Vegas-December

An email from Elaine and David saying that flights were cheap to Vegas and a few days later we met up with them in Las Vegas. Sadly we had to leave a night early to beat a storm so we could make it to a wedding and they had to stay an extra night due to an ice storm in Chicago.
highlights include but not limited to:
-walking, shopping, walking
-new york, new york roller coaster
-blackjack at almost every casino on the strip
-jokes, jokes, jokes
-trader joes!
-dinner at Tom Colicchios'
-lunch at Bobby Flays'
-dinner at Daniel Bouluds'
-friends, food and fun

Chicago-November

(kristin and elaine at Avec)

In November we went back to Chicago for a few days. I was nervous that it would make me want to move back but luckily it didn't, no matter how hard our friends tried. The food was fab, weather blah, shopping eh, fun oh yes!

philly- September

in Sept we went to Philly on a whim to see Rusted Root and Dave Matthews the next night. The weather was perfection, everywhere we ate was amazing, and sight seeing was great and took us back to elementary school history class. Both concerts were fun, Dave saw that I was there and played all of my songs!
I hope we continue our family tradition of seeing Dave in a different city each year.

A Song for the Mormons! (12/14/09)

Video Recaps | Full Episodes | Webisodes

recall

my thoughts on Jersey Shore are not a solid recommendation; I only watched half an episode and I had hit my skeeve limit and that is saying something since I am watching The Bad Girls Club right now.

I only wanted to say that the show is reality and as an Italian it does not offend me.

*I have to watch Bad Girls Club on very low volume because it frightens Oscar and infuriates Nick, but there is nothing good on the tivo

jersey shore..fo sho

There has been a lot of controversy over the new mtv reality show Jersey Shore. I have been to the Jersey Shore and consider myself lucky that I did not contract hepatitis from the "water". If you look past the greasy film on the water there are more prophylactics floating around than fish.

I grew up in the tri-state area, I am a daughter of a 1st generation tri-state area Italian Mom and an Italian/Irish Dad from New York and I am not offended by the show; because it is TRUE! I have tried several times to explain to Nick what a Guido is and now I can watch the show with him and explain it thoroughly as if it is a National Geographic special.

I am very proud to say that no one in my immediate family is a Guido/Guidette, wops yes but no guidos. I was a little worried about my brother years ago because of his gel usage and tan, but thankfully now he has a ski mullet and lives in Steamboat. And my sister like me got the Irish skin and could never get tan enough, but she does have a Steelers necklace so...to be continued

love tank

when a husband agrees to a Target trip and doesn't complain in the health and beauty aisles; an angel gets their wings

when a husband goes Christmas shopping, to Target whine-free, starts to help clean without being asked, takes you to Chipotle even though he doesn't like it, takes the dog out several times during your unofficial party, and discretely cleans up the party while you dish with a bff til 3:00 in the morning; a love tank is filled

*Kris Tina, you might be the only one to get the reference

Happy Hanukkah!

Husb gave me a new laptop for the first night of Hanukkah! You may hear from me a lot more often now that I can watch Bravo and blog at the same time!

Mazel!

first cayman pics

the beach looked like this, no waves and never really anyone else
i sometimes required a dress turban, even with the cabana and spf 70
nick did a lot of this. much deserved!
after swimming with the dolphins we visited a turtle rescue farm

people it is a spray tan that was airbrushed on in four coats

ever?

ever had a headache that lasted 72 hours, at least 12 advil, massive amounts of tea, aromatherapy, physical activity, 6 aspirin, and 2 hydrocodone? ugh welcome to my life and i didn't even eat gluten or do anything fun enough to deserve this

seen a license plate that says "you think i'm ugly, you should see my kids" Husb and I did yesterday and we want to get them for every holiday party of the season

labor day

labor day '09

the day something was hung on the walls of our new abode

more to come

trash or treasure

today on the way home from some errands i stopped by the DI to fuel my vintage milk glass obsession, etsy shop, and because i am on a quest to find bamboo * chippendale chairs that look like the jonathan adler ones minus thousands of dollars.

I saw what seems to be this exact yellow chair but thought "eh...sick"... I come home hit my round of Design blogs and see this Kelly Wearstler room! so maybe after some steam and bleach I could love this chair?!

*i did find a fab hollywood regency style bamboo mag rack and side table, if you are good I will show you the transformation

Cait, we may have to go back for this chair tomorrow and a dresser I saw that I could not handle but you could make look fab!

to: future me

i am pretty sure no one is out there, so this is mostly a reminder to myself to post pics of this summer and to remember all of the fun things we did this summer, cause really i will probably never get around to putting pics up.

*bought our first house
*had our first home owners incident and a half, clogged drain and then water coming out of the basement ceiling.
- future self remember not to put a 14 oz of coconut down the drain
*first party in our house, all the pi phi's over before Katie moved to Austin
*Bear Lake
*San Francisco
*floating the Provo
*hiking parley's
*teaching Oscar to swim
*our backyard!
*vegas with the girls!
*Elvis Costello and the Utah Symphony outside at Deer Valley...40 degrees in shorts and a tee shirt
*baby bird
*etc...
*coming trip to Philly to see Rusted Root on Friday and Dave Matthews on Saturday
*postponed Grand Cayman trip

Start of a great weekend...

.....

remember another great weekend?

2 years and I couldn't be happier. Love you Kiki.

regularly scheduled

whoa..i never really reveal that much in blog posts, unless it is about my g.i. tract. i sometimes write serious blog posts in my head but never actually post them. this post will be more what we are use to.

*Someone in my fam sent me this picture because of my need to reduce, reuse, recycle, re-purpose.


*I just finally let Oscar back in the house, earlier this morning I saw him rolling in something gross, just a pile of earth worms, so i gave him a hose bath. I thought he might be dry so i unhooked him and instead of him running into the house he ran to the neighbors I ran inside to get a banana to coax him back i get back outside and he is running like a bat out of h and the neighbor is saying he has the bear. Oscar runs back into their house with the babys favorite bear and i see that she has friends over for a playgroup this reminds me that i am in my pj's. I finally get the bear away and he takes another stuffed animal, i get that away and as we gracefully leave a mother (a neighbor i have yet to meet) says say bye to the dog to her baby in her arms and oscar barks right at him causing said baby to start bawling.

case of the Mons

today i am in a funk.

Not the kind of funk where you get mad and cry over little things, like the husband eating all of your Organic Blue Chips before you were even awake and put the bag back in the pantry with only crumbs left, because you had looked in the pantry and decided hummus and blue chips would make everything better and then you open the bag....ugh this infamous funk lasted about 9 hours and was 2 fridays ago.

today's funk is more: why is my house still not the way i want it, i will never find an enjoyable fulfilling job that will let me work less than 40 hrs a week, i have bad cramps, feeling bad for myself cause i won't see husband til thursday, why can't the dog let himself out, why don't they make gluten-free oreo's kind of funk. really important in the scheme of things stuff like that.

at least i have started to try and de-funk; i showered, i am making myself leave the house and go to the post office to mail an etsy order, pilates reformer class at 4:30. hopefully a chipotle or luna's date after pilates will seal the deal.

CC Interiors

I have a super stylish friend who started her own design firm and blog called CC Interiors

Here is a bedroom she just did! Amazing! As Rachel Zoe would say "I DIE!"

Her personal blog is uber amazing as well and she has links to all of her super stylish friends from NYC for all your blog stalking pleasure!

as of late

These two masterpieces are the latest to come out of my workshop. If I do say so myself you would not believe the before pics.

Help, I have no ideas for this chair yet!
After two trips to Pottery Barn and two to Target I have not found lampshades for these two Stiffel lamps from my Grandma. ** Please notice that she never took the plastic off of these 1945 gems!

a Pittsburgh man..

R.I.P. Billy Mays

preview

i am having a hard time "placing" things so what Nick calls "trinkets" are everywhere!
i have painted lots of furniture from my Grandmas' house. (i promise this is a very pretty color;called sliced cucumber )

Oscar got a mullet! the very back of the yard needs some work...takers?

*while posting this I caught Oscar eating a purple crayon..

be trendy

June 2

today I:

*joined Twitter (KikiMacey), to find out my 14 yr old sister is way ahead of me

*got very jealous and mad at my husband for something dumb

*realized I might miss my job just a little

*was so mad at Oskie that i thought I was going to physically hurt him if he didn't STOP everything he was doing

*did zero laundry, packing, or cleaning...tomorrow night will be exhausting

*talked on the phone with my mom about Spencer and Heidi

our house

pending an inspection tomorrow...crossing fingers!

*since when does my phone take good pictures?

1st attempt at phone blogging

it is 9:30am and I have already walked into the mens bathroom at Ohare far enough to see men, complimented an old man on his surgical mask after his velcro shoe went into my security bucket, laughed out loud to myself reading several times, fell after trying to jump some chairs in the terminal and realized my shirt was unbuttoned.

05/06

things I do not understand today:

the 50ish man walking down Ontario St this morning at 8:20am in pink tights, a black leotard, black leg warmers, the kind of velcro shoes you get at drugstores, greasy, balding hair, beergut, and a satin jacket w/ diy VFW patches

the oldest pregnant woman I have ever seen

most 4 year olds

why the longer I am off gluten the hungrier I get

the Russian comic who works at Starbucks


things I love today:
Chocolate Crisp Bumble Bars

when Oscar chews on things he is suppose to chew on

when children listen to my words

herb salad mix from whole foods

the 50ish "fly girl" I see on the way home from work

05/04

As I was just cleaning the microwave w/ a lemon and some salt trying to get the bean incident out, if you saw the short lived post (I did not know he didn't want anyone at work to know, so modest) about Nick being a big deal don't judge me for how long it took me to clean it up! I started getting very excited to buy a house in the coming weeks! Decorating, gardening, shopping, and general domesticity. I am also nervous, way more nervous than Nick, I mean what are we 24 and we are buying a house! This will (god willing) be the house we bring our first babies too, oy vey it feels like just yesterday I was living in a sorority house and Nick was two doors down living in a fraternity house!

I've been over the blogospere lately and Oskie won a fight with my camera cord but I will update soon about the house happenings!

Cait and baby Winston, can we go thrifting everyday looking for great furniture to restore with your mad skills?

Easter

If Oscar had not hidden and/or chewed the camera cord I would post pictures of the four days we spent with my family (minus Joe) here in Chicago.

If I was not exhausted from what I hope is only a cold, and not strep throat or scarlet fever which are going around my center. I would type about how much food we ate, how much gluten I ate and all the fun we had!

The quote of the holiday weekend is from my 14 y.o. sister at dinner. The waiter sat the calamari in front of her and she said " those testicles are so big...tentacles!" My dad covered it with "too much information in health class" but the jokes started and even my dad (if you knew him you would be as shocked as I was) and Nick were in on it too!

here is my brother Joe keeping it real this past weekend in Colorado!

I do not get paid enough

It has occurred to me that IF there is a hell and IF I am going there that at the gate greeting me of my own personal hell will be two four year olds and a two year old!

*and if I am going it probably happened in Park City with the ski team freshmen year or involving a Pi Phi, but at least all of my friends will be there!

camera dump

a dump of pictures from my camera and phone, what blogs are for right?
Dallas was the spacation that we needed! All we did was sleep, eat, spa, eat, spa, sleep!
St. Patricks - friends, river, lunch at David Burkes, Elaines house, Wrigleyville, Lincoln Park, taking care of Robyn, cabs, cabs
apparently religion has everything to do with how well you do in poker!
someday Erika is going to be famous!
our new road trip guilty pleasure, Cracker Barrel!
Oskie is keeping it real, he got a major haircut this weekend and now actually looks like a westie and not a wolf!

so far so good

People universally tend to think that happiness is a stroke of luck or something that will maybe descend upon you like fine weather. That's not how happiness works. Happiness is the consequence of personal effort. You fight for it, strive for it, insist upon it. (Elizabeth Gilbert)

-one of my 2009 feelin' fine motto's

final answer..

We thought a lot about Arizona, we thought about Colorado (sorry Amy), we thought a little about Austin, Texas; and we always said well if we don't like where we move we can always move to Utah. We have reservations about moving back to Zion, but we have been talking about it for a week now and it just feels right. We have talked to the court and the bank about our landlord foreclosing and we should be able to stay in our condo until our lease is up June 30th. Ironically, being able to choose where ever you want to live is very stressful. Reminds me of the book Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely.

*now I need to start working on getting a Trader Joes in UT! I will not be ok without their gluten free goodness and I will not seem like such a good wife without their cheater dinners! Caitlin are you with me?

chi-vegas

We have been going through the Zagat resturaunt guide with David and Elaine trying a new place every Friday and Saturday...I need to be better at taking pictures.

Last Friday we ventured to Chicago's own Vegas, Alhambra Palace with David and Elaine and some other couples. Zagat gave it a 13 so we didn't have the greatest expectations, we went for the experience, it was ok, we give it about a 17, and a 15 for the genuine blonde belly dancers!

Afterwards, we went to the terrace of the Dana Hotel, unfortunately no VH1 reality TV shows were taping there that night.

d.y.k.?

did you know that when you are renting a condo (paying a semester of college in rent a month) and the person who owns your condo defaults and is being foreclosed on even though there is a management company you can just happen to open a piece of mail which you were not suppose to see and see that you are going to be kicked out in 3 weeks or whenever they feel like it really.......we have been on the phone all day trying to find an attorney

see you sooner then later either phoenix/scottsdale or boulder/denver.....er marriott

team Gretchen or team Tamra?

today i love sleeping in til 10:00 with Oscar
lunch and shopping with friends
travel insurance
a nicely healing appendectomy scar
a birthday check from Grandma
getting a call from Nick at 3 for us to meet him at the park
eating an avocado and a bowl of EnviroKidz Organic cereal for dinner
the real housewives of orange county confess...oy vey

danke

Thanks Debra and Max for the great lunch and shopping at Bloomies.

Just finished buying all the things we need, our bags are nearly packed, and...

Well we just finished buying all the things we need for our trip to Africa, our bags are nearly packed and we couldn't be more excited to leave on Thursday... so if you know us, you know what that means! Appendectomy!

To make a very long story short, Kristin and I ended up in the emergency room last night with her having some very extreme stomach pain. After waiting hours in the waiting room with all manner of homeless and mentally ill individuals, we finally got in to see a doctor. After a few hours of exams from multiple doctors, as well as a CT scan, they determined that her appendix needed to be removed ASAP.

Kristin, making her best sad face.

This was at about 2:00 AM, so we spent the next few hours at the hospital and Kristin had surgery this morning at about 6:30 AM. It went quickly and well, and you can hardly see the incisions. She's recovering now and doing great. She should be released tomorrow and we'll head home and try to sort out our trip to Africa... We'll keep you up to date.

every saturday..

every saturday in chicago should be 50 degrees and you should go to brunch at Ann Sathers with people like Dan, Mary, Scott and Nick and then go to the thrift store and find dozens of pink swirl Fire King teacups and the perfect yellow vase. The Aveda spa and then taking your puppy to the park where he gets incredibly muddy...come home to watch some quality shows waiting for you on tivo before going over to a new friends house for a home-made dinner and drinks!

*minus your puppy (and for Nick, also your wife) standing on the ledge of your neighbors ungated 40th floor ledge...

" the silly volunteers were scared..."

While reading and looking at the pictures in the December newsletter from the Daktari Bush School and Animal Orphanage, I couldn't help but notice a little tid-bit about how they found a Black Mamba in the Volunteer Chalet but "it was only a few meters long...and the silly volunteers were scared..." heelp me rhonda!

The Black Mamba (Dendroaspis polylepis), is an elapid snake and is one of Africa's most dangerous and feared snakes. It has a wide range of known locations throughout Africa. The black mamba is native to Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, Botswana, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Angola, Namibia, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa and the Congo. They inhabit a wide variety of areas that include open savannahs, open woodlands, and rocky outcrops.^[1] It is also known for being very aggressive when disturbed or confronted and will not hesitate to strike with deadly precision.

The black mamba is the largest venomous snake in Africa and the second longest venomous snake in the world. Adult black mambas have an average length of 2.5 meters (8.2 ft) and a maximum length of 4.5 meters (~14 ft).^[2] Like all other reptiles, the black mamba relies on external heat to regulate the temperature of its body.^[1] Of the venomous snakes of the world, only the King Cobra is longer. ^[3]

When warding off a bigger threat or feeling very threatened, the black mamba usually delivers multiple strikes, injecting its potent neuro- and cardiotoxin with each strike, often attacking the body or head, unlike most other snakes. It can strike up to 12 times in a row. A single bite from a black mamba can inject enough venom to kill up to 10-25 grown men, easily killing one unless the appropriate anti-venom is administered in time.

source wikipedia