pictures

Aidan Meets an Idol (Picture)

19 February 2011 / aidan, living in chicago, pictures

For Christmas, Adam got Aidan an mp3 player, and he loaded it with all sorts of songs he thought Aidan would like. This gift has been a HIT. Aidan needs music when he’s going to sleep, and the mp3 player is perfect.

Adam loaded up a LOT of music, and Aidan took to it right away. Especially the songs by “Weird Al” Yankovic. He goes around singing the songs, and he listens to them over and over.

This morning, we woke up very early and headed out to Naperville for Anderson’s Bookshop’s 9th Annual Children’s Literature Breakfast. One of the keynote speakers was none other than “Weird Al” Yankovic.

Aidan got all shy and cute around him. He was speechless, but he had the biggest grin on his face. It was awesome. 🙂

It’s things like this that make living in Chicago pretty darn cool.

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Oh Well Hello There! (Multimedia)

22 January 2011 / disney world, pictures, vacation, videos, yay

Wow, it’s been a very long time since I’ve updated. I’ve just been busy working and relaxing and OH YEAH I WENT TO DISNEY WORLD AT THE BEGINNING OF THE MONTH I guess I forgot to mention that, huh?

Sorry about that. Seriously, this working full time (more than in most cases)–well, I’d put the deposit on the trip in September of 2010. Then fourth quarter started. Then there were the holidays. The days went by in a blur, and before I knew it, I had to rush around preparing for the trip. It was crazy–a Disney trip has NEVER snuck up on me like this. I’m usually on pins and needles counting the days for it to hurry up and get here!

So, Disney World came upon us FAST. We had a blast. 🙂 I spent most of that first day in denial and in a daze, but that might have been because I was so darn tired cause I couldn’t sleep the night before! I didn’t start to feel like it was real until after the Celebrate A Dream Come True Parade!

We stayed at Port Orleans French Quarter, which is one of the moderate resorts. (We usually stay at Pop Century, a value.) OK, I got spoiled. The bus stops were close to the parks, the resort was small and quiet, there was a hot tub, and it was just pretty! (Check in was super slow, but we ended up meeting some people from Columbus OH who just happen to be now living in the house that Chris grew up in. How is that for coincidence? Guess who was singing “it’s a small world” all afternoon after that?) Anyway, Adam and I decided that it’s worth the extra $$ a night for all the extras we got out of it. We’ll be staying there this June as well.

(God, imagine if I ever get to stay in the Polynesian! Talk about spoiled rotten, right? But that won’t happen for a long time, not with rooms starting at $400 a night. Yowsa!)

Almost every character I met hugged (or kissed) me, some more than once! I even got a hug from Tinkerbell. The hugs from Princess Tiana and Prince Naveen (the highlight of my trip) were the best, though.

Did I mention that Tiana is my favorite Disney princess? Oh well, now you know. 🙂 On Sunday, our first day there, we were going around Magic Kingdom, and I’d mentioned to Adam that meeting Tiana and Naveen would make my trip. It would make my YEAR. We couldn’t figure out where their meeting place was, but we’d been planning on hitting MK the next day, so we figured we’d look for them there. Well, Adam and I got to the park at Rope Drop (I highly recommend doing that–it’s awesome so early in the morning!), and we ended up RIGHT BEHIND THEM as they walked down Main Street. When we got to their meet and greet place, they let me take pictures with them and chatted with me and it was like, amazing. I was like this when it was all done:

Yea, that was a pretty awesome day in the Magic Kingdom, even if it did rain quite a lot. It was warm, and I rode Big Thunder Mountain Railroad twice (ended up riding it five times total during the trip), and it was the day of the Main Street Electrical Parade, where Adam and I were quite entertained by a total brat who was 11-years old and acting like a spoiled princess (she had visited the Bippity Boppity Boutique at some point during the day–she was ALL done up). Adam and I nicknamed her Veruca Salt. 😮

Although we had a great trip, I don’t know if I’ll go in January again. The crowd level was pretty great for the most part, and soaking in the hot tub in the evening was nice, also. But a couple of days, it got pretty cold, and that’s not what you want to have to deal with when on a vacation in FLORIDA. We only had one day of rain, though, and one day it was absolutely perfect out. So the weather is hit or miss, and a lot of things were being refurbished or fixed up. Tarpilicious! Not that I noticed…too much. I was too busy gawking over the fact that Christmas stuff was still up for the first few days of the trip. I was thrilled, to be honest, because dude, I might still have my Christmas decorations up, and I figured if DISNEY didn’t have theirs down, then I shouldn’t feel bad. (Of course, once I came to this conclusion, all the decorations were gone the next day. Even the poinsettias that had been planted were changed to purple and pink and yellow flowers.)

You know what this means right? I really have no excuse. I have to get the Christmas decorations down. And I will… sometime next week. Maybe.

ANYWAY.

Here are a few more picture highlights:

And you can see many more pictures here: Disney World 2011
(YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO LOOK AT THEM!)

It was nice seeing Adam’s family at various times throughout the trip as well. Eli ran the Goofy, Melissa ran the half-marathon, and Adam’s parents were there for cheers and support. Also, Cassidy brought little Lola which was awesome because she seemed to enjoy the park in the best way a little baby could:

We ate good food (Liberty Tree Tavern, Garden Grill, and Boma FTW), saw parades and shows, rode rides (yea Expedition Everest, Tower of Terror, Rock N Rollercoaster [twice], Space Mountain [twice], and of course, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad), and really had an amazing time. I cannot wait to take Aidan this summer. Because OH YEAH we are going again! Twice in one year for me, and Aidan too, because his father is taking him in August. ROCK.

Oh yeah, I have six words for you: GIANT CHOCOLATE AND M&M COVERED MARSHMALLOW.

So getting another one of those when I go in June. Mouth is watering just thinking about it.

OK, that’s enough for now. 🙂 Hope you enjoyed my short recap. Talk to you soon… but first, I leave you with some LOLz for days:

Okee dokee, artichokie. I’m gonna sign off before I get tempted to add more gifs. I am tired. I did four yoga sessions today and attended a kirtan. I should sign off. But I might play a game or ten of BeJeweled 3 before I actually turn in.

Byeeeeee!

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I’ve Been A Bad, Bad Blogger (Pictures, Long)

28 December 2010 / christmas, life, ohio, pictures, yay

It seems that blogging once or twice a month is going to be par for the course for me, which makes me kind of sad. I still read everyone’s blogs, but when I sit down to blog myself, I just kind of get overwhelmed with a sense of non-motivation and non-inspiration. I’ve been working a lot–a ten hour day is pretty much the norm these days (except today was pleasantly slow and I got out on time), and we’re short handed, with people out for the holidays. It’s tiring, but the money is good. And tomorrow I get a half day off, I am off Friday-Monday, and Tuesday I get another half day off. I’m looking forward to all the resting and the extra time with Aidan!

Lots of stuff happened since I last made a *real* update. I’ve fallen out of my yoga practice, which I am regretting. I REALLY ~~want~~ need to get back into it ASAP. I can’t wait until the work hours lessen so I can do so. Just walking into the studio is good for me. I attended WindyCon, and got to see S.J. Tucker perform (and also bask in some s00j love). I also met some new friends there and heard some good music.

And oh! Check out the hair fall I made!

I’m working on a mate for it so I can have two ponytails, but I need to find my materials. I’ve misplaced them. Hmm.

Yeah, that’s a bad thing about working so much. I can’t find anything. I make huge messes that I have no time to clean up, and I get overwhelmed with the lack of free time to do much besides bathe and sleep (hence the lack of blogging/updates). I also didn’t get to go around and take pictures of the Christmas trees, visit Chriskindlmarket, or see the big tree in the Walnut Room at Macy’s. No time, or just too freaking cold to go out. Thank GOD for Amazon Prime. I did a lot of my shopping online this year. It’s fun getting packages!

Aidan arrived December 17th. It was really cold, his flight was delayed but we didn’t care. We decorated the tree as soon as we got home!

The next day, I’d planned on just staying in all day, but I decided we should pop into the Moksha Yoga holiday party. I am so glad I went. I got loads of hugs, and all three of us attended an acroyoga workshop. Check out Aidan flying!

Anywhere Is turned ten at the end of November. I’ve had my domain for ten years, y’all. I used to have a huge following. Not so much anymore. The site has seen its share of drama, slow times, layout changes, and migrations from blogger to greymatter to b2 to wordpress. I was around in the heyday of the Internet Girl World, and I’m one of the few who is still hanging around, and hanging on.

I remember the trends back then. All sites had a basic format: Me, You, WWW, Site. Under all of those links there were tons of stuff to explore, if the site was good. Cliques, cjb.net, pixels, woogoo, being “hosted” (I remember how awesome it felt when Dara asked me if I wanted to be hosted!), UBBs, gbook.nu, virtue.nu, banners, link buttons, blinkies… tons and tons of things! I can’t believe how much the Internet world has changed and simplified!

Moving on from that trip down memory lane, I HAD A REALLY AWESOME CHRISTMAS. We began celebrating December 21st, on the Solstice. We opened our presents to each other and watched Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol. It was REALLY NICE to be able to spoil people like I’d wanted to for years. And Adam got me a really pretty Tiffany necklace! 🙂

After a couple more nights of opening presents and eating Ivy’s delicious cookies, we set out for Ohio just before 5am on the 24th. Thank God we had clear weather. Even though the car needed a $323 repair during our travels, I was less concerned with the cost and more concerned with getting the thing fixed so we could make it to our destination. And we did! We went to Columbus first to drop Aidan off at his dad’s, then to Aurora to spend the holiday with my mom. My sister, who I hadn’t seen in years, was there! The food was excellent, my mom LOVED the record player I got her, and Chris surprised us by bringing Aidan up Christmas night instead of waiting until December 26th. There was also a Doctor Who marathon on BBC America, and I got to see Doctor Who at the Proms. Awesome.

I had an OK birthday. It started off great, but I ended up working late and I got a migraine. Still, I got a couple of cool gifts and they threw a small party for me at work. It could have been worse, so no real complaints. Plus, Aidan is here, so who cares about everything else!

Thanksgiving was weird. Adam and I usually have Jeff and Deborah over, but this year, they wanted us to go to their place. It turned out to be a relief because I was just too exhausted to clean or prepare for guests. I’d worked so much that week, plus I hadn’t been feeling well at the beginning of the week, so it was rough. It was nice to go and relax, eat, hang with friends, and watch Doctor Who. 🙂

Aidan turns eight in two days! I know, right? Last night, Adam and I surprised him with a trip to the LEGO store, where he made three LEGO guys for 9.99, and I got him a LEGO City sports car that was only $5. He’s obsessed with LEGOs and video games, and drawing.

I’d better wrap this up. I’ll try to find time to do the end-of-the-year review. I get four days off, plus a half-day off tomorrow (apparently, I have accrued .50 days of PTO that I HAVE to use before the end of the year–I tell you what, it can’t be every day that your boss calls you and says “I need you to take half a day off this week so you won’t lose your PTO”–so I’ll be using that tomorrow. Yea!), and I am taking 1/2 day off Tuesday. So looking forward to the time to relax and be with my family.

Life is good.

Til next time! 🙂

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No Idea For a Title (Pictures)

7 November 2010 / christmas, life, pictures, work, yoga

Holy cow. Fewer than 20 days until Thanksgiving! That means fewer than 20 days until dressing and gravy and mac&cheese and homemade cranberry sauce and all sorts of delicious noms.

The past few days have been super chilly. Temps in the 30s when I walk out in the morning, not making it out of the 40s for the high. I hate it. Me and the cold? Not good friends. That’s probably why I have so many coats and hats and gloves and scarves. Now that my hair is really curly and sticky-outtie, I am not sure how to keep my head warm during the winter. Hats don’t really fit over my hair, and earmuffs and head wraps won’t be enough for long. I suppose I’ll just have to smash my hair down, and fluff it back up when I take my hat off. I’m all about comfort over style. I don’t play when it comes to keeping warm.

I’ve started seriously thinking about Christmas shopping, but haven’t actually DONE any yet. I already know one thing I am getting Adam, one thing I’m getting my mom, and a few things I’m getting Aidan. I’ll probably get to work on that stuff soon. I enjoy going out to the stores to shop, but I got another Amazon Prime membership, so I imagine I’ll be ordering quite a bit as well.

I’ll probably put the tree up… early December or so. I enjoy decorating for Christmas–it’s about the only time I’m any good at it, but I don’t like to do it too early. A lot of stores around are already doing so. Macy’s windows are done. I plan to look at them Monday during my lunch. I’ll post pictures, probably on my Flickr. 🙂

Work is still really crazy. I clocked 47.75 hours this week. That’s nothing compared to some people. But I did NOT have to go in last Sunday, thank goodness. They keep reassuring me that Schawk is not like this all year! Just a few weeks left of fourth quarter, but I’ll be sad because one of the temps will most likely be leaving (I hope they keep extending her contract if not hiring her altogether) because she makes work a *lot* of fun.

I dream of the Sears ads. I often find myself waking up and seeing a page, wondering how to make it better. That’s madness. I wonder if that will ever go away. I certainly hope it does.

I can tell Helena misses me. I don’t get to spend a lot of time with her these days. When I was home all the time, I’d lie on the couch and she’d lie on my feet or legs and purr and purr and purr. If I was sitting up, she’d butt up against me (like she’s doing now!) and just sleep. I’m gone all day, and when I get home, I hop on the computer, work, gobble down some dinner, take my bath/shower, prepare for work and go to bed. Yesterday morning, I took my time getting in (cause um, hello, it was Saturday), and she was sitting on the couch in her spot. I just pet her and cuddled her and she purred like crazy. She didn’t even try to bite me when I rubbed her tummy.

I love my little Helena.

Friday evening, I took a Fall Detox Vinyasa class. It certainly was not what I was expecting. There was amazing music which I loved, and oil. Lots of oil. Asanas. Some hard stuff. Some easy stuff. Some stuff I love like pigeon and double pigeon. I’m definitely getting stronger when it comes to plank and chattaranga, but those first down dogs are always so hard for me for some reason. When class was over, I felt happily yoga drunk, chatting with people, eating fruit, and drinking dandelion tea. There’s another detox right after Thanksgiving. I wonder if I’ll be ready for that. Especially for those hard moves…it’s for intermediate to advanced students, so maybe I’ll hold off until next year. I’m still pretty new to yoga.

I could be telling myself this because I know parts of it is hard and I have trouble keeping up. And I might be too scared/lazy to take the challenge.

But here was the funny thing. Friday evening was the first time I’d been to a yoga class since Amber’s class not last week, but the week before. It’s amazing how quickly the fast pace of downtown was in my blood. I keep mentally yelling at people to HURRY UP and GET OUT OF MY WAY and wondering why they were all moving.so.darn.slowly. But then I realized that *I* was the one not centering. My mind was in a million directions, and my body was following suit. I was impatient and irritable and fidgety. But then class started and I felt better once the Sun Salutes started.

It’s so hard to do make yoga a priority these days, when work/chores/responsibilities is taking up what feels like every free moment. But I HAVE to do it, for my sake.

I must make yoga a priority.

So, I’m planning on attending a couple of workshops in January, the kirtan on November 20th, and some weekend practices. My friend Cassandra, whom I met at Moksha, is now a certified teacher at P.S. Yoga and she personally invited me to take her Monday night class. So I’ll have to make sure I do that sooner than later. I love her teaching. She has such great energy, too. I watched her grow over the summer when she was teaching her karma classes; I attended one of her workshops. She said that she had a lot to teach me, and I’m eager to see how much more she’s grown, and what she wants to show me. 🙂

As a gift to myself for getting a job, I ordered an Ellowyne Wilde doll. I’d been looking at her for months, and I got a free shipping code from an email, plus the one I wanted is and end of edition doll (meaning she’s about to be sold out and retired), so she was marked down! Here is my newest girl!

I am in love with her. Absolutely smitten with this doll. Her clothes–the fabric is really good quality, and she comes with jewelry. But my favorite is her beautiful red curls and green eyes. I don’t plan on buying any more. She’s special, and I don’t want to overwhelm myself. (Says the girl with 12 American Girl dolls, all but four of the Monster High dolls, many Doctor Who and other assorted action figures, Barbie dolls, and more.)

So, I know she comes with the name Ellowyne, but I feel like I should give her a name that I choose. I haven’t decided on one yet, though. I know it’ll come to me. Or maybe it won’t and she’ll stay Ellowyne. We’ll see what happens.

At any rate, I’m tired. I’m going to head to bed with my ARC of Afterlife by Claudia Gray (ooo, aren’t you jealous?) and hope it doesn’t scare me awake! (I was reading it while taking a short break in the cafeteria Saturday, and the ice machine did its thang where it drops ice and makes lots of noise–yeah, startled me. I was all on edge b/c of this book!)

Anyway. *rubs eyes* Good night! I plan to sleep in big time. We’ll see if the cats/neighbors/weather will let me!

P.S. Oooh YAY extra hour! 😀

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Time Is Flying (Picture)

30 October 2010 / life, pictures

Say what? When did the end of October get here? I mean, seriously! This is nuts.

I worked a TON last week. I thought I’d be sleeping in until noon today, but I woke up at 9:30am. I have so much housekeeping stuff to do. The laundry? Yeah. We’ll be taking a trip to Coin Laundry World and utilizing their Fluff ‘N Fold services. I am also going to gather up the stuff that needs to be dry cleaned. The bedroom on my side is a falldown mess, and so is my closet. I need to get a big bag and throw in all the clothes I can’t/won’t/don’t need to wear anymore and donate it. My body’s changed so much since moving here; so many things I could fit or looked good in look absolutely stupid on me now. I don’t like it one bit. It’s annoying how easy it is for my body to expand but how hard it is for it to contract to the way it used to be.

Last night, I opened the new Excel (I like Microsoft Office 2011!) and downloaded a Christmas shopping template. I already know two things I want to get Adam and I know two things I want to get Aidan. No ideas for anyone else, yet, but little Lola will be easy. It’s hard to believe that Christmas is only 56 days away.

I’ve been buried in work. Today is the first day I don’t have a billion proofreading things to do. (This reprieve is only temporary–things will get crazy again next week when a new project officially gets off the ground.) Freelance projects galore! But it’s all good. Very good. Especially because yesterday, I was offered a full-time permanent proofreader position at Schawk! I haven’t worked in a permanent position since March of 2008 (we’ll just ignore the day-and-a-half I spent at Concierge, Unlimited), so it’s going to be an adjustment. Things won’t end after Thanksgiving this time. It’ll keep going, and going, and going! But I’ll get benefits, and I’ll have a steady income, and I know the work and the people. I know exactly what I am getting into. It’ll be good. I’m not going to lie, though. I will be VERY glad when fourth quarter is over. Having one day a week off, and wanting to sleep halfway through that day, is very hard. I’m behind on TV shows. My reading count has slowed way down. I’ve already mentioned the laundry situation. The free time goes so quickly and there is never enough time to do all the things I need/want to do, plus try to relax on top of it. Plus, people want me to call them, and I just can’t. Socializing is pretty much out the door. I am eager for things to slow down. This is the worst fourth quarter ever. I worked 12 hours last Saturday, 11 hours Monday, 11 hours Thursday, and 13 hours yesterday. I’m also on call for tomorrow. *Really hoping I don’t have to go in, but pretty sure I’ll have to*

I will have to re-evaluate my plans for the winter. I was planning on staying inside, scrapbooking, going to many yoga classes, and writing. The scrapbooking will have to take a back seat. Yoga will have to move to the evenings and weekends, which means no more Tantric Vinyasa 1-2 classes on Tuesdays at noon with Mia. 🙁 Fortunately, she teaches a basics evening class at Tejas Yoga on Mondays, and the studio is an easy orange line trip from work, so I can go to those. So I don’t have to lose my Mia fix. 🙂

Anyway, I need to get going. I have a bunch of stuff to do today. (I’d like to hit the 1:30pm yoga class but I don’t know if that’ll be possible.) I leave you with a photo of Aidan’s Jack O Lantern from our pumpkin carving party a few weeks ago:

Happy Halloween!

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