BFF's since 2nd grade

So as you all know Lindsey, my bff since the 2nd grade, came for a visit this past week. It was sooooo wonderful to have someone here on a daily basis to visit with.  I miss her more then ever now that she has returned home........But it was wonderful to have a piece of home here for a visit.

We did a lot of shopping and eating.....two of our favorite things to do! And Bruce took Saturday off so we could all go explore the Royal Gorge and cook out.   It was so beautiful! We loved it!  We also did some walking and exploring of other local attractions.  And the weather could not have been better, so sunbathing on the patio was high on our list of things to do also.  I dare say our house is quiet now.....but soon enough (next month) my wonderful mother-in-law Rosie will be out for a visit, we can't wait!

Luckily due to Lindsey flying out yesterday, I was unable to weigh in.....and after the homemade cheesecake and lasagna splurges and eating out, I am GLAD! HA!  But back on track it is and I will be weighing in next Tuesday.  Bruce took his test and felt great about it, so that is a wonderful sign! YAY BRUCE! And Pudge is loving the beautiful weather and being able to SWIM! :) I have a paid vacay next week, so we are heading to the mountains to camp, first time this season!! We can't wait!!!

We hope you all had as good of a week as we had!  Take care, love and miss you TONS!

Love,
Nichole, Bruce, and Pudge xoxo

Relaxing by the fire 

 Royal Gorge

 Lindsey on top of the world :) 

 Walking the Bridge

 View from the Tran Am

 Skyline Drive

The only pic of the three of us at the bottom of the Royal Gorge.  

Please excuse my crazy hair :)

 Bruce's man fire :) 

 The beautiful flowers Bruce bought and had waiting for Lindsey and

 I when we came home Friday.  They were originally in two 

vases, one for each, but we decided to blend them :) God he is AMAZING! 

Ready for SUMMER!

We are soooo ready for summer!! The weather is mostly in the 70's and this has us so excited and eager to ........travel, attend weddings, camp, hike, have bonfires, kayak, fish....the list goes on and on.  So with the nice weather came a wave of yard work duty.  We planted, weeded, fertilized, and cut all day Tuesday.  Our yard is beautiful and ready for summer! :) I also gave in and bought a ton of the wall sticky hanging things.  It makes me mad to think about the wasteful money part of it, but I am so much more in love with our home now that our photos are up.  In just the last few weeks we de-cluttered the house, organized the office and spare bedroom, and revitalized our yard.  And I figured since we did all of that, why not just go all the way?!  Our house is much more homie now and I love it, even after spending the damn money. :)

WW went pretty well this week.  I lost 1.6 pounds, not as much as I would have like to see, but it was something.  I have lost a total of 28.2 thus far, well on my way.  We made stuffed shells with ricotta, mozzarella, and Parmesan cheese and homemade marinara sauce for my splurge meal this week, YUM! And to kick off our summer obsession we made angel food cake topped with strawberries and whip cream (all lite of course and you can't even taste the difference ;) So delicious! We ended our day off together by relaxing, studying, and enjoying the fresh air by having the slider open until we went to bed.

Bruce has his SGT's test tomorrow morning and he is camping out at home studying is butt off.  GOOD LUCK BRUCE!!! You will do amazing!

Friday I get to pick Lindsey up! I am so so so excited!! I will get her in the morning and we plan to hit up the mall right outside of Denver on our way home....COACH HERE WE COME! :) Then we will do a little more shopping in the Springs and have some dinner.  Saturday we plan on going to see the Royal Gorge and grill out in the beautiful weather.  I am beyond excited for this week and weekend :)

Pinterest made an appearance again.  I made an awesome planter for the front yard and some adorable gifts from idea's I got from Pinterest.  LOVE IT! :)

We hope you all had amazing weekends and an even better week! Miss and Love you all tons!
 Love,
Nichole, Bruce, and Pudge xoxox

Beach towel, magazine, travel cup, and tanning lotion
all tied together with ribbon. Loved this idea

Stacked pots.  I used a paint pen to write on the pots.  Except I didn't measure the wording very well on the top one, so if you're wondering it says "The Browns"....Oops.  But still love it.

Pudge and the new pots :) 

Front yard :) 

Random pic.  The lovely trail of cloths my hubby left me after our run.
Good thing I love him so much haha :) 

Garage Sale

So quick post about the garage sale.......IT WAS A SUCCESS!!!

It was pretty painless and I would go as far as to say, EASY! It took me about 2 hrs last wk to clean out the house (which I would have done anyway) and decide what I wanted out out out and maybe an hour Friday night to set it all out and organize it, with the help of my very patient hubby of course. ;)  I was open from 8:30-1 today.  I actually had people waiting for me to open the garage door because they saw me setting up the evening before.  People are serious about their garage sales!

We were able to meet lots of new people around our little town and it was so wonderful to see so much of our unwanted things make someone else so happy.  Someones trash is someone else's treasures.  We spent $4 on poster board and price stickers and got $30 to make change with, and with that all accounted for we ended up profiting $203 smakaroos.  Not too shabby for the spring cleaning pile and throwing this together so fast!  Bruce was so surprised, and he said we should remember this when we do our "spring cleaning" again.   Most of the stuff was gone by the end of the day and what wasn't I took straight to the donation center so it wouldn't make an appearance in our house ever again!

Next on the list for this weekend is to plant all of our flowers, vegetables, and grass seed/fertilizer.  Which means we will be officially ready for summer! We hope you all have a wonderful rest of the weekend!

Love,
Nichole, Bruce, and Pudge xoxo

The final set up of the sale right as we were opening the doors. :)

New shelves and organized office

 You can actually walk in.... :)

Clutter free & chalkboard Love

So this past week has been primarily dedicated to getting organized and completely clutter free for summer. The spring cleaning bug has bitten again, except this time we hit all closets, rooms, and everything in between. We cleaned out every single nook and cranny finding so many things unused and collecting dust.  Because of these new discoveries we have (well I have) decided to have a garage sale this Saturday! Yes I said a garage sale.......and I am officially 90 years old! No offense.  I just have some really beautiful things that are literally brand new with tags, for example the brand new unused Oster stand mixer ($100) that we received as a wedding gift and never used because we also got our KitchenAid stand mixer.  I thought that instead of the usual trip to the donation dump I will try my luck and see what comes of it and whatever is left after Saturday will go directly into my trunk and straight to the donation center.  I just can't believe how much we can accumulate in just a year.......crazy.  So I got the cute little colored stickers and poster board and tagged everything and made some signs, the whole shebang! Wish us luck........

WW was definitely not as bad as I was expecting! I actually maintained, which means I didn't lose or gain a single ounce.  Which of course I am sad I didn't lose, but on the other hand after eating and eating and drinking and drinking and eating some more in CT & NYC I am glad that I didn't gain either!  My WW leader was so proud of me, which was nice to hear even though I didn't lose.  So back to work it is!  Time to get back on the losing wagon!

Bruce and Pudge are both back to being super duper healthy! Thank goodness.  Bruce finally has his SGT's test scheduled for next Thursday at 9am.  So he has about a wk left of studying, I am so proud of him!! Pudge's nail is healing and he doesn't even notice it anymore, so he's back to playing and running full speed!

I also completed another Pinterest project this week.  While cleaning out the clutter I found an old gold mirror that was hideous!  I painted the frame silver and painted over the mirror with chalkboard paint.  It turned out fabulous and I am so in love with it!  I immediately went out and got more of the wall sticky hanging thingy's and hung it up, chalk, and an eraser.  Bruce really likes it too, it's a great way to leave little notes to one another.  :)

So that about sums up our week.  We hope you all had a fantastic week also! We love and miss you all so much!

Love,
Nichole, Bruce, and Pudge xoxo

Completely rejuvenated 

 hung right outside of the kitchen :) 

What's Sleep?!?!

I have returned from my amazing trip alive and completely and utterly EXHAUSTED!!! I haven't been this worn out since............well probably not since I use to pull an all night college binder with class the next day :)

I flew out of Denver at 6 AM Thursday morning (which meant leaving our house at 3AM), arrived in CT at 2 PM, ran on adrenaline and pure excitement to stay up until about 2 am the next morning.   Friday I was a bit hungover, not gonna lie! haha But we muscled up enough effort to have some more drinks at the Hibachi restaurant.....SAKI!!!! Then of course that lead to a few beers at home in our sweats! :)  I stayed up to talk to Bruce at 12 CT time and went to bed.  Saturday we were up and at 'em for 6 am to be ready for our limo at 8am.  Needless to say we didn't sleep until about 5 AM the next morning.  Then up again at 9 AM to go and explain more of NYC.  We were all in bed by 10 on Sunday and in bed by 1 AM Monday......so sleeps were few and far between.

BUT I will say this, it was SOOOOOO worth it!!! We had an absolute blast!!! We laughed and laughed and laughed the entire time! I'm talking full on belly laughs, the kind that make your sides and cheeks hurt the following day! It was everything I knew it would be and more.  I miss those girls and am sad that we are so far away, but when we do get together, boy do we make it count! I am soooo truly blessed to have each and every one of them in my life.  They bring me pure joy and happiness and I believe that is a rare thing to find in this crazy world!

I believe every person should experience NYC at least once in their lives.  It's truly amazing.  Nothing like it in the world.  I was awestruck.  We explored China town, Little Italy, the Subway system (lost haha), Ground Zero, Coyote Ugly and much more Saturday after arriving before heading back to our hotel to get ready for our big night out to celebrate Naomi!! We met some amazing ppl that were so kind to hook us up with more limos to go to and from our hotel.....yes we took limos everywhere! So awesome! The club had a rooftop that had a breathtaking view.  We had our own space (VIP), bottle service, and even security! And to top it off we had an amazing server, she was just so kind and on top of things and our "body guard" as we like to call him, was so so so kind and did his job well also! No one got in our space, we didn't have to worry about all the liquor or our things, which was a relief!  We were also right by the DJ and basically had our own dance floor, amazing is the only word to describe it!

Sunday we got up early enough to hail taxi's (yes I hailed a taxi down town NYC hehehe :) and went down to Time Square. Then we headed out to see St. Patrick's, which was by far the most beautiful place I have ever had the privilege to see.  And Rockefeller Center and everything in between.  Then we took our limo back to CT.  We were in the city for about 30 hours and did and saw so much! I will never forget any of it!!!

I am, however very scared to weigh in this coming Tuesday.   I obviously missed it yesterday because of travel, THANK GOODNESS!!! We ate a lot of really great food, but boy oh boy!  So I am going to try and run my butt off to get back in the swing of things! I am sure the first couple of runs will be torture but hopefully I just fall right back into the swing of it after that initial torture.

Wednesday, right before leaving, Pudge hurt himself pretty badly.  He tore his entire dew claw basically off, ripping it down to the tenant and nerve.  Poor little guy, it was so sore.  So I took him to see Erin and he was on pain killers, antibiotic, and had a cast for 5 days.  He now has the cast off and it is slowly healing up.  He feels a lot better tho, he hated that cast.  He did get spoiled.  Daddy carried him everywhere and gave him lots of loving and treats while mommy was away.  Poor little man.   Bruce is so amazing, he also cleaned all the carpets and house from top to bottom while I was away and I came home to a spotless house! If I haven't said it enough before, he truly is amazing!  He got another email from Border, with another workout routine.  Ugh I wish he would just get the email we are waiting for, but I can't complain too much because he is still in the running!

Well we hope all is well!! We love and miss you all soooo much! I'll leave you with a few pics from the trip........

SAKI :) 

 Naomi opening her gifts

 The BEST gyro I have ever had 

 First cab ride in NYC

Dinner in Little Italy 

 Naomi getting our bottle service at the club

The view from the rooftop of the club :)

 We're on the big screen 

 inside St. Patrick's 

 St. Patrick's 

 The girls before going out Friday in CT 

 :)

 goofy :) 

 So funny 

 Pretty Ladies

 Gorgeous family 

 Love him!! :) 

 LIMO!! :) 

 beautiful 

 Walking thru the gates of NYC subway system 

 The girls

 Freedom Tower 

 China Town

 Loves

 :))) 

Our bodyguard pretending to kick Naomi out haha :) 

 Time Square