#7 Oxygen Bar, #10 Manicure, #29 Buy Dress, #37 3 Course Meal, #43 Ride Motorcycle

To make it a little less overwhelming, I decided I would try to fit most of the things I recently accomplished in one blog.  I have about two weeks left and I didn't want to have to write so much in such a short period of time!  Some of these things happened a long time ago... mostly because they were hard to write an entire blog about.  So here they are!  I'm a lot closer to being done than you probably thought!

#7 Oxygen Bar
This is one of the ones that happened a long time ago.  Of course, when I first put this on my bucket list I was aware that there was at least one in the Minneapolis/St Paul area-- the little one I've walked by a few times at the Mall of America.  I also did a little research and found another one located in uptown.  I also realized the activity was a little expensive (about $40-$50), so even though my friends initially said they were interested, I didn't necessarily expect they would actually want to pay for it in the end.  So, in the back of my mind, I figured that on Brian and my road trip extravaganza all over the southeastern United States we would be able to find at least one we could stop at.  Believe it or not, there aren't any!  In fact, there were only about 3 or 4 in the United States that I could find online that were still open-- and most of them were on the west coast.  This was surprising to me!  Mostly because out of the entire United States, I don't really think of us being one of the MOST trendy states.  Then again, oxygen bars are thought to be connected to good health, and that is something Minnesotans tend to value.

Anyway, I decided I would go to one in Minnesota after all, and I hoped my friends would still be interested in coming with.  Luckily they were! :)  I can't remember exactly why (this is why I should write my blogs right after I finish something), but we couldn't go to the one in uptown after all.  I think they closed the oxygen bar portion of the restaurant, although I could be wrong.  But we were still able to go to Mall of America and make somewhat of a girls night out of it.

Alyssa and Amy both met me there after work.  Amy decided to opt out after all, but she was allowed to sit in one of the massage chairs and watch (as long as the manager didn't stop by.)  Alyssa and I both received the full experience though, which consisted of massage chairs, relaxing music and oxygen tubes through the nose.  At the end we got to sit at an actual oxygen "bar" so we could try a variety of different "flavors", and were also served energy drinks and given head massages.  It was definitely not what I expected, but it was a lot of fun!  Oxygen bars are said by some to decrease stress, increase energy, help you concentrate, and even strengthen your immune system.  I did feel more relaxed afterwards, but then again it could have also been from the relaxing music and massage chair. :) 

We all went to a stir fry restaurant when we were done.  And partway in to dinner Alyssa and I both ended up feeling really sick.  We did order the exact same thing for dinner, though, so it could have also been related to that.  It's hard to know.

Even so, it was definitely a worthwhile experience.  I've never done anything like it before and it was a lot of fun.  Is it worth paying $50 to do it again?  Probably not.  But I'm definitely glad I tried it!

#10 Get a Manicure
Believe it or not, over the course of my life I had never had a manicure.  I've never actually had a professional pedicure either (although my friend Laura did give me and Amy one on one of our Nebraska road trips a while ago.)  The main reason I gave for this was that I was a pianist, so it was hard to be concerned about having perfect nails.  If I didn't have them cut as short as possible, my piano teacher would always yell at me.  And I've taken piano lessons from age 5 until I graduated from college.  So there was never really a time in my life I didn't have to worry about it.  For the record, you can have pretty nails and play piano-- you just can't have long nails.  It was just never worth the stress to me.  When I graduated, though, that was one of the first things I wanted to do.  And I never did!

I had a few people that wanted to do this with me when they heard about it: my friend Amy, my sister Amy, and Jeannie.  I was able to go twice this year-- once with Jeannie, once with friend Amy.  And I'm definitely willing to go again with my sister. :)  It was not what I expected at all.  In my mind, manicures were a means to an end.  You go in and leave with pretty nails.  I didn't realize that the process was meant to be somewhat of a luxury!  Between the two salons I visited, I had leg massages, foot massages, hand massages, massage chairs, paraffin wax, several oils and lotions, on top of them actually working on my nails.  And it was a lot of fun and very relaxing.  It also took a lot more time than I thought it would.  Which, in both cases, was okay since we had plenty of time to kill.  Jeannie and I ended up taking an entire day off to get mani/pedis, go shopping, get dinner, and then drinks.  It was definitely one of the most fun things on my bucket list.  And, of course, I had the most pretty nails I have ever had in my life.  I will be doing this many more times in my life I'm sure.

#29 Buy a Dress
It might seem silly that I put this on my list.  I'm 25, I've definitely been to my fair share of weddings.  And, of course, I've had dresses to wear to all of them.  There was never a problem until a couple years ago when I got my puppy, Sadie.  I think you can probably see where this is going.

Sadie was one of the most difficult dogs to potty train.  It wasn't entirely her fault.  She has always had severe anxiety problems and goes nuts when we leave her alone.  But, on top of this, she was allergic to her puppy food.  I wasn't entirely aware of this at first, but over the course of time she had several issues going to the bathroom.  As soon as she turned a year old, I immediately switched her to hypo-allergenic dog food (with salmon instead of chicken) and she hasn't had any problems.  But you can imagine how hard it would be to train a dog to go outside when, if she had to go, she had to go right at that moment!

Anyway, I had to kennel train her while I was at work.  And since I felt bad enough leaving her in her kennel 40 hours a week, I never put her in her kennel when I went to bed.  I wanted her to have as much freedom as possible.  But of course she had a few accidents during this time.

On a separate topic, a lot of my dresses were not able to be washed in washing machine-- they either had to be handwashed or dry cleaned.  So after I wore them, I put them in the laundry and they were eternally in the laundry.  At some point, I was irritated that I'd have to sort them out every couple of weeks when I did a regular load, so I put them in a separate pile on the floor of my closet.

Put two and two together and you probably know what ended up happening.  And, unfortunately, since I didn't wash these dresses regularly, I didn't realize what had happened until it had been a while and it was probably too late to save them.  I did have a couple that were not in the pile, but most of them were. :(  Since I didn't have the most money in the world right after I graduated, I didn't really shop as much as I used to.  On top of that, since I technically HAD a couple dresses, I didn't think of it as a "need" and so it took me a while to replace them.  This year, I decided I had to make it a need because with the amount of weddings and formal events I went to, I needed to have more than a couple dresses...

 

So far this year I have bought two.  The first was for a wedding I accompanied back in December.  And just a couple weeks ago I bought a summer dress.  Now that I finally have a LITTLE more money to shop, I'm hoping to buy a couple more.  Sometimes I just need to tell myself to do something, otherwise I never do it.  I'm glad I made myself do this though, because I definitely needed them more than I let myself believe. :)

#37 Make a 3 Course Meal from Scratch
There isn't TOO much to say about this one.  After much thought and pinteresting, I came up with a three course meal plan that I thought Brian and I would both enjoy.  Of course it is incredibly unhealthy as a whole, so hopefully we don't end up gaining back all the weight we have lost while we eat the leftovers the rest of this week... and maybe even next.  The funny thing is that, without realizing it, I planned a meal that was entirely meatless.  And, just a few weeks ago, we were pretty much only eating meat!  But I think we can afford to enjoy a meal like this every now and then... :)

Course 1 was mozzarella sticks.

Course 2 was 3 cheese lasagna (which is my favorite food in the world, and I had never actually spent the time to try and make it.)

Course 3 was sopapilla cheesecake-- which is basically cheesecake filling in crescent rolls, topped with butter and cinnamon sugar.

And ALL of them turned out and were incredibly delicious!  I've definitely come a LONG ways this year and hopefully I will continue to become an even better cook over time.  At this point, I have no doubt that I can do it. :)


43. Ride a Motorcycle

I've had very good experiences riding motorcycles back in high school.  Two of my closest guy friends at the time, Nick and Jesse, bought motorcycles and were nice enough to take me on a handful of rides.  All of these were memorable-- there's something completely different about riding down the same roads you take every day on a bike, rather than sitting in an enclosed box.  It was also probably memorable since these people meant a lot to me.  Regardless, it was something I've been wanting to do again for a while, but I never had the opportunity.

Jeannie and Brian tried to arrange an actual motorcycle ride for me last fall with her ex-boyfriend.  But it didn't actually work out.  And since this was someone I didn't exactly want her to keep in her life, I didn't try to encourage it later. :)  I definitely appreciated them putting the effort in to trying to make it happen, though.

This year I decided to do a little research, and I found out that you don't actually need a motorcycle license to drive a scooter-- which is a smaller version of a motorcycle.  Brian and I originally wanted to rent one when we were in Miami, but since there was so much we were trying to do in a short amount of time, we didn't end up doing it.  I was later able to find one in Minneapolis, though, and a few days ago we decided to spend a Sunday riding around the cities.

Honestly, Brian resented the idea at first and I had to somewhat bribe him to do it with me.  Later, I found out it was because he was legitimately nervous about it.  Which is understandable because he'd never been on a motorcycle before!  And I also made him drive it. :)  But once we actually left the rental shop, it was more fun than I even expected!  It was a very nice day, there wasn't much traffic, and we were able to weave our way all over the Twin Cities during the few hours we had it-- from Northeast Minneapolis to St Anthony Falls (my favorite place in Minneapolis) to Como Park and back.  By the end, Brian told me he wanted to buy a motorcycle!  So it was definitely not what he expected at all.  I would absolutely do it again and recommend it to anyone!  It was probably one of the more fun dates we have been on. :)

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(44 down-- 6 to go!) :)