Weekend with the BF

My best friend and maid of honor flew to see me in Tucson this weekend. As always when we're together...we HAD A BLAST & a packed weekend. I think part of the weekend we thought we were back in college. Below are some highlights of our fab weekend!

Sara flew in Wednesday midday in perfect timing for me to scoop her up from the airport after my job interview. Praying that this job works out--I'll talk more about it if I get it. Of course H&M was one of the first stops. Sara had a gift card and spent it plus some in no time! We spent the rest of Wednesday afternoon around Tucson then had dinner at one of my favorite places - Guadalajara Grill.

Thursday morning Sara treated me to pedi's and then we got ready for our trip to Phoenix. Ryan had an interview Friday morning so we decided to go up the night before with him. Fingers crossed Ryan gets this summer job. Thursday night we got to get dressed up for Casino Night @ Gainey Ranch Fitness Club in Scottsdale. Ryan's family friend manages the club and was nice enough to invite us to the event. Sara, Ryan and I rocked the craps table all night & I'm ready to go to VEGAS now! We were so into the game we missed the fabulous dinner they had at the club. It was all fake money but we had so much fun learning how to play while enjoying a few cocktails.

dressed up for Casino night

Friday evening we had a chill night at our place and had some people over. We needed our rest for the Arizona-Washington game Saturday. We had a great day tailgating for the game. Ryan---Mr. President of PAD is in charge of putting on all the tailgates. We had a camper, flip-cup, cornhole, grilling, a DJ set-up and lot of great friends. Sara & I spent most of the day regulating the corn-hole.

tailgate set-up

camper, TVs, & a DJ

Group tailgating pic

...more weekend recap details to come

Saturday Morning

I started my day bright & early @ 3:45am. I got dressed quickly and headed out to Sabino Canyon to help volunteer at the "Hearts for Diamonds" race. I have been involved with quite a bit of volunteer work lately with the University Medical Center. I have met some great people & will explain more about this in some later posts. We were setting up tables and getting the registration tables ready using flashlights since it was still dark outside. Arizona does not observe daylight savings time so the sun still rises very early -- and by 5:30am it was light enough to see your way around. The sun was up over the mountains by 6:00 when the race started. The sun rising over the mountains was breathtaking and I can't believe I forgot to take my camera to capture a picture :(

Sabino Canyon has a 3.7 mile paved road up to the top of a canyon. I found some pictures I took at the canyon back in the spring and have shared them below. What made me a little uneasy about hiking here in the near future was the sign at the base of the trail stating "mountain lion activity high." On the weekends, bikers are banned from using the paved trails but this weekend bikers have been encouraged to ride the trail because of the high frequency of recent mountain lion sightings. I think I'll wait and hike when the mountain lion threat goes back down or until I invest in a hiking gun :)

sabino canyon

view from one of the many hiking trails

another view of sabino canyon

view from the start of the paved trail via

I was home by 8:00am and going back to sleep didn't sound appealing at the time. I woke Ryan and Sumo up & we all walked down to the Farmer's Market. Sumo was exhausted when we got back and I was happy with my purchases. My purchases included:

- head of lettuce

- a big carrot

- 2 small red potatoes

- clove of garlic --- best/strongest garlic I've ever used :)

- ryan bought a small apple pie and it was gone within 2 hours of being home

- a small pumpkin to help me welcome the Fall season --- these 100 degree temps are making me miss NC

- a sample of some organic dog food that sumo consumed in about 2 seconds

- a bag of chicken tamales from our favorite lady (her daughter helps her @ the market since she doesn't know english) ---- only 1 tamale still remains

my purchases