Gah I need to vent... so here I go. 
Long story short.... I'm going up North, had plans of taking a train at 5, the train overbooked, so I took a FOURTY FIVE minute 2 mile Uber ride to the bus station (It should take 10 min, dang traffic!),  sprinted out of the car mid traffic the second I saw South Station in sight, and now I'm on a bus and we're stuck in traffic again... and I sit here typing this to you all. So it's not THAT bad at all... I'm just frustrated.
In other news, our beloved fur child took it upon herself to knock down our "I love you because...." frame in the middle of the night, shattering it and sending glass chards everywhere. I guess she doesn't love us, or maybe she feels unloved? Maybe she didn't think L would look sexy with a man bun? I don't know. Instigator.

My bean boots arrived after being on back order for three months. I was overjoyed when I walked in our building and saw that beautiful L.L Bean box sitting there. Not to mention, just in time for my ski trip this weekend. They know me too well. I went all out with the gortex and thinsulate... these babies are going to be with me for at least 20 years ;)

In terms of my P90X3 workout/21 Day Fix Nutrition I have been doing great, 34 days down! I did two workouts yesterday and today because I don't know if I'll be able to get them in at the hotel, and am feeling so SO sore. My arms may or may not fall off. My chocolate Shakeology arrived the other day and I instantly started concocting. I made Shakeology balls and haven't quite decided if they're going to be my breakfast, or dessert. Yum yum! Healthy either way!

I went a little crazy last night and created a wall for my nutrition plan. I have it all figured out in terms of days of the week, what meal, and where/what all of my carbs/veggies/fruits/proteins, etc. are going to be. I love it!

I bought new sheets and 4 euro pillows the other day, and now I'm on the hunt to find a new duvet and shams for the Euro pillows. I'm starting to love these ones from West Elm... maybe I'll pull the trigger, maybe I won't... we'll see!
Have a glorious weekend!! 

Lately...

I found myself missing the blog this week, as I haven't had the chance to spend much, if any time unwinding on here. So without further adieu, I give you a brain dump for Friday. L tried to feed our precious angel spam earlier this week, and as you can tell... she was not a fan. This spiraled into a series of unfortunate events which ended up with her getting sick. I then, unknowingly put a pile of my clothes on her sleeping ottoman, and she let me know what was up by taking number two's where she shouldn't be. After four days of pulling my hair out and going crazy from constantly cleaning and scrubbing I put two and two together and discovered that I had made her mad and she was teaching me a lesson... lesson learned. Note to self... don't takeover "her" spots. 

I had another Christmas party on Tuesday. A little late, I know... but it was so wonderful to have the crew all together and happy with a drink in hand! We celebrated at "Causeway", located right across from the garden and reserved the entire top floor for our crazy souls. We had a gift exchange in which I excitedly walked away with some Ulta goods and cash while others walked away with booze and blow up dolls. These cats are crazy, I tell ya. What a crew!

Like every other person and their mother, L and I went to see American Sniper, and were left beside ourselves. I was the one secretly trying to hide my tears in the theater. Even though we went on a Wednesday night, the show was still practically sold out! The movie was intense and very moving, and I barely recognized Bradley Cooper who had put on 40 pounds in 6 weeks for the part... unbelievable.

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L, being the financial advisor that he will someday be, talked me into opening a brokerage account and investing. Yikes. I have to say... I'm a huge scaredy cat when it comes to playing with my money like that. I don't know the slightest thing about stocks and investments and was on the verge of tears when I saw the money transferred out of my savings. The mutual fund that L had me put my money in will probably stay there for at least a year, and if I lose a single penny I'll be crying (as of today it was up $35! ...but he said that it will probably go back down, lots of fluctuating). I'm not good at this whole risk taking thing with money. I'm hoping it does well.... as it is my house fund!

I may or may not need to invest in this book.
After working out nearly dying in front my laptop yesterday at home using two wine bottles as dumb bells for day 1 of Jillian's 30 day shred, it came to my attention that it was time to revamp my workout regime so I went ahead and purchased P90x3 yesterday! I'm terrible... absolutely TERRIBLE with the whole working out thing. I've been making a monthly donation to my gym since July, and plan on canceling my membership today. Honestly, my lazy butt hasn't made it out to Government Center lately (a whopping 10 minute walk), and there's no sense in paying for a membership I don't use. The gym that I am currently a member of is like a Planet Fitness so believe me, I'm not investing much... however, the only thing I ever do when I am was there was mess around on the elliptical for an hour so I don't think I'll be missing much. What I'm most excited about with P90x3 is the 30 minute workouts! This girl does not have time for those 60 and 90 minute ones. I'm hoping that with the shorter workouts, I'll be more motivated to do them knowing that they're only 30 minutes, AND it's even something that I can do in the mornings before work. (HAAAA --- okay, someone please reference me back to this post in a month. I'm not exactly famous for working out). Anyways, if I actually stick with it and make it more than a week and hopefully the full 90 days, I'll try to post before and afters/updates! Wish me luck!

Getting toned is the ultimate goal here, so if these guys can do it... so can I!
AND... not to get too involved in sports politics... but we're going to the Super Bowl!!! Deflated balls or not! When it comes to deflate-gate I think it's safe to say, we (and I think I can speak for every Pats fan and New Englander out there) really don't give a f%$! If there are consequences, so be it... we would have won regardless, and are just proud to see another great team represent us. This game against the Seahawks is going to be a good one, both teams are tough and will bring their A game to the Super Bowl!

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Have a wonderful Friday friends, and an even better weekend!!

Friday Roundup

I tackled trying to take the tree down the other day and ended up making a huge mess! Our building requires us to use tree bags to transfer trees in and out so that we don't leave a trail of needles on they're clean carpets. Well, I had no tree bag so I created my own out of saran wrap, multiple trash bags and tape. In other news, the living room is cleaned up and all of the Christmas decorations are almost all put away. Loving the fresh palette. 

New year, new eating habits? HA, what a joke. I tried. While these foods do taste delicious and make me feel so much more energized I find myself miserable without my beloved Cape Cod kettle cooked chips. I'm still doing well with it (mainly because my healthy food is all readily available), except for the part when I hounded a brownie and ice cream at work because I forgot I was eating healthy and the time (yesterday) when I made a special trip to the market to buy ingredients to make a cookie cake. fail, fail, double fail. 

It's finally starting to look and feel like winter around here with snow flurries and freezing temps. I am really REALLY starting to appreciate the fact that my wonderful landlord pays for heat. We've been bundled up in our flannels battling it out in cards. Last year we paid for electric heat and found ourselves in the high hundreds these months just to heat out 12 sqft. bathroom.  

 In other news, I'm itching for a workshop so that I can build these adirondack beauties out of wooden pallets.

...AND I'm taking this on as my project of the month. Fridge perfection!

Enjoy your weekend and stay warm!

Here's to Friday!

We made our Christmas cookies this week and I am so, so pleased with how they turned out! Every year we try a different recipe in hopes of finding the perfect one, and this year I KNOW we got it right! The cookies were big and fluffy, and I followed this frosting technique in order to perfect my decorating!
The recipe yields about 40 cookies, and you don't need to cool them which is perfect for my impatient self. ALSO, they don't expand into a big blob when baking... another plus in my book!

Ingredients: 1 cup granulated white sugar 1 cup butter, softened 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 1/2 teaspoon of almond extract 1 egg 3 cups all purpose flour 2 teaspoon baking powder
Directions: 1 - Preheat over to 350 degrees F 2 - Mix the butter and sugar until it is creamy 3 - Beat in the egg, vanilla extract and almond extract 4 - In a separate bowl combine the baking powder and flour. Slowly add to the wet ingredients while still mixing. 5 - Divide the dough into two batches. Roll one dough ball out (about 1/4 inch thick) onto floured parchment paper  6 - Punch out your cookies using your favorite cookie cutters and then place on a cookie sheet with parchment paper. 7 - Bake 6-8 minutes and let cool completely before frosting and decorating!

I mentioned earlier this week that we headed up to North Conway, NH for a very impromptu date with the slopes. The morning that we went skiing there had been a cloud inversion which is apparently a very rare thing. When we got to the summit, all we could see below us was a complete sea of clouds... it was absolutely breathtaking. 

Because we had never skied at Wildcat before, we had to do our ceremonial ski map framing to add to our collection of mountains. 

I couldn't pass up these adorable flannel sheets at Target the other day - our bedroom looks like Christmas!

We used Tiny Prints this year to order our Christmas cards and I couldn't be more happy! They have all been mailed out, and we have been receiving more and more Christmas cards every day to add to our wine cork card display!

I'm trying to get a lot of days off of work for Christmas and New Years and have been busting my butt at work to make it happen... hopefully it does! Yesterday was a 14 hour day and this entire weekend is going to be crazy, I just know it! I really want to go see Trans Siberian Orchestra (again) at the garden on Saturday but I just don't think I'll be able to swing it! They're my favorite this time of year!

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 I hope all of your shopping is done! Can you believe Christmas is in 6 days! December is flying by!

Have a Happy Weekend!

FRIday!

Boston apparently doesn't know how to produce SNOW anymore because we have been getting rained out everyday this week! It's nasty rain too. Wind and everything. I can't go from point A to point B without having to build an arc first!    In other news, we sent all of our Christmas cards out last week! LOVE them! Will be sharing a fun Christmas card display with you on Monday!  

   If I had a spare $635 dollars I might consider investing in these 5050 boots! But like I said... only if I had the pennies to spare. Why do they have to be so gosh darn expensive and so cute at the same time!? I guess that's why stars like Angelina Jolie get to wear them.... someday...  

      I ate an entire bag of Cape Code Chips (the best) during the VS fashion show. I don't feel bad about it at all. I deserve it. I've been itching to go to the factory... guess I'll just eat a bag a day until I go. They're the BEST kettle cooked chips on the planet.

Speaking of the fashion show, I hadn't heard the song "Take me to Church" until Hozier sang it, and I must say... it's been on repeat for a couple hours now, he's got a voice! The music video is very moving.  
How about a cheesy Christmas photo op with my best fur pal!? She lives for this kind of stuff.  

 Cheers to your weekend, enjoy all of the fun Christmas festivities!

Fabulous Friday

Can you tell that it is my favorite month of the year? Everything I do has Christmas incorporated into it... I have a problem, I'm tellin' ya!
Last night was my first Christmas party of the season and it was quite the success! Located at my office, over a thousand dollars worth of unwrapped, nonviolent toys were dropped off for the annual Toys for Tots drive/party that the office holds! I couldn't believe how many gifts there were. We stuffed ourselves full with amazing food and loaded up on tons of wine. What a wonderful start to the holiday season! You can read more about it here!  

 

...and we can't forget the booze...     This past week L and I celebrated both of our birthdays! Again, lots of Italian food and big, delicious homemade cakes were had!  

    We also picked up our BEAUTIFUL Christmas tree from Prince Postale! Our Christmas shopping/wrapping is about 70% there!  

    I read this cute article of Christmas traditions to start with your spouse/significant other. I really want to do matching buffalo check PJs this year... we'll see if L's onboard.  

    Our Christmas cards arrived today, and I am anxious to share with you within the next week or two a project that I've been working on! I'll give you a hint... it involves my unending collection of wine corks! 

 
Stay tuned!   Also on the blog this week: December Goals  Gift Ideas for Family & Friends  O' Christmas Tree  Birthday Business   

Hello, Friday.

Hey Friday! You came quickly!   L's family is flying in from Ohio today for a fun weekend of visits! Coming from the midwest, they're not too into the city scene, and will be heading up to North Conway to play in that wonderful and amazing town over the weekend! Everybody loves North Conway.  

 via   This week wasn't very eventful at all. at all. As I browse through my photo album, one of the more eventful activities this week was the reproduction of this amazing throwback snack! Dunkaroo dip! I really, really needed something to quench my sweet tooth hunger yesterday, and this incredibly easy snack was the perfect fit!  

  I sent some bears swimming in a pool of raspberry vodka dreams last night. They're currently hanging ten in the refrigerator soaking up every last ounce and looking fairly plump!   

  Besides a little photo shoot of the cat (which I'll spare everyone from - except for one magazine worthy shot)... that's about everything that I have documented in the nifty iPhone for this week. PA-THE-TIC. I know.  

model material. #crazycatlady   In other news, I came across this chic console table. I love the patchwork and the simplicity of it. Maybe one day when I have more floor space I can fill my place with fun stuff like this!  

  I know I already shared with you my Christmas list, but how fun is this hello apparel sweatshirt. I love how they paired it with buffalo check leggings!  

  I spoke with the owner of the store where I will be buying my Christmas tree, and he said that he will have them out the day after Thanksgiving! Whew! Don't you just love how I end up gearing every post towards Christmas? I can't help it!  

via   Enjoy your weekend and stay warm!   Also featured on the blog this week: 2014 Christmas List Dunkaroo Dip

FRIDAY!

It came to my attention that I was a no-reply blogger and have been for basically my entire blogging career. Blogger fail. I always wondered how everyone had the blogger profile page and how I got stuck with Google+... well things have changed people! Thanks to the wonderful Samantha over at It's all in the details she shot me an email directing be over to Sarah's site where she walks you through step by step on how to fix no-reply bloggers caused by Google+. Thank goodness.. I am now in the blogging 21st century! Google+ just go away. Thanks Samantha and Sarah!   

Check it out... I'm cool now.
We had out "Friendsgiving" dinner the other night complete with a pot roast, mashed potatoes, carrots, rolls and a disgusting and less than sweet pumpkin pie.  

  I once again rented a zipcar and had another traumatic episode of driving in the city. What should have been a 10 minute trip from the North End to Cambridge took 40 minutes. FORTY MINUTES! I had my brother and L navigating for me in the back seat and seem to remember some tears and other demands... "I have an idea, why don't you two grow some brain cells and use them to help me get to Cambridge". I really am a pleasant person. The stress of driving a car I don't know on streets I don't know in a high traffic area at night clearly is a stressful situation for me. The sad part is... I can find my way around the city on foot or public transpo by the back of my hand... but the second you put me behind a wheel, all hell breaks loose and the tears start to flow. So embarrassing.   So to follow up with the above story, I went to Cambridge to pick up the IKEA Aneboda wardrobe. It's the perfect size to stash away all of our junk not to mention it matches the rest of our extremely white room. As you can see I was Captain Helpful the official photographer for this exciting event.   

Before

After

I love the height that it brings to the room as well! 

Natasha posted this list last week, and I instantly printed it out and have revamped my gift planning. I'm getting there - about 30% done!  

Hopefully everyone has a great weekend and stays warm, we're playing with the 30's today! Brr!