Uh Oh...

I'm already failing at blogging!  However, it's been a super busy few days so I'll use that as an excuse!

So on Friday I turned 26.. I know, that really isn't that old... but all I keep thinking is "oh my gosh that's the downward slope of my 20s..."  not cool.  Luckily I have quite a few amazing friends who have also celebrated their 26th birthday in the last few days, so I'm not alone- we're ALL getting old!

So in honor of my birthday Joe and I had an adventurous weekend!  We headed to Arlington (after a nap) on Thursday evening and had Chinese food with the Costlow family and then just hung out for the rest of the evening.  On Friday I was lucky enough to get to spend the entire day with my favorite little sister, Miss Audra.  She, Joe and I went to Rock Bottom for lunch because I'm slightly obsessed with their mashed potatoes.  We stuffed ourselves and then I bought a bright blue purse at Payless- fabulous.  After that we ran home to say goodbye to Brian who was leaving for Seattle and then the three of us headed out into the beautiful weather to wander around.  Joe got his hair cut while Audra and I went in some really cute little shops.  As soon as we got back we took quick naps and then went to dinner at Boulevard Woodgrill which was fabulous.  We sat downstairs in the bar area where they had half price apps which we totally took advantage of by order ceviche, calamari and firecracker chicken or something.  The chicken was super spicy (just the way Joe likes it) and the calamari was pretty good but the ceviche was suprisingly amazing.  Now, ceviche is a recent food obsession for me.  A few years ago Debbie brought it to a party and I was terrified.. but she convinced me to try it and the rest is history.  It's a pretty scary dish consisting of fish, onions, and a lot of lime juice which kind of "cooks" the fish.  You can understand my fear.  Needless to say Joe makes awesome ceviche but what we had at Boulevard was suprisingly tasty with cucumbers and tomatoes mixed in.  For my entree I had a ribeye with mushroom butter, broccolini and roasted potatoes- fabulous.  Jeff had nachos and everyone else had some form of seafood which everyone raved about.

After dinner we headed home and Joe ran to Carvel to get a Cookie Puss cake.  For those of you who are not familiar with Cookie Puss I strongly suggest you take a look at his wikipedia page- it's fascinating reading.  This Cookie Puss seemed to be a leftover from St. Patty's with some creepy green icing... however his face tasted fabulous.

Joe ended up covered in green icing- not a great look for him.

On Saturday we devoured some Italian Store subs and then headed to Fredericksburg for a Tobin-family gathering.  It was great to get to see my aunt and uncle who live in Massachusets for the first time in too long as well as my Maryland relatives and my MA cousin who happens to be going to school at Mary Washington right now.  We had more steak for dinner and apple pie, carl's icecream and red velvet cake for dessert.  When Joe and I finally folded ourselves back into the car we were stuffed to the gills to say the least.  We got home late on Saturday and went right to bed.

I spent Sunday afternoon at Old Navy with my sister shopping and saving over $100.00 thanks to a 30% off coupon!  Joe spent the afternoon developing blisters from raking our front yard... he's a good man.  We had Cici's for a late lunch and then went to The National to see Ben Folds.  Ben Folds is by far my favorite person to see live, he never fails to amuse the HELL out of me and the show on Sunday was no exception.  Apparently he and Nick Hornby (High Fidelity author) teamed up to write some songs.  Nick did the lyrics, Ben did the music, and together they made magic.  He played a couple of those songs including "The Levi Johnston Blues" which was a hilarious musical ode to the father of the coulda-been-VP's grandbaby.  Amazing.  Ben also spent about 20 minutes on ChatRoulette improving songs about everyone we came in contact with.  Towards the end he admitted he was a bit addicted and would have to be cut off after the next person... who ended up being a dude drinking Jose Cuervo from the bottle while wearing a viking helmet, complete with horns.  Again, amazing.  Joe had never seen Ben perform and I was glad to see that he enjoyed himself thoroughly.

We crashed when we got home from the show and made it to work on time on Monday.  However, the excitement did not end there!  We had a brief visit from one Miss Ashley Belyea and her lovely boyfriend.  It was really exciting to see Bella for the first time since Christmas and to finally get to meet Keith who proved to be as great as she claimed =)  They both commented on our new blogging experiment and suggest we blog about their totally rad visit- so here you go guys, BLOGGING!  We went out for Thai food (our first Thai food in Richmond I think..) which was pretty good, and then we went home to share some drinks and desserts (yes, the leftover red velvet cake as well as Guiness gelato).  I shared some lovely pictures of Ashley during some of her more awkward times (and of course my more awkward times but I was not the focus of Keith's attention) with Keith, which he loved and I think made Ashley want to strangle me.  At one point I confessed that we have most definitely known each other too long.

We also reminisced about some good times- the 911 call in Medford when we were sophomores in high school, the 7th grade fight when she told my the my "twisted sense of justice includes cruelty"- yes, a direct quote, and discussed the fact that people we know are getting married and having babies- a terrifying thought.  All in all, it was a great visit that was, as always, too short.

I also had the chance to talk to Leanne, one of my best friends from college, for a little while this morning.  She's currently living in Australia and we havent spoken since Christmas I think.  It was great to catch up and share our mutual distaste of our current professions.  Talking to her reminded me just how much I miss her.  It's amazing how not seeing or speaking to someone keeps you from acheing from missing them, but seeing Bel and talking to Le this week has been both lovely and also rather painful.  I do miss my girls.

So that's a way-too-long update on my birth-weekend and all of the totally interesting things happening in my life- I hope you've enjoyed =)

p.s.  I totally don't re-read these before I post them... excuse any typos or incomplete thoughts....