Life Lately

In the last few months I have...

Celebrated my Love's Birthday with party hats and scotch.

Experienced my first real flooded apartment. 

Spoiler alert!! It was awful.

We even had to move our bed into our living room for about a week while the carpet was being repaired.

 Ugh. Such a pain.

Chopped my hair off to donate to Panteene's Beautiful Lengths Program.

Explored some of the beautiful outdoors that Austin has to offer with new friends. 

Some of our friends from back home came into town for a visit. We took them to some of our favorite spots (the park and eateries mostly).

And we also took them to see some things that even we hadn't experienced yet!

(The Congress Bats, Salt Lick Texas BBQ)

I finally got around to enjoying our new pool.

It's phenomenal. BTW.

I joined Tone It Up's bikini series again this year and becoming best frenemies with the treadmill upstairs. 

And of course I can't forget the oodles of Ellie Bean cuddles. 

Those are the best.

This Weekend

This weekend I.....

 Made my first ever Tone It Up protein pancakes. 

They were fantastic.

 Took the dog to Zilker Park for some throw ball.

Walked to Birds and got the Man a much needed hair cut.

Walked around Congress and visited a few thrift shops.

Also, we just happened to come across this sign on the way home.

On Star Wars day nonetheless.

We visited the Pecan Street Festival and drank wine and beer while checking out the booths.

Oh, and there was a petting zoo.

Obviously it was the best part. 

My favorites were this kangaroo baby. (Joey)

 And of course the Alpaca. 

Always the Alpaca.

 I still liked it despite the no chasing rule.

Had dinner at Rio's Brazilian.

It's always always delicious.

Then of course we went to one of the wonderfully hipster bars on the East Side.

After my run on Cinco De Mayo I enjoyed some coconut water in my wine glass. 

To make it fancier.

Obviously. 

Not pictured are the fish tacos and guac that we devoured. 

Like animals. 

Because it was Cinco De Mayo.

Let's Be Friends!!

I have finally made the transition over to Bloglovin!

So you should all head over there and give me follow.

Obviously.

Just click the link below!

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Have a happy Thursday pals!

6 years, The Flaming Lips, and Diddy

Well SXSW is finally over, and let me tell you,

it was epic.

We started off the weekend by heading down to Auditorium Shores on Friday night to see The Flaming Lips.

Remus and I had been looking forward to this concert since we heard that they were coming to SXSW.

For one, The Flaming Lips are a pretty nifty band.

And secondly, the show was FREE!

We love free things. 

Like, a lot.

Also! 

Friday just happened to be our anniversary!

6 years!!!!

photo from the concert

I don't know how we've managed not to kill each other.

It must be the side burns.

Anyhoo, back to the concert.

If you haven't been to Auditorium Shores its a park that runs along the lake (even though it looks more like a river). It serves as a dog/regular park in the day but is often used for big events like this one.

Much like Lindley Park for my Bozeman friends.

And another thing....

 It's gorgeous.

Watching the sunset on the city sky line felt pretty special for our anniversary. 

Though we only had this view because we needed to use the porta-potties. 

Still....it was nice.

The night really couldn't have been nicer.  

As for the actual Flaming Lips concert....

It was EPIC!

There were lights and strange costumes(of course),

a person in a hamster ball crowd surfing (I had been told to maybe expect this),

and then the baby doll that was cradled throughout the entire concert and kissed repeatedly (apparently it had been found on the ground before the show, they kept mentioning it an attempt to find the real owner).

Oh! There was also some hair pulling.  On stage. Not done to me.

Needless to say I have never seem a show quite like it.

It was awesome.

On Saturday we hit up Fader Fort.

We got there early because Saturday was the last day and we knew it was gonna get pretty busy.

Plus surprise artists had been showing up in the evening and we knew it had to be someone huge that night. I mean, Usher was the night before. How do you top that??!

Now let me just say, Fader Fort is THE place to be during SXSW.

This place was freaking amazing!

The place it literally set up like an adult wonderland. There were little lounges all over the place with different things to offer.

There was free cotton candy, free mohawks (no, I didn't get one),

tire swings and SO MUCH MORE!!

There were about 3 live bands playing in different places all around and also,

FREE DRINKS!!

And they were good drinks too.

Now of course it was a hot summer day. And alcohol and heat can really catch up to you if you're not careful.
Good thing Fader had FREE Vitamin and Smart Water.
BOOM GOES THE DYNAMITE.

Seriously. This place was fantastic.

Now when I say it was a hot summer day I am not joking. It was around the upper 80's that day.
Once we drank our faces off  had been there for a couple hours we decided we had better find some shade if we wanted to make it until dark to see who the special guest was.
So we ended up making friends with some people at a picnic table doing the same thing and spent the next few hours chatting in between bathroom and drink runs.

After a few hours it finally came time for us to head to the main stage to wait for the special guest.
It was crazy packed. By about one hour before the special guest you couldn't even leave to go to the bathroom or you wouldn't make it back. 

And when it finally came time to the special guest to come out....
It was Diddy!!

Now, I'm not exactly a Diddy fan. That is to say, I don't actually own any of his music.
But I was still very excited.
I mean, this guy is like, super famous! And he was right in front of me!!
Crazy pants guys. Crazy pants.
I tried to get photos to prove of my Diddy-ness, but they all turned out something like this:

I'm pretty sure he's not even in this picture. But this is the best one I have.
Poor lighting and day drinking will do that.

The show itself was awesome.  The energy in that place was like nothing else.
People. Were. AMPED.

When the show ended our new friends said goodbye and we hung around the stage for a little longer, hoping for an encore that never came.

The show ended on such a high note that there was even a break out of song/rap in the porta-potties (damn you free Smart Water) post Diddy.
There's nothing quite as funny as hearing a ton of people sing
"Party at the potties, yeah, party at the potties."

All in all, we had a great first SXSW experience.

But I'm also glad it's all over.
Drinking and staying out late for a week straight is hard work.

SXSW: The First Weekend

Holy smokes. This weekend has a been a whirlwind.
As many of you know this weekend marked the beginning of South By Southwest 2013. 

(For those of you who don't know, SXSW is an annual music, film, and tech. conference in Austin.)

It's super cool.

Now this is my first SXSW adventure and although my weekend started off slow because I'm an old lady who gets tired and overwhelmed easily  I think it actually turned out pretty awesome!

Remus and I kicked things off with the Startup Crawl on Thursday night and hung out with some of his co-workers on Friday. 

On Saturday we wandered downtown looking for something fun (free drinks) and didn't have much luck.

But then came Sunday.

Sunday is where the fun really started.

In the afternoon we headed down to Auditorium Shores and participated in The mp3 Project by Improv Everywhere.

It was so much fun! 

We were told to come down to the park at a specific time, download this mp3 and not listen to it, and dress is a certain color shirt. Once we were there and the clock hit 3 we all started playing the track which gave us all directions for what we were supposed to do next. 

It was so much fun!

We were directed to do things like follow non participants around and play freeze tag. 

My favorite part was when we all formed a giant bulls-eye in the middle of the park. 

I can only imagine what all the passerby's thought. 

The next thing on our agenda for Sunday was the Foursquare party at Hype Machine's Hype Hotel.                                                  

This was my first big South by party and it did NOT disappoint. 

The DJ was fabulous! Even Remus danced a little!!

Seriously that never happens. 

EVER.

Though it could have been a little to do with the free drinks.

Maybe...

Anyhoo, that was weekend one for me. Up next this week will be Fader Fort (got my wristband earlier today) and of course the Flaming Lips on Friday!! 

That is all.

There will be more.

Austin Specialty Beerfest

This last Saturday Remus and I attended The Austin Specialty Beerfest at Fiesta Gardens. 

As you can see the weather was fantastic and there was even a cider supplier there so I didn't have to sit out on all the fun!

There were over 40 breweries at the festival and each one brought two of their most delicious brews so there was definitely no shortness of variety.

And of course you can't hang out in the sun and drink all day without a little food (i.e. tacos). Those lovely tacos you see were courtesy of Peached Tortilla. And yes, they were delicious. 

And the greatest part of the whole thing?

I mean, besides the gorgeous riverside park, sun, and booze?

The whole thing was a benefit for The Boys and Girls Club!!

Whoever said drinking was bad for the children is a big fat liar. 

What I've Learned Wednesday

Hey all!

So you know on Friends when Ross is taking his sabbatical and Joey teaches him how to spread out his time effectively?
If for some crazy reason your answer is no then here's the link.

See, Joey is actually giving his dear friend a gift. The gift of relaxation!
 There are so many articles out there with advice on how to fit more work and activities into your day. But what about those of us on the other end of the spectrum? Those of us with to little to do??
So in order to bring a little help to these needy, needy people I present you with my "What I've learned" post for this week:

How to successfully waste your time when you have no schoolwork or job!

1. Unpack
So this involves the actual act of getting into your boxes which of course takes an annoyingly large amount of time. Then you have to clear your apartment/house of all the boxes/plastic/crap that you now have no use for.  You may even have to actually drive to get to a recycling area!
This could take days if not weeks to fully accomplish.  I give it 2 weeks of excuse worthy time.

2. Decorating
Pinterest. Enough said.

3. Cleaning
Because having a completely spotless apartment suddenly seems very important doesn't it??

4. Exercise
Because like cleaning, suddenly having the perfect butt seems super necessary.
This also buys you some more Pinterest time. Score!!

5. Dog walks
Or anything that can make your dog as tired as canine-ly (See what I did there? Cuz it's not "humanly"?? Clever stuff, I know) possible.
Basically if they don't look like this:
6.
then you haven't walked or fetched for long enough. You should try to push them to just before their limit. Don't kill them or anything. I mean, who would you talk to all day?? Yourself??!! That would just make you a crazy person.


6. School stuff
This one is obviously super boring. But it would probably be a good plan to at least look into your continued plans for your education. Probably.

7. Actually get a job
Lol!


But seriously.

What I've Learned Wednesday: How to survive one week without your stuff

This photo has nothing to do with the post. I'm just tired and thinking about snow.

So for this WILW we're going to talk about something I've had a glorious amount of experience with.

How to live without your stuff for one full week.

(Plus a couple days. But who's counting? Right?)

So here's the full boring story:

Me and the Mr. hired a moving company to help us with our horribly long and crazy move, but it turns out that you "could" have to wait "up to" 15 days for your belongings to actually get to you.

Now, it didn't actually take the full 15 days for us. It was only 12.

Just 12 days.

12 days without my stuff.

I know, I know.

"First world problems," you say.

But still. It was rough. 

And here are the things that I learned helped to get one through those trying times.

1. Camping gear.

It packs down small so you can fit it in the car and still make it the 24 hours to your destination. 

Also, even an air mattress and sleeping bags beats sleeping on the floor.

2. Starbucks.

You forgot to bring along your coffee maker and that sucks. But Starbucks is delicious and not only gets you the caffeine you need, but also gives you reason to get out of your empty apartment.

Win+Win

3. Two words: Arrested Development.

When you forgot to pack any and all dvd's what other show would you choose??!

Plus it streams for free on Amazon Prime. 

4. Dog.

Or any animal I assume. Just as long as it can see your sadness and then cuddle it away.

My dog can.

5. Wine and Chocolate.

I don't think I really need to explain this one.

Update

Well we made it to Austin.

The Welcome to Texas sign. Sorry for the poor quality. We were driving all fast and stuff.

And with the help of doggy drugs and good weather 

we survived the 24 hour drive in one piece.

This is your dog on drugs.

We arrived about a week ago and so far we have experienced:

a flood warning complete with sand bags around our front door, electrical problems,

an exciting (for me), horrifying(for the Mr) and altogether overwhelming first trip to Ikea,

and probably about one million trips to Targets. 

That's right. Targets. 

Austin has quite a few and apparently I have made it my mission to visit them all.

And due to the fact that we have not yet received our belongings we are becoming quite skilled at making our meals with only using the one pan that we purchased at Goodwill.

Beans and sausage with avocado on top. 

Real good.

We have also found a wonderful dog park with a gorgeous view of the city and a grocery where we have already befriended the meat man. ( We like to get good and comfy at our grocery stores.)

Of course I will be a whole lot happier once our stuff actually gets here.

As much as I love  Mr. Boyfriend, I'm getting a teensy bit tired of the whole

squeezing onto a twin blow up mattress thing.

I also miss my couch.

But in all seriousness, the vibe here in Austin is great. Everyone I've met has been so nice and despite the sadness I feel from being away from my family I really think this city is going to be fun. 

Cheers!