i've been stuck in this whirlwind my life's been spinning round my head

I'm really bad at coming up with titles for things, which is why I always use song lyrics as my post titles. In case anyone was wondering, the titles are completely irrelevant to anything; it's usually from whatever I happen to be listening to at the time.

I changed the look of my blog. I'm not totally in love with it, but I'm happy enough with it for the moment. For now, I'm keeping the same title, but that may change.

So for the last few trips that we've taken, I've used Priceline's "Name Your Own Price" feature to book our hotels. We've been pleased with the results so far. Unless there's a specific hotel where you'd like to stay, I honestly can't see a reason not to use it. It's unlikely that you'll find a better price somewhere else.

In general, I don't think it's worth it to stay at a Disney Resort Hotel when you're visiting Disney World. You can get a much cheaper (nicer) hotel on Priceline (or other travel sites). For example, the cheapest Disney "Value Resort" (2.5 stars) room right now is $85/night. The last time we went, Josh and I got a 3.5 star room for $30/night. If you're going with more than just two people, it can be even cheaper to rent a house. However, something made me decide to stay at a Disney Resort Hotel this time. So we'll be staying at the All-Star Music Resort. (I did get a pretty good deal, but not through Priceline.)

I am super excited about it. I stayed at the All-Star Sports resort on my high school senior trip, and it was pretty cool. I have also stayed at Port Orleans, but that was about 20 years ago, so I don't remember it really well. Unlike our last trip, we will actually have a day where we aren't visiting the parks, so we'll get to explore the whole resort and hang out at the pool(s).

The only disadvantage at the last hotel we stayed at was transportation to the parks. They offered it, but it didn't run very often, and the last bus left the park right at closing time. Had we chosen that option, we would have missed the bus and had to find another way back to our hotel due to the long lines for the monorail/ferry to get back to the transportation center. Luckily we drove, but that also meant paying to park. Staying at a Disney resort, the transportation will be a lot better, and it'll be really nice to not have to worry about driving and parking at the parks.

Initially, I had thought we would leave Thursday morning and come home Sunday, leaving us Friday and Saturday in the parks. However, after doing some research, I found that it would be better to do the parks on Thursday and Saturday, which gives us a nice, relaxing day off in between. We'll leave work early on Wednesday and drive down to Orlando. I didn't want to add another (expensive) night at the the ASM resort, so I booked us a cheap 2.5 star hotel through Name Your Own Price. I got a room for $35 at the Destiny Palms Hotel.

I'm going to be honest - I wasn't excited when Priceline gave me the name of the hotel I'd booked and this is what I saw. It doesn't look like a great place to stay. However, I checked reviews on multiple websites, and I didn't see a single complaint. Everyone seemed to really love it. Plus it has a free continental breakfast (which you know Disney doesn't offer! haha). We'll be getting there late at night and leaving early in the morning, so it really doesn't even matter. We just need a safe, clean place to sleep, and this meets those requirements.

I kind of wish we had some friends that could come with us, but it's bad timing for a lot of people, and no one is able to come with us. :/ Still, I know we'll have a great time. I can't wait!!

if mountains could talk this one would share its secrets with me

Wow. Another year gone by, almost exactly.

I really need to get back into this blogging thing. I'm going to stick with it this time. Really, I am. It'll encourage me to take more pictures and read more books. (I actually have been reading a lot lately, but this may help me stay on that path.)

I can't decide if I want to keep it the way it is, or if I want to completely revamp it. I guess we'll see!

The last time I was here, I was just under two months out from my wedding. So now we're just under two months out from our one-year anniversary. To celebrate the occasion, we're taking a trip to Disney World. (We also spent part of our honeymoon at Disney.) I am maybe a little bit overly excited about it. The last time we went, we didn't plan anything. We booked a hotel, and that was it. We bought our park tickets when we got there and played everything by ear. This time, I am planning everything. We were disappointed that we weren't able to eat at the Be Our Guest restaurant the last time we were there because we didn't even know about it, let alone that we needed to make reservations. Well, I still wasn't on the ball enough this time around, and I didn't manage to get a reservation. It's a shame because that would be such a perfect anniversary dinner! I did, however, make dinner reservations at other restaurants each night that we're there, so we won't be left wondering where to eat and wasting time. I think we'll just be a lot more prepared, in general, this time, and I think we'll really be able to get the most out of it.

But we have another trip coming up even before that. We'll be going to PA for Labor Day weekend for my dad's wedding. It's kind of crazy; both of my parents and I will all have gotten married in a period of less than a year. I'm pretty excited about this trip as well. The last time we were in PA was kind of a drive-by trip. We flew in Saturday morning and left Monday morning. This time we'll have a bit of quality time. I'm really looking forward to going to the Philadelphia Zoo and seeing all the big cats in Zoo360. I've been squeeing over their facebook pictures every time they post them.

I'll leave you with a wedding picture, since that's what I was talking about the last I was here!

i've had the time of my life, and i owe it all to you

It has been three years since I updated this blog! Whoops. I even updated the house blog more recently than I updated this one. Weird.

The biggest announcement is that in 57 days, Josh and I are getting married!

You guys are lucky you missed out on the majority of the wedding planning stuff. ;) We still have a few things to get together, but for the most part, it's done. I'm frustrated by how few people have RSVPed at this point (42/135). Everyone said it would happen, but I just don't get it! I need 20 more people to decline to be where I want to be, but I don't see that being an issue. I just hope not too many more than that decline! I'm just ready for it to be here. We've only been planning since February; I don't see how people can stand to plan for years.

I'm going to try to keep this updated, but we'll see what happens!

I've gotten really bad about keeping this updated. The truth is, I haven't done much of anything to update about. Josh and I went up to Lake Jocassee on Sunday (pictured above) but it started pouring as soon as we got there. We couldn't swim because, even after the rain stopped, it continued to thunder the whole time we were there. It was a nice trip, but it would have been a lot nicer if the weather had been better.

Our thermostat on our AC broke two nights ago. It was literally like living in hell in this apartment. I put in a service request yesterday, but apparently they didn't get it. So the maintenance man didn't come until 4:00pm today. We were last on his list, even though it literally took him about one minute to fix it, and that includes the amount of time it took him to walk over to the office and get a new thermostat. When he put the new one up, it was reading 93 degrees. Ugh. It was awful. And I think our animals were more miserable than we were. But it's nice and cool now, and I am so thankful.

Josh filed for unemployment almost two months ago, and he still hasn't gotten a check because Clemson hasn't filled out the necessary paperwork. Gotta love em. By the time he gets his first check, we'll be back at work and won't be able to get it. I filed a couple of weeks ago, but same deal; I doubt I'll even get my check before we go back. But it was worth a try, I guess.

Other than that, there's really nothing going on. Just finishing up the summer, getting ready to go back to school and work. While I know I'll be wishing for a break as soon as it starts, right now I'd like it to hurry up cause I'm so bored!

book review: twilight

Twilight by Stephenie Meyer

Do I really need to give a description? I'll just give the Amazon one again because otherwise I'm just gonna tell you "It's about a girl who falls in love with a vampire."

Bella Swan's move to Forks, a small, perpetually rainy town in Washington, could have been the most boring move she ever made. But once she meets the mysterious and alluring Edward Cullen, Bella's life takes a thrilling and terrifying turn. Up until now, Edward has managed to keep his vampire identity a secret in the small community he lives in, but now nobody is safe, especially Bella, the person Edward holds most dear.

So, obviously I'm really late to jump on the Twilight Saga bandwagon. My aunt suggested it to me when it first came out, but I never got around to reading it. Then it started to get really popular, and I was skeptical. (I was the same way about Harry Potter. I didn't start reading the books until I'd seen the first two movies.) I saw the movie, and I thought it was terrible, so I had no desire to read it. But then I saw Eclipse and loved it, so I decided to read the books, and Twilight was so good! I wish I had read it sooner. I thought with all of the hype that it would be a letdown, but that wasn't the case at all. It completely lived up to my expectations. So if you haven't read it yet, you definitely should.

it's time to try defying gravity

It's been awhile. I'd like to say that I've been busy, but I haven't. Not doing anything means not having anything to talk about.

I had wanted to go to the Pendleton fireworks on the fourth, but we ended up going to the lake instead. There were too many people, and the fireworks sucked. We could see Pendleton's fireworks over the trees, and they lasted about 20 minutes longer than Clemson's fireworks. It was lame. I probably won't go to the fireworks at the lake again, even though I've been doing it for half my life.


It's nearly impossible to get a good picture of fireworks when you're standing on a boat that's constantly rocking. Oh well.

Thursday was my birthday. It wasn't anything exciting. We went to Outback, and then we went to see Eclipse. I liked it a lot. Much better than the first two. Aside from the whole romance aspect of it. Bella drives me nuts, and I wish she'd just grow up and stop being an annoying little brat. I don't know. I haven't read the books, so I don't know if it's bad script writing, or if that's really the way Stephanie Meyer intended for her to be.

I'm reading Twilight right now, actually. I bought it last night, and I'm almost halfway through. That's the one thing I hate about books. If they're good, they consume me. It gets to the point where I don't even want to put the book down to get up and get a drink. I have to force myself to take breaks, or I'll just sit there and read the whole thing, no matter how long it is. Twilight has definitely consumed me. It's been a long time since I saw the movie, and I don't remember it well, so luckily my brain isn't trying to do much comparing.


Music: Wicked (Kristin Chenowith and Idina Menzel) - Defying Gravity

book review: looking for salvation at the dairy queen

Looking for Salvation at the Dairy Queen - Susan Gregg Gilmore


It’s the early 1970s. The town of Ringgold, Georgia, has a population of 1,923, one traffic light, one Dairy Queen, and one Catherine Grace Cline. The daughter of Ringgold’s third-generation Baptist preacher, Catherine Grace is quick-witted, more than a little stubborn, and dying to escape her small-town life.

Every Saturday afternoon, she sits at the Dairy Queen, eating Dilly Bars and plotting her getaway to Atlanta. And when, with the help of a family friend, the dream becomes a reality, she immediately packs her bags, leaving her family and the boy she loves to claim the life she’s always imagined. But before things have even begun to get off the ground in Atlanta, tragedy brings Catherine Grace back home. As a series of extraordinary events alter her perspective–and sweeping changes come to Ringgold itself–Catherine Grace begins to wonder if her place in the world may actually be, against all odds, right where she began.
*description from Amazon* (because I read it more than a week ago, and I wanted to be sure it was accurate)

I loved this book. It was a quick, easy read. It may not have been the most original story in the world. I mean, let's face it, there are hundreds (thousands?) of books about girls growing up in a small town in the south and trying to escape to a big city. It was also fairly predictable. Some surprises were easier to figure out than others, but it didn't make me like the book any less. This was Susan Gregg Gilmore's first book. I saw on Amazon that she has at least one other one out, and I'm definitely going to check it out.