Wonderful day...

, originally uploaded by daniellehampton.

Today was such a beautiful day, and we are already winding down and heading to sleep so we can have another celebration tomorrow! Hank's birthday! We are going to be spending the day in NYC, shopping, enjoying good food...and seeing one of my dearest friends Emily! I am so excited.

Our anniversary today was awesome though, and thanks so much to all of you for your sweet words and kind wishes. We slept in a bit, then went to lunch at Sentosa's, a veggie restaurant about fifteen miles away. It was really delicious. Afterward we spent the afternoon on the boardwalk eating some yummy dessert and walking around. We got home and decided to go on a long run, which turned into a longer walk and talk following the run, and now we're pooped! It was super fun today reminiscing about our special day one year ago. It's so exciting to think about the next million. We have a lot of big things coming up in this next year and I feel very fortunate to have an amazing partner in life to share all of these things with. Today was a great day to remind ourselves of how lucky we are and we definitely had a wonderful time doing so!Source URL: https://sweettattooforgirls.blogspot.com/2009/05/
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Happy Anniversary!

As of today, it's been one year of wedded bliss! It's been an amazing year, and I can't wait for a million more. I love you Hank!

















Source URL: https://sweettattooforgirls.blogspot.com/2009/05/
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Hello from the Jersey shore!

I am sitting in the car in the parking lot of the grocery store waiting for everyone to come out, so I thought I would write a quick little blog post! We just arrived and it's so nice to be back on the beach. Our place is beachfront, so we just walk right down the stairs and there we are. We have a large deck with loungers that I can't wait to utilize tomorrow.
Vermont was awesome, I was really sad to say goodbye this morning but I know we'll be back soon. It was so fun to spend so much time outside and have so much relaxation time. I took a lot of photos between the Canon and the Nikon and I spent some of our drive today looking through all of them. I think though as I've gotten older I'm more prone to motion sickness because after staring at my computer or reading I start to feel a little icky. I hate that!
So now we're heading back, groceries and family are in the car and we are navigating down the 37. It's 6pm right now and I think the only plans for tonight are a nice run! I am signing off but I hope all of you have a great night!Source URL: https://sweettattooforgirls.blogspot.com/2009/05/
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life

Today was a beautiful day. Tomorrow we head back down to the shore and I am so excited to be on the beach. I've had so much time to think these past few days and reflect on so much, and I'm in a good place right now. Spending time with my family is the most important thing to me, and it really makes you realize what exactly is most important in life. Re-evaluating things, making plans, it's all been happening as I've been enjoying so much time outside. As trite as it is, I have to say it- there's so much beauty in the world when we just slow down and enjoy it. I know I am guilty of rushing through things so its nice to get a reminder to slow, slow it down. My birthday is in two days, our wedding anniversary is in three, and Hank's birthday is the next day. What a weekend coming up! I am going to keep enjoying myself, relaxing, and getting rid of those last little lingering negative thoughts in my head. I'm almost there. I'm finally at a point in my life where I love who I am, physically and emotionally, and it's an amazing feeling of accomplishment. Sure, the ups and downs come, but at 26 I am comfortable with me, and love my own company. These may be too much self-rambling for some of you, so thanks for reading if you did! I hope all of you are having a wonderful evening and loving the start to your summer!Source URL: https://sweettattooforgirls.blogspot.com/2009/05/
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Green green grass

garden, originally uploaded by daniellehampton.
Hello blogger friends! I have been super busy these last few days so I haven't had that much time to blog, but I have managed to upload photos to my flickr. I am always so worried that my pictures will all get deleted so I am religious about uploading them the same day. Between all of us, we have taken a million photos of our trip thus far, and we still have two weeks to go! We are staying at my Aunt and Uncle's house and it's truly been heaven these past few days. Right now some of the fam is at a motorcycle exhibit but I can't wait 'til they get home- my Uncle Paul is a major photographer for the NY Times, and he's giving us pointers and a lesson on our new Nikon camera tonight! I'm so stoked. We've had the camera for awhile (Christmas) but the only thing it's been used for is photographing Hank's toys. So today we will get the rundown and I can't wait. This entire week has been chock full of great family time, trail runs, outdoor enjoyment, sailing, and eating amazing food. I can't even begin to go into all of the fun we've been having. I come to Vermont a lot, and everytime it's better and better. I could live here, for sure! I'm not going to post a million pictures in this entry (just one of me to say HI!) so go to my flicker to see the rest if you're so inclined! Tomorrow morning we are heading down to the beach house on the Jersey shore and I am so so excited for beach time for two weeks. I will try and blog a bit later about a more detailed rundown of the trip!

If you want to check out all of my vacation photos you can visit-

flickr.com/daniellehampton!
Source URL: https://sweettattooforgirls.blogspot.com/2009/05/
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mobile blogging

I don't mobile blog too often, but I'm in the car for another few hours so I thought, why not? We got into Newark last night around 1:30am and stayed at the Marriott by the airport. When we arrived in our room, one of my Dad's friends had sent up a cheese and fruit platter, with a bottle of wine. It was really sweet, the beds were super comfortable and the hotel was quiet. It was a nice place to rest our heads. When we first booked this trip, we didn't anticipate going up to Vermont right away so that's why we didn't elect to fly into Burlington like we usually do. Due to my all of my father's Asian travels and our vacations we always fly on points so it was too much of a headache to change it. So that is why we are currently driving through upstate NY! Hank flies into Burlington tonight and we will all be staying at my Aunt's beautiful lake house until Wednesday. Then we'll be down at the shore. My parents are leaving for the Carribbean next week too while we're still at the beach house in NJ.
I am just loving being back "home" so much. We moved to AZ when I was 14, so all of my memories growing up are from back here. If Hank and I didn't already have a wonderful life and his career in Prescott, I would love to live in Vermont or upstate NY. My uncle live up here in NY and I love where he lives. I'd want to get some land and just lead a simple life raising a family. I can't get enough of all of the green trees- it's the major thing I missed when we moved to AZ, but luckily Prescott has tons of forests and beauty as well. I am not a desert girl at all, and I guess I only lived in the desert for 4 years, because I went up to college at NAU as soon as I graduated high school. I've never realized just how short of a time span I actually lived in Mesa, weird. But anyway, I love it here!
I'm sitting here, watching the trees go by, listening to The Gaslight Anthem. I cannot get enough of this band- the sound, the lyrics, I love them. And plus, they're from New Brunswick, where I was born! :)
I'm going to take a little nap but I'm definitely going to be blogging and taking photos throughout this trip so stay tuned! Happy Memorial Weekend to all of you!Source URL: https://sweettattooforgirls.blogspot.com/2009/05/
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Birthday video

I just taught myself how to use IMovie on my Mac, and I made this silly/cute little video from photos and video clips from the evening. :)

Source URL: https://sweettattooforgirls.blogspot.com/2009/05/
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Wonderful Weekend, Part 2

So after we got home well after 3am following the my bday party, we all headed to sleep pretty quickly. My sister was heading to Vegas the next morning so she had a long day ahead of her and needed sleep! Saturday morning Ambs and I woke up super late, around 11:30. I haven't done that in so long and it's weird to feel like the entire day had already gone by. It really reminded me of why I am such an early riser! We headed out to my hair appointment at Erika's so I could get my color freshened up for our trip, then we stopped by a couple shops on the way home. That night was Shirley's birthday party so we got back and started getting ready. I love that Shirl and I have birthdays so close to one another, we are already talking about the huge joint bash we're doing for our 30th! It' not for 3 years, but we are thinking a destination birthday of some sort! :)

So we got ready and headed out to Sens, which is a tapas restaurant in downtown Phoenix. We arrived and I got to see so many happy faces, including Emily, who is due to have her daughter in about a month! I am so excited, and everytime I am around her it gets me really excited to one day be in the same place. Shirley, Adam, Alana, Chad, Erin and Jeff decided to take the lightrail from Tempe so they arrived a bit late, but when they got there we started to decide what we wanted to order. I had actually never had tapas before so it was fun to look through all of our options. Between everyone's dishes I got to try quite a few things and they were all excellent. It was a really perfect place for a group dinner, and I could imagine it would be even more perfect for a date night! I can't wait to take Hank- there are a few really tasty veggie dishes I think he'd love. Shirley was glowing all night, basking in the birthday love, and she seemed to have a wonderful time. After dinner we walked over to the Roosevelt for a glass of wine/beer and hung out a bit more. Some of Jeff's coworkers were going out on Mill, so we all headed that way and ended up at Rula Bula. Totally cute bar with awesome live Irish music...but total d-bag central, which is granted being that we were in ASU-land. Amber and I took off to get some Mojo Yogurt (we hadn't tried it yet), and both the Isis and Earth Crisis shows were over so Hank and some friends came down to meet us. We walked around for awhile then ended up at Slices, where everyone who was at Rula Bula came down to have pizza too. All in all it was a wonderful evening, and what's better than celebrating the birth of your best friend?

Here are photos from the night -

obligatory photobooth pics, of course!




waiting for friends to arrive




Shirley and Emily (with Camryn in her belly!)


Shirley and her bf Adam


some of the girls


Sens


one of the dishes Amber ordered...yummy tofu


Erin and me




Stacey and Shirley


Emily, the beautiful Mom-to-be!


Amber and my yogurt later in the evening...I am a total fan of Mojo now (thanks Janay!)


outside Slices


the birthday girl...after a long night! :)
Source URL: https://sweettattooforgirls.blogspot.com/2009/05/
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Wonderful Weekend, Part 1

Wow! I don't even know where to begin in explaining that wonderfulness that was my very busy weekend. I suppose I'll start on Thursday, since I worked a half day and then Hank and I headed down to Mesa. Amber rearranged her moving-home plans so she could spend the weekend with me (what a great friend), so she and her Dad arrived around 8pm, after driving straight from San Francisco to my parents' in Mesa! Talk about a long drive! After we got settled, Hank had the bright idea to go to Filiberto's late night for some greasy Mexican, mmm! Filiberto's is a Mesa tradition- both Laur and I have spent many a drunken high school late, late night there with our friends, so it's always funny to go there and grab a bite to eat. I had a little of Lauren's carne asada burrito and it was so delicious. I knew I could have eaten one of my own, but I also knew I wouldn't feel too hot or happy if I did, so I chose to just have a little piece, which was enough! After Filiberto's we headed home and all of us pretty much just went to sleep.

Friday morning I got in a great workout, but unfortunately did a heavy leg workout without even thinking about the fact that I had a three hour rollerskating party to attend that evening...but more on that later. Amber and I decided to spend the day shopping so we ran around to a million different places and we both ended up getting a few cute summer dresses. I love shopping with Amber, we have such different styles and I always enjoy seeing what she puts together. So we shopped, went to the bookstore, ate lunch, ate more frozen yogurt, then headed home to start getting ready for my birthday party! My birthday isn't actually for two weeks, but since we are going to be out of town, my sister thought she'd do an early celebration, and I'm so glad she did.

Lauren invited all of my close friends for dinner before the actual party started. It was so nice to have all of the people I love at one table- minus Autumn, Em, Suki and Meli though. If they would have been there I don't even know what I would have done! Too much love in one place! Ha! But it was so nice. We decided to do dinner at Caffe Boa on Mill Ave. If I could have done it again I may have chose a different place, as the menu was a bit pricey for what we got, but it was great ambiance and in a fun area. I got a salad, but after trying Amber and Laur's ravioli I really wished I would have gotten their dish. I forgot what exactly was in it, but it was so delicious. Hank got a caprese type salad that he loved a lot too. So dinner was awesome, I received such wonderful gifts from my friends and I am so thankful for all of their generosity. Here are some photos from dinner (you can find a million more on my flickr if you click on any of the photos).

leaving my parents' house, en route to dinner


pretty girls in the car


Alana, Erin, and Shirl - some of my college girlfriends/best friends


Shirley and Lauren


one of my amazing presents from Erin- I didn't get photos of my other presents, but I love them all :)


the whole group, plus John's middle finger. THANKS JOHN.


zee lovebirds


Jonathan and me - friends since 1996!


Ha, I love them.


After dinner some people walked down to Mojo for frozen yogurt and some of us headed to Skateland to get squared away, bring the cupcakes in, etc. I hadn't been rollerskating in years and years so I was actually feeling a little nervous about skating. I am not much of a risk taker, especially risks where I can break bones, so I did have little butterflies in my stomach as we pulled up. They went away pretty quickly though, and I remembered how much I loved rollerskating! Some of my friends were so, so good on skates and it was super adorable. The entire night was perfect to me. A huge empty roller rink, with the people I love all skating and having fun. Nothing could have been better. Hour of the Wolf played a little set, we all skated to fun music, and the night ended around 2:30am.

It meant a lot to me that my friends came out and spent the night celebrating my birthday. I have the best friends in the world and I was yet again reminded of that.

Here are a lot of photos from Skateland- there are so many so I just picked a random bunch!

Lance


Shirley and skeeball


girls!


Elisa, Ambs, and me


Suki (Sarah), me, and Erin doing who knows what. I love this photo!


my skate partner for life!


O'Hagans!


silly me


the lovely Erin


my Sarah and me!


Shawna and Holly- Shawna is one of my oldest and dearest friends, she was one of my best friend in high school and we still keep in touch, which is awesome. I love having that history!


This is my favorite photo of Zoe from that night- she is the best rollerskater!


the Peters!


Lance and me being weird.


Janay and Danny!


Hour of the Wolf playing a little set- I was skating by and accidentally cut out Hank! Oops!


The night was just wonderful and I also love the fact that my real birthday isn't for two weeks! That means I get to celebrate a few more times. I love it. One thing I didn't love though was waking up so, so sore on Saturday morning! The combination of squats, lunges, machines, etc and then skating nonstop for three hours really did a number on me but today I am feeling a lot better and I love that my birthday incorporated so much exercise! :)

I will end this by saying again, thank you to all of my amazing friends for celebrating with me, I love all of you more than you'll ever know! I appreciate all you do for me.Source URL: https://sweettattooforgirls.blogspot.com/2009/05/
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