Long Weekend with Monica!

Not much sewing happening at my house because my best friend from high school, Monica was in town for a long weekend for the first time ever! We go way  back and she has seen me through several heartbreaks and I have seen her in a successful marriage with the same guy she was dating way back when we met (I was dating Coleman's father then).  While our love lives diverged (lol) we both had two boys (and me a girl in the middle) and our oldest boys had a few challenges and we truly became best friends in those young years when we needed each other's support DAILY!  Seems so long ago now as they are all grown up and college age now. 
I honestly can't remember the last time Monica and I had this much undivided time together and it was fabulous to catch up!  She is now a first grade teacher and so now we have teaching in common too...:0  In fact, she sent me a whole pdf of all kinds of games she plays with her kids so I can see if any of them can be adapted to ASL (I teach adults but it is all language development so we play kids games--I have been known to play Simon Says, telephone, tic tac toe, etc.  all in ASL!). 
Anywho, while Monica was here we were jam packed with activities to include sightseeing, shopping, eating, walking, visiting my family, taking silly pictures and more eating!  So here are some photos of what we got up to. 
Sunday, after lunch at Joe's Farm Grill, we took a long drive and went to the Salt River Canyon.  Here are Kathy, Randy and Monica at the top.

 Here is Randy at the bottom.  Water was a bit chilly but it was really fun to see.  There was a rescue swim thing going on nearby too so that was interesting!

 Here are Monica and I at the bottom too!  Monday I taught in the morning and then Monica, Kathy and I drove to Scottsdale and did some shopping.  We also each had a margarita in the middle of the day.  They had gone to breakfast while I was teaching, but I had eaten my early yogurt as usual.  So at 3 PM when we had Margaritas...well one of us was rather tipsy!  It was fun to just relax! 

We also took her to the Grapevine to eat (one of my favorite places ever since I was a girl) to have Lavosh.   It is an outdoor restaurant (you can even eat on the roof, but with the sun going strong (even in March) we chose to eat under the shady roof! 

 
Randy and I took her to ride the light rail and eat at the Spaghetti factory for a late dinner.  That is another restaurant that I have loved since I was a child.  They have a "spaghetti tree" which as kids we really believed grew spaghetti!  It is looking a bit under the weather these days.  It is all in an old mansion type house  and it gorgeous and spacious inside.  We ate on the trolly...how fun is that?  Monica left her phone there and we made it one stop down the light-rail when she realized it and we got off and got on another one going the other way to retrieve it!  Luckily one of the waiters had it and she got it back!

 Tuesday Kathy stayed home and Randy and I took Monica to meet mom and shop in Cave Creek.  We went to "The Town Dump" which is an eclectic store and found some cool things like this tiger and these stools! 

On the way home we stopped at the Brass Armadillo and checked out the antiques.   I really wanted to take this machine home with me because it was in pristine condition, it runs and it was 85 bucks!  Of course, I have no idea if it is worth that but for an older machine it was in great condition.  I am still thinking about it!

 This little toy sewing machine was over a hundred if I remember right.  It was SO cute!  I don't have a collection of toy machines, nor do I have a place to put one, so I did like Bonnie and did a proper "catch and release!"

 We did see a few quilts--nothing really worth picturing but I LOVED this hand sewn scarf and thought it was photo worthy.

Monica offered to fly Kelsey's quilt back (and she already dropped it off with Kelsey's mom) so I wouldn't have to pay shipping so I can't wait to hear what she thinks of it!  Monica said she has hers in her guest bedroom because she doesn't want her dog to ruin it.
So Monica's visit was a whirlwind tour of the area with plenty of shopping and entirely too much eating!  There were so many other places we wanted to go but had only so much time.  We did show her the outside of The Phoenix Castle when it was all lit up but little did we know tours book MONTHS in advance!  We will plan to see this next year and send Monica pictures because we sure aren't going through it in the heat of summer. 

 

Today I am working all day (even now, lol my morning class is in a computer lab and there is no talking for me to terp right now!) until late but then I am hoping to get in some Saturday sewing.  Sunday is Easter and we are having it at my brother's place this year.  My Mom and Dad are moving again in a few weeks (yes this is the 6th time they have moved since I moved her 4.5 years ago) and with the new baby we figured it would be easier to just have it at Sam's.  :)