merry christmas 2013

Christmas cards are in my top 5 favorite things about Christmas. How can you not love them? It probably explains why I love Instagram so much, but I just LOVE looking at all the pictures. We displayed them on our stairwell this year and I love looking at them every time I come and go.

Saying all of that, it's no surprise that I could spend HOURS looking for just the right card for us to send out. And I'm also extremely picky. And I also think paying over $2.00 per card is just downright insane. Last year I found a good deal on pre-made cards, but this year I decided to branch out and make my own. I found an amazing deal on Overnightprints.com and got 80 for $30.00 shipped to me in 3 days. Can't beat that!!

I apologize that these pictures still have the print lines on them, but I took fancy pictures with my fancy camera…and then left the memory card at home. Also the back cuts off on the left side, I couldn't get it to show the whole thing. But you get the idea!!

I still want to look at them all the time because I LOVE how they turned out. When I found the tinsel tutorial on Pinterest, it all just fell into place and I knew what I had to do. 

I hope you and your family have an amazing Christmas this year! 

christmas 2012 - a recap

Only 364 days until Christmas 2013!

But seriously, Christmas 2012 was amazing. Spending time with family is my favorite part of this holiday. That and seeing everyone's faces when they open gifts! I LOVE when I get it right and immediately see the joy on their face.

Christmas was extra special this year because it was the first year my nephew really got it. 

Viewing Christmas through a child's eyes makes it even better. I can't wait to have little ones of my own and start our own traditions with them.

Until we have little ones, I'll just have to settle for Mr. Bowden. It was his first Christmas and as you can see, he had a great time. Pooped out around 5pm.

My first Christmas Eve away from home was this year. It was definitely harder than I expected. We spent Christmas Eve and the morning with A's parent's in Lafayette and then drove to Houston to get in around 2pm. I am SO blessed that I get to spend the day with two amazing families, but it's bittersweet. 

I spend 23 Christmas Eve nights with my siblings and parents. Church around 7, then home to open one present. Santa would come and we would wake up to cinnamon rolls in the morning. Not a huge shebang, but 23 years of doing the same thing makes it pretty special.

This year we spent Christmas Eve at A's parent's house. Mass at 4 and then home to eat and play board games. I made everyone Lasagna Soup and then we enjoyed some Apples to Apples and Taboo. A fun night for sure!

So, this is our new tradition for now. We're having fun thinking of we would like OUR tradition to be. Merging his and hers and making it ours and only ours. I'm pretty excited about that.

I'll leave you with a few more scenes from last night - can you tell that I'm having fun with our new iMac? Also, I got the Creative Suite and I'm having too much fun playing around with Photoshop again. I used it daily in college, but haven't much since. It's like riding a bike...but harder. Might take me a while to get the finished products looking good!

pedi-scam

NYC at Christmastime is magical. There are lights everywhere (do they start putting those up in August or something?) and the city just feels like a Christmas wonderland. It's my second year in a row to go at this time, and though I complain of travelling so much for work, I really am SO lucky that I get to experience this for free.

The not magical part? There are people EVERYWHERE. It seems everyone know how amazing it is this time of year. People everywhere = no cabs anywhere. No cabs = standing outside in the freezing cold for even longer.

When we didn't see any cabs pull up, we thought we were being smart by locating a pedicab and jumping it in. It was surprisingly warm under the tarp and "fur" blanket, and it was only a 9 or so block ride.

Our driver was awesome, and he must have been crazy in shape to ride all over NYC with people attached to the back of his bike.

We enjoyed the sights during the ride and joked about how smart we were to take a pedicab - we even got there faster in it because of the insane traffic!

Our driver was very nice and took some pictures for us at the end of the ride. Extra tip for you, kind sir!

At the end of the ride, he plugged in his square and scanned my card. I immediately hit the 25% tip button and only then looked up at the total in the corner.

$193.75 - that had to be wrong!! I changed the tip to 15% and it read $173.45. I looked up in horror and asked our driver if there was some sort of mistake, perhaps it was supposed to say $17.43?

NOPE. The ride is $50 per person plus some sort of cents per block.

I really would have had a panic attack had that ride been on my own dime. Straight up not able to breathe in the middle of the city. Thank goodness I could expense it.

We were all set to brag about our awesome ride, but after that we vowed to not speak a word. Somehow someone at the party brought it up and we asked what she thought of them. Turns out, the city is in the middle of a big pedicab crack down as they are ripping people off right now. Yep, we were definitely ripped off. Seems as though tourists are the only ones who ever take them.

So, word to the wise, wait for a cab. (OR download the Uber app - it is a lifesaver!)

Other scenes from the city:

This is how old people pre-party. Carbolicious.

Baked by Melissa is always necessary. ALWAYS.

Hello, nola. See you again in three hours.

 

We are heading to New Orleans around 1 today. A's team plays in their bowl game tomorrow (Geaux Cajuns!), so we'll be celebrating that all weekend.

 

PS - can you believe Christmas is on Tuesday?! The insanity of EOY for me really takes all the fun out of the anticipation. I am so glad I saved some days off so I could have all next week off. I need to hit the refresh button. I'm looking forward to being able to post more & read more blogs - and keep that up into 2013!

merry christmas 2012

No wedding wednesday today because I'm about to board a flight to NYC! I wish I could say I was going for pleasure and doing all sorts of fun things, but I'm heading there for another work party. Yes, it will be fun, but I won't get to do anything off my list. A was going to join me for the weekend, but UL plays in a bowl game on Saturday and if we missed that, I would have a VERY unhappy husband!

Instead I am linking up with Kristen.

I wish I could send all of you cards personally, but I didn't order that many cards! So, this will have to do.

Here's our 2012 Christmas card. Merry, merry!

dear santa...

Dear Santa A,

I've been a REALLY good girl this year.

So gimme everything I want.

Love, Kaits.

HA. Just kidding. I mean, I have been a good girl, but just spending Christmas Eve/Morning with my husband would be enough for me. Hard to believe, but it's our first year we're able to do that! I am so glad things worked out and he won't be on a rig in the middle of nowhere this year. Little things!

Buuuuttt, if I were to get everything I wanted...here's what I would ask for.

 via

I have LOVED this company for a while, so when I saw they made a smaller bracelet I knew I had to put it on my list.

 

 via

adorrrrrableeeee.

 

 via

Bowden just ate my "good" pair - these will be a necessary stocking stuffer.

 

 via

MUST HAVE.

 

 via

I don't know why i like this so much, it's just so adorable! And fitting for Louisiana because I'm going to pretend it's a crawfish.

 

 via

Do I have to even explain this one?

 

via 

I travel a lot for work, so this will be perfect for those times when I use my phone too much in the cab :)

 

via

I'm running a half marathon on March 3 (eeeeeek) and last time I attempted a race (5K) it was bad. I trained on a treadmill and could do 3.2 there easy but when it came time to run on concrete I SUCKED. I'm hoping that with this, I'll know how far I've gone on concrete so I can train there.

This be me if I get ANY of these. But mainly my excitement of Christmas comes from giving. I get SUPER happy when I see someone excited from a gift I gave them. That's one of the best parts for me.

pics on SodaheadBow

 

What do y'all want for Christmas?

greetings from chicago

Just checking in from Chicago while freezing my little booty off. It was apparently 70 degrees here yesterday, not sure why it couldn't have stayed that way? At least it's not 32 degrees during the day like it was last year. My ears fell off that trip - OK, they FELT like they did.

Anyways, I'm here for a "holiday" party for work. I hate that we have to call it that, but I have to be a good employee and not offend anyone or something.

Come back tomorrow (evening) for a much better post. This one needs to end pronoto so I can head out to meet up with a sorority sister that I haven't seen in too long.

Hootie hoot y'all.

a tutorial on this gorgeous tuesday

It's way too pretty outside to be working today! Thanking my lucky stars that I work from home and have the perfect excuse to frequent the sunshine today. Puppies gotta pee, yo!

[And I already broke my blogging-every-day rule...color me shocked. Friday we had a team training thingy for work and then yesterday just sucked, as most Mondays do! Making up for it today with some pictures, though. Although I'm too lazy to bust out the DSLR so iPhone photos they are!]

The pupster's name is Bowden. (Bonus points to anyone who knows why that's his name/who it's in honor of!) He's only 3.1 pounds, so it's REALLY hard to find him clothes. Scratch that, it's really hard to find him cheap clothes - who has $40+ bucks to spend on a Christmas sweater? I much prefer the same sweater at Marshalls for $8 bucks. Problem is that they usually only have larges.

I put my thinking cap on and decided to make him one! I bought this newborn onesie at Target for FOUR dollars. And they have three other cute Christmas onesis that I'll for sure be going back for later.

Isn't it cute? Good thing I have a puppy to wear it, I almost want a baby looking at this. Almost.

So then I chopped off the sleves and the bottom snappy part, folded it inside out and pinned up the sides. (If you don't know how to sew, you could just cut and call it a day, but after the first wear it may fray a lot.)

Then I sewed it and voila! (For some reason my machine decided to eat the shirt a few times. The perfectionist in my is so pissed that I'm sharing this project!)

I can't wait to do this for every holiday, now. A didn't quite love it as much as I did, but it keeps Bowden warm so it's staying on!