Wedding! Christmas! New Years! Whew.

We're almost half-way through January 2009 and I'm not even close to catching up with blog stuff from 2008. Lovely. So, instead of lots of long, drawn out posts, how 'bout a marathon one with everything (except the 3 Day Walk, that still deserves it's own post) all thrown together? Good? Good.

* Wedding in New Hampshire
Waaaay back in November, we attended a wedding for Jim's law school buddy. We were only there for a couple of days, but we had a great time. While it might have been raining outside, it definitely didn't dampen the festivities. The couple are very much in love and and it seems only a matter of time before they start expanding their family. Congrats G and J!

Rehearsal Dinner

Getting ready at the hotel. I was allowed to hang out with the guys to serve as photographer. Let me just say that it's tooootally different than girls getting ready before the wedding. Wow.


At the church




The reception took place at a castle. The cocktail hour was held inside and then the dinner was outside in a tent. The only downside was the water that was tracked onto the dance floor. Made dancing a bit treacherous, not that it stopped us or anything.
We also had to play some dollar game that I don't really remember, but it ultimately ended in me and one of the law school buddies having to go up and do a line dance. Um yeah. I look thrilled, no? :| The rest of the evening was much better.

Before we leave the wedding, what, you might be asking is the proper footwear for a chilly, wet New England wedding? Duh. Uggs with your cocktail dress. (Please note, I did change into heels for the ceremony and reception.)

* Christmas
We hosted several parties and then had Christmas Eve at our house for my mom and brother. I spent a large portion of December in my kitchen rockin' out to Christmas music. Some of the fruits of my labor:

Crudite, Prosciutto-wrapped Asparagus

Salted Marble Chocolate with Pecans, Snowflake Gingerbread Cookies

Mini Pumpkin Cheesecakes, Pumpkin Cake with Cream Cheese frosting

Jim and I did manage to take some time out to chill by ourselves, too. And what better way to do that than taking advantage of our hot tub. And some booze. And cigars. Wheee!

I was seriously considering not cooking for Christmas Eve, but eventually decided that it'd be worth it. Indeed, it was. No pictures because I was too busy in the kitchen, but we had a full ham dinner made from scratch. It was delish.

We also had fun with presents. My mom told my brother and me that she got us the same exact gift. That scared us. It shouldn't have, seeing as it was a portable GPS for our cars. Yay! Jim got golf lessons at our local course, while my mom got a PB giftcard and a Barefoot dreams blanket that matches the one I have.

Later, Jim and I exchanged gifts alone after everyone had left. However, before we could open gifts, we had to deal with an unexpected visitor. A lady had accidently hit my mom's car. Long story short, it didn't look bad, but she couldn't open the door and had to have a body shop take care of it before she could drive home. Sigh. It turned her short vacation into one that was almost 2 weeks. Yeah. Fun.

Anywho, back to Santa. Jim got me a Nikon D40 (yayayay!), a T3 hair dryer and some other assorted little things. He got an ipod touch and a blu-ray player. See, told you it was a very merry Christmas!

The next day we spent the morning with his family in the South Bay where we got tix to Phantom playing at the Pantages in January and a gift certificate to Cut! Woohoo! That afternoon we trekked out to his aunt's house in the valley for more socialing with the big extended clan. We are now officially the only married couple in the family that either don't have kids or aren't currently pregnant. We're standing strong though! It was a great night (except for one little incident that doesn't need mentioning here) and it was good to see everyone.

* New Year's
Mellow, just the way I like it. No pictures because I wasn't feelin' it. We had dinner and watched TV with some friends at their apartment and it was lovely. Good food, good friends, good conversation. What more do you need to ring in the new year, right?

And there you have it. The end of 2008 -- except for the walk, really the recap is coming soon.

Now I can start fresh and not feel so bad about being so very behind. Yay!

Can't seem to catch up

There is so much to blog about, but I barely have time to breathe these days. I'm exhausted and I'm trying to enjoy the season, which leaves little time to blog about the things I'm doing that are trying to maintain a sense of normalcy this holiday season. With that said, I'll try to get some pictures up of the following things one of these days, but for now, here is a rambling post full of bullet-points:

* We hosted our annual party for some of our good friends last weekend. I made a bunch of appetizers, which meant I was cooking half of Friday and all day Saturday, but they turned out great and it was fun living in my kitchen for awhile. The highlight for me was making mini pumpkin cheesecakes (so yummy!) and Gingerbread Snowflakes from Miss Martha. If I do say so myself, they turned out adorable!

* I've done the vast majority of our Christmas shopping this year online. I've found good deals, lots of free shipping and I haven't had to run around all over the place looking for stuff. With only 2 gifts left to purchase, my holiday shopping is almost complete. Thank God!

* I was in charge of our office holiday party for the second year in a row, after swearing that I wouldn't do it after last year's craziness. Well, now I've officially had it. I'm out for next year. It's frankly not worth the bitching and moaning from folks and the work involved in putting it all together. On the upside, I provided the holiday music and two of my worker bee co-workers who helped put the party together liked it so much that they've asked for a copy of it. :) They said it was a great mix of all those songs you hear out in the malls, but can never remember once you get home. It's such a silly thing to be proud of, but oh well. Ha!

* As of today, I know of 9, count 'em n-i-n-e people who are having babies sometime in 2009. And about half of them are close family and friends. I'm so happy for everyone, but no joke, I'm buying stock in Babies R Us! Oh, and we keep telling my mother-in-law about the babies and she finally replied with "Okay, I don't want to hear anymore about your friends babies." Implying, of course, that she'd like to hear about our babies! Hahahahahaha! Yeah, not for a loooong time, if ever.

* Instead of real babies, hubs and I are starting to consider a baby of the furry variety, namely a puppy. We have a short list of breeds we're considering and will likely head to a dog show after the first of the year to see the breeds in person, talk to the breeders, etc. Once we finally decide on a breed that would be good for us, we'll get more information from AKC breeders and local breed-specific rescue groups. Most of the dogs on our list are also known for being good therapy dogs with proper training and this is something I'm really interested in. Not only would we be giving back to the community, but we'd be ensuring we'd have a well-behaved dog in general. We're not exactly sure of the timeline yet, but 2009 will likely see us adding a furry friend to our home. Very exciting!

* Lastly, I chopped my hair. This was sort of inadvertant as I asked the stylist for a "long bob", but she didn't so much hear the "long" part. I'd been toying with the idea of going short for some time, but I didn't have the guts to go for it. It was much easier for the stylist to accidently goof, at least for me. Super easy to style and such in the morning and it's just fun to have a very different look.

And that's the long, somewhat convoluted version of what's been going on these days. Things with my dad are still sticky, but I'm trying to leave most of the crazy to the lawyer and only get involved when absolutely necessary. So far, so good. And I seem to be having more good days than bad, but I'm not sure how much of that is due to accepting what happened vs. being too busy to really take it all in. Time will tell.

Hope everyone is having a happy holiday season!

Still upright, barely

As most of you already know, we found out on the 20th that my father had passed away. My brother received a call from the police that morning for permission to enter the house for a welfare check after concerned neighbors had contacted them. What they found was not good and it started a whole storm of events that is still ongoing. Those first few hours passed in a blur. My brother called me at work and I lost it, but quickly tried to regain my composure to deal with everything. I walked over to Jim's office and he sat with me outside for awhile so I could try to wrap my brain around everything. As I've talked about here, I'd had very little contact with my dad in the past year, which makes his death even more complicated than it would have been otherwise. I also had to quickly make a decision on whether I'd continue with my plans to walk in the 3 Day Walk as I was scheduled to get on a train to SD a few hours later. Ultimately, I decided to still participate in the walk and I'm so glad I did. Alyssa and I talked a bit about it at the beginning of the trip and then I put it aside for the duration of the weekend. I think the distraction was good for me, but it didn't stop my nights from being very long and holding little in the way of sleep.

Without meaning to, my brother and I divided the tasks that needed to get done with him serving as point person for the coroner and funeral home and me dealing with all the legal stuff once I got home from the walk. To say that things are complicated would be an understatement. Aside from the swirl of emotions surrounding his death, there is also the financial hornet's nest that we are left to deal with. Earlier this year, my dad switched me from being executor of his will to just a backup, in the event that his tax attorney couldn't perform the job. Thank God he did that. Even without being the executor, the amount of paperwork I'm having to sort through and the information I'm having to provide the attorney is taking days to get through. We took a trip out to my dad's house in Arizona over the weekend, which was tough for a bunch of reasons that are just too much to post here. We came back with 6 file boxes of paperwork that needed to be sorted and organized before I could decided what needed to be copied and mailed to the attorney. I'm still in the middle of it and it's just draining.

In terms of the emotional fallout, it's been pretty low for me. With the exception of my outburst when I first found out, I haven't really been able to cry and deal with the emotional stuff. I think part of this is having to stay strong to deal with all the practical stuff and part of it is still being angry over what happened earlier this year and the mess that has been left. How calloused to be angry with someone who is no longer here, right. And yet, I can't stop ping-ponging between being so incredibly sad and so very angry, with a background anxiety that I can't shake at all. I also feel like my brain in a fog , which makes focusing difficult. And sleep. Ha! Haven't had a good night's rest in almost 2 weeks. I sleep, but it's light and I wake up a lot in the middle of the night and feel just as tired in the morning as I was when I went to bed. I'm sure a lot of this is just going to take time to sort through.

Originally, my mom was going to stay home for Thanksgiving because she had made plans with a family friend to hang out. Once we realized we'd need to make a trip out to Arizona that weekend, she came down early and we had a good little Thanksgiving dinner at the house, just the two of us. [Jim and my brother hung out with us in the morning, but we insisted they do they're normal dinner plans that afternoon.]Even in the fog that my brain is living in, I managed to pull together an honest to goodness traditional dinner in a few hours. With enough leftovers to eat on when we got back Saturday night. It was really nice to have a real holiday with her in the midst of all this, even if we did do it in our pajamas. :)

I'm back at work today, but it's hard getting back to the real world. I've been tucked in my little cocoon of family, our house, a few friends and the tv for so many days that it's hard getting back into the swing of things. For everyone that emailed, called, sent Facebook messages, etc, thank you so much. They mean a lot to me and I'm so grateful to have such warm and caring friends. There are still many that are unanswered and I swear I haven't forgotten about you, it's just taking me awhile to get to everything.

I'm trying to take things one day at time and just get through as much as possible each day. I know things will get better. I know that eventually all of the craziness will be worked out and I'll be able to actually grieve properly. But for now, I'm floating along, trying to keep everything in order and maintain some semblance of normalcy.

T Minus 2 days....

** A quick note about the last post. I'm glad that it was as coherent as it was because I was still really dopped up on Ambien when I wrote it. Why I decided to blog then is beyond me. The 2 hour layover in Newark is a blur as is the horrible turbulence we felt on the flight out. Drugs, I tell ya. **

The wedding was fun and I have pics to share, but it's going to have to wait til after this weekend. Why, you ask? Because this week has been devoted to final prep for the Breast Cancer 3 Day Walk which starts before sun up this Friday. Eeeeee!

I'm mostly packed, save for a few last minute things that need to be thrown in, I have my train ticket to SD and I'm ready to do this! I'm also mostly excited with a few nerves thrown in for good measure. I think I'll chalk the nerves up to the fact that it's a new experience and once I actually get out there, it should all disappear. Lastly, I'm worried that I'm going to be a sobbing mess here and there during the weekend, especially on the last day. I mean, really, I started tearing up during the safety video we had to watch to finish registering for the walk. Yeah, probably doesn't bode well for keeping the tears in check on the event itself.

Please keep Alyssa and I either in your prayers or your thoughts this weekend. The forecast is clear and I'm hoping for a great experience for us. :)

Red eye fun

I'm blogging this at the Newark airport as we wait for our connection to New Hampshire. We took the red eye flight and I took an ambien to try and get some sleep. I'm not sure that I really slept, but I was definitely in a fog. So much so, that I'm sure I resembled a drunkard as I stmbled off the plane to get to our connection. The upside to the drug is that the flight seemed very short and the very cute, but potentially loud toddler sitting in front of me, didn't bother me in the least.

We're here the rest of the weekend for a friend's wedding and then back to sunny Cali on Sunday night. Should be a fun trip, except that I'm already tired and feeling a bit off. I'm sure the sleep meds have nothing to do with this ....

Project House

We've been in the house for a little over 4 months now and it's finally starting to feel like home. I think this is a combination of actually living here and continuing to add all those little finishing touches to make it feel like our home. The last couple of weeks, in particular, it's been all house stuff, all the time. I'm tired, but things are coming together really well.

Kitchen:
This room was basically good to go when we moved in... except for the terrible door handles and drawer pulls and the icky kitchen curtains. Blech! I found a dark oil-rubbed bronze set that is a little bit modern and a little bit traditional. Amazing how just changing out the hardware can change the whole look and feel of the room.

Before

After

The curtains were more difficult. For some reason, the only kitchen curtains I could find were either covered in fruit or had more ruffles than an Easter dress. Ugh. I wanted to get something up, so I settled on a cream cafe curtain. Not great, but better than what was there before.

Before

After

Living Room:
We started off with a good couch, tv stand and bookshelves, but we've recently added a rug, a new coffee table and side table. Those three things alone make the room so much cozier!

Before

After

With the temperature dropping, we picked up fireplace accessories so we could finally use our fireplace. Target had a simple, clean line collection that was not only inexpensive (dude, those screens can be $$$), but fit the style of the room well.

A few decorative pumpkins jumped into our cart, too. Aren't they cute?

In the future, we'd like to add a console table next to the front door and set up a reading nook in the corner of the room next to the picture window.

Enclosed Patio aka The Bar Area:
It's finally getting some character! Some wrought iron wall decor and tall dark wood candlesticks and voila -- it's starting to look pretty.

Master Bedroom:
During the summer the light that would stream in in the morning was awful. Curtains suddenly became a necessity. Not only are they useful, but I think they add a bit more interest to the room, no? Oh, and we finally got around to hanging that picture frame, too.

Guest Room:
This was formerly the kid's room and it was a horrible lilac color. So not us. We opted for a warm creamy-beige for the walls, which was a nice background for the dark funiture and deep red linens. I'm actually excited now to have people spend the night!

Before

After

Bathroom:
We only have one full bathroom and when we moved in it was soooo ugly. Dark blue-ish purple walls with tons of white tile, painted white cabinets and a faux marble counter. Ugh. I seriously cringed whenever I walked in. Since we feel like one of these days, we're going to do a major renovation of the bathroom, we opted to just change the paint and accessories to give the room a different feel. While the layout would still not be my first pick, it looks SO MUCH BETTER! The pictures don't do the transformation justice. The wall color is Cloud (a very light blue) from the Restoration Hardware Baby and Child line and the cabinets went from boring white to a rich dark brown. We swapped out the cabinet pulls for a matte silver that gives the room a more modern feel. Towels and accessories were a mix of good 'ol Tarjay and Lowe's. I absolutely love this room now. Love it!

Before

After

The last room that is undergoing huge facelift is our basement aka my home office/craft room. I'm still adding some finishing touches so I'll wait to post pictures, but let's just say that it's becoming a little slice of heaven for me. ;)

It's a beautiful morning

I've got my first Peppermint Mocha of the season and I'm still enjoying the after-glow of the historic win by Barack Obama last night. Such a freaking great day!

A few personal thoughts from last night:

* I thought McCain's concession speech was really good. It felt like the first time we've seen the real McCain all campaign, which is a bit sad. I'm glad he went out on a positive note after a hard fought campaign.
* Palin still scares the crap out of me. I stand by the fact that she was the nail in McCain's proverbial coffin. I know a lot of folks for whom she was an absolute deal-breaker, which doesn't surprise me in the least. I truly hope that she is not the future of the Republican party.
* I was already aware of this, but OMG, how great of an orator is President Obama?!?! He is the perfect blend (at least for me) of pulpit-style rallying and eloquent speaker. It comes so natural for him, which is not an easy feat. I think that many Americans find his style comforting and I think this will bode well for him in the years to come.
* I feel so hopeful after last night's speech. Many parts of it brought me to tears as I felt like he was really speaking to each of us personally, charging all of us with helping him get this wonderful nation back on track. I'm excited, I'm hopeful and I can't wait to see how the next few months will unfold.
* It looks like Prop 8 will, in fact pass, which makes me sad. I'm fairly confident that it will eventually be over-turned by our courts, but what a sad day for many couples here in California. Sigh. I think we're definitely moving in the right direction as a country, but we're obviously not completely there yet.

Happy Hump Day everyone!