Disney World, new Garmin and Halloween Party!

This past week flew by! I was in Orlando from Tuesday through Thursday night for work meetings. I didn't know what was on the schedule while we were down there, but it was my second time ever in Orlando, and I still had never been to Disney World. I was very excited to learn that on Wednesday they arranged for us to be picked up from our hotel and taken to Epcot for the Wine and Dine Festival! We were there from 4-9:30pm, so we got to stay for the firework show, it was great! We only went on one ride, since the lines were so long, but the ride was awesome, it was 'Soarin' which is a ride that simulates hang-gliding over California. It is so cool, you even smell different trees as you fly above. Here's a link to check it out here. It was worth the hour wait for sure! We then walked around the Wine and Dine Festival. We ate at the pizzeria in Italy. There were six of us, so we ordered two of the large pizzas, assuming they were the big round pizzas we saw that everyone had. When they were delivered to our table we were very surprised to see how big they were. Between the six of us, we almost ate both of them! They were so good.

Saturday morning Chris and I headed to Mallard Creek Greenway for a 12 mile run. I was not at all in the mood to run. For some reason, I have not been into running this past week. I'm not burnt out, since I haven't been following any training plan in preparation for the NYC Marathon, and I have not been running high mileage weeks at all. I have gone over 30 miles maybe two or three times. So, I don't feel very prepared for this marathon, but feel comfortable that I will at least get through it and hopefully feel good at an easy pace. It ended up being a really nice day for a run and with all the leaves changing it was pretty, and enjoyable for the most part. I was able to use my new Garmin 405 watch. I ordered a refurbished one online for just $125.

When we came home we started preparing for our Halloween/housewarming party. We decided to have this party in part for a fundraiser for the Isabella Santos Foundation. We asked our guests that instead of bringing anything over for the party that they make a donation to our fundraising page: http://www.firstgiving.com/fundraiser/karinandchris/isabella-santos-foundation-5k-for-kids-cancer. We are so excited to say that we have raised $1,040!! I am so grateful to everyone who made a donation!!

The party was so much fun, so glad so many people made the ride up to the burbs to hang out with us! Here are some pictures below...

Okay, this little guy was not at our party, but him in his little pumpkin costume is too cute not to post. This is my nephew, Andy.

Chris originally dressed up as a mummy, but the costume did not stay on very well, so he changed into a Kill Bill costume that I had in my Halloween costume box.

This morning we were able to sleep in, and I enjoyed laying around for a while on the couch and catching up on some Modern Family episodes on Hulu Plus. Finally, I got up and Chris and I took a walk over to Birkdale Village and around our neighborhood. We even stopped by the playground on the way home!

Halloween is in the air!

This week we have accomplished so much around our house, I love it! We are finally getting things done, unpacked, and it's starting to feel like home here.

Our friends Lauren and Brian let us have a couple area rugs they were not using, so we picked them up yesterday and one of them goes perfect in our living room. It feels much homier to have soft carpet to walk on when we're relaxing here. Since we had our tv mounted above our fireplace we had to find somewhere to put all of our media gadgets. While at Target one day, I came across a ladder desk which looked like it would work perfect in our corner. It was 70% off, score!

The colors in the carpet go great as well, thanks guys!

Chris painted our guest bedroom on Friday night. On Saturday I cleaned the room, and on Sunday we went and picked up a new mattress set. We put the bed together today and the room looks great. I even put some new flannel sheets on the bed...thinking of sleeping in there tonight since the weather is so cold! We just need to hang pictures on the walls.

The first guests we know of are my parents who come on Christmas day. We welcome guests anytime, so come visit!!

Ohh, Chris's friend James came by on Thursday night to help us with hanging our new chandelier. The entry way chandelier that came with the house was an out-dated gold one. One day at Lowes I walked through the lighting section and just loved one chandelier that reminded me of Tiffanys! It looks like diamonds to me, I love it.

Hard to see with the light on, so here is one with it off...

It doesn't hang as low as we would have liked it, but I still love it!

Here is a picture of James hanging this. I wondered how we could hang a new chandelier, being so high and all. James said he would put a piece of wood balanced on our railing and the high ledge above the entrance and just walk across in the middle to hang it. I was pretty nervous to watch him do this, but he was not nervous at all.

Just look, he is so high!

We also asked his advice as to how to light up our living room. With such a high ceiling we are trying to figure this out. He suggested a few options for us, which he will have to install :) That will be a project down the road. James is also Chris's best man, he'll be joining us in Jamaica with his wife and daughter, Layla!

I've also had time to add some Halloween decorations around the house, I love decorating for the holidays so I just had to start getting things up. I don't want to go too crazy since I plan to decorate much, much more for Christmas!

I picked up this little guy at Michaels, I named him Ghoulie, he is so cute, I love him.

Today we put up a spot light to shine on him so everyone can see him at night!

Here is a picture of the front of our house, I hung some spider webs out front as well as hanging some Halloween lights, banners, a flag and a cool skeleton given to us by Chris's grandmother (along with some other decorations we still have to use.)

Oh, I also decorated inside. Check out our fireplace, we have a visitor trying to come down our fireplace!

I think we've been pretty productive this week. Chris also spent some time in the yard this weekend, blowing away all of our leaves and cutting the grass. Chris's grandmother also stopped by on Saturday to bring us some plants for our backyard to spruce it up. Soon we will get to cleaning up the backyard, adding mulch and planting a couple tress she also brought us!

As far as my leg, I'm still trying to figure that situation out. My doc told me not to run until Sunday (he told me this on Thursday,) and only then run a short run. I ran this evening with Chris and I actually felt good! I hope this keeps up and my doc visits are helping! Fingers crossed for NYC!