Bachelorette Party!

We partied hearty last weekend to celebrate the upcoming (very soon!!) nuptials of Jody and Alex. Here's how the weekend went down:

Friday night after work, Jody, Claudia, Kim, Cordova, Julia and I met up at the new Talking Stick Resort & Casino in Scottsdale. Our room was awesome, with a great view of the pool and the desert in the background. We ordered out a pizza, salad and some wings from Oregano's and enjoyed our dinner in the hotel room with fancy silverware and napkins. Kim did a trial run on Jody's hair for the wedding while we cracked up to The Sweetest Thing and the Penis Song. It was a pretty casual night, which was exactly what we needed after a long day at work.

Our Fabulous Hotel

Saturday morning, we headed down to the pool to get some sun. We couldn't have asked for better weather - temperatures in the 90's with a light breeze occasionally passing through. Aside from some little boys trying to flirt with Jody by splashing and playing WAY too closely to us, it was a nice way to start the morning. Around noon, we headed upstairs to the spa to get manicures. The nice thing about spas is that you're allowed to use their facilities all day if you're receiving a treatment. So we split off into twos - Claudia and Jody got their nails done while Kim and I relaxed in the whirlpool, then we switched. (Side note: before we settled on the whirlpool, Kim and I decided to try out the steam room at the spa. We literally didn't last a minute - the humidity was too much for our Arizona lungs and we had to duck out of there while another guest laughed us on.)

After our nails were done, we headed out for lunch at Pita Jungle. The food was good, but the gelato next door was even better! We must have driven the employees crazy with how many samples we each had before settling on our respective flavors. It's just so much harder at a gelato shop versus and ice cream shop because everything tastes JUST LIKE what the tag says! Peanut Butter ice cream at Cold Stone may taste like ice cream with just a hint of buttery flavor, but Peanut Butter ice cream at Gelato Spot tastes like you just crammed a spoonful of Skippy in your mouth.

After our lunch break, it was back to the pool to relax and read magazines and further enjoy the good weather. Shannon and Tom even came out for a bit to try to build a base tan before their trip to Cabo. Then it was back up to the spa to get ready for the night. Since there are 4 showers at the spa, as well as a huge, mirrored sink area, it was easy for all of us to get ready at once versus fighting over the small bathroom space in our room. The showers there were really cool, too - they had an open-air feeling and windows that looked out over the green golf course. Maybe in our next house, I will have Matt build me a bathroom that opens up to the yard :)

Getting Ready

Once we were all primped and ready to roll, a few more girls showed up at the hotel to pre-party with us. Jody opened her gifts, which included a hilarious "Panty Line" that represented via underpants the various stages of marriage she and Alex will go through. There were funny little poems that went along with each stage and had us all cracking up. Since our dinner reservation wasn't until a little later, we headed over to Culinary Dropout for drinks. Jody started in on her list of embarrassing bridal tasks that we assigned her, which she continued throughout the night.

Dinner was at Olive & Ivy - my first time to that restaurant. The food and the sangria did not disappoint, and we had a good time with even more girls who showed up for the festivities. After dinner, it was over to Ernie's for some good-time karaoke! I had never been to Ernie's, but had heard from some of my co-workers that it was a fun dive bar with cheap drinks and a guaranteed good time for all. It definitely lived up to its word - we snagged a both towards the karaoke stage and enjoyed the various people entertaining us. Some were actually really good singers (some chick did a rendition of Alicia Keys' "If I Ain't Got You" - some guy sang a spot-on Elton John tune), but most were like us and just there to goof around. Jody and Kim rocked the mic with Michael Jackson's "The Way You Make Me Feel," then Claudia and Jody rapped their way through Salt N Pepa's "Shoop" to please the crowd.

After we'd had enough for the night, we headed back over to our hotel to crash. The next morning, we packed our bags, checked out, and headed over to Chompie's for a nice brunch. The omelets were fantastic, and it was a great way to end a great weekend. Next step in the wedding fun is the actual wedding itself!! We can't wait!