Spain- Day 2, Bilbao

Warning! Long post ahead! When we first got to Spain, I was so trigger happy with my camera. I wanted to capture every little detail so that I could remember it all. The below picture- I wanted to remember the apartments and all the people in the calle (street).
Somehow we wandered into a farmers market thinking it was a mall. I can still remember the smell of the fish. Pew! But Chad thought it was pretty cool. And actually, it is pretty cool. I love how important food is to the Spanish culture. They love food...but in a different way than us Americans. Food is more of an art. Meals take time. Time in the preparation. Time in the eating. You know the scripture/prayer, "Give us this day our daily bread", for them it's a more literal thing. Whereas I have a freezer stocked full of bread, they might go to the local bakery everyday & get fresh bread. I love that. I think there's lessons to be learned there.
This was the first cathedral or church that I took pictures of. If only I knew how many I'd be seeing!
Plaza Nueva
Empanada de Atún (Tuna Empanada)
Pixtos...translated, umm, how to describe it...finger food with, in this case, anchovies, octopus & squid?? It was an experience. I'll say that much. But I'm not super big on seafood. But oh, we also had Spanish tortilla! Yum! For those wondering, spanish tortilla is basically an omelet of potatoes & maybe onions. Sounds simple, but it's sooo good! Napolitanas & something that I don't remember the name of that resembles a chocolate covered pretzel, but tastes nothing like that!
And if you see a store with a bunch of pig legs hanging, what should you do? Make your husband stand in front of it so you can take a picture of coarse! No, but really, this is such a common food in Spain. I remember thinking it was such an odd thing that one of my neighbors had a pig leg sitting on her window. Ever wonder where Jamón Serrano comes from- this would be it.
Near...far.  (I don't know about you, but I can't help but hear Elmo in my head when I say that phrase). 
Funicular that took us above the city...
...so I could get some amazing panoramics...
...and so we could take pictures by this sculpture thingy!
Then off to see the Guggenheim museum.
And we finished the day off with a chorizo sandwhich & paté. (Man, I feel very cultured saying I ate paté!  But I must give credit, where credit is due.  I was initially exposed to paté by my very cultured, Danish mission companion- Anna Brock.  And with that said, maybe I am very cultured- I have a friend in Denmark!  How cool is that?!)

Spain- Day 1, Bilbao

For those of you that may not know, I served a mission for the LDS church in northern Spain. I've longed to go back & visit the areas where I served my mission. It's been about ten years (man, where has the time gone!?).

We had a vacation coming up & I brought up Spain again like usual, but this time it was different.  We both realized it was now or never (or at least another 5-10 years). Chances are the next opportunities we get to go, I'll either be pregnant or have morning sickness (if things go according to plan). So with those things in mind, we began the planning (& I must give a HUGE thank you to my former mission comp Katharine Ahnder (now Beus). Serious, I don't know what I would've done without her info/tips. So helpful! Thank you!!)

We left Thursday night & got there Friday afternoon.  Here's day one of our vacation in Spain.

View from our airplane.

Oh, how I remember these mountains! I remember the first time I flew into Bilbao. I thought the landscape looked like pictures I'd seen of Ireland.  Beautiful.
We stayed at a hotel that was called Abando. We really liked it. It was a great location. Easy walking distance to shopping, the Guggenheim museum, & Casco Veijo (pictures of those to come!).
After dropping off our luggage in our room, we went for a little "paseo". We saw a chucheria (spanish candy store).  I beamed like a little kid & tugged on Chad's sleeve begging to go buy candy. And of coarse, once inside I had to take pictures. Oh chucherias, how I have missed you! And thank you/curse you Ashley (Chad's sister- who happened to be my 2nd mission companion) for getting me hooked!

Blog Renovation

Well, you know me. Every now & then I just get sick of the same look & gotta switch things up! Thought I'd try out some of my own designs that I've been making & selling in my etsy shop.

 If you can't tell, I'm in love with geometric patterns right now...and green. It's always been my favorite color though.

 I can't promise that design will be up forever, but for now it's a fun change!

 Below- my old blog look.

Giveaway on Bella Lulu Ink!!

The other day I was checking out my stats on etsy & I noticed that I was getting some traffic from some blog called Bella Lulu Ink.  What the?!  I had to see what this was all about.  I was so flattered to see that this blogger had included one of my designs in her "top 5 list" of the week!

'Who is this Bella Lulu Ink girl anyways,' I wondered.  So I did a little etsy stalking & found out that her name is Chelsea and that she's an amazing web/graphic designer...& that she's a fellow midwesterner (is that a word???).  To top things off, we only live about 2.5 hours apart!  How random, no?!

So, that leads us up to today.  Today I'm offering a free giveaway on her blog.  Go check it out!!  Not only because there will be one lucky winner...but also because we both would soooo love the support to our newly founded etsy stores. Chelsea is pretty awesome too.  That'd be another good reason to check out our giveaway. :)

And just to wet your appetite a bit to get you over to her blog, facebook page &/or etsy store...here's a few of her designs!

A few of her premade blog designs...
And some of her premade logos...