Things I love

Lately I have been really busy with work and wedding planning. I took the month of February off from planning my wedding to help recenter myself and make sure I was focused on what is important in life. I think I have found that again and I honestly can say I feel much more like my happy ex-yankee self. Its amazing to me how fast I started to become totally obsessed with my wedding and I hope I don't get to that point again. Not that I will not love my wedding, I just feel like it is important to focus on why I am getting married! It is almost March and the wedding planning blogging will start again soon but in the mean time I thought I would try to write at least one more non wedding related blog.

So with that being said I was reading a new blog I found Classy in Philadelphia  and I really got to thinking about things. She apparently just went though a break up and was reminding herself about what she really loves. I thought I would piggy back on that and comment on some of the small things I love in my life.

- I love drinking black tea in the morning. Heck I love tea in general.  It wakes me up and makes me feel all warm and happy. Even if I have to go to work everyday. My cup of tea in the morning makes me one happy girl. When I got to bed at night I drink a cup of sleepy time tea every night. Totally helps me sleep all the way through the night.

- I love weight watchers! I have been on and off the proverbial wagon these last few months, but as my friend reminded me last night my wedding is about 7 months away and I should get my butt in gear. Weight Watchers has helped me to loose over 20 pounds in the last year or so. I feel so much better about myself and I know how to eat right now. Now I have about 7 or 6 pounds to go and I just need to get back in the swing of things.

- I love my girlfriends. I have a great group of close girlfriends who have been with me through so much crap. I love them for always being there for me and always being able to make me laugh.

- I love Austin. I have lived here for almost 5 years now and I honestly would stay here the rest of my life if I could. The people, culture and city are just amazing and I feel so lucky to live here.

- I love my sister. My sister is my best friend and always has been. We are so different and that is one of the reasons I think we get along so well. She is a great mom and I hope to be like her when I "grow up".

- I love my WF (wonderful fiance). He is so amazing to me and I am so lucky to have him in my life. I can't say much more about him other than I thank the powers that be that I am so blessed to have a good friend and lover like him.

- I love the cold. I miss it being cold all the time and I love when it gets really cold here in Texas. We had snow here for the first time this year and it just made me so happy. I made soup and drank some tea and relaxed on my sofa (in my leopard snuggie) with a good book as the snow came down. It was one of the most perfect afternoons I have had in a long time.

So I pose this question to you bloggers, what are some of the things you love in life?

Life is Precious

Yesterday I got an email from one of my best friends from college and bridesmaid, Kate. Kate's longtime boyfriend and friend of mine Matt Sheeran is a PA state trooper. He is a great guy who has said he has always wanted to be a cop. Friday night he and his partner were hooking an abandoned vehicle up to a tow truck when he was hit by a drunk driver. He was pinned between the car and the tow truck. Matt's legs have been crushed and I don't know much more than that. I have attached a link to the latest news story so you all can read it for yourselves. 

http://www.myfoxphilly.com/dpp/news/local_news/022210_State_Trooper_Hurt_In_Interstate_95_Crash

This is Matt: 

http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=7294286

Kate has told me Matt is stable but they are in for a two year recovery process. After seeing his interview you can see he is doing OK. He is such a good man and I am so worried about not only him but my friend Kate. I am not sure if he will even be able to go back to the force but I am sure he will want to. Please keep Kate and Matt in your thoughts and prayers as they have a very long road ahead of them. 

Well Well Well

I just was reading one of my new bloggy friend's blog and found out she has given me a blogger award!

How sweet is Tobin Tales for naming me in her awards? She is a new friend but let me tell you she is one funny girl! Check out her blog and get to know her!

So the rules are I need to tell you all seven random things about me. Since I tend to be fairly candid on this blog I am hoping to be able to come up with seven new random things you don't know about me.

1. I love the way my dog's paws smell. I really do. I sit in bed with him at night and smell his paws sometimes. True story. WF thinks it is the weirdest thing he has ever heard of. I think it is weird to but whatever, I still love it. I don’t know why I like the way he smells, honestly to me it just smells home like and stinky all at the same time. I like it when he really needs to get groomed and he smells really really bad. He sometimes will get up from laying in one spot for a long time and I love the little stink bomb he leaves behind. I know I am super gross.

2. It must be a VERY special occasion for me to wear fancy panties. Some of you ladies know that it takes an act of god to get my butt into a thong. I just don’t like them. A while back I had a really severe kidney infection due to dehydration. But I also think it was the fabrics I was putting up against my body. I freaked out about it and stopped wearing any thong whatsoever. I just worry about germs or something. I don’t know what is wrong with me that I think one is better than the other. Anyway I recently got shammed by my own mother who explained to me that I must "Inspire my future husband". So I have started to go through my panties and throw out all my old un-fancy panties and have been buying new panties periodically in an effort to keep him inspired.

3. I have a secret fear that I am not good enough for my WF. He is like freakishly nice and super good to me. Let me give you something to throw up about. Every morning he makes me breakfast and lunch as well as a hot tea just the way I like it for the car ride to work. This weekend I was working all weekend and we got a whole bunch of stuff in a shipment from his grandpa and he took the time to move the furniture around and pack everything away as well as re-organize the dishes to make everything fit nicely. He then did the laundry, dishes and cleaned the whole house so that I did not have to worry about it when I got home. Another vomit worthy point, he came to my meeting this weekend to take me for a glass of wine. I was so tired I wanted to go home. He then proceeded to rub my feet for a good hour and let me bitch about all my work stuff not trying to get hotel sex out of me once. I don't know how I got so lucky to have such a sensitive loving man in my life but I worry that I am not good enough to keep him.

4. I am an Italian food snob. I once left a date early from this guy who I was not that interested in anyway because he took me to a crappy Italian food place after I told him do not take me there. He was all offended, I took it as a sign that he was not a good listener and therefore not really worthy of going on a date with me anyway. Don't fuck with me and Italian food.

5. I love kids but I am so not ready for them. My sister has two of the cutest kids ever. They are fun and I can't wait to go visit them any chance I can but I am sooooo not ready to have them. Whenever we are at their house and they are both crying and I stub my toe on another toy, or I just can't watch another episode of “Dora the Explorer” I think I am really not ready for this. I am too selfish for all of that. I want to come home and sit in my perfectly clean home and watch the shows I want to watch. I like to sleep late and drink too much wine. I can handle all that comes with being a mom but I am just not ready for it yet.

6. I am going to be giving up on twitter. I don’t get it, and I don't really like it too much. I think it will happen soon. I don’t need to have everyone in my life know everything I am doing at all times. There are too many status updates and too many ways to find out my friend is eating pizza at home. I don't care and therefore I must cut that crap out of my life. I am not 100% about when this will happen, maybe I will just stop tweeting myself and follow everyone else. I am just too freaking busy for that crap.


7. Dust really grosses me out. Seriously it is the most disgusting thing ever. Think about it. About 90% of dust is made up of human dead skin. REALLY. Dead skin. I look around my house and I think dead skin is all over everything. I dust all the time just so I don’t have to have that thought. I bet you you will now have this thought and be grossed out the next time you see a dust bunny in your home. EWWW


Bonus: I don't really like to shop. It has been song long since I have had money to buy lots of things and all shopping does it stress me the F out. I need to go shopping so bad though and I know it. I have given into being overwhelmed and have enlisted my two best girlfriends to help me reconstruct a decent wardrobe. Due to weight loss, I pretty much have had to re-buy everything. It sucks.


Well that is it. That’s all about me and that is all I got. I am so please to have gotten this award. Thanks again Tobin Tales for thinking of me. And now for the hard part who to pick to give the award to next:

Ok here goes:

Better Together
Just Another Day in Paradise
Kelly and Your Little Dog Too
Berry and Bramble
Vicki Smalls
Elefantitas Alegres
And Both Shall Row

All of those blogs a read all the time. I tried to name differnt ones than Tobin Tales to give you more options! Some are my real life friends and some I just wish I was friends with them. They are lots of fun and I hope you all check them out. Congrats to you ladies! Can't wait to learn seven new things about you!

I worked all weekend...

This weekend blew. Seriously it is not even over for me yet. I have been at a work conference since Thursday and will be busy until Wednesday. Today WF let me borrow his air card so I could have access to the internet and check email while sitting at our convention booth. I know you are super jealous of me.

One GREAT thing that happened this weekend - Janet is engaged! Whooo Who! One of my closest friends, and the reason I met WF got engaged this weekend to her fantastic BF now Fiancé Ben. They are like two peas in a pod and I could not be happier for them. I had been holding on to the secret for like two or three weeks and just dying to know all the details. Ben proposed Friday at their home and then took her out to dinner to meet up with all of her friends that night. It was so much fun to get to see the happy couple right after it happened. You could tell Janet was still in total shock. I am pretty sure she still is. But she was so happy and the ring is absolutely GORGEOUS! I can't even begin to tell you guys. That thing will blind you if you look to closely at it. It is a yellow diamond surrounded by pave and just absolutely sparkles! Janet is one of my bridesmaids and I am super excited to get to plan our weddings around the same time as each other. I am actually really looking forward to hearing about what she will do. She is pretty creative and I bet you will have totally beautiful wedding when the time comes. In the mean time I hope she gets to just enjoy being engaged! It’s so much fun.

The rest of the weekend I have been hanging out at a hotel in downtown Austin surrounded by members of the association I work for. I have been having a great time chatting with members and going to meetings. What is hard is that it is non stop. When you stay in the hotel that they stay in they are always around. You are walking to your room to go pee, they want to talk. You are trying to sneak away to sit down for the first time in a day and they want to chat. It is all the time. I am really looking forward to a break in the week, if not I might loose my mind.

I am hoping that I will get to sleep at some point for more than three hours soon.

A night full of awkward but good social gatherings...

Last night I decided to head to the Austin Blogger happy hour at "Vino Vino", because let's face it I will never turn down the chance to drink wine and gossip with the girls. Well I got there right at 5:30 and did not see any of  the usual group. Thinking I was just early I sat down and had a glass of wine. I kept looking at these two other girls in the bar who also seemed to be waiting for a big group of girls. But again I did not know them so I continued to sit there alone. Well after about 15 minutes of awkwardly trying to make a bartender like me so he would give me a free glass of wine (which was a success BTW) I saw Emily walk in and sit down with the other girls. I read Emily's blog quite often and  I knew her from her pictures. So I figured what the hell and I walked over. Turns out the girls were bloggers! So after sitting down and chatting for a bit, I found out that they both have bogs I was currently not reading, but they were super nice. One was Tobin Tales, and the other, please forgive me I don't remember the name, but please post it on my comments because you were really sweet and I do want to read your blog!

Anyway, we soon realized that it was just the four of us. No one else showed up!!!! I was a bit confused because normally everyone comes to these things. I called Amelia and she said she would stop by and so the five of us has a great time. We chatted and had some awesome calamari. I loved Vino Vino and I am really looking forward to setting up another happy hour where we can all catch up. I would like to know if we were being punked though. Hope everything is OK with the rest of you bloggy girls!

I then headed to the Four Seasons to meet up with my childhood best friend Bonnie. It had been about ten years since she and I actually sat down and talked. I was super nervous for some reason so I was glad I had had a glass of wine at Vino Vino. It was funny after all these years we sat down and it was like no time had passed at all. We talked for three hours about everything under the sun! She is doing really well and she is going to come to my wedding with her family in September! I was so touched that she is going to make the trip.

It was amazing to me that even after all the years and how different we are now both of us were still great friends. It really made me appreciate all of my wonderful girlfriends. So to all you ladies, you know who are, thanks so much for being my friends and I am genuinely looking forward to the next ten years of fun stories and long conversations we have in store for us. Thanks for being there!

I have a hole in my head...

Do any of you ever have these wonderful ideas for blogs and then when you go to sit down and write them they are no longer in your head? I have this problem all the time. Like today while I was driving into work I came up with the most fantastic blog. It was not about the wedding or too much about WF. I think it was about cooking. I don't remember at all.

Shit like this happens to me all the time. Maybe tomorrow I will come up with another fantastic blog that I will not write about, until then I leave you with a whole lot of nothing.

Weekend Recap

This weekend was rough. I am pretty much feeling like death warmed over right now and poor WF is not doing much better. So we tried to take it easy, but were committed to a few things so it really did not work out.

Friday night we saw Valentine's Day with our friends Janet and Ben. It was pretty cute. All the critics hate it because it is super sappy and predictable but whatever I liked it. It made me smile and that was worth it.

Saturday we headed to Houston to spend some time with my sister before going to a wedding in Lake Jackson. We tried on potential bridesmaid dresses and actually think we came to a consensus on what we are going to do about that. But since I am not doing wedding stuff this month, I will tell you all about it March 1st!

Saturday night we went to a wedding. I have to say it was for people I did not know at all but it was the worst wedding I have been to so far. Mainly because they started almost a full hour late.Yea a full HOUR late. Oh and did I mention for that hour we were suck outside? Yea thats right they had an outdoor ceremony in February and then had the audacity to start an hour late. Give me a break. Then they did this weird grand march thing, of which I was the city slicker who refused to participate because I don't square dance and my feel hurt. The decor was actually really cool. You could tell that the bride was really creative with that so I give them props for that. They had an awesome candy bar, but due to being sick I did not really get to enjoy that. I was most annoyed because the couple had no interest in talking to their guests. They hung out with their wedding party and friends but never came and said high to any other tables. I was offended by this and made a point of meeting the bride and groom before I left. Maybe it is because I am so sick or maybe I am just really picky. I would say we learned a lot about what not to do for our wedding.

Sunday, Valentine's Day, WF and I headed home. We had Pho for dinner and went to bed at 830. HOT I know. I hope you guys had a better weekend than I did. Happy Valentine's Day to you all!

Whole Foods Cooking

Thursday night I surprised WF with a Whole Foods cooking class. It was a Valentine's couples "Surf and Turff" class. We cooked a lobster aoli salad, another salad with hearts of palm and then crap stuffed fillets, finished off with a coffee cheesecake. It was so much fun and seriously delish.

I highly suggest you try one of these cooking classes out. We had a lot of fun spending time with each other and relaxing. I would say I probably would have gotten more out of it if we were not both sick but still well worth it.

We are not doing much for V-day this year because we had a wedding this weekend and just a lot going on in general. All in all we just felt lucky to have some time to be together. I am looking forward to many more Valentine's together. One off year will not make any difference in my mind.

Oh god please no... must fight it

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I am sick. It is official. I am super gross sick. I don't sound that bad just yet but it is coming. My throat is on FIRE and my glands are swollen. I am achy and tired and I can barley open my eyes enough to type this.

There are several large problems with being sick at this time. Let me fill you in. First this Thursday I have a big surprise planned for WF and I. I will not tell you what it is just in case he does read this. But let me tell you being sick will really imped the experience. Plus the added not feeling hot and sexy at all when you are trying to celebrate Valentines day with your finance really kinda blows. Then we have a wedding this weekend in Houston. We have to travel to Houston and go to this wedding. Again not fun when you are sick. On top of that we are going to visit my niece and nephew, fun but not when you are hacking all over them. (Although I am pretty sure they are the ones that got me sick in the first place, ass holes) Then next week is going to be super busy for me. I have a HUGE week long conference that I work like 20 hour days at. Being sick BLOWS during said events.

The WORST part of all of this? Is WF is sick too. You ladies must know that grown men are the biggest babies when it comes to having any sort of cold symptom. They wine and bitch about how sick they are. WF is great most of the time but when he has a cold, OMG I could hit him. Last night he kept joking that he thought he was dying. REALLY? Scratchy throat and you think you are dying?

My rant is over now.

Shopping is my cardio

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This weekend I was super busy, I shopped the whole time! Friday night I went shopping at Target. I made WF come with me as I perused potential wedding invitations, house decor and bathing suits for the honeymoon. All good things. We then went home and had our normal movie night.

Saturday I woke up and went shopping. I met the lovely Kelly and Janet at the "Steeping Room" for lunch. We then checked out the Domain for a good 4 hours.  Yes 4 hours of bliss. Janet had to bail a bit early so Kelly and I made a day of it together. I found great deals at Banana Republic, Martin and Osa, Forever 21 and DSW. I was going to post pictures of all of these items but I cant seem to find any of it on the websites of said stores. I am being lazy and not really doing my research but whatever.

Anyway, Sunday, you guessed it, I went shopping. This time to the grocery store. Yes I braved the grocery store on Superbowl Sunday. It was a nightmare but with WF's help I was able to get everything we needed for the next two weeks and for our Superbowl party later that night. I made weight watchers spicy chicken dip, some weight watchers homemade cumin dusted sweet potato fries and bacon wrapped apricots with sage. YUMMY stuff here people. I also made traditional queso in my little crock pot. Amelia brought a fruit tray and Janet brought some yummy mac and cheese. All in all we had tons of food and great friends to watch the game.

Shopping was for sure the theme of my weekend. Hope this weekend I have a chance to sit down and relax. UGH.

One Sick Puppy

The last few nights WF and I have been worried sick about our dog Harry. He has been really sick and last night we gave in and took him to the animal hospital. On Tuesday during dinner we gave him a bone to chomp on while we were eating so he would not beg while we had guests over. Shortly after he started to have massive amounts of gas and diarrhea we thought maybe he got into something and it would run it's course (turns out it was the bone). Then he proceeded to have an accident in the house, which he never does. Then Wednesday night he threw up all over our bed trying to wake us up to take him outside. We felt so bad for him. WF took him out and he pooped everywhere and got sick again. So we decided if something else happened we would take him to the doctor. Well yesterday WF called me to tell me he had another accident in the house and there was blood in the poop. So he immediately took him to the hospital.

Turns out Harry had irritated his colon from all of the pooping from the bone that made him sick. He was in a lot of pain and he could not hold food down because he had thrown up so much. He is now on three medications on special dog food and is under a watch by the doctor. I was so worried about the little guy last night. We held him and snuggled him all night. He seems to be doing better. We are hoping he starts to get better later today. So very sad.

If this is what it is like to be a parent we are for sure holding off. Too much stress.

Confession

I just ate a really healthy asparagus soup with whole wheat toast for dinner. To reward myself I thought, I will have a treat for dessert. I made my self some hot coco thinking, "I was so good today, I want something sweet". I then proceeded to eat half a bag of marshmallows with it. Counter productive? I think so.

I am now going to throw up... Weight Watchers FAIL.

It is a holiday in my book!

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Today is the premier of LOST! It is totally a national holiday for me. Oh lord I am so freaking excited! It is a combination of feeling really ready to get some answers, like what is the smoke monster, and why the huge foot statue? And totally needing a dose of my weekly mind f$#% that is Lost! Does anyone else love this show like I do?

WF and I are hosting the lovely Amelia and her husband tonight for a three hour session of TV watching. They too love this show (I am glad we have dorky friends like us). I have planned the menu and bought plenty of wine. I am going to put it out there that if this show ends like Twin Peaks, and it is all a dream I might throw a shoe at my TV.

Only 8 episodes left! How will it all end?