Stephanie's Visit

This picture pretty much sums up how I felt about the fact that Stephanie was coming to visit & spend the weekend with me. :) She was a gem & decided that this weekend should be a getaway for us both. So she booked us a room at the Double Tree in downtown Dallas! I was super excited.

She arrived on Thursday night & we just stayed at our place so she could see Doug & the boys. Plus I had Friday planned for around my neck of the woods. 

Friday morning we woke up & decided to start our weekend off with a workout as we knew we'd be eating a lot. Haha! So we did some P90X3 with Doug. It was fun having an extra work out buddy.

After getting all sweaty & downing a protein shake we headed off for some pampering. Down the street from our house is a Reflexology spa where they have a killer special that's 70 minutes for only $30! Doug had been before & loved it so we were excited to try it out. This is what you see when you walk in. A room full of beds with small dividers between each one. You stay clothed for the massage so it was good we kept our athletic wear on. :) It was wonderful. There were moments of extreme pain from the pressure, but it was a hurt so good kind of thing.

 After that we hadn't had enough so we headed over the Hawaiian Nail Bar to get our nails done & a pedicure. Seriously, I could get use to this kind of treatment.

 We were starving afterwards so I took her next door to Torchy's Tacos. She loved it! I knew she would. :) Then we went back home to shower & get ready. After saying goodbye to Doug & the boys we hit up the Allen Outlets for some shopping.

 And we couldn't resist making a stop at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory for an Apple Pie Apple. Yum!

 After shopping til our feet hurt & the sun was going down we decided to hit the road & make our way downtown. Since moving here we've found a great place to eat called Whiskey Cake Kitchen. It's farm to fork and amazingly delicious. So I wanted to take her there for dinner. 

 We shared the chicken apple salad & a burger. And of course we had to order the famous whiskey cake for dessert.

Being stuffed to the gils we waddled out the car & went to the hotel. I must say as fun & pampering as the day was, our time at the hotel that night was where the real therapy came. It was so wonderful having 'my person' there face to face with me as I opened up about some of the trials I had been facing since last fall & moving to Texas. We shed lots of tears, laughed lots & ate more cookies from the hotel then we should have. I'm so lucky to have such a great friend in my life that no matter where we live we're always there for each other. It makes me so so good that she continues to make me feel special by putting in the effort to keep our friendship.

Not sure what time it was when we finally went to sleep but we decided to not set an alarm & just sleep. And sleep we did. It was 10:00AM when we finally got up on Saturday morning. Because we loved Paula's donuts so much in Buffalo we decided to look up the best donuts in Dallas. A lot of reviews mentioned Mustang donuts so we decided to give a try. The breakfast of champions right? 

Yes, I'm a child & love to order the chocolate with sprinkles. 

After our breakfast dessert, we headed to the 6th Floor Museum for the JFK Assassination Tour. I never really realized that he had been shot in Dallas. But let's be honest, I didn't know much about him at all. The tour was an audio tour with headphones. I love that kind because you can stop & start when you want. It's a 'must do' on any website for Dallas, clearly that's true because the place was crowded. I never really got bored though like I do at most museums. Haha! "It was a book depository building back then. The tour told about his presidency, then went into detail about when he was shot. He was doing a publicity tour in Dallas for his campaign to be reelected. He was sitting in an open limo, next to his wife, Jackie O, when 3 shots were fired. One missed and the other two shot him. Another man in the limo was also shot but didn't die. The limo raced off to the nearest hospital but he was pronounced dead within half an hour. And just two hours later, Johnson was sworn in as President with Jackie standing next to him. The shooter was a man named Lee Harvey Oswald. He got away, but shot a police officer later that day and was arrested. That night a club owner shot him on national television while he was in police custody. It all seemed so crazy. It went into the conspiracy theories a little but I didn't get those at all. Mostly, it was just astounding to see how the whole world mourned his loss. But we weren't allowed to take any pictures, so this was the only one we got on the next floor. Overall, the tour took 3 hours, so it was a big chunk of our day!" (taken from Stephanie's blog.)

I made Steph run out to the X where one of the shots was made. She was a good sport running into traffic. Haha!

This was a separate memorial that Jackie O designed in his honor. Not really sure I understand what she was going for, but whatever.

After we walked over to the Reunion Tower to check out the city view from up top. We were a little taken back by the price of $16 for the elevator ride, but did it anyways. The glass elevator made it more interesting & the view from the top was great. I'll never do it again, but it was fun to do it once.

We were pretty hungry after & so we headed to a steakhouse called III Forks. It was recommended by one of Stephanie's friends as a must so we were excited to try it. Well......let's just say that as we drove up to this here restaurant I began to panic. I was wearing jeans & a baseball tee with converse. Uh...I'd say being under dressed was a HUGE understatement. It seriously took a lot of guts on my part to even walk in. They asked if they could take my coat and I politely declined. This baby wasn't coming off for the entire meal! Steph felt pretty bad that we hadn't done our research on attire or how fancy this place was. As did I. As did I. The steak was pretty darn good & other then feeling out of place, I really enjoyed it. We sure got a good laugh about it after we left.

We decided to hit up the movies & go see Insurgent. Afterwards we weren't really ready to head back to the hotel, but we were out of options as stores were closed & our bellies were too full to eat anything else. As we were driving away from the theater I caught a glimpse of some lights & realized it was a carnival in the parking lot. Wahoo! 

We bought our tickets for the Ferris Wheel & loaded into our cart to enjoy the ride. Well I'd say we did more then enjoy. Haha! I had forgotten how fun it is to ride rides with this girl. She FREAKS out! Like all panicky, screaming with her eyes shut that she hates this. I couldn't help but laugh my head off. And I think because I was laughing so hard she began to laugh real hard/scream & man was it a good time. :)

My belly hurt from laughing so hard, but not badly enough to not purchase some cotton candy. That's always a must!

We went on another little roller coaster because we saw a bunch of little kids riding it & figured it was harmless. Oh boy were we wrong. We sat 2nd row behind some boys around 9/10 years old. I'm sure they regretted taking that first row. All we did was laugh & scream some more. That thing was so old & sounded like it was going to fall apart. I think that's what put Steph over the edge. And it went really fast too. We figured it would make around 3 loops or so, but no. It went on & on & on! We had a blast & I love that we did it so spontaneously. 

 The next morning we decided to hit up the farmers market downtown.  I just love all the colors & different kinds of food they offer. We had our fare share of sampling too.

After the market we headed to the Dallas Arboretum to check out the tulip festival. It had been raining off & on the last couple days so it was a little soggy, but the blooms were fantastic! 

Then we went to check out the George Bush Library. I'll admit this was more for Stephanie then me, but I know this girl loves a good museum so I was game. Haha!  

My favorite part was the Oval Office replica. Everything was true to size of the office in the actual White House. But here we actually got to touch everything & even sit as the Presidents desk!

 We decided to squeeze in a little shopping at the mall & a late lunch before heading to the airport. We couldn't resist eating at the Grand Lux to partake in a favorite dish of both of ours, the caramel chicken. Yum!

Dropping Steph off at the airport is never an easy task. I always end up driving away in tears having to part ways from her. I'm so grateful that she came to visit. It truly was a blessing for me to have her come. She helped pull me out of a difficult phase I was in since moving to Texas. And I believe she needed me as well for some things she was going through too. That's what best friends are for. To be there for one another no matter how many miles are between. It was a great getaway with a great friend!