Gobble Gobble Gobble!!

THIS

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=  I'm REALLY excited about Thanksgiving and the weekend!!!!!

Birthday Week!

Yes, I'm 29.  And I still get a birthday week!  It was supposed to be a day, I was quite content with the idea of a day/lack of a day for this birthday, as this year has been huge already and turning 29 just sounds a bit...lame.  But it happened, and it was all great!  I'll save the wordiness for another week, here are just a few ways I'm a really lucky girl!! :)

Mike took us out to a fabulous dinenr on Saturday at Three Forks Restaurant.  When Mike asked me if there was anywhere I would like to go and eat, I simply replied, "I want beef".  So that's what we did!  We got dressed up, had fancy service and an amazing meal, and an even more amazing bottle of wine and, well, BEEF!  Mike had a giant 18oz Bone-in Ribeye that was fantastic and I had a beautiful trio of filets (3 3oz filets with different accompaniments on each one!), plus sides, a delicious salad and a complimentary dessert drink to top it all off!  It was a wonderful night, topped off with a drink at Medure Lounge, around the corner from our house.  The best news of this entire thing:  Lloyd got his first steak bone and he LOVES it.  Loves is still in the present tense because he's still working on it and we aren't allowed to touch it or take it away from him yet, we might lose a finger.

This is the face of not willing to share!

On my actual birthday, we had bagels at work for breakfast, I attended a fancy luncheon for Catering professionals, and then Mike and I had a fun Mexican meal at our near-by Mexican restaurant (yes, everything revolves around eating-this is not new news!).  To top off the birthday, Mike gave me a very special present: He had a new pearl put in to my Nana's ring (I was wearing it every day even with the old pearl that had lost it's color and sheen), and had the setting cleaned and polished!  It looks absolultey beautiful and I'm so happy that he had it fixed! :)

Love it!!

I've been receiving cards all week from friends and family, I'm so lucky to have such lovely people in my life!  Thank you all!!  Especially my lovely husband, you're the best!! :-*

The Football Game Weekend!

Lloyd and I journeyed the 480 miles each way to Raleigh & back this past weekend to visit with Family & Friends, and for the most important Football (American) game of the season: NC STATE vs. UNC!!!

After a smelly start at 5:50a (this needs another blog, our puppy has the worst smelling insides ever!), we arrived in Raleigh just after lunch, to a cold and rainy day.  We had lunch, then Daddy and I basically circled Wake County, running errands around town.  We even made a stop-in at the Marriott RTP to visit the UNC-lovers, which was fantastic, as I haven't seen most of them since leaving in February :(  I was especially glad to catch up with my work BFF, Megan, and hear about her mission work in Mexico; she does more wonderful things in a given week than most of us do all year, in case you wanted motivation to be a better person! :)

Anyway, after dropping Lloyd off with the Aunt & Uncle (thanks to Nic Nic & Brian for babysitting the monster all weekend-it's cute for about 5 minutes and that's where it stops!), Daddy and I went to meet Mummy for shopping at Trader Joe's.  I stocked up on the essentials: a case of wine, frozen seafood (we live in FLORIDA, what is wrong with me??), and cheese.  We had a nice night at home, relaxing and went to bed early to get ready for the next day.

NC STATE WON THE GAME.....AGAIN!  That's really all that you need to know, but it's fairly important so I thought caps would help.  We had a great morning tailgating in the freezing cold (bloody mary's & beer DO help, fyi) and I had a fantastic time watching the game with Lauren!  And, of course, we won!  Five years in a row we have been projected to lose...when will those dirty sheep learn?! :)  For the foodies that read this, I made this great "Breakfast Braid" thing with ham, eggs & crescent rolls, pretty tasty if you ever need a breakfast recipe to feed an army!

Excited about the win!!!



Taking names....



Trying to control the masses after the game!



Saturday night I had the chance to see my loves Lisa, Meghan, Natalie and Suelee and we had a great time catching up!  I miss my friends more than I realize most days (Mike and I are lucky enough to like hanging out with each other, which really helps the time fly by!), so it's always fabuolus to see them all! 

Sunday was a beautiful day, so Mummy, Daddy and I decided to take the Donkey for a walk around the lake.  We won't complain about the weather, but Mike and I are definitely not seeing the leaves change this year, so it was amazing to see all the trees in the beautiful colors!  Obviously taken for granted in past years, they stood out a lot this weekend!  And Lloyd really liked eating the leaves and acorns, most importantly! 

Mummy and I had a nice afternoon shopping (love the new work clothes!) and then went home to get ready for Nichola & Brian coming over for dinner.  We had a fantastic day and evening, so much so that Lloyd put himself to bed-in his crate-around 10:00p, he'd had enough.  That was proof enough for all of us that we'd had a fun day!

It was a really nice weekend at home with everyone and I'm glad we made the trek up I-95!  Lloyd told me on the way home that he can't wait to visit Raleigh/move there permanently one day! ;)  (Mike is going to kill me for that!). 

Love to you all, can't wait to come back for Meghan & Steve' engagement party in a month!! :)
Oh, and GO PACK!!

Wedding Fever (not ours this time!!)

I don't know if it's our age or what, but everyone is getting married or engaged (eye roll, yes we're conformists...and we like it!)!  And having babies (my Facebook exploded with the cutest infants this week, November birthdays are amazingly popular!)...but that is another story for another time!  Two people that I love very much are currently planning weddings and it's so exciting to be part of their excitement as they approach the BIG DAY!

My cousin, Helen, is getting married on April 28th, 2012 to the mostly lovely man to put up with our family (minus Mike and Brian), Jon!  They are getting married at St. Wilfrid's Church, our family church, and having their reception at a beautiful hotel that over looks a soccer field!  They even get to go down to the pitch (read: field) to take pictures, how cool is that?!  I was also asked to be a Bridesmaid, which is just the greatest thing ever-I love being a Bridesmaid (yes, I really do and I really did just say that!), it's really exciting and special to be allowed to be with a Bride as she gets ready for the ceremony and to help with anything that needs to be done that day in preparation.  Mike and I are already really excited about going back to England again to celebrate, we know their wedding is going to be fantastic and are so happy for Helen & Jon, and their future together!! 

This picture is going to be reversed is less than 6 months!!  Helen helping with the dress at the church (she was mortified and wanted to kill me for this, but she looked so beautiful in her pretty dress! :) )

In even more recent news, our lovely friends Meghan & Steve got engaged!!  We are planning an engagement party for them as we speak and I'm so excited I could burst!  Meghan & Steve are the cutest and I'm very proud of the fact that I was Meghan's date the night she and Stevie met (nothing to do with me, I was actually in the way, but still!)!  They are going to have the most wonderful wedding, once Meghan narrows down her 400 venue options ;), and hopefully I can be of assistance along the way, as needed.  My specialities in life are Orders of Events and tiny details, it's a gift, what can I say?!

Cute cute cute!  Stevie ruled the dance floor this night!

LOTS, and I mean lots, of people roll their eyes about weddings, Brides, and the whole "over the top-ness" of it all.  Not this girl!  It's a special time for any couple that decides to take on the sanctity of marriage, and should be treated as such.  No matter how a couple decides to declare their committment to each other, it's all about that declaration, first and foremost, not the centerpieces, cake or color of napkins.  And it's so exciting and wonderful!!!!  Yay!!  On a somewhat related note, have  you seen my husband's dance moves?!?!  You want that guy at your wedding, he's half the party all by himself!! :) 

P.S. Random tidbit about England: You aren't allowed to bring drinks on the dance floor.  This, obviously, make complete sense but the Mahoney's and I were amazed to learn this!  You're welcome for the useless piece of information that you'll probably never need again :)

I can't help it, I love him and we loved our perfect day!

Food Coma....

No one's surprised when I say this, but we LOVE food!  Not food for sustinance sake or survival, but food because we really like it.  Mike and I, without question, love cooking, eating, going out to eat, drinking wine that goes with eating (and sometimes just drinking)....anything food-related.  I'm even excited about having a compost one day, that comes from all of the decomposing food items discarded when cooking food that we're going to eat.  Yes, I've already thought about food we'll be cooking & eating in 5 years.

So it's no surprise either that we surround ourselves with people that like food too. Our friends Alex & Sarah love to eat great food, Ivy & Adam are serious about their dining too, it's just the most wonderful hobby that we all share!  When Ivy and I went to visit Lauren in Charleston last weekend, we had a wonderful time catching up and hanging out, but mostly we just enjoyed eating together.  We had fantastic fajitas (courtesy of Zach) on Friday night, breakfast Saturday morning, a DELICIOUS lunch at Ivy & I's favorite French restaurant downtown, amazing afternoon desserts at Kaminsky's,  Ivy's favorite-5 Loaves-for dinner Saturday night, and then amazing pancakes for breakfast.  And then we left Charleston.  All that food in such a short period of time, and none of us felt even a little bit bad about it!  Wonderful food, great friends, that's what it's all about!

All of this to say, I like cooking for my husband.  I think it's part of being a good wife (just my opinion, don't be offended by the 1950's flashback), and Mike likes this about me (most of the time, except for when I make him eat something that went wrong, then not so much).  He's also not in love with the whole, "smell this and tell me if it's bad" thing, weirdly enough.  We love eating meals together, especially dinner after a long day of work.  Here's what we've been eating lately:

Parmsean Sage Pork Chops, Zucchini Patties & Butternut Squash Risotto!



Prosciutto-wrapped pesto chicken, Italain Mashed Potatoes, & Pesto Asparagus

And these are just the times I can restrain myself long enough to take pictures.  We love food.  That's all for now, I'm sure it's got to be snack time soon!  Happy eating people!!!