Adventures with Sissy!

My little sister and best friend came to stay with us for 10 days and we had so much fun!  She is such a California girl and got me excited to do all these California things I take for granted.  We tanned at the beach (a.k.a I covered myself from head to toe in sunscreen, a hat and a blanket while she laid out and put oil all over herself), ate at super healthy, overpriced cafe's, shopped until we both ran out of money, made homemade banana ice-cream (best banana ice-cream we've ever had!), went to In-N-Out so sissy could get a t-shirt, star-gazed at the Griffith Observatory, drove by enormous houses in Beverly Hills (museums?) and all the designer boutiques (you know the kind with only one of everything where they serve you champagne while you shop?) until we were too depressed to care anymore, went home and cheered ourselves up by painting our nails and doing facials and stayed up late most nights watching crazy weird documentaries about conjoined twins, the heaviest person in the world (650 pounds), the tiniest person in the world (5 pounds), people addicted to eating french fries and pizza and CORN STARCH, and pretty soon we were feeling pretty great about ourselves!

My little sister is one of the coolest people I know.  She's a vegetarian (I wish I had the strength), an amazing photographer, has the coolest style, and isn't even into boys!  She is way cooler than I was at 16 (and let's be real, than I am now haha).  She is so mature and smart and cool and just so interesting!  I guess she lives in practically a different world than the one I grew up in though.  When I was 16 I got my first cell phone (my dad's old one) and all it did was call people.  Useless.  Steph could care less about boy bands (are there any?), glittering her eyes (does anyone else remember Bath & Body Works body glitter?!), and boy scoping at the mall (who even talks to their crushes anymore when they can text, tweet, facebook message, and "♥" them?)  Yup, it's a different world alright so maybe that's why we are super different.  But either way I love her to pieces!

Here are some of the few pictures I remembered to take...if she had left her camera I would have lots more!

At sissy's favorite, Urth Cafe!

As usual, she ordered much better than me: Tortilla soup and a caesar salad

Margherita pizza (still pretty good)

Facials!

Our good old friend Albert Einstein

This view was so much better in person!

At the cutest Italian restaurant, C & O Trattoria (they pass out song lyrics to Bella Notte and everyone sings it every half hour and have waiters whose sole job it is to see you never run out of garlic bread rolls which are the yummiest EVER!)

We love you sissy!  Come back and visit us real soon!

Masters Family Reunion 2014

I can't believe it's been nearly four months since I last blogged!  I completely re-designed my layout hoping that will make me want to blog more often!  My cousin Cali helped me with the tough stuff and I figured the rest out on my own.  So now I'm trying to start blogging at least once a week!  I want to get in the habit now because when we have kids I know I'll be super busy and if I don't already blog, there's no way I'll start and I don't want to forget anything from their childhood.

So, what have I done this summer?  Well, I interned for my agent at Coast to Coast, we MOVED, went to our tri-annual Masters Family Reunion in Colorado, celebrated my hubby's 27th birthday, spent a week with my sister shopping, eating, hitting the beach, and touring all of LA, and I officially graduated from USC!  It's been a pretty busy summer.  Here are some pictures to recap the fun!

Mark's presents!

Mark's favorite dinner: pork chops & applesauce (which he cooked himself because I don't know how to cook meat) 

Mark's Special Plate (wedding present from our cousin Ellen)

Mark's biggest present - a dartboard!

At our family reunion, the main cabin had this big electronic dart board and anytime Mark wasn't in my sight I knew where to find him...playing darts!  He LOVED that dart board!  Whenever we were in the family room talking or anything he couldn't be in there for more than 5 seconds without getting up and gathering a group together to play with him.  When he couldn't get real people, he rounded up the little kids (including toddlers) to play!  Haha, most of the time he played with real people though.  He loved that dart board so much I didn't know how he was going to live without it, so I got him his very own.

This is where we spent most of our time...playing games, reading, watching family slideshows, playing darts and just relaxing

I think here we're watching one of those slideshows I mentioned

Before a game of Blow Darts (basically you blow air soft darts at other people so Mark loved this one too)

Even the babies played (don't worry, we didn't really hit them)

Our turn to cook! We made delicious Hawaiian Haystacks and one of my new favorite desserts, Skooky (I think). It's basically barely cooked cookie dough with vanilla ice-cream on top!

 Haha, my sweet cousin Jessica who for some reason let Laurin do this to her hair! (Note her evil grin)

My sissy and the happiest little baby I ever met, Phillip!

Mark and Nathan climbing rocks! Every time I saw these two together my heart melted...I can't wait to have kids of our own!

The second group of horseback riders!

 On our nature walk

Everywhere we went looked like something out of a fairy tale! I wished we had more time to just wander through the forest and look for unicorns and fairies ;)

 Nathan loved being with us which made me super happy!  At one point I walked into the car to sit because that rock was super uncomfortable and he came looking for me and hopped on my lap in the car.  He is so precious!

Our group got rained on during our ride (more like poured on) and Mark gave his raincoat to Laurin because she didn't have one for Nathan...isn't he the sweetest?

We taught the little kids how to play Apples to Apples and even though the game went like three times as slow and we often had to "help" them which didn't make it all that fair, I had so much fun!  Little Emma is so smart and caught on super quickly.  I just love kids so much :)

 Our family of two!

The Mark's

Everyone but Sean

Well this is getting super long...I guess that's what happens when you try to blog about your entire summer in one post!  So I'll be back to write about my adventures with sissy in LA!

My Life in Lists: Week 4

My cousin chose to feature MY post for the MLIL weekly link-up last week!!!  Excited to link up again this week with her and my other cousin Kelli.

This week's topic is Pinterest!  I used to be an avid pinner but lately have been swamped with school.  Luckily that will all be over in 4 DAYS!!!!!  I tend to pin more than I actually try things out since I don't have a lot of free time but here are a few pins that have changed my life!

Things From Pinterest That Changed My Life

1. Avocado, Mozzarella & Tomato Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

I am not a navy wife but I am in love with this sandwich!  It's such a simple yet genius idea!  It's quick, easy to make, cheap and incredibly delicious!  Try it with sourdough bread and serve with a fruit salad for a yummy dinner!

This is just one of the many recipes on my What's For Dinner board but unfortunately it's one of the few I've actually tried, haha.  I'm sure many of the others are amazing as well and I can't wait to try them when I'm done with school.

2. Weekly Chore Chart

We do a variation of this with our small apartment but it's amazing how fun and easy cleaning can become when you split all the tasks up throughout the week!  We keep the cute chart on our tack board in the kitchen and it's fun to see what the chore is for the day (we only have about 1-2 chores per day since we live in an apartment) and get them done and feel like we accomplished something!

3. Fashion Inspiration

Pinterest is a great place to find ways to make cute outfits out of things you already have in your wardrobe or discover simple pieces to add to make an outfit even cuter!  Here are a few pictures that have inspired my own wardrobe collection...

 

4. 30 Day Challenges

Challenges make working out fun because you have something specific to do each day and when you finish at the end of the month, you feel so good about yourself!  I completed this challenge awhile back and while sometimes I felt like I might die and other times I became like an old person when it came to standing up or sitting down, I felt so proud of myself at the end of the challenge! I couldn't believe how easy the squats became and how much more in shape I felt.  In May I'm starting a 30 Day Abs and Arms challenge simultaneously!  Join me and I promise you won't regret it!

5. Inspirational Quotes

I think the best way to start a day is with a beautiful quote.  I don't look at these enough but I think I'm going to make a new goal to read one quote every day when I wake up!

6. Random Things That Make Me Laugh

Without Pinterest I would not randomly burst into laughter in the middle of Physics lectures...thank you Pinterest!