Be Happy

Although it is usually always hard for me to get out of bed in the morning, once I'm up I really enjoy my morning routine.

Depending on what time I wake up, I either go to the gym and work out next to Mr. Hot Boy that doesn't know I exist and then come back and watch the Today Show {love it} while I get ready, or I listen to Chris Carr & Co. on the radio {so funny} when I need to go into work early.

Top this off with my morning latte, and it puts me in a pretty good mood.

People must think I'm crazy as I laugh hysterically out loud during my entire drive in to work...interrupted by occasionally singing along to music.

I am then greeted by friendly workers at my parking garage. Every day, they smile and genuinely say "good morning." They all know me by name, and when I'm running a bit late and they see my car pull into the garage they hold the shuttle for me so that I don't have to walk in the cold.

If these guys can exude happiness every day, despite driving a shuttle in circles over and over, I can choose to be happy as well.

I do have so much to be thankful for, and life is better with a smile :)

TV 4 ME

Sadly, tonight is the very last episode of Jon & Kate Plus 8. Yes...I still watch this show. Team Kate all the way.

The season finale of Project Runway was last week as well.

And now I'm left with only Desperate Housewives on my DVR...not that I don't adore this show...

However, I need advice. What other good shows are out there that I should be recording? The weekend is terrible television, and I always wake up on Saturday wanting to watch DVR but nothing is ever waiting for me! Help! =)

Deck the Halls

I made {and ate} holiday Chex Mix....

...while setting up my very own Christmas tree...

...topped with girly ornaments and a pink tree skirt...

...and I finalized decorations with a photo of friends much missed.

Happy Holidays {a little early}!

A Short Post

Not all things are good when they are of the short variety.

Examples include:

Short Guys

Short Tempers

Short Deadlines

Short mini-skirts

Short Guys...

But short work-week, yes please! :)

P.S. Stay tuned for pictures of my decorated Christmas Tree. I exchanged my tree yesterday and finally decided on {very girly} ornaments. I may or may not have also purchased a pink tree skirt... Can't wait to decorate!

Re-organization Station

I had training at work the past two full days. In addition to getting to work before 7am to finish some things up before our sessions begin, I also do some work when I get home at night. I'm exhausted and figured I deserve a break today. I left at 5pm for the first time since I can remember. :)

It. was. fantastic.

I felt like I had ALL night to enjoy!

Having all this time on my hands, I picked up dry cleaning, ate dinner, caught up on Desperate Housewives (awesome!!!), cleaned up a bit....and then decided to re-organize for my new christmas tree.

Fail.

I huffed and puffed moving around furniture by myself....took the tree out of the box...and it's HUGE!!!

No way that puppy's fittin' in this living room.

I'll be taking it back for the trendier {skinny} tree.

For now, I think it's bedtime...is 7:50 too early? hahaha

In Other News:

• I spent three hours shopping for christmas decorations today. As I was in line to pay, I decided I didn't like the ornaments I picked out. I left with only a tree. At least it was 50% off...what a steal!
• My brother played in his second NCAA soccer tournament game tonight, and I got to watch it live on-line. Technology these days... Anyway, they WON {beating the #1 ranked team in the nation} and will be moving on to the sweet 16 game in either Pennsylvania or New York!! I'm so excited and proud of their team!!!!
• I am currently completely, absolutely, 100% in LOVE with this berry wreath I got as a birthday gift:

...Now if only I could find ornaments for my new tree that I am equally in love with.

• I'm taking a two day excel training course this week, and I am not being the least bit sarcastic when I say I am pumped for it.
• I'm also branching out and going to a play downtown on Tuesday night with a random group of girls from work that I have never met. I was somehow attached on a mass email invitation, and decided I should respond...it can't hurt.

Surprise!!!

Upon arriving at my friend's house on Saturday night, I was surprised by 6 of my best friends from college in town for the evening!

I could not have asked for a better birthday present! :)

We started out the night with dinner & wine at Mitchell's Fish Market, one of my favorite restaurants in town {where I felt extremely grown up...as we were all sipping wine and discussing our work lives}.

The food was delicious! "Best meal I've ever had"...as Kari some people would say. As this was a joint birthday celebration, we got THREE free desserts...7 Layer Carrot Cake {tdf}, Ice Cream Pie {also delish}, and a Java Lava Molten Chocolate Cake {my favorite dessert ever...}. Needless to say, this sweet tooth was in hog heaven.

Here's a picture of the Happy Birthday Girls:

The size of my smile could be directly related to the size of my dessert. I'm just sayin'...

The entire group at dinner:

Enjoying the city skyline:

I didn't stop laughing all night as we caught up on stories about our lives, reminisced about old ones, and made even more lasting memories.

We ended up at a very random bar full of very interesting people. Very entertaining to say the least! As my dad has always said, "It's not where you are, it's who you're with." No matter where I am with these friends, I have a wonderful time.

To my amazing friends ~ Thank you for the fabulous surprise! I only hope you had as much fun as I did! I miss you guys every day, and cherish the times when we are all together again. No matter where life takes us, when we are with each other it feels like no time has passed. I believe that is a sign of lasting friendship. I love you all!

Fab Day

My birthday was FABULOUS!!

To start off the day, people at work remembered it was my day. I got a {homemade} card and some guys at work bought me lunch AND frozen yogurt with sprinkles...yes, I did turn 23, but they know the sprinkles are my fav.

I opened all my cards when I got home from work, and felt so special that all these people were thinking of me. In fact, many of the cards made me shed happy tears. I greatly miss my family and friends that are far away.

To end the day, a group of new city friends and I went to dinner at a place we'd never been before and it was delicious! The restaurant was cute and the company was great. I haven't laughed that much in a long time. There were six of us, and we had all never hung out before, but we were giggling the entire night. The waittress came by about 5 times before we were ready to order because we were too distracted to look at the menu. This is the best gift I could have gotten...new friends in the area! =)

And being that it still technically is my birthday month...I'm going to treat myself to Starbucks and write some Thank You notes. Happy Weekend!!

I'm not going to say it...

ok, fine.

TOMORROW IS MY BIRTHDAY!!! woohoo!!!

I have a stack of cards and a surprise from my mom waiting to be opened!

Hoping maybe someone at work will tell me happy birthday too! We'll see if anyone remembers. haha...pathetic.

Random Thoughts...

• I had an AMAZING weekend at home! Every time I go down there, I come back feeling so rejuvinated (maybe because I sleep like a rock in the comfort of my parents' home) and grateful for the blessings in my life.
• On Friday, we went for a birthday dinner at my favorite restaurant. I said I was too full dessert, but mom ordered me some to go....she knows me too well. I was digging into the dessert even before I opened gifts when we got home! Funny how I can always find room in my stomach for sweets...I'm convinced I store dessert in a separate part of my belly.
• My mom allowed me to open my birthday presents early since I'll be up here on my actual birthday. My jaw dropped to the floor when I opened these gorgeous earrings:

I pretty much haven't removed them since I got 'em!

• She also gave me a beautiful single pearl necklace, several new cookbooks to try, and an Excel Book for Dummies (apparently, I talk about work a lot...)
• My brother made me laugh by giving me a card in spanish...he's so random! I'm assuming the card said Happy Birthday, but the words he wrote in it were so sweet they brought tears to my eyes. I miss him so much.
• I've been learning the words to my new Carrie Underwood CD as well...I just love her! I think her voice compliments mine well in the car =)

...not to mention, she's stunning!

• I took a spinning class for the second time tonight, and I LOVED it! I may be addicted to these workouts. They are so hard, but really get the endorphins pumping =)
• I probably should have taken the class 3 times over today because I can't count on one hand how many pieces of leftover Halloween candy I ate at my desk today....good grief, I have zero self control around chocolate!
• I got two birthday cards in the mail today!! I am trying to practice self control in this area of my life, and I am not letting myself open them until Wednesday so that I have something to open that day. I can tell one card is holding a gift card, so it's making it more difficult to wait....
• Sorry this post is all about BIRTHDAY stuff...it's just as exciting as I remember! Only 1 more day!!

Conference Champs!!!

Today was a GORGEOUS day outside, and what better way to spend it than at an exciting soccer game...

Lil' Bro and the team one 2-1 (against my ex-boyfriends alma mater) making them conference champs and earning them a bid to the NCAA tournament! Good job boys, you deserve it!

indecisive

{in-di-sahy-siv} adj. lacking definition.

I admit, I have a problem.

It is now 12:30am and after 3 hours I have just finished packing for my weekend trip home.

I know I'm only going to be gone for two days and there's no way I'll wear four pairs of jeans, but I just couldn't decide which ones to cut.

I know I don't need 5 pairs of shoes, but what if I actually decide to workout while I'm down there? I have to pack my gym shoes as well...

The 3 scarves? Each one goes perfectly with the separate outfits I packed and the 2 coats I'm bringing.

Yes, I can explain why I'm bringing four bags...

1. The computer bag (totally doesn't count).

2. gym bag (just in case)

3.  one for clothing, duh

4. and my toilletrie (how the heck do you spell that word, anyway?) bag

I've decided. I don't care who's judging, I'm going to have a great weekend at home no matter how much it takes to make that happen! Better safe than sorry. I can't wait to celebrate my birthday with dinner at my favorite restaurant, (hopefully) go shopping with mom, and to watch my little brother play soccer. Sounds delightful! =)

One Week!

Today marks one week until my 23rd birthday. In years past, I would count down the days until my "birthday month" so far in advance every friend is annoyed by the simple utterance of the word November. As another sign of me growing up, I have not even had time to think about my birthday between how much I have been working.

However, as of today I have 1 week left of being 22, so I thought I better start getting excited!

I don't think my actual birthday will be anything special (as it is on a Wednesday, so I naturally have to work all day...welcome to the real world), and I won't be with family or friends. In fact, we are not officially celebrating my birthday until Thanksgiving. Seems so far away....oh, how I'm looking forward to that break...

Anyway, here are some things I'd love to have one week from now:

• Clothes {of course} but more specifically, I am sick of wearing the same dress pants to work every day! New skirts and sweaters are always welcome as well! =)
• Black boots...without too high of a heal
• new gym shoes/workout pants
• Season 6 of One Tree Hill
• stretch gift: Louis Vuitton wallet to match my purse =) I know, not happening...but a girl can dream.

Hope mom is reading this!

Happy Halloween!

I finally decided on my Halloween costume...but not until yesterday!

Luckily, everything worked out perfectly, and I didn't have to pay a dime for my outfit because I simply borrowed it.

The Plan:

Laura, Kristen and I got ready at my apartment before going to a Halloween Party at a bar nearby. I had fun meeting new people at the party and witnessing some extremely interesting costumes (and people...), but the most enjoyable part of the evening was realizing what wonderful friends I already do have.

Doing our makeup and getting ready together made me miss living in the sorority house so much. I miss having dozens of fashion experts around to help me put together an outfit. My original version of my costume had a turtle neck and leggings with flats, and no pinning to the costume...the definition of "frumpy." Thankfully, Laura helped alter the costume to make it a bit more sexy youthful and Kristen helped to secure my "hat". Here is the end result:

Here we are, ready to go!

To start the night out pleasantly, I left my phone in the cab after getting dropped off at our destination. I was so afraid that was a bad sign for how the evening would end up, but we simply had the same cab pick us up to go home and everything was fine (and sadly, I had no missed calls/texts for the entire 5 hours we were in the party...sad! haha). Side note: Our driver's name was LaMan...I translate that to mean "The Man" in some foreign language, and I find that hilarious.

The party was a lot of fun. We got to dance and meet new people. And I dealt with people "spinning" my hat all night...and then threatening to touch me in awkward places.

When we got home we laughed hysterically telling stories about the evening and recapping all the randomness of the night! Our sleepover was so much fun, and I am so lucky to have these girls in my life. =)