Celebrations, photo collages and holiday travel

Dave says I’m one of those people who only needs a regular flip cellphone, because I don’t use all of the features of an iPhone.  Well … prove him wrong I did.

While waiting for our delayed flight to Florida in the Denver airport on Christmas Eve, I downloaded some photo-art apps.   A sampling of my digital artwork is shown below … (tech savvy = me)!

Today, I write to you from my parent’s house in Port Charlotte, Florida, where I’ve been for the past few days enjoying a most-stupendous holiday break.

It’s been a whirlwind of celebrations, which started with my 29th birthday in San Francisco in the beginning of the week.  Dave cooked me a gourmet breakfast, set up a facial and massage appointment for me in the early afternoon, and then followed it up with an amazing dinner at Salt House, a restaurant in our neighborhood we’d heard many good things about since we arrived in “Everybody’s Favorite City”.

It was going to be a nice dinner no matter what, but due to the stupidity of our waitress, we not only loved our food, but we also scored some free items throughout the course of the night.

I ordered a light vodka martini, which was instead delivered as a hard tequila glass of gasoline.  Strike 1.  Then, we asked for a recommendation for the best entrée on the menu, and once we placed our order for that same dish, it was no longer available for the night.  Strike 2.  These things aside, we may have enjoyed one of the most delectable dinners of our time in San Francisco, complemented by an extra free dessert, and a fun Pinterest-found game of “30 date questions”.  Knowing me as well as he does, Dave had prepared for the evening with this set of hard-to-answer date questions to strike up some seriously interesting conversation.

My birthday was definitely a nice day.  Although it was spent just the two of us, it was full of surprises and fun.  And, it was just the beginning of the celebrations.

The next day we spent the entirety of Christmas Eve in transit, whether on the BART, at the airport, in flight, or in a car … in fact we didn’t arrive in Florida until after midnight, which made it officially Christmas Day.

(Side note:  Cleary these travel plans weren’t ideal, but they were the best we could do with last-minute booking on a budget!)

Nonetheless, we made it home, and it was worth all the hassle.

Christmas morning was full of gifts and laughter with Dave’s family in St. Pete, and Christmas night was full of gifts and laughter and plenty of wine with my family in Port Charlotte.  With all of the catching up and festivities, the day went by so incredibly fast.

The celebrations didn’t stop there.

The day after Christmas, my Mom held a belated-birthday luncheon for me, where all of my friends came over for an afternoon of relaxing chatter.  We sat in the living room and filled up nearly five hours of pure conversation and giggles, with moments of taking pictures, and of course, the blowing out of 29 birthday candles.

Even though I moved across the country, nothing has changed with my group of girls.  It seems like just yesterday we were all together.

Being back in Florida is great.  There is nothing better than relaxing time with the people you know and love.  Even though Dave and I are both feeling a bit under the weather from our travels, I feel completely full of friends and fun, and the holiday break isn’t even over yet, with a trip to Orlando for New Year’s coming up at the tail-end.

What else is worthy of sharing from my time in the Eastern Standard time zone?

• I drove a car for the first time in three months and it didn’t seem weird at all.
• I wore flip-flops for the first time in three months, and honestly, it did feel weird.  My feet felt quite naked.
• I purchased some items at Target, and I didn’t even have to pay the extra 10 cents for a bag like you have to in San Francisco (score)!
• I got caught in the rain running from the store to the car and had a bit of a freakout. Dangit — I really thought I had left the downpours out west.

Overall, Christmas break is amazing.

I love spending time with my family and friends, and I’m thankful to have had this great break to do that.

With all this free time, maybe I can download some more fancy apps … that’ll show him!