's not really the best time to be selling a house, but we've got to get Tim and the dogs up to Chicago ASAP. But my visit wasn't all hard work, we spent many an evening with friends and family, sharing dinners, stories and drinks. I did capture a few pictures along the way (which means Tim actually captured a few pictures along the way)...