Photo Book Wedding Present

 

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 Back in October, we took our first family trip and drove from Milliken, CO to North Adams, MA to see our good friends take the marriage plunge.  This is the wedding gift we made for them.  Hopefully Ann and Mitch see the actual book before this post :-)

Being the frugal gal I am, I made this book for free after cashing in Coke Rewards.  We don't drink soda but we sure do take advantage of the family members who choose to! Thanks Mom and Dad.  I did, however, fork over the funds for shipping; a whopping $8. 

Happy Marriage Ann and Mitch!!

Our First Home

After slaving away all summer working for my parents at their dog boarding kennel, Ashcroft Kennels, Mig and I had finally saved enough money to buy our first home with cash. Now, this may seem awesome to some until I remind them that our home is on wheels. After a long search for something that suited both our needs and the dogs, we settled on a 20 foot, 1985 Toyota Sun Land Express. With an initial investment of $4500 and then some $1500 more on simple repairs and preparations for a year of travel, we have our perfect home.

The Biltmore

Here I sit in the Asheville airport and I finally have a consistent enough internet connection to post this.

On Wednesday, my friend Kim and I went to the famous Biltmore Estate (Kim had 2 free passes, which is great because admission is around $45 otherwise). The Biltmore is promoted as the largest house in America. Although the entire house is utterly amazing there was one room that took our breath away: the library. Filled with over 10,000 books on two levels, this may be the most beautiful room I have ever seen. I highly recommend a visit to this estate which is also home to an amazing garden and fantastic views along the driveway to/from the house (about a 15 min drive in either direction).

North Carolina is beautiful in a way that Colorado cannot even compare. There are rolling hills covered with trees of green and blooming bursts of flowers everywhere. I suppose it helps that it is spring. My only complaint on this trip is that there has been rain everyday; which usually stops in the afternoon but leaves the air thick with humidity. In all honesty, I have been overly lazy on this visit (partially because I am alone while Kim is in Vegas for four days) and have been working on getting my mind in the right place.