And so our 6 weeks in Arizona comes to an end. That’s right, six weeks in Arizona. Why six weeks in Arizona? Well my whole family (Mom, Dad, Brother, Sister-In-Law, Niece) are here. Also Joy’s maternal grandparents are here. Believe me, if it weren’t for that we would have been out in 3 days tops. I’m going to come right out and say it (as I often have in this blog) – I hate Arizona. Specifically Scottsdale, where we were staying. It’s a generic sea of strip malls and chain restaurants mixed with excesses of space and traffic. I’m constantly singing the theme song to Weeds over and over in my head.

We stayed in a beautiful vacation condo that was walking distance from Kierland (think upper scale strip mall, with upper scale chain restaurants). We picked it in large part because of the amazing pool and outdoor grounds. Unfortunately for our entire stay it was too cold to use any of it. We did walk (a completely unheard of concept in Scottsdale) across the street a few times, but after awhile it just wasn’t worth the strange looks we would get. I think people felt bad for us thinking we were too poor to afford a car?

Despite our dislike for all things Scottsdale, the visit really was fantastical. We were able to spend true quality time with my family. We ate many Walker Style meals (dinners with huge portions starting at 5:00pm), did the occasional “Art Walk”, but most importantly spent time with my niece Ari. I took her to her swim lesson (actually getting in the pool with her), read her countless Dora stories, and watched her constantly miss her mouth in her 2-year-old attempt to eat. We even went to the ballet with Joy’s grandparents (thanks to my best friend from college Heather who is now the ballet’s marketing director). We finished off the stay with dinner with my business partner Samantha and her boyfriend (now live-in) Rob who came out from San Francisco to visit family of their own. Sorry for the “here’s what we did” style post, but there just wasn’t much world insight to share...

As an added bonus, however, we had the pleasure of driving our car back up to San Francisco.  My brother had been using it while we were away and we needed to get it home.  So we packed up all our stuff and drove it straight for 12 hours.  Got in late, spent the entire next day running errands - the day before Xmas no less, awesome day to be running around to Target, Sears, Home Depot, Sleep Train (bought a new Tempurpedic mattress!), etc.  And now, today woke up at 5am and hopped on a 5 hour flight to Maui.  The Wandering Walkers never rest!