A Special Birthday Shout Out!

A little HAPPY BIRTHDAY shout-out goes to my New Years Eve sweetie! I'm looking forward to celebrating your special day with you! Happy Happy Happy Happy Birthday! Let's make this birthday the best one yet! :)

Here's the front of the card I made him:
(I hope I get extra points for being sweet and creative!)

And to all my oh-so-lovely readers: Happy New Years Eve!

May you all be safe, have fun, and make out at midnight! See you next year!!!

Five Hundred Twenty-Five Thousand Six Hundred Minutes...

Two Thousand and Ten is coming to a close. Where did the year go???

Did I do anything exciting???

Did I do anything to one day tell the grandkids???

Did I influence anyones life???

Did I do anything to better myself???

Did I save any money (my main resolution for 2010)???

Did I get in better shape???

Did I learn anything new???

Did I meet any new friends???

Part of me says yes to all of these questions and part of me wishes I would have used my time more wisely and done a lot more. Which only makes me thrive to make 2011 a more exciting, adventurous, influencial, happy, healthy and successful year.

Let's recap my year:
*Rang in 2010 in Louisville with a few of my favorite Cincinnati friends! *Got an I-phone! (Best. Purchase Ever.) *Celebrated my 27th birthday! (Yikes, I'm old!) *A random sweet man at UDF (at 2:30am) buys me a box of Velveeta Shells and Cheese. (Highlight, fo sho!) *Partied with friends.

*Attended the LMFAO concert, which was pretty hilarious and a complete waste of time. *Went to Columbus a few times for random roadtrip weekends. Attended the Arnold Classic with 90% of all meat heads in the U.S. (Even Snooki was there w/ her meathead boyfriend!)

*Ventured to Raleigh, NC to party with my friends Richard & Stephanie. *Went to Memphis a few times to visit family and friends. *And to celebrate my niece turning 2 years old!

*Road a Mechanical Bull. *Vacationed for a week in California. *Saw the Ellen Degeneres Show and the Chelsea Lately show...(something I can tell the grandkids!) *I did the sprinkler a LOT (even on Ellen!)!!

*Met "that someone special" (hi honey!) *Attended a lot of Reds Games. *Ate a LOT of sushi. *Ate a LOT of Yagoot yogurt. *Watched the bf throw out the first pitch at a Reds Game! (Pretty awesome!)

*Volunteered with children. *Cultured myself at the Contemporary Arts Museum. *Saw a whimsical butterfly exhibit. *Hung out with monkeys at the zoo! *Was a vegetarian for 1 month. *And was sick for a week afterwards.*Attended Race for the Cure. *Held a HUGE snake! (scared?)

*Painted my apartment! *Bought new furniture. *Got professional pictures taken from my friend Kyle! *Made some new friends. *And ofcourse hung on to the old ones. *Got Promoted. *Got a Raise. *Got an Award! *Destroyed Decorated my boss's office when he went out of town to get hitched!

*Went to a wedding in Louisville. *Went to Austin to visit my BFF. *Experienced the "bat bridge". *Carved Pumpkins. *Went to a wine tasting! *I received a LOT of beautiful flowers.*Went home for Christmas.

*...And will celebrate the last day of the year with my sweetie.

All and all, I have no complaints about the year. I had lots of good times with friends and family. I had lots of laughs and felt a lot of love. But I'm pretty certain next year will bring so so so so so much more, I can just feeeeeeel it! Can you???

Christmas Vacation

Hello everyone! I am finally back from my Memphis Christmas vacation. I won't bore you with all the details from my trip, but here are some of the highlights:

Christmas Eve Eve (Yes, the Eve of the Eve) dinner at my brother's house. Me and Madelyn take a break from the goodies to have a little photo session...

The biggest bear ever from Uncle Michael.

Gotta get the popular christmas tree shot!

Then went out to watch the Tigers game with some friends, but unfortunately my camera did not make an apperance. Christmas Eve...I have lunch with a few of my ladies! Then spend the rest of the day with my sister & brother-in-law's family.

Lots of Love to my bff Kimberly!

Lindsay and Amanda never disappoint! 

Christmas Day...spend the day with family. Then, met friends downtown for our annual "Drink-Till-You-Puke" christmas event. (And I must say, I call it that for a good reason! Yuck!)

Two of Memphis's finests! Deaver & Zachary!

My bar tab was over $100, so I assume these shots were on ME. You are welcome, you jerks! :)

And we also celebrated Jer's birthday. Speaking of Jer, on a scale of 1 to 10, how much do you love his tattoo??? haha. A cowboy toaster riding a tricycle. That's deep. Ha.

Happy Birthday dork!

So, that was my vacation. Did everyone enjoy theirs? Christmas is such an exhausting eventful time that it going to be pretty hard to focus on the weekend coming up. I don't even have a New Years Eve dress yet!!! Will someone puh-lease tell me what to wear so I don't have to think about it??? Pretty please and thank you!

4, 3, 2, 1 Christmas!

I spent a good portion of my weekend driving from store to store to pick out the rest of my Christmas gifts and even took off work yesterday to accomplish the rest of my shopping.

SO, HOW AM I STILL NOT DONE?

Geez, I just want it to end!! I only have two more presents to go but I am already christmas-shopped-out! Someone, please give me some christmas shopping motivation. I am in need.

Despite the agony of having to brave another trip to the store, I am very happy it's CHRISTMAS WEEK! I am only working two days this week! And tomorrow is only a half day because my boss is taking us out for pizza and bowling for our Christmas party. I'll regret this next week when I am waist-deep in requests and reports, but for now...I will enjoy it! :)

Thursday morning I will be up at the crack of dawn to make my 7AM flight home to Memphis! I'm pretty excited to see my family, friends and eat THREE Christmas Dinners! Yes, three! Family dinner at my brother's on Thursday, my sister's inlaws family on Friday and another dinner at my sisters on Saturday! Uhm....I hope someone got me a treadmill for Christmas!! Yikes!!

I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend! I will be back next week to blog all about my weekend in Memphis! Until then....Be safe! Enjoy yourselves! Eat lots of cookies! And...

Froehliche Weihnachten!

Joyeux Noel!

Sung Tan Chuk Ha!

Feliz Navidad!

Buone Feste Natalizie!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

What I'm Loving Wednesday

Today, I'm loving...I have a three day weekend this week!

I'm loving...there was a huge box FOR ME on my front porch yesterday when I returned from work.



And it was filled with tons of little goodies from my brother! (Which is totally out of character for him!) I got tons of candles, christmas decor, a lime green wallet, and gorgeous christmas ornaments! Wow. I'm overwhelmed with all the amazing things! Thanks Bro!

I'm loving...when I got to work today there was a little box on my desk from some collegues of mine in Los Angeles! It was a cute little cup with a rubber orange top filled with candy!!

I'm loving...that I have a fun holiday party to attend this weekend.

I'm loving...chapstick! I'm addicted and I don't know if I could get through the winter day without it!

I'm loving...my Chick-fil-a calendar that I bought during lunch today. Does anyone love Chick-fil-a as much as I do??? I have the 2011 calendar hanging on my desk to prove it!

.....however....I'm NOT loving...the 2-5 inches of snow predicted for tonight. My backyard already has PLENTY of snow! (Please don't snow, please don't snow, please don't snow!)

H7MA Xoxo!!

Be My Guest(s) (Part 2 of 2)

Notice the "(s)" on the Part 2 of this post?? Well, that's because Friday night included a few more guests. Jessica drove down from Chicago to party for the night (along with her doggie, Dexter!) As well as, our friend Michael, who drove down from Cleveland. It definitely made for an interesting night (especially since all of them were sleeping at my place along with two more people and two doggies). Six people and 2 animals staying in my one bedroom / one bathroom house? Uhmmmmm.....sure. why not.

First, we pregamed with a few beers, glasses of wine (a whole bottle of wine for some of us) and Deweys Pizza.

Kristen, Emily, Me, Erin, Jess, Chad, Michael, Joe (and Mac the dog)

I heart these girls!

Then, I yelled out "CABS ARE HERE!" in my best Pauly D Jersey Shore voice (I really did!) and we all jumped in a cab and headed downtown to FB's where a V.I.P. table was awaiting our arrival. (along with three bottles of deliciousness)!


Horray for bottle service!

And horray for crazy friends!

I had such a fun time with all my visitors and other Cincinnati friends who came out to play this weekend. If only they all still lived here and we could have this much fun every weekend, like the good ole days.



The Jax & EJ Show

Love you EJ, come back to visit again soon! Love you. Miss you. Mean it!



Be My Guest (Part 1 of 2)

On Thursday, my friend Erin arrived from San Diego to stay with me for a few days. She moved away this summer so it felt pretty good freaking fantastic to see her again!! Oh, how I have missed my partner-in-crime!

First, we headed downtown for dinner at Nada with a few friends for tacos and drinks! Yumm! I usually always get the chicken tacos there, but I decided to try the shrimp tacos this time and they did NOT disappoint. Shrimp tacos from here on out! (Washed down with a Nada-rita, ofcourse!)

Me, Kristen, Joe, Michael, Erin, Chad, Emily, Andy

Then, we moved the party across the street to Righteous Room and Scene for post-dinner drinks.

Check out all our stripes!

And just when I thought the night was over...we ended up driving to Mt. Adams for more fun....but all we found was this tree. :)

Tree Hugers!!

It was a pretty eventful night and I was pretty thankful I took the day off work on Friday. And there were a lot of people downtown for a Thursday night. Am I old that I spend most of my Thursday nights on the couch watching Sunny in Philadelphia and The League??? Ha.

"Be My Guest Part II" coming soon...

Christmas Stockings: Unstuffed

Need stocking stuffer ideas??? Well, you are in luck because I have a few ideas since CV and I traded stockings early. I must say, I definitely enjoyed giving/receiving stockings before Christmas! It not only got us into the holiday spirit but it was also fun to suprise each other with little stocking treats! And I think we both did a great job picking out the perfect little gifts!

A few items are missing from the pictures, but here are most of our goodies:



CV's Stocking Stuffers! Didn't I do a great job??? :)

My stocking stuffers! What fabulous little gifts!!!



Here are a few things we stuffed our stockings with:  movies, back scratcher, fuzzy socks, kitchen accessories (salad tongs, can opener, spatulas, wooden spoons), car air freshner, a red wine cleaner (that gets red wine stains out of anything!) ornaments (one with our picture, a football, penguin and santa!), mini coffee flavors, travel size tissues, magnets for the fridge, a tiny shaving kit from Sephora, chapstick and a 5 hour energy. And ofcourse some delicious ones: cookies, chocolate, gum, mints!

Some were for fun, some we needed (like my can opener!), some were inside jokes, but all were perfect! It was definitely a fun night and I can't wait till the exchanging of the real presents. I've already purchased and wrapped mine and placed them under the tree!
I'm alllll ready!!! :)

What I'm Loving Wednesday

This is my first time participating in Jamie's "What I'm Loving Wednesday"!

Here are a few things I'm loving today...

I'm loving...this beautiful bouquet of red roses that CV brought me the day after Thanksgiving! And I'm loving...that they are still alive! (But I'll probably have to throw them out tomorrow!) Boo. Hoo.

I'm loving...my (fake) Christmas tree! This is the first year I've put a tree up and I'm pretty excited about getting it all decorated and filling my home with Christmas cheer! (Pictures of my tree will be posted later!)

I'm loving...glittery nail polish. Christmas and the New Year seems to be the only time I'll let myself get away with glitter on my nails. And I'm definitely going to take advantage!! Bring on OPI "Merry Me" and OPI "Looks like Rain, Dear" colors for the holidays!!

I'm loving...this little girl. I'm loving...how she's always sticking out her tongue at me! :)

And I'm loving...that I finally have 50 official followers! (Thanks to another Cincinnati blogger Tara who is my #50!) Thanks to all my blogger friends!

So, what are you loving today? Visit Jamie's blog to link up!!

Professional Online Shopper

During this time of year, I definitely consider myself a "professional online shopper".  I fly home for Christmas every year, so it makes more sense to buy those presents online and have them mailed to my mom's house then to buy presents locally and stuff them in my luggage or carry them on a plane!
(And not to mention I get to avoid the long lines, parking lots, and mall traffic! Sign me up!)

Do you plan on buying anything online this year? Well, here are some helpful tips for your online shopping.

1. Retailmenot.com - Have you ever noticed that some vendors have an "add a promotional discount code" on your check-out page. Well, this site can help you find promotional discount codes and other offers to add to your online orders! So far this year, I've saved over $50 because of this fabulous website! I recieved a $20 off a $75 order, an extra 20% off an order, and a free shipping! Trust me, before you click "check out" be sure to see if there is a code out there that could save you extra money!

2. National Free Shipping Day - Mark your calendars! National Free Shipping Day is December 17th, which is pretty much the last day you can online shop and have your packages arrive before Christmas. (without paying the high overnight shipping rates!) Right now over 1000 vendors are participating. Pretty good deal for you last minute online shoppers! (Click the link to check out the complete list of vendors!)

Hope this helped and happy online shopping!!

A Snapshot of December

Burrrrrrrr. It's December...can you feel it???

Oh what a WONDERFUL month I have ahead of me. So many fun things going on, I hope I find the time to do everything I want. This month will include lots of shopping (mostly done online so I don't have to carry a bunch of presents on a plane), christmas festivities, celebrating a few birthdays, along with the joy of christmas stocking stuffers, wrapping presents, hot chocolate, baking pies, christmas cookies, etc. etc. The list goes on and on.

To highlight some of the special events of the month:

1) Visitors!! - That's right! My partner-in-crime, Erin, will be in town from San Diego next week and my friend Jessica will also be visiting from Chicago. I. Am. So. Excited! I see alot of eating, drinking, and laughing in my future. (But first, I see a lot of cleaning since they will both be saying at El Casa de Jacqueline.)

2) Festival of Lights - The Zoo. Animals. A Zillion lights. Need I say more?

3) Parties Galore - A tacky christmas sweater party, work parties, friends holiday parties, girls christmas exchange party. Yes Yes Yes please!

4) Home for the Holidays - Home to Memphis for four days to celebrate Christmas. Since I didn't go home for Thanksgiving, I'm pretty excited about being home for a few days this month. I only wish Paisley could come with me! (Which reminds me...I need a dog sitter!!!)

5) CV's 29th Birthday (a.k.a. New Years Eve) - Celebrating my sweetie's birthday while wearing a sequiny number and shiny accessories??

Count me in and watch me sparkle! :)