Ice Skating!

So, nerds....have you ever been ice skating before? I gotta tell you, it's pretty cool. For my birthday celebration with my friends, I took my besties Kate and Caitlin (Kate, Caitlin and Kiley, haha) to Memorial City Mall to ice skate and hang out. It was pretty fun actually. Memorial has a pretty legit ice rink, and they actually have hockey games there every 4 hours or so. I picked everyone up around 11:00, and by 11:45 we had arrived at...yes, the American Girl Store. I'll tell you, it's CRAZY how obsessed girls can be with their dolls! Not only did it have a variety of clothes, outfits, and props (bathtub, ship, mini piano, etc) there was actually a hair salon for the dolls. You could crimp, curl, straighten, and braid or fix your doll's hair in just about every hairstyle. And they even had a little deluxe spa skit (complete with stick on cucumbers and a facial mask). Its all expensive too. 

So, after that, we had lunch at California Pizza Kitchen, which wasn't bad. We even saw Caitlin's MATH teacher there. Awkward much? After that we walked around and played around in Aeropostale (sunglasses and nail files, bro). It was really fun. Of course, being the teenage girls we are, we took lots of pictures. 

Finally, around 1:30, we headed on over to the ice rink. I actually had to have my mom strap on my shoes which was a little embarassing, but hey, that's what moms are for, right? 

Both my friends told me that ice skating was NOTHING like roller skating. I was a little skeptical, but of course I believed them. So when I stepped out onto the ice, I instantly FROZE UP. 

Okay, so ice skating and roller skating are basically the same thing. I am pretty good at roller skating, so ice skating came pretty naturally to me. I like ice skating. It's kind of more of a gliding sensation, and it's much smoother. Kate was very good also, and she made our game of tag very interesting (i.e hiding in the bathroom, sneaking up on us behind a panel in the ice rink, teaming up on each other). Haha, however Caitlin had a little more trouble. You see, she's like a pro competitive swimmer. All day, every day, swim swim swim! So it's only natural that land sports are a little more hard for her. I swear, half the time she was just hanging on to the rail for dear life! 

So, ice skating was fun! Caitlin eventually got the hang of it, and we were hitting the ice! Of course, there were 4 year old Asian girls in little leotards doing spins and flips and skating backwards (not to be stereotypical, just stating facts), and us 3 awkwardly gliding on the ice. 

Our game of tag was epic, by the way. I swear we were going as fast as our skates could take us. Which, I guess, wasn't as fast as some of the other skaters, but hey, we were in our own little world.  

After skating, we went and got some fro-yo and watched some hockey. I really don't get hockey. It's enough to be able to ice skate at like the speed of light, but to handle a hockey stick and keep your eye on a little puck, that's insane. Plus, the guys were huge. 

Anyways, in the car I opened up the gifts that they gave me, and I gotta say, they were pretty cool. 

Caitlin gave me a Claire's little penguin bag. It's so cute!!! And she alos gave me a $25 gift card to Aeropostale. Pretty nice. 

Okay, to really understand this gift, I have to backtrack a little bit. 

Partly why Kate and I are so close is that we were on the same volleyball team, and in off season together. We always have little races when we sprint or run together, and we are always the top runners. We push ourselves to get better miles, to sprint faster, even get better times on the 20 minute workout (it stinks, haha). 

So Kate got me some sweet patterned running shorts!!! And a matching shirt to go with it! She also got me a sketching diary, which I loved since I loved drawing. 

So all and all, today was a great day. I love my friends so much! Don't you ever feel that way, just so content and happy, knowing that you're surrounded by amazing friends and family? 

I love my life. God bless.