Our Anniversary AKA New Year's eve AKA My Penguin encounter

The Man has been teasing me for a week that we had an appointment at 1:00 on our anniversay (which just so happens to also be today, New Year's eve) and that it would take about an hour.  And I, for the life of me, couldn't think what it could possibly be.  Couples massage?
At 12:40 we got in the car and he started driving.  We chit chatted and just generally enjoyed being together when he pulled into the Living Planet Aquarium...
I almost cried.  There would only be one reason for him to take me there.
I have been in love with, and even slightly, okay maybe more than slightly, obsessed with penguins since the age of 15.  Should I date myself and tell you that this means I have loved them for 17 years?  That's over half my lifetime already.
And it has been my dream for the past 17 years to someday be up close and personal with a real live penguin.  The chest high blow up penguin I have hidden under our bed hardly counts.
The aquarium has gento penguins.  Gento penguins are easily frightened and have huge personal space issues, so we weren't allowed to touch them, but we got to sit in the room with them for an hour.  And they still interacted with us.  Yeah, this was SO much better than a couples massage!

Every penguin that wandered in was fascinated with the fray on West's jeans. 

And the tab on the back of his shoe.  This penguin, Ghost Rider, is the black sheep of their penguin family there. (Every family has one).  He wasn't afraid of anything.  After he was done chewing on West's shoe, it went for the underneath of his leg, and kept on going until he bit West's leg.  West tried really hard to hold still, but it kept biting harder and harder until he finally yanked his leg up.  The penguin ended up hanging from his jeans because he wouldn't let go! Brian, the penguin guy, finally had to shew Ghost Rider away. I SO wish I had gotten it on video.

 In this video Ghost Rider hates the squeegie that they use on the floor.  He knew that the squeegie was kept behind the door, so he kept "an eye on it".  He'd keep going back to the door and burrying his beak  there and just watching the squeegie.

At one point Ghost Rider was hiding underneath the bench, I have to admit, after what he'd done to West, I was a little nervous to have him out of sight and underneath me.

These two penguins are one of the two established mated couples at the aquarium.  We got to see them bow to each other which is a courtship move and then they stood and "held hands", which with the personal space issues that they have, is as much contact they'll stand, and they only stand it with their mated partner.  I have another video here that shows them "fighting" with each other, because one of them got too close, but they don't actually touch other because that would be getting too close.

I love my man for making this dream come true for me.  Love him.  I can't even express it enough.  That he cares that much about me to want to do this for me. Dreams do come true.  Even if it means almost feeding your man to a penguin.
The aquarium is building a bigger center, and they're going to expand in their penguin center.  My favorite type of penguin is a rock hopper penguin.  Guess what they're going to be getting? I can't wait!
You can also check out the aquarium's website and watch the penguins live here.

Every year we're going to take a picture on our anniversary, holding the picture that we took the year before.  It's going to be fun to see how we change year to year, and to have the depth of pictures grow in each one.

Bucket list for 2012

Pinterest is inspiring.  It really is.  But there are so many ideas and so little time!
I've gone through my boards, I've checked them twice, and I've created a bucket list of sorts of the things that I will do, make, or visit in the year of 2012.
Are you ready for this?

1. I'm going to read "The Total Money Makeover" by Dave Ramsey.  And not only read it, but explain it the The Man as I go, and then we're going to apply it to our finances.  Our total goal (that won't happen in 2012, but we'll at least start it)? Debt free. Can we do it? Yes we can! But I have to read this book first.  I hear it helps you get in the right frame of mind to actually want to follow through with it.  Yes.

2. We have a pretty awesome job chart system going at our house.  But it's just boringly written on a dry erase board.  I need cuteness.  Our job chart is going to be converted into cute form.

3. Also in the name of converting to cuteness, instead of hanging my handwritten menu on the side of the fridge, I want to paint our cabinet end with chalk paint.  It's in a prime position to look awesome.  It hangs where the bar starts so it would look like a cafe menu board. I get giddy just thinking about it!

3. We will finish the blasted bathroom.  Which means I get to do all these fun details in it.

4.  I looked at my "Please take me there" board longingly.  *sigh*.  But in the name of getting out of debt I suppose I ought to visit a new place that's close to home.  Arches anyone?

5. I'm going to try my hand at bleach pen shirts.

6. And I'm making this shirt.  Because I love everything about it.

7. As well as this skirt.

8. This one kind of scares me to put on my bucket list. But I would like to have my six pack back.  Not a big six pack, just a slightly there cute girly six pack.  I had one a couple of years ago.  I want it back.  Yikes.  Now it's on my list.  So I have to do it.

9. I'm going to make a quilt.  Maybe not all of these, but at least one them.  Or maybe not even one of these per say, but I will end 2012 with at least one quilt made by my hands.

10. Because I can't stop laughing about this.  I need this in my house and my parentals will probably receive them as gifts.  Because I can.

I think I better stop there.  I actually want to do/finish this list so I need to keep it realistic (and I've probably already over shot realistic).  Okay, wait.

11. Run another half marathon.  But this time actually complete a full training for it.  Besides, I have a time to beat now, and my cousin wants me to go to San Diego to run one with him.  Done deal.

12. Go diving in the ocean.  I have been a certified scuba diver for... 15 years and have never gone diving in the ocean.  Sad.  Is it cheating to add this to the list if I know I already have the trip planned for March to do this?  Plane tickets are already purchased. (This also includes seeing my brother Nick get married and going to Universal Studios Orlando (both of them)).

Okay, now I'm done.  Time to get started!

We still have a week and a half before 2012, and perhaps I should be writing this post on New Year's day, but I'm not one for "resolutions" on the first of the year, I do them when I'm ready.  I happen to be ready.  Let's do this.