A slice of...Austin, Texas!

This week I am so happy to share one of my darling best friends in the whole wide world with y'all...and her little slice of Austin, Texas (hence the y'all!). Amber Joy has always been a fixture here at Sometimes Sweet and if you're a regular reader I'm sure you recognize her from any of the million photos we take when we are together. Amber is actually from Prescott originally and kind of grew up with Hank, they went to the same high school and all of that jazz. I met her about six years ago through all of our mutual friends, and we've spent many summers and all of our school/holiday breaks together having some of the best adventures and the most fun, silly girly times you could imagine. Amber is now a newer resident to the Lone Star state, as she moved from Santa Barbara just a few months ago, but has already settled in and has happily made Texas her new home. Prior to that she lived in the great city of San Francisco for many years, and although she easily could have written page upon page of her favorite SF things to do and places to go, and I wanted her to share Austin with us! I definitely can't wait to go and visit her once little Henry is born so he can see where his Auntie Amber lives, and so we can visit all of these neat locations. It looks like a fun, lively place and seeing it through Amber's eyes has been wonderful, and I hope all of you enjoy it as well. Also, check out her blog http://amberjoyh.blogspot.com/, and be sure to leave her a little hello! And now, here's Amber!


As a recent transplant to the Austin area I am barely scraping the surface of all the great things this city has to offer, but I am already overwhelmed with all of the great entertainment, variety and never ending things to do so far! Although maybe pre-mature these are my top five favorite things to do in Austin, Texas!

1. Barton Springs: This is an amazing natural spring that they allow the public to enjoy. The water is always FREEZING, but feels so wonderful on those crazy hot summer days of Austin! It normally costs $3 for a day, but from 9pm-10pm it's free swim and what could be better than a night swim in a natural spring.. for FREE?

2. Liberty! This is a staple bar on the east side of the city that features a wonderful family seating atmosphere on the back patio. Another feature on the patio is a delicious food trailer that's open for as long as the bar is and it's definitely a must try. They also have a great happy hour with $1.50 16 oz PBR and there ain't nothin' wrong with that! But most importantly, Liberty is a wonderful spot to check out some pretty fly doodz!

3. Lone Star Beer...the NATIONAL beer of Texas because "to drink anything else would be treason".


4. Hey Cupcake! Just deliciously wonderful. I am pretty darn picky about my red velvet cupcakes and I must say...they take the cake! Hey C.C. also offers many other absolutely yummy options often including one vegan flavor of the day. Something for everyone!


5. Favorite Shopping...so far....I still have a lot of exploring to do in this area, but South Congress will be tough to beat. It is most accurately and easily described as the Haight st. of Austin. It features a great number of vintage, costume, eclectic stores and some great little food spots. If you end up visiting grab a cupcake and dive into some of the fun stores such as Uncommon Objects and Lucy in Disguise with Diamonds and prepare to lose a couple hours, but all in good fun!


So there you have it, Amber's lil' slice of Texas! xoxo

Austin, Texas!

image via weheartit.com

So, today is a big day for a little lady by the name of Amber Joy! Obviously if you read my blog you know her, and maybe you even read her blog (http://amberjoyh.blogspot.com/), but today is MOVING DAY for her! The reason I'm posting this, is to ask if any of you have any recommendations of things she absolutely must do, must try, should experience in her new home of Austin, Texas! Feel free to comment in the space below, I know she'll love reading any Austin-related tidbits you may want to share. Thanks in advance, and love all of you!

summer in Prescott

Prescott is one of my favorite towns in the entire world, and everyday of my life I feel so lucky that this is where I call home, and where we will raise our family. Hank's family has been here for three generations (baby Henry will be the fourth), and I think it's amazing to be steeped in such tradition.

It's funny that during junior year of college at NAU, Shirley and I found ourselves lost in Prescott. She had followed me up here in her car so I could drop mine off at the local VW shop in town, since there wasn't a shop in Flagstaff that my warranty included. We spent hours and hours driving around the back roads- how were we to know that Whipple St. turns into Iron Springs Rd., and Willow Creek turns in Grove?! It was horrible. But who would have known that just a few years later I'd be calling that quirky little town home.

I love Prescott because it is such a small town, having about 40,000 inhabitants (compared to Phoenix's 1.6 million). I enjoy the vibe our town exudes, I adore the downtown area, and especially how in the summer there are events every weekend. I always daydreamed about taking our kids down there on a blanket during the evening concerts on the square, walking the perimeter of the courthouse with our stroller, and enjoying quiet picnics on a weekend morning. Now that we are about to become parents, it's sunk in quite a bit more that this is the place where my children will make their memories, this is where THEY will call home for their entire lives.

Prescott is far enough away from Phoenix (120 miles) but close enough to still be able to go down and shop when the mood strikes. It's close to my family, but still feels far enough that we're making our own little life for our little family. I do hope that one day my parents and sister move up here, but it has been nice to have a place away from home that I've made our home. Whenever our friends and family come visit, they always remark how much they love it up north. The weather is cooler, we get all four seasons, and the summers are completely manageable, staying in the 80s at most.

This weekend was a typical Prescott weekend. Each year we hold a Bluegrass Festival where hundreds of musicians flock to our town to play on the big stage, and also enjoy a weekend with fellow enthusiasts and fans. Although there is a large stage set up on Gurley Street, it's common to see twenty or so small groups of musicians on the opposite side of the courthouse playing music. It's a fabulous weekend, full of good music and fun people, and this time I was able to enjoy it on Saturday, and also stroll around a bit today with Amber following our yummy brunch at The Dinner Bell.











my darling friend Crystal (you've probably seen her on this blog quite a bit, she visits us often!)




one of the many smaller groups of musicians


So all in all it was a great weekend, spent with my family and our friends. It was awesome to have my parents and sister come up on Friday, and we spent the afternoon eating lunch at Bill's Pizza with Hank's Mom, step dad and sister, and then of course had to do some baby shopping before they headed back down the mountain. It's been two days but I'm still riding high from the amazing ultrasound, and it seems like everywhere I look now I see adorable little boys. I can't help but think about our Henry. What will he be like? Who will he look like? My heart is so full of love for this little guy that I can't wait until he arrives and we can shower him with affection!

The weekend is almost over, even though for a teacher the summer is one huge weekend, and I have quite the to-do list for the evening, after we get home from dinner. Now the countdown begins for the 4th of July, one of my favorite times up here in Prescott! My family and Autumn's family will be coming up to spend the weekend with us and I cant' wait. I hope whatever you did over the past few days you've had a great time, and Happy Monday tomorrow, to all of you!

I'm here, I'm alive!

I always told myself I would never apologize for a lack of blogging, but now that my number of followers has grown so much, both on the friend connect and via Google Reader, I feel almost a sense of responsibility. I've gotten quite a few very sweet, concerned emails from my readers asking me if I was okay, where I've been, etc. I can assure you that all is well in the Hampton house- better than well, even! I can't get into it quite yet, but just know that I've been very busy and haven't had the easiest time finding time to sit down and blog about everything going on! Soon, though. I've missed blogging everyday though, and I'm excited to get back into the swing of things in the next few weeks. So to those people that wrote or commented, thank you so much for caring and being so kind. I promise I'm not going anywhere!

This past weekend was such a great one. I need to upload some photos from Amber Joy's tattoo session when I get a moment, but it went so well and I know she's incredibly happy about the result. Hopefully she'll let me feature her next week on Tattoo Tuesday so all of you can see the process, and I will also touch on some after care tips. Amber sadly left for California Saturday, and after I spent some great family time, I headed over to my bff Autumn's house to spend time with some of my favorite ladies and their families. Hank and HOTW were on a mini-tour with Terror and Ignite over the weekend, so it was just me representing the Hamptons, but it was so good to see Chloe and baby Carter, and all my girls. We have SO much fun things coming up in the next few weekends, including Erin finding out the gender of her baby! Spa week is next weekend, and we also have Viva Las Vegas in the beginning of May. Shirley is the president of a huge charity organization in the valley called 20-30, and they put on the event every year. It's always such a great time, and all of the money goes to a great cause. If you'd like to dress up and join Hank, me, and our friends in Scottsdale at this event, click here to check out their website! Also give me a heads up so we can be sure to do a little blogger meet up there! :)

I didn't share this last week, but while Hank and I were out and about downtown, we ran into my friend Lisa. She got so excited and said she'd been carrying around a present for me forever in hopes of running into me, and ran over to her bag! She pulled out....



this amazing antique Russian doll necklace! I just about died. I love it so much and I feel so grateful to have such wonderful friends who think of me in such a sweet way. I don't think you read this, but thank you thank you thank you Lisa! Oh, and before someone asks, my top is See by Chloé.

Other than the usual, not much else is going on. My 10-year high school reunion is in a month or so, and although I'm on the planning committee due to being in student council back in the day, I'm just not interested in going whatsoever. I keep in touch with most of my high school friends via Facebook, and the people I want to hang out with, or keep a relationship going with, I make time for. I'm not really into seeing all of these people because one, I really don't feel the need to share my "status" and life with these now-strangers, and two, I don't have enough time for my current friends half the time, so just thinking about reconnecting with all of these people makes me incredibly tired and overwhelmed. Maybe I have the wrong attitude though. I do get a little spark of excitement when I think about seeing some of the people I used to party with, and hang out with, but at the same time, that was then and this is now. I was one of those people that really loved high school and got a lot out of it. I had a great time back then, and I look back fondly on all of my great memories but I prefer to keep them as just that- memories, outside of the handful of people I still see on a regular basis. So, my decision is to just skip it. Have any of you attended your reunions? What kind of experiences did you have?

I'll leave you with an early morning/tired face photo of Amber and me this weekend. We surprisingly didn't take many photos this trip, as it was pretty much a whirlwind of shopping and getting tattooed! Love you Ambs.

Friends and fun

Wednesday was a wonderful day- our dear friends Erin and Jonathan came up to Prescott for a visit. We've all been friends for a long, long time, and it's always so wonderful to be able to spend extended amounts of time with them. They got in around 4pm, and once Hank got off work we all went to Hugo's for dinner (of course). Afterward we spent the rest of the night downtown, playing Wii, and laughing so much. It was perfect. I took a million little Flipcam videos, so I stuck them all into one long video. It's nothing special, but you'll get a little look at Prescott and our silliness. I am loving this little camera, and I'll be taking a lot more videos in the future.

I also wanted to add that I had to take my formspring off of my blog for now- there's absolutely no way I can keep up with all of the questions! Maybe one day I'll put it back up when I have more time.

xoxo

12/30/09 from Danielle Hampton on Vimeo.

Here are some photos-

JP and Madeline, she loves him


Hugo's session














Hank tried to make cookies but it turned into one big cookie...delicious though!






Wii bowling!


downtown




me!


Adie!


Amber!


Erin!

Friday night

I am back from a wonderful, early evening spent with good friends. Amber, Robyn and I went to see "Julie and Julia," which was an adorable, light-hearted film. I am the biggest Meryl Streep fan, and I absolutely adore everything she does. She did Julia Child spot-on, and at times I forgot I was even watching Meryl. With that said, I am not the biggest Amy Adams fan, but I thought she did a good job in the movie. It was a good film. Not great, but it was definitely a great feel-good movie. I just watched "Doubt" a couple of weeks ago, also starring Streep and Adams, so it was interesting to see them in completely different roles. It also really made me love Hank somehow a bit more when I watched both Julia and Julie's on-screen husbands. Hank is just like those men, the kindest man I know, and I feel like my relationship with Hank was similar to the one Julia Child had with her Paul. My heart was very full the entire time, in a good way. So, I left the theater with a smile on my face and I feel inspired to cook more which is always a plus.

Amber leaves for the second and last time tomorrow morning, so it was nice to spend one more evening with her. She's my movie partner (well really my partner in most everything fun!) so thankfully and luckily Hank is coming home next week to work our way through our "must-see" list. We seriously go to the movies about once a week I feel like, especially when there are good movies out, like there are now.

What else, what else? Well work today was very interesting. I had a student have a seizure in my class which was very scary and upsetting. From what friends told me, it may have even been a weird overdose freakout and not a seizure, but I'm still unsure. I took care of it immediately and she got the help she needed, thank goodness. Other than that it was a typical Friday- my sophomores were a little rowdier than usual but overall all the kids I have are so respectful and well-behaved. Like I said before, it should be an awesome year.

So Amber and I, and our friend Chelsea, are planning a very exciting, very long trip this summer to Europe. None of us have ever been and since we are in the very, very beginning stages of planning I would love any input as far as where to go, what to see, etc. Luckily Chelsea has friends in some places so it looks like we may have host families and friends helping us along the way, but if any of you have any friends in Europe please let me know so I can bug them via email! ;) I'm sure I will be posting about this over the next year in a lot more detail, but so far we are planning to visit Greece, France, Italy and Ireland. I am getting excited just thinking about it.

Another thing I wanted to add to this blog is about my Mom. I waited until after her surgery to type this out, as I was really nervous and didn't want to even go into it here, but all is well now, thank goodness. As many of my close friends know, my mom battled breast cancer last year and WON (fuck you, cancer)...although she lost both of her breasts in a double mastectomy. She is the healthiest person I have ever known (both in mind, body and spirit), yet she constantly deals with very serious health issues, which is heartbreaking and very frustrating. Most recently my Mom's cardiologist informed her that the back wall of her heart was very weak and he was concerned about the risk of a heart attack, so today they went into her heart but luckily found no blockages. She is doing well now, post-op, but it was scary today and I avoided talking about it until I knew everything was alright. I am going down to visit her tomorrow morning and I am really excited to give her a big hug. I swear, these past few years have been a nightmare of health issues for my family and really, enough is enough.

So a scary day turned into a very good, positive day. My Mama is a-okay, Hank is officially home in FIVE days, and I spent time with two wonderful ladies this evening laughing and having a grand old time. Tomorrow is a hair appointment with Rhonda and hang outs with my Mom and fam, and then most likely out with Kelli and Lauren for a girls night.

I was going to head down to Phoenix tonight but instead I'm heading to the gym for a late night workout. Phoenix in the morning! I hope all of you have a wonderful night. So much love. :)

Half of Robyn, Amber Joy and a flash-blinded me, waiting for the movie to start


and me, STOKED that my sweetheart will be home in five short days (hence the five fingers...)! Don't mind my crazy face- I guess this is how I look when I'm excited! :)

Wednesday night

toasting at St. Micheal's






Jordan- playing bass in Hot Skin


Hot Skin at Sundance's


Amber and me, my leg looks weird but Amber's face makes me laugh so it stays :)


our typical bathroom photo


Hour of the Wolf


my cute hubby