Big Breath In.

Hiiiiiiiiiiii!!!!!!!!!

Im not dead. And I'm so sad that it has been ALMOST A WEEK. I really thought of you guys every single day I did not blog. It made my heart feel like this:

I know that saying I've been super busy just sounds like an excuse, so I won't say that. I'll just tell you what I have been doing over the past 4+ days, and you can feel like you're up to speed on my things:

1) FAMILY ROAD TRIP!!

Last Thursday morning, Steve and I left for a road trip back down to LA. This is something I have been doing once a month or so, and usually I just have Ruby as my co-pilot. Which, she makes a horrible co-pilot because lately she's become suuuuuper afraid of the car (She's so weird. develops random phobias overnight). So normally Ruby is all anxious, and I feel sad for her, and spend the 7+ hours trying to console her from the horrors of the car, while listening to an audiobook to keep from dying of bordum.

But this time I had Steve to do the Ruby-consoling, so that was awesome. 

I realized while driving that I was crazy excited for this trip. I don't know if it was simply that is is something I normally do alone, and it was cool to have my husband along with me - or just that we haven't traveled as much this year as we have in the past. (AKA, this year we've only done like 5 trips, most years we do like 5 billionty trips to every single corner of the earth). 

Or it could have just been the fact that Steve is freaking funny when no one else is watching. And being locked in a car with him for 8 hours can be fodder for some pretty weird behavior. 

Basically its like this. If we were Nick and Jess:

 (I tried so hard to find a gif of this scene. Steve and I literally do this to each other all the time. If you don't watch new girl, you should).

But Family Road Trip was awesome. I made Steve listen to my favorite Audiobook, Wild, by Cherly Strayed. 

For those of you who don't know this, I have always wanted to Hike the PCT. I first heard about it when I was 22 or 23, right when I came back from living over seas. And what does one do at 22 or 23 after living abroad, rootless, and unattached? Dream of finding new adventures of course. 

But I found a job, and a life, and have literally never gone backpacking.

This book is wonderful, and Cheryl's inexperienced way of falling through the trail has only encouraged me not care that I have never gone backpacking...I am going to hike it anyway. 

I made Steve listen to the book while we drove so he had an opportunity to fall in love with the idea as well. And of course, he didn't. But if he wants to be the kinda guy that let's his wife hike 3 states in the wilderness alone, now that's on him, isn't it?

2) SWIMMING IN THE OCEAN.

So Steve and I are doing this triathlon in 3 weeks. And no we are not ready for it. We rented wet suits and have been trying to practice swimming in open water. 

Now we both grew up going to the beach ALL THE TIME. Swimming in the surf isn't new, isn't hard, or isn't scary. So we feel like we have that going for us. 

Swimming in open water, for like an hour at a time? SO FREAKING SCARY.

It was amazing to both of us how hard it was. It was like trying to swim in a washing machine. And then, because Carlsbad is so beautiful and you can see through the crystal waters at times, you can see rocks, and fishes, and seaweed, and occasionally sand sharks.

Initiate melt down.

I am laughing now at some of the things I was telling myself to get through this portion of our practice:

"Seaweed is just like salad. It's like the salad of the ocean....you LOVE salad Jenni!"

Or

"The dark scary rocks are right there, but you don't have to touch them, you don't have to touch them, you don't have to touch them...."

Or 

"Some people come on vacation and pay good money to go snorkeling. It's basically like you're on vacation right now!"

Or my favorite

[literally sitting up and saying out loud to myself] "OH MY GOD BROWN, get a hold of your shit. You're fine. Honestly. You. are. fine. It's just water!"

At which point I basically panicked and did this in water.

So I'm glad that I got that out of my system. And hopefully in a few weeks when we do this race for real, I don't make a complete fool of myself.

Fingers cross-ied.

3) MATCHING EVERYTHING

So this happened. I'm not really sure how, but it was complicated. Actually no it wasn't. My family just sucks at communication. I thought my mom was just asking me if I wanted the dress, and then surprise! it was match.com.

My grandma thought it was basically the best thing that's ever happened in her whole life though. So, at least I'm her favorite.

4) LOOKING FOR APARTMENTS (KINDA)

I'm still trying to keep an eye out for amazing apartments, in case we find something majestical that we MUST move into (yeah, right).

I just really want a tiny little postage stamp of a house, maybe with some front steps, and a patch of grass in the backyard so Ruby doesn't have to pee in a litter box her whole life. And it would be great if that could be on the sunny side of the city, so we don't have quite as much fog.

But what I am realizing is that this dream isn't exactly a small request.....it's like a $6K a month request. And I cannot get my brain around the fact that lots of people pay that. All the time.

Sooo....just keeping our eyes peeled in case the real-estate fairy decides to bless me and make all of my dreams come true.

5) DESIGNERING ALL THE THINGS

I have some secret surprises coming your way. And yes, you should be very excited about it. I can't tell you what it is, but you're gonna like it :D

But between that and my marketing work, it has left the last few days full of writing, designering, and writing some more. I LOVE IT. It does get a bit lonely sometimes sitting on my couch and not in a real office (which I have and oddly don't use), but it's been really fun.

Ok. So that's some of the things.

I promise this week I'll keep you up to speed. I have a lot of thoughts rolling around in my head right now...but Im not sure they're ready to be blogged. Or that they're for this blog. Some of them are big, and questions, and I'd halting on getting them out there.

But hang tight, we're getting there.

Love and kiss.

-J