Mini Vacation

When Raj and I first started dating, he suggested we take a short trip to Gatlinburg TN for the weekend. This was about our third week of dating and it was at that suggestion that I knew this was the man of excitement that I had been waiting for (and boy was he!). Since then, Gatlinburg has become sort of special to us. We've been three times now! This last one was this last memorial day weekend.

I wanted to do something extra special for him this Valentines. In Feb. he came home after visiting his parents in India for a whole month. He came back the day before Vday and even though he was exhausted and jet lagged he wined and dined me, I owed it to him! I was lucky enough to come into some money at that time, and while I admit it was a fast, not so smart decision, I booked us a cabin in Gatlinburg for our four day weekend (but as usual, SO worth it).

Waiting almost four months to go was super hard, but so worth the wait. As usual we had a blast. The view from these cabins is phenomenal. We love grilling, and sitting in the hot tub with a drink in hand. This particular cabin had a pool table even. I think Raj and I were due for a relaxing weekend (me especially, after this terribly exhausting school year!). 

If you've never been here, I HIGHLY suggest it. It can easily be a romantic vacation, one for a family, anything. There are tons of attractions and gift shops, not to mention the Smoky Mountain State Park, one of the most beautiful drives you could have.

Our cabin was amazing. Hot tub outside, giant garden tub inside, full kitchen, washer/dryer, grill, AND a pool table in the loft ( just to name a few! )

I don't get to grill at home as much as I'd like. Mosly because our grill sucks, and we could never get this kind of view from a grill at home! We grilled ribs, steak, and corn on the cob. I had made Raj a deal on the steak. He was saying he was full after two bites, so I said if he finished ALL of it, I'd buy him a pair of Nike's . . . he ate it all haha.

For $15 each we were able to rice a lift up the mountain. The view is incredible and we were so lucky that it was such a beautiful day!

While this treat was a bit costlier, we took a helicopter ride! So beautiful!

I thought I would share our trip. If anyone is trying to plan something for this summer, I highly recommend checking out Gatlinburg or Pigeon Forge Tennessee USA. Totally worth it!

All of us, including our pup Zoe, had a great time!

I'm still alive!

Things have been super crazy, super busy these last couple of months. I'm finally starting to see a slow down and I'm so thankful.

I finally finished my year long student teaching. While I enjoyed the experience and I learned a lot, it's been incredibly hard. We all know that education isn't cheap, and not being able to work a paying job on top of that only makes it worse. I was student teaching 40 hours a week, having 2 three hour long night classes a week, hours and hours of lesson planning once I actually got home, and then I was able to make a meager income working a part-time job on the weekend.

I was starting to get so bogged down by everything that I ended up quitting the weekend job for my own sanity. I can't say I'm sorry I did it either. It was a job working in a home taking care of four physically/mentally disabled clients. It did have it's easy days, but three of the four wore diapers and if I wanted to clean up human poop I'd have been a nurse . . . or have a baby! haha.

As much as I love cooking I just didn't have the time for it! I'm also trying to be health conscious so I didn't want to resort to eating outside everyday. I have been prepping my meals, healthy meals, that aren't Indian (mostly boring stuff like chicken and veggies).

Meal prepping seems to be a pretty popular topic these days and I have a lot of people ask me how/what I do. I'm no nutritionist by any means, but if I got any interest from you guys I would be more than happy to share!

I'm still quite busy these days. I have one final summer class, and a pedagogy exam before I'm a full fledged bonafide secondary social studies teacher!

With everything else cleared out I've started substitute teaching. Aside from being in desperate need of income, this is a great way for me to get my foot in the door and meet different principles in hopes of landing a full time teaching position by August (how I long for my own classroom!).

I promise to try and stay more on top of my blog, now that I have no excuse not to!

ta-ta for now!