Happy Fourth of July my friends! I wish that I could tell you something cool that we did today, but in all honesty, we were pretty lame. We just stayed home. All day. But you know what? I couldn’t be happier about it! As most of you know, I have been back and forth to Wisconsin over the last month and will continue to do so for the rest of the summer. While I absolutely love being there, it feels good to just be home. You know what I mean?

I flew back into Phoenix on Thursday afternoon and by Friday morning I was already crying “uncle” from the heat. I had mentioned to Joe that we should try to make it up to Flagstaff more often, but with my crazy summer schedule, I didn’t see foresee that happening in the near future. But when I awoke Saturday morning, I was greeted with a usual good morning kiss followed by a not-so-usual proposition. “Want to drive to Flagstaff today?” Now for those of you who don’t know, Joe is a homebody. He loves spending weekends in: relaxing, hanging out poolside, or catching up on our favorite shows. So I was extremely surprised and excited at the thought of a. getting out of the heat b. roadtrippin’ it with my love and c. exploring the adorable town of Flag. So I ate breakfast and proceeded to throw on some clothes super fast, to ensure that Joe didn’t have time to change his mind! We were out the door by 10am and were on our way.

Things were looking good. We were on our way. However, there were a couple things that we didn’t factor into our decision: 1. it was the hottest day in AZ in 10 years meaning EVERYONE wanted to get out of Phoenix and 2. it was a holiday weekend. It didn’t take us long to realize that we were not the only ones who thought that Flagstaff sounded like a good idea that day. Traffic was at a stand still on the two-lane highway for about an hour. I kept reminding Joe, “well, at least this gives us more time to catch up!” And before too long, we had reached our destination. We stepped outside and were welcomed by the amazing, ‘cool’ breeze. Mind you, it was still 90 degrees but when you live in Phoenix that feels divine!

I had such a blast exploring the town with my man. We started the afternoon off at this great little organic cafe which was delicious! Sounds pretty healthy, right? Don’t let that fool you, we splurged on ‘naughty food’ too! Soon after lunch I spotted the sweet shoppe, complete with homemade carmel apples. This girl can not say no to a carmel apple :). Even after I saw them making them with globs of corn syrup. The only thing that may have stopped me would have been if I’d seen the price before I bought it. $7.50! For a carmel apple! Perhaps I’m in the wrong business ;).

After we soaked up a good 3-4 hours in Flag, we were ready to call it a day (party animals, i know). We were looking forward to smooth sailing on the ride home, but we all know that things don’t always work out the way we want! What should have been a 2 1/2 hour drive turned into a 6 hour crawl. An accident caused the two-lane road to back up which meant we were moving at a snail’s pace.  Thankfully, us Kokes know how to make the most of things! We rocked out to ‘old’ music we grew up on. Joe was shocked that I didn’t have the BSB Millennium album and insisted that we download it immediately lol! Unfortunately, we were in and out of dead zones, so the album was downloading super slow. I laughed saying that it probably wouldn’t finish downloading until we were home. Joe expressed his concern about getting caught with having a Backstreet Boys album on his phone. What would his friends think? ;) Finally things started turning around: The traffic was ceasing. The album was downloading. And Joe saw a sign for Taco Bell up ahead. While I protested against him eating ‘grade D’ meat, I must say that our timing and exit choice couldn’t have been better. The town of Anthem was getting ready for their ‘4th of July’ firework show and Joe + I were right there to watch it. We stood on the sidewalk with a perfect view; me audibly cheering for really cool ones and Joe eating his Taco Bell. It was pretty perfect. We then made our way back into the car for one last stretch of driving for the night. Only this time we were amped up, because it was BSB time. We cranked that music up so loud and sang at the top of our lungs. And for the record, Joe knew more of the lyrics than I did! We pulled into our driveway about 12 hours from the time we left, singing “Show me the meaning of being lonely” and feeling more in love than when we left. All in all, it was a pretty perfect day :)

rockin’ my new fav toms

we love alley ways. even when we’re on vacation

i wanted to sample just about everything there!

they even had doggy sweets. i bet this dog was hoping for one of those!

it was as good as it looks :)