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Archive for vacation

our summer staycation at jw marriott starr pass

By Nicole · Comments (1)
Thursday, July 21st, 2011

Last year, my dear friend Stephanie of Metropolitan Mama and Give Every Day blessed (and surprised!) me and my family with a 25,000 point credit with Marriott’s Reward Program. What that translated into was a free night at the JW Marriott Spa and Resort at Starr Pass here in Tucson a week before I headed into surgery.

Marriott’s free rewards program allows you to earn points for every night you stay. Points can be earned in a variety of other ways when traveling. You can redeem your points for free nights at over 3,400 locations throughout the world.

We stayed for two nights over the 4th of July weekend. It was the first time we has been to Starr Pass and it was absolutely amazing. Our room (when we were in it) was clean, beautifully decorated and quite. We had a balcony with the best view in the entire resort. The landscaping was emmaculate. Every person we were in contact with ended our conversation with “It was my pleasure…” Customer service is obviously a priority here.

The kids enjoyed the lazy river and waterside.

I enjoyed lounging by the pool and drinking my strawberry margarita as I floated in the inner tube.

We ate at “The Plunge”, a pool-side, full service restaurant, and visited the Starbucks several times. But the big hits were the 3 pools and ordering snacks and drinks pool-side.

Our weekend ended with a spectacular fireworks show on the greens, positioned directly outside our balcony. No kidding. It was amazing. And as if that werent enough, God decided to put on His own fireworks show about an hour later with a nice big monsoon storm…complete with lightning and a deluge of rain. It was our lucky weekend.

If you are in or traveling to the Tucson area, I highly recommend staying at the JW Marriott Starr Pass. But be prepared to pay a pretty penny for the amenities, food and extras…they’re not cheap. It was a little bit of sticker shock for this city employee salary family. Having said that though, you can get some amazing deals during the off season (August – December)…we’re talking $139 a night! That’s a sweet deal.

So thank you, Marriott, for a wonderful experience. And most of all, thank you, Stephanie, for choosing us to be the recipients of this amazing and generous giveaway. It was just what we needed to end the Summer right!

Comments (1)

Its Been A While, But I’m Back In The Saddle Again. (I Feel A Song Coming On…)

By Nicole · Comments (6)
Tuesday, July 21st, 2009

Boy, oh boy. If there’s one word to describe my life in the past two months it would be “abnormal”. Or “changed” or anything to do with “different-than-before”. If you read this blog at all, you’ll know that there have been just a few things going on in my personal life…all good things, but change nonetheless. Want to recap (Warning: Mother of all updates ahead…)?

May 11: Meet with realtor, take the plunge, put house of 7 years on the market and put an offer on the dream house.

new-house-driveway

great-room-new-house

kitchen-island-new-house

May 14: Husband has second work related shoulder surgery. Comes through swimmingly.

May 16: Sell house to sweet young couple just starting their family and buying their first home. Don’t even have time to stage it for selling. (I’m not complaining.) Pack, sign papers, try to keep things like work projects, homework, end of school year activities rolling as usual, pack some more, sign more papers, rent a storage unit.

May 22: School’s out for the summer. Oh no, now what?

diploma-schools-out

June 15: Move out of house…become temporarily homeless. Thank goodness for Grandma. Stay with her for 3 weeks while new house is finished. Swim everyday…sometimes twice a day. Not bad for temporary housing.

swimming

June 20: Work with some very patience clients who stick with me through internet connection up and downs. A few to mention and thank:

La Jolla Mom

la-jolla-mom

Check out her sweet new digs, especially if you live in the La Jolla, CA area. She’s got the low down!

Thoughts On Grace

sabbathmoments

We came up with a nice button for her Sabbath Moments Meme

Hopelessly Flawed

Hopelessbutton

Heather needed a button for a new series she’s doing called Makeover Mondays. Check it out and share your make over stories!

June 28: Dig Social Security card out of storage unit to prove to the bank I am who I say I am. Ready to offer first born as well, if needed.

June 30: Make my mark on the new driveway (before it was officially ours…oops).

driveway

July 2, 11:00 a.m.: After several delays, faxes, phone calls, and a few tears, finally close escrow!

signing-escrow-papers

July 2, 8:30 p.m.: Pull out of town in the rain for an overnight, 16 hour drive to Northern California for previously planned family reunion/vacation.

July 2-10: Soak up every ounce of fun in Monterey, CA.

fourth-of-july-bbq-vacaiton

lovers-point-monterey-vacation

lovers-point-monterey-vacation-2

big-sur-lighthouse-tour

seafood-vacation-monterey

family-portraitMy brother, the photographer, took our family portrait. I can not believe everyone (plus dog) is smiling and acting normal.

July 11: Come home, time to move! Of course its the hottest weekend of the Summer thus far. A mere 109 degrees. Can’t believe our friends still like us after that. Love the new house, so much to do. Choke on price tag for covering 19 windows.

moving-day-hot-summerDoes this lovely picture say it all??

July 13: Start noticing strange drainage “happenings”.

July 17: Drainage “happenings” escalate to “issues”. Call builder.

July 18: Previously planned out-of-town guests arrive for the weekend!

July 20: Year-round school starts, guests return home, drainage “issue” resolved. Wont go into the gory details, but lets just say it involved several plumbers, county officials, miscommunication, and a backhoe. I can once again flush my toilets with peace of mind.

backhoe

July 21: First day back to a normal work day! I’m so ready for life to settle down again. Thanks for sticking with me, dear internet friends. Its good to be home.

Now back to work…ready to get down to business on some fun upcoming blog projects. Need a blog design, Twitter page or button? Step on up! I’m ready for ya.

Comments (6)

Be Right Back…

By Nicole · Comments (2)
Tuesday, June 30th, 2009

Clock SignKids, I’m going on vacation. Day after tomorrow we’ll be heading to my hometown to celebrate 4th of July and a retirement party for my dad. I’m so excited I can hardly stand it. Oh, and there’s the small little issue of closing escrow on our new house. There’s more drama there than I can bear to utter right now, but if you hear a scream of absolute joy sometime tomorrow coming from the South Western region of the United States, you’ll know that we successfully closed escrow!

So I’ll be offline for a week or so, as I sign my life away, vacate, move, unpack, so on and etc.

Have you entered my TypePad giveaway? If no, you must! Hurry on over now.

Happy 4th. Be right back.

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Comments (2)

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