Archive for the ‘Friends + Family’ Category
Man, seriously, I am sharing a lot of photos this summer. What’s up with that? 
Last weekend Divine treated me to a day of girl fun and fabulousness. We’re both pretty busy people, so it was only just recently we’ve been able to get together, just the two of us, to hang out. This outing was a belated celebration for my birthday, first with a spa appointment, then with dinner in the city.
If you’re ever in San Francisco and want to be pampered, I highly recommend the Recharge Spa on Nob Hill. I love their logo. Kinda reminds me of someone else’s.
I really like flowers in a vase. I really do.
So I selected pale pink for my hands and the sea foam green for my toes.
And here’s Divine waiting for me to stop taking photos of her.
Instead of spa chair foot baths, we soaked our feet in foot basins. Good health practice. And check out the chairs we sat in. Nice.
Check out my toesies! They look so clean. Of course, not even a half hour later I smudged the polish. I always smudge the polish.
Typical: me taking a photo of the Apple store as we passed it.
One thing I can say about San Francisco’s homeless, they have personality.
Had ourselves dinner at First Crush. The food was great. The wine, even better.
Grabbed this shot incognito through the window of a couple in love. Nights are magic.
Thanks, Divine, for such a great time. We’ll do this again for your birthday. 
Posting photos from my trip to Chicago last, last weekend. Lent Joy a hand photographing another wedding. Unlike my last trip to Chi-town, which was only a month ago, this trip was super short - only 36 hours! But I’ll take a short trip any day if it means hanging out with good friends. Seriously, there’s nothing quite like spending time with friends to make one’s summer a blast.
Sahrie picked me up from the airport and I spent Friday night at her place. Glad to see her and MJ! Saturday morning, we headed out to meet Joy for a day of beautifying and shopping. Girlfriend time is fun.
Stopped by a restaurant for some grub. While there, I had to watch my beloved SF Giants lose to the Chicago Cubs. Boo.
Oh, I forgot to mention that I got a super cute haircut while I was there! It’s short and piece-y and reminds me of a cut I used to sport in the 5th grade. Ha! So to commemorate the occasion, we played Rihanna in the car.
Trekked it over to Joy’s place to spend the rest of my trip with her family. The last time I was there, I totally forgot to take a photo of her house rules. This time I made sure it was the first thing I did.
The last time I stayed over, little Rocket was only just crawling around. And in the short time since, he’s become a walking demon. Rocket, indeed. Glad to catch this shot of him when he was actually sitting still.
Had the pleasure of taking these family photos of the Uzarraga clan. They are a beautiful family. So happy to spend some time with them.
CONGRATULATIONS ARE IN ORDER
For the fantabulous Kelly Purkey. Who is now a Garden Girl. Who is a girl I love with all my heart. Sincerely and truly and so damn happy she’s on the team!
Congrats, KP!
I guess I’m a chatty, catty with all the posts I’ve been putting up this week.
And in this one, I’m sharing just a few of the photos taken with my camera during my recent girlfriend getaway trip to Las Vegas. Hot, hot sun. Fun, fun times. And let me point out already that these are the photos that I can actually post. There are more that are *ahem* controversial.
We booked our flight via Virgin America. Have you ever been on this ride? So, so smooth.
Inside surrounded by their signature purple lighting was Virgin America’s media center unit which they call Red. Here I am chatting with my friend asking what our Vegas plans were.
We stayed at the Hilton Grand Vacations just off the strip thanks to some time share goodness. This elephant met us once we entered the room. And the chocolate coins, too.
Helery, Cat, Jeannie and I did some shopping inside the Caesars Palace Forum while we waited for Aileen to arrive. I always enjoy visiting Caesars Palace because of its decor.
Hit up Anthropologie and their collection of letters and numbers. Can you guess what this trip was all about?
After a night of *ahem* party fun, here are Jeannie and Aileen early the next morning being LOL silly.
I actually did a bit of work and held an engagement shoot (which I’ll share in a future post) early Sunday morning and these two came with me. We did a session at this landmark Vegas sign. It’s actually much smaller than how I thought it would be.
Walking around and checking out the sites. This is the water foundtain in front of the Paris hotel.
I was loving the columns inside the Miracle Mile shopping complex. Doesn’t this pose just scream passion?
Cat and I as seen in the largest rear view mirror in the world.
Do we look like Kanye or what?
This was the closest I got to a Chippendale.
Sunday night meant the seafood buffet in the Rio. I only had enough energy to take a photo of my dessert because I was already slipping into a food coma.
After a night of partying *ahem*, we headed to a much needed spa appointment the next morning. The most fantastic spa experience I’ve ever had; I highly recommend the Mandara.
And after the spa was more lounging by our pool. There’s nothing quite like lounging by a pool on a Monday morning.
I looked up and saw this.
I actually didn’t gamble at all during the weekend; I’m not much of a gambler. But I was highly amused by a lot of the slot machines, especially this eBay one. Don’t people gamble already when they make purchases from eBay? Funny.
Walked the strip our last night there. Stopped by the M&M shop and took a photo with this guy.
You tell ‘em, girl.
The girls re-enacting on this fake Brooklyn Bridge the Miranda and Steve scene from the SATC movie. Hilarious.
The strip. Lights galore.
And the obligatory photo of the water fountain show at the Bellagio a la Ocean’s Eleven. Just lovely.
Thanks for letting me share! Cheers!
I’m finally just now sharing photos that I took on my trip to Chicago this past Memorial Day weekend. I went to help Joy photograph a wedding (and I’ll be sharing those photos in a post later this week). The wedding was fun, but I had a great time just trekking around downtown Chicago and visiting with Joy’s family.
I took a red-eye flight so I actually got into Chicago Midway early the next morning. On the way to Joy’s house, I caught this Illinois sunrise.
When we got to her home, there was a rainbow waiting for us.
Precious Cadence let me sleep in her room during my stay. She left me a note of welcome.
I got a taste of what it’s like to be a mother of three young ones. Oy vey. Haha.
After being in the Chicago area for CHA the last three years, I finally had the opportunity to actually go into downtown and tour. Here are just a few flowers that lined Michigan Ave.
Of course I took a photo of the Apple store. Of course I did.
Tourist central: The Water Tower Place.
Joy with her Aunt who was kind enough to act as our guide. She was super fun.
Joy is laughing at me about something, but I forgot what about.
My craving for Thai food and sushi was satisfied. Yum.
And my fortune. I concur.
I didn’t get a chance to visit with other friends while in Chicago, but I hope I get a chance to when I visit again in July! What?! Yup, I’m coming back for more wedding fun. Yay, I can’t wait!
A new year. A new blog design. A new Grace. Here we go.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME
I celebrated my birthday this past Sunday with the best people in the world: my family and friends. The party started early Saturday evening and we did a countdown to midnight. So much fun. I felt incredibly loved and so lucky with the people in my life. We had food cooked by my brother, an awesome guava cake, an ample supply of spirits, and Rock Band. I couldn’t have asked for more than that.
Here are a few pics from that night:
Archie, getting the party started.
Celebrating Melinda’s 30th birthday, which was the Thursday before.
With my roommates from college. We saw SATC the night before and continued the party.
Everyone playing Rock Band. It’s so freakin’ addictive.
I’m sure I’m saying something truly riveting…
The spirits. And there was more in the ice box in the garage. Oy.
And a game of Texas Hold’Em. I don’t play, but I love to watch.
Can you find birthday Grace?
A photo of just a few of the birthday cards I received. Love them all and I’m going to scrap them soon.
Thanks to my Dad for making sure I was a girl, to my Mom for doing most of the hard work, to my brother for being my hero, and to all my friends for keeping me theirs and loving me unconditionally.
CHANGES
So you like the new blog design? Goodness, there are still massive additions I need to make, but at least I got the foundation of this blog design down. There are a lot of pages that will remain under construction through the weekend, so I hope you come back to visit to see the changes.
HOME SICK
Ugh. I’ve got a head cold that I can’t shake off. So I’m sick in bed and messing around with my blog design. I need to finish a few designs tonight. Art therapy - there’s nothing quite like it.
Kinda. If you call Southwest planes jets.
I’m on my way to Chicago! To meet up with Joy! And do fun stuff! Whee!
Yeah, but not yet. I’m stuck in Oakland waiting for my flight. It’s been delayed two hours, which means I won’t be landing in Chicago until close to 3a.m. Poor Joy since she has to pick me up.
So while I’m waiting, I’ve connected myself to the interwebs and am now catching up on episodes of Top Chef: Chicago on You Tube. Is that legal? I don’t even know, but if someone puts it up, I will watch.
ART THERAPY
I need some. Like right now. I’ve been so busy at work that I haven’t had the time to just create random acts of art. Haven’t had the time to even blog. No excuses, I know, but there you have it. I expect I’ll be messing around in Joy’s stash so we’ll see what the weekend brings.
LABEL TULIP SHARES
Layouts! That I did as the guest designer this month for Label Tulip. I really love this club because the girls on the team are awesome. They love to scrapbook and they show it off well. Fantastic team, fantastic talent, fantastic product choice. And I’m honored to be with them this month.
“One Day at a Time”
“Daily Routine”
Personalized Gift Tags
THAT’S ALL FOR NOW
Until tomorrow and a new Love List. Same bat time. Same bat channel.
share today. One of my layouts I created for the Garden. This one was super fun.
“War or Peace?”
(c) 2008 twopeasinabucket.com
TO-DO TODAY
- Verify the status of my tax refund. (Yay!)
- Determine what I want to spend my tax refund on.
- Come up with a better invoice/receipt system for tax filing next year.
- Put any remaining tax refund money to savings to buy more happy stuff in the future.
WHO READS THE GRACE’S LOVE LISTS?
Should I move these lists to another day of the week or should I just keep them for Friday? I’m curious as to your internet browsing habits.
LOVING MY LENS
Loving it. Took these last week of a friend. She’s beautiful. Huge eyes.
314
That’s the magic number. That’s how many emails I have unread. *Sigh* Today I’ll try to get to half of them. Wish me luck.
Have a great day!
Cubicle life is much more fun when your neighbor takes time out of her day to feed you.
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