finishing up july

when the bean booked their plane ticket to singapore, they’d overlooked a very important calendar entry: jin from BTS’ los angeles stop on his post-military world tour.  oops.  

but i promised to take lots of videos and pictures and ended up bringing along the bean’s bestie’s little sister.  i know that sounds random, but she’s a huge fan and a super sweet kid and it was fun to spend an evening with her as she fangirled over jin.

the hub and i took advantage of our kid-free time and headed out for a road trip.  he’d been invited by his dad to join him and his brother and a friend to do a little fishing, and while i’m definitely not into the fishing part i do love a good road trip.  once he’d convinced me that i wouldn’t be horning in on a boys’ trip (which i kinda figured anyway because i know his dad pretty well), i was all in.  we packed up the truck, dropped the dogs off at their favorite doggy hotel and hit the road.

we blew right past vegas:

and settled in for a few miles before making our next turn.

because i’m 12:

we spent the first night of our road trip in park city.  

the next morning, we got up and crossed another state line:

and drove through a scary rainstorm.

we arrived at the house and met up with FIL, brother wan and FIL’s friend.  the house was pretty nice, and when i went out into the back yard i spotted some wildlife across the river.

while the guys went out and fished, i enjoyed lots of solo time at the house - i’d packed lots of supplies to try out a bunch of fun new crochet patterns and cranked out a few pieces:

and OMG - while surfing the channels on roku tv, i discovered a channel that plays episodes of general hospital 24/7.  it was a few years behind, but it was really fun to revisit old storylines and see characters who’d disappeared from the canvas.

i did join the guys for one of their evening fishing sessions, although i stayed in the truck to avoid getting eaten by mosquitoes.  it was fun to get out of the house for a little while though, and see views like this:

oh, also!  did you know that there’s such a thing as a portable espresso machine?  i’d ordered it just before the trip and packed it along with the supplies i needed, and surprised the hub with a cup of his favorite morning beverage on our first morning.  he was pretty excited not to have to settle for a k-cup or drive ten minutes to get to the nearest coffee shop.

and before we knew it, it was time to pack it up and start making our way back home.  we hugged everyone goodbye and hit the road.

we stopped for lunch once we crossed into utah and even managed to find one of those dirty soda shops open for me to try.

i cranked out one more plushie (plus a couple of cute accessories), and then we crossed into nevada.

this time, we did stop in vegas and checked into the crockford at resorts world, which is the most luxurious of the three hotels there.  the hub was able to score a comped room based on his previous visits, and it was really nice.  

we headed to the bar just a few feet away from our room to do some pregaming before making our way to the sphere.  i’d managed to sweet talk him into taking me to see the backstreet boys during their limited time summer residency, and i was so excited:

the show was just as awesome as i’d been reading online, although the hub wasn’t as enthused.  the huge monitors that surrounded us with projections coordinated with the concert made him a little queasy, although he’d been forewarned by the plethora of folks who reported motion sickness issues via social media over the last couple of months.  instead, he’d duck out and grab  more drinks and snacks, or pick up a sweatshirt at the merch table, or chat up the event staffers who were more than happy to share stories with him.

bagelmania is always a required stop for breakfast before starting the 3-hour drive home.

and back home, i tackled one more little crochet project.  this pattern comes in two sizes, so i decided to try out the mini version first.  look how cute:

and i was only home for a day or two before i headed out to glendale for my annual solo trip to the general hospital fan club weekend.

more on that coming up!  most of you won’t care, but that’s okay.