Friday, January 13, 2012

Trip Home & Key West

I need a vacation from my vacation! From Christmas Eve until my return flight home from Orlando, it was go, go, go!

Christmas
I arrived home the evening of Christmas Eve. My parents were stuck in traffic from a horrible accident on GA400 so I had an extra hour or so of sitting around before they were able to pick me up. Luckily, I was right in the middle of finally finishing up reading The Help so I didn't mind too much. We ate dinner at Buca di Beppo (a family favorite for many years!) and headed home.

On Christmas day, I slept in until around noon. I'm sure my parents were happy that I didn't wake them up at 4 am to see if Santa had visited. Once I was up, we exchanged presents and spent the rest of the day preparing for Christmas dinner, which we had the next day (my brother worked on Christmas so we postponed getting together until the day after).

I received some amazing presents, like this micro-polishing system for my face, a bareMinerals makeup kit, and the newest book by one of my favorite authors.


I have two of the best girlfriends in the world, and it makes me sad that I can't see them more often than I do. Megan & Jenny both came down to the house one day for lunch and to make cake pops!


My parents took me to their favorite restaurants while I was home so I had a lot of good food! For my friends living in Forsyth County, here are the websites for Kitani Sushi and Gasthaus. Both serve excellent food! So Me's is located in Helen, GA and is owned by friends of my brother. The food is really good as well.


(I didn't take that many pictures on the first part of my trip...oops. But don't worry, I have a ton from Disney World that I'll be sharing next.)

New Year's
I flew from Atlanta to Key West on Friday morning to reunite with Chris and his parents, Jeff & Danny. We had a jam-packed schedule from the moment I landed. We rode our bikes downtown to Duval St., watched the sunset celebration at Mallory Square, shopped, ate at a ton of good restaurants (like Seven Fish, Santiago's Bodega, and Louie's Backyard), and even did a key lime pie taste test challenge.

 1, 2, 3

Our favorite pie ended up being the one on the far right, from Kaya Island Eats. This is a fairly new restaurant located at Mile Marker 14 on Saddlebunch Keys.


The nail polish in the second photo above is really cool! It is by a company called Del Sol, and indoors the color is a shimmery blue, but once exposed to UV light, it changes to a light purple! I think it's so neat!

My favorite "cousins" (Chris' first cousin & her family) sent me Lilly Pulitzer pencils and a notepad set along with fun sprinkles for decorating cupcakes! PS - Hiiiiiiiiiii Jeanie & Mishi!


Here are a few more pictures from the trip!



Chris & I had such a great time in Key West! Even though the island is small, I still feel like I didn't really get to see everything in my short time there!

Next up, I'll share pictures from Disney World for my Dad's 65th birthday!!

7 comments:

Sweet Simplicity said...

I want to go to Key West someday. I have heard such good things about it.

Mary A. said...

seriously awesome haul! What a memorable trip!

Stephanie said...

Oh how fun!!!! I need a vacation!!!!

Jules said...

I'm so glad you had a nice vacation. Christmas at home sounds really great filled with family, friends and food! You got some nice gifts too.

Geof always tell me how much I would love Key West and I think he's right. It looks like you had a great time with "C" and his family. The Key Lime Pie taste test is something I would have loved because that's one of my favorite kinds of pie.

I can't wait to read about Disney and I hope you have a relaxing weekend!

Laur said...

WOW! I'm tired after just reading all that! Sounds like a great trip! Cant wait to hear bout Disney!

Mrs. Jansson said...

What a fun trip! Can't wait to see your photos from Disney World!

Shoshanah said...

I used to have a flip flop charm similar to yours. I loved it and wore it all the time, at least until it fell off of me one night. This was back in college, and let's just say I had no idea it was missing until to the following morning.

 
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