Books Galore

As I mentioned in my previous post, we did a lot of traveling on our honeymoon. Be it on a train, a plane or a taxi, I prefer to keep my nose in a book. Here are the 3 books I read while abroad.

LOVED and would suggest all 3 of them!

Honeymoon!

As far as honeymoons go, ours was the best. Im sure everyone thinks theirs was the best, but this one truly took the cake. We made the decision to hang out at home for a few days before leaving town. We wanted time to catch up on our sleep, open our gifts, start on thank you notes, pack and of course spend time with our family that was still in town to celebrate our nuptials. By the time we left for our ten day adventure, we had plenty of time to get our bearings and were ready and raring to go by the time we boarded our 9 hour flight.

The Thursday after we tied the knot, we left Austin for the romantic city of Paris. We arrived somewhat early that morning, dropped our bags off at our hotel and immediately found a café where we sat outside and sipped on piping hot coffee. It was drizzly as we expected so armed with our umbrellas, we strolled the streets until we could check into our room. We did all the normal tourist things on the days we spent there: ate crepes, drank countless cups of coffee, took a bazillion pictures, drank many many pints of beer and made friends from all over the world. We saw the Eiffel tower both during the day and at night, saw the Arc De Triomphe, strolled the stores on the Champs- Elysees, stood in line at the Louvre to see Mona and other legends. We loved the city and couldn’t get enough of it. Sadly, we had to stick to our schedule and move on.

We left Paris to see what I dubbed the “sleepy town of Bordeaux”- which is supposedly not so sleepy and more of a college town. What we saw, however, was quite different. We arrived after a few hours on the train and checked into our hotel. Our hotel, I should mention put us up on the 4^th floor and we had no elevator. Derek kindly lugged our two almost fifty pound suitcases all the way up and opened the door to see two twin beds. We had a great laugh at that much, I assure you. By 8 PM despite our best efforts, we couldn’t, for the life of us find much to do or much going on. All the high end shops were closed, the streets were empty and even the restaurants were devoid of all human interaction. We called it an early night in the hopes we would find more to do the next day. We found the city bustling when we awoke and quickly took in all the sights. We drank a ton of Bordeaux wine, shopped at more high end stores we couldn’t afford, ate delicious pasta in a box (Ill tell you more about later but suffice it to say it was one of our favorite meals), and of course we took hundreds more pictures. It was in the city of Bordeaux we spent most of our time drinking delicious wines, learning about all the surrounding vineyards and finally found the night life the night before we left.

Our last stop on our honeymoon was Barcelona. We awoke early on our last day in Bordeaux and boarded the first of many trains and we would ride 2-3 hours before switching to another train (we did this three more times before arriving in Spain). The trains were nice and even roomy but changing trains required dragging our luggage and looking for the correct gate in a language we didn’t know. We both are quite fluent in Spanish but much to our dismay, in Spain they mostly speak Castillian. One we arrived, we immediately felt the buzz wed been told so much about, there were people everywhere! We checked into our amazing hotel which did NOT have twin beds- and we headed out. Over the next 4 days we ate tapas galore, we drank pitchers of sangria, we shopped, took even more pictures and made more friends. We saw Sagrada Familia church, walked Las Ramblas, went to the top of the Christopher Columbus tower that overlooked the city, saw Barcelona Cathedral and of course took in much of the night life. Dinner wasn’t typically until 10 PM or so and we wouldn’t return to our hotel room until 4 or 5 AM.

Needless to say, by day 11 when we boarded our flight home, we were exhausted, arms tired from dragging heavy luggage, eager to hear our native English and feet beaten from miles and miles walked. We had an amazing time together, had a blast learning about other cultures, making friends and are anxious to continue this next chapter of our lives as a married couple!

I, of course have hundreds and hundreds of pictures, so I might put together a slideshow or link a photo album to share them all with you! If you have any suggestions, please feel free to share.

Happy to be home! Ive missed you all!

Married Woman!

Im back. Im married. Ive been across the world and back.

Its been so long since I felt like I had the time to sit down and catch everyone up. I honestly feel pretty indifferent about blogging lately. That’s not to say I haven’t been reading up on all of you, I just tend to feel overwhelmed at all the stories I want to tell and cop-out instead out of sheer laziness. Maybe you’ve been there, maybe youre sick of hearing me bitch and moan about being busy and my lack of blogging but Im here and that’s got to count for something.

On January 1^st I married my very best friend. Sure it sounds completely cliché, but its true. I spent the day getting ready with my Mother, my Aunt, my Grandmother, my 8 best friends and my Mother in Law along with her sisters. We had a full house to say the least.

The ceremony went off without a hitch and wearing new rings, we headed to the reception where we proceeded to have the party of a lifetime. We ate, we danced, we drank, we toasted and we said our goodbyes amidst a sea of sparklers. It was truly a night I will remember for as long as I live and the gratitude I feel towards our parents for making it all possible will never fade away.

I wish I could share more pictures with you but I am waiting on the cd from our photographer to arrive. They are posted online but you know how that goes with copyright laws and such. And so, I will share with you some snapshots that have been posted on our trusty Facebook. Theyre not in order, but for now its all I can do.

Enjoy! Ill post a bit more on our honeymoon when I get another second to catch my breath!

Mrs. Bohls

Hey all!  It's Allena visiting from A Gurley Gurl.  I had the pleasure of watching our lovely Dezzy become Mrs. Bohls last night.  She and her Mr. are not quite on their honeymoon just yet but are enjoying the beginnings of their life as a part of the 'old marrieds' club.  I volunteered to post a few pics on behalf of Derek and Dez to commemorate their first moments as Mr. and Mrs. Bohls.

Excited much? {grin}

I think these 2 are meant to be, huh?

 Sweet newlyweds 

Enjoying some great toasts!

Embarking on the next chapter!  (And in true D&D fashion, enjoying one last beer)

I had an amazing time last night as a guest, and I know Dez will have lots of stories and pictures to share.  Dez was a stunning bride, and as usual, hosted a fabulous party.  Have a blast in Paris you two!!

Merry Almost Christmas From The Almost Bohls Family

Christmas List

My gift this year is a wedding. We get to party it up with our closest friends and family AND I get to marry my best friend. What else could I possibly want? Ill show you...

11 days...

Im Alive(ish)

We are getting married in 16 days. That’s just a tad longer than two weeks! How did it get here so fast?! Were behind on our Christmas shopping but moving as calm, cool and collected through the days as we can.

I cant believe how busy the weeks leading up to a wedding can be. I was prepared for it, and now that my Mom is home things have been moving along at a wonderful pace, I just cant believe how many tiny details begin to consume your life.

Weve edited and edited and edited our wedding programs. We picked them up from being printed and tied tassels to all 350 of them. We bought candles for the candelabras on the registry table. We purchased peppermint stir sticks for the make your own hot chocolate bar. We found the perfect from-scratch recipe to make the hot chocolate mix. We ordered 100 bottles of wine and 8 kegs. We found my Mom a beautiful dress at Neiman Marcus. We had a final meeting with our reception venue. We ordered 388 sparklers to be used during our send off. We have our wedding bands. We have zero thank yous to write as of this very moment as weve written them all as the gifts roll in.

Anyway, you get the idea. Weve done a lot and weve got a lot to go. Im one busy bride to be. Pray for me.

Couples Shower

We had a couples shower this weekend-it was our last shower and we really went out with a bang.

Our guests were asked to attach a Christmas ornament to their gifts and so our collection grew by a large amount! We are so grateful for all that have showered us in love over and over... itll be here before we know it.

And now... finally... I am airport bound to pick up my MOM!

Guess

Guess who got their marriage license today?

Guess who lost ANOTHER key on her laptop keyboard. That makes 4 missing letters and numbers.

Guess who went to the doctor and left with 4 new prescriptions today?

Guess who is hoping and praying to not be a sick bride?

Guess who has a couples shower tomorrow evening?

Guess who is still motherless thanks to snow storms in Paris and an airline strike?

Guess who gets to host her favorite human on earth, her grandfather, for a sleepover tomorrow?

Guess who waited for over 6 months to receive the first two dvds of Mad Men and hasn’t had a moment to watch them?

Wordless Wednesday: Christmas