We Now Interrupt this Regularly Scheduled Vacation...

...to say I'm still here!  I'm off all week to spend time with mi familia and we're having such a great time!  I'll be back to blogging next week.  I'll probably still be doing some commenting here and there, but I'm trying to limit my computer time this week.  Hope everyone is having a great holiday time with your families as well!

 image via weHeartit.com

Merry Christmas to All!

May your Christmas sparkle with moments of love & laughter,

And may the year ahead be filled with contentment & joy.

Have a Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas, my sweet bloggy friends!

I won! I won! iwoniwoniwoniwon

Okay y'all, I have spent the last 20 minutes looking for a picture of Sid Caesar from Vegas Vacation when he won the round of Keno after years of playing and losing because that's how I feel.  I finally won!  Woo hoo!  Happy Christmas surprise!

Thanks SO much to Meg over at Life of Meg for hosting the giveaway for this little darling:

 

A holiday apron from Lover Dovers Clothing.  You can read more about it here.  (Sidenote - Meg didn't ask me to do a plug, but I wanted to because this apron is awesome)  

I can't wait to get it, it is so adorably cute!

Last Week's Whirlwind

Last week was absolute craziness!  I knew it would be busy, but I completely underestimated how much so.  Enough that I will be playing mad catchup this afternoon and tomorrow so that the house, laundry, etc. will be ready for Christmas (and I can maybe? go a few days and not have to do anything). 

The week before Christmas is always parent observation week at dance.  I love this because it means I get to spy on my little darlings to see how much they are goofing off learning during class.  Their classes aren't exactly cheap, so I don't like any surprises come recital time.  I have to say, I am so remarkably pleased by my littlest munchkin.  Did I know she loved dance?  Absolutely.  Did I have any idea how natural she is and how much terminology she actually knows?  Absolutely not.  This is all especially surprising because husbie yanked her out of dance last year because she was spending the entire class wandering around and crawling on the floor like a puppy.  Yay Ava!  This year husbie is completely pleased with everything she has learned and how she is doing.  We have switched dance studios since last year, and it has made all of the difference in the world, for both girls.  Of course, I took a zillion pictures of Ava and a few of Haley.  She's finally getting to the point where it's not cool for mommy to stalk her like mommyrazzi.  Boo.  

Wednesday Ava had her first modeling shoot.  I was completely nervous for her going in, as a lot of times she pulls out the scared and/or super cheesy smile, but she did great.  The photographers and everyone were wonderful and she had a great time and I'm hoping they got some cute pictures of her.  The agency said that they loved her, which is great news!  Extra cashola going into her college fund is fantastic and as long as she is having fun doing it, we'd like it to continue.  I'll post the pictures on here as they send them to us (they are for a Valentine campaign), but here are a few snapshots I took with my iPhone:

The rest of the week zipped by.  Friday we had our annual company Christmas outing.  We went to lunch at Blue Goose and went to see The Tourist.  Awesome movie!  I love Angelia Jolie and think she is so beautiful (although it definitely wouldn't hurt if she would put on 10 lbs - good problem to have).  The fashion in it is amazing - I love the glamorous gowns and dresses she wore.  I definitely recommend it, if you're looking for a movie to see over Christmas.

Saturday we headed to Houston and got back around 3 PM on Friday.  We picked up Winston from WufSpa (best groomer/boarder in Dallas, IMO) and headed home to watch the Steelers lose to the Jets.  We're having my side's family Christmas gathering on Thursday night so we'll have a Steeler watching party / Christmas combo.

On another note - thanks to everyone that sent in their experiences and suggestions on my last post.  I really appreciate it!  It's comforting to know that others have been in similar positions and how it was handled.  Y'all are such a great sounding board!  :)  A PSA - if you don't have your email address set to show to me when you post a comment, and you don't have anything against showing it to the blogging world, think about changing this setting.  That way, I can email you back.  :)

I hope everyone is having a great pre-Christmas week!

Weekend Wrap Up - Christmastime Style!

We had an incredibly busy weekend (with the exception of Sunday) with all sorts of Christmas happenings - my favorite kind of December weekend!

Friday I left work around noon to find a replacement skirt for The Limited skirt featured here.  I did find this one at the Gap, which ended up being (what I thought) was a pretty cute alternative.  I had to go to a different Gap to get it, because of course they didn't have my size.  After I got the skirt I realized I had a jewelry emergency problem.  The jewelry I had already purchased went with the other skirt.  I remembered a couple of my girlfriends talking about Charming Charlie.  OMG, Jewelry Heaven. 

Since everything is color sorted, it was perfect and so easy to find navy blue jewelry to match my skirt.  LOVE it.  They have tons of other cute stuff, too, not just jewelry.  Apparently they have locations in several different states.  I am going to have to go back when I have more time to really look around.

Friday night we packed the girls up and sent them to Granny & Pop's and Austin and I headed to his Christmas party.  We couldn't take any pictures there (security issues), so here we were before:

The party was fine - we had a few drinks and mingled with the work peeps then headed to yumminess:

I'm not going to even bother counting up how many calories and fat grams our dinner had.  ;)  It was awesome!  We went last year for New Year's and it was a total debacle - bad food, bad service, crowded, etc. etc. etc.  I am happy to say that they completely redeemed themselves.  I have to say, I love my husbie, but he is such a photo party pooper.  He wouldn't let me take any pictures.  :(  He sucks.  Love you, mean it!  Anyway, I passed out in the car from a food coma and kinda-sorta woke up enough to put on sweats and get in bed.  Sexy.

The girls spent Saturday going to see a nativity play at one of the churches here while he and I spent the day trying to finish up the Christmas shopping.  Thankfully, we are almost done!  The girls are completely done, we have our nephews and a couple of other people to buy for. 

Saturday night we headed to Santa's Village in Richardson.  If you have kiddos and are in the DFW area, I definitely recommend going!  We took Haley when she was 4 and haven't been since.  My sister came along and even though it was cold and windy, we had a great time. 

 

 

They have tons of cute cottages with all sorts of fun activities - letters to Santa, crafts, Santa video message/interview, you name it.  They also have a stage with performers, including these ladies:

The Dallas Tap Dazzlers!  Okay, so you have to be 45 to be a Tap Dazzler.  I am so signing up as soon as I am eligible!  Think I am kidding?  I'm not.  Haley told me she would be mortified if was a performing adult tapper, which is all the more reason to do it!  In all seriousness, I think it is fantastic that these ladies (most of them grannies), do what they get out and perform what they love.  

Yesterday we had an awesome day full of football and movie watching, with some cooking and laundry as well.  

I hope everyone had a great weekend!  Stay warm wherever you are!  :)

Random Tidbits

Bear with me on this one, ladies, it is going to be completely random!  

I want to start off by saying Yay!  Welcome new followers!  So glad that you stop by my little corner of the blogging universe.  :)

Prayers for Sweet Babies

There are so many sweet babies (and mommies & daddies) that need every prayer they can get right now.  Check out my sidebar for links to find out more about them, in case you haven't already.

(The Horror of) Eating Out

So sorry for depressing everyone with my last post!  Nothing depresses me more than realizing that I have been stuffing my tummy with all of this crap.  :(  Boo.  JPO had a great point about portion control - things aren't nearly so bad if you only eat 1/2!  My mom used to preach this to me constantly when I was growing up.  I have a girlfriend that eats 1/2 of her portion at restaurants and then dumps salt on it so that she won't eat it.  It's a little strange, but it saves the picking that I always do while waiting on someone to come steal my plate away.  I should also point out that there are some sensible (yet still yummy) things to eat if you have to do the drive-thru:  McDonald's 6 piece Chicken Nuggets have 17 grams of fat and 250 calories while Taco Bueno Chicken Taco Rollups only have 8 grams of fat and 210 calories.  

Local DFW Area Christmas Needs

While I know not all of my readers are in the DFW area, if you are one that does and feel so inclined, check out this story about Hope's Door.  They are a Plano women's shelter that caters to women and their children who are in need and have possibly (and probably) been a victim of domestic violence.  The charity who had committed to providing Christmas gifts for the women and children at the shelter refuse to do so without receiving the names of those living at Hope's Door.  It is against Hope's Door's policy to divulge this information, as it is a safety matter for everyone living there, not just the domestic violence victims.  You can read the news story here.  If you, or someone (or company) you know that is interesting in becoming a donor, contact information is available at the bottom of the story. 

Why do my children want the most obscure Christmas gifts?

Every year they just have to want the hardest-to-find items to come from the big man.  Seriously.  Last year it was the Zhu-Zhu pets, which my husband single-handedly tracked down via a combination of Craigslist and eBay.  This year it is the Zhu-Zhu princess collection (which I think were an eBay-only release as I have not seen them in any stores and the people at Target had no idea what I was talking about) and this beauty:

The Barbie 3-Story Dream Townhouse.  This thing is awesome.  I think I might want it for me more than the girls.  Just kidding.  I think.  Anyway, it is very cool and has all sorts of working lights, sounds, and overall jazziness that my 80's dream house didn't.  I did see a big stack of them at Toys'R'Us a few weeks ago, however, they were about $50 more at TRU than at Wal-Mart.  So, I foolishly decided to wait patiently for them to come back in stock at Wallyworld.com.  They are still out of stock with no signs of coming in anytime soon.  In the meantime, TRU is sold out, as is everyone else except Amazon.  Amazon, where they are priced $100ish more than they were at TRU.  Freaking ridiculous!  Husbie and I decided that the Barbie house would make a great Valentine gift.  About 10 minutes after this discussion, my assistant comes in to tell me that she has found it on Amazon for cheaper than the original TRU price.  Holy crap, she has redeemed herself!  *I should note here that I did not assign her with the task of finding it, she did it on her own.  Mainly b/c I think she would rather shop than work, but that is a whole different topic*  So, it is on its way here.  Hooray!  That was a huge item off the list.

The Best Laid Plans

My feelings toward TheLimited.com right now are not thoughts of sugarplums, they are thoughts of coal.  I ordered the adorable skirt from my Office Party WWW post on November 29.  It is still not here.  Husbie's office party is tomorrow night.  The skirt is supposed to be to me on Saturday.  NOT helpful.  The Limited never communicated that it would take over a week to get it out of their warehouse.  To make matters worse, it is coming via FedEx SmartPost, which I have learned is the shittiest (language, sorry) way to send a package.  It has gone from Ohio to Massachusetts to Dallas.  It is now sitting in a sort facility in Dallas and I cannot pick it up!!  SP packages are delivered by the post office, not FedEx.  I am hoping our post office can catch it and hold it tomorrow so I can pick it up.  Tonight I will be searching for an alternate skirt in case it doesn't.  Husbie's office environment is of the bureaucratic federal variety, so it is always difficult for me to find a cute outfit that is appropriate and doesn't make me look 20 years older than I am.  This was THE outfit!  Fingers crossed that all works out!

Tweet, Tweet!

Do you tweet?  I do!  My twitter username is @applesfalling.  My tweets are private, primarily because I don't like all of the spammers following me and there are certain individuals that I know IRL that I may or may not tweet frustrations about sometime.  So, please follow me!  I try to reply to some of y'all sometimes and you don't see it because I am private.

I'm a total space cadet.

Sooo, I posted about a really fun blog hop that I was doing here, and I never posted the responses I got.  Bad blog hop cruise director!  I'll be posting them later today, I promise.  

I hope everyone is having a great week!  It's almost the weekend!  :)

(The Horror of) Eating Out

A way-to-lengthy-to-get-into-on-this-post turn of events last night led me to download the Restaurants app on my iPhone while we were watching my Steelers get beat up (but still pull out a W!).  Husbie and I were horrified as I went through all of our favorite foods at all of our favorite places.  I never kidded myself into thinking that this stuff was good for me, but I had no idea it was this bad.  When we cook at home we do it very healthy - grilled chicken, lean beef, veggies, whole grains, etc. etc. etc.  We probably eat out (fast food or sit down) at least one night per week and 2-3 lunches per week for me.  Here are my most frequent offenses:

All it took to shake us into reality was the hour that we spent going through all of the absolute junk that we have been eating and another hour of the AllRecipies.com app finding yummy things we could make at home.  So, we are challenging ourselves to eating out only one time per month and myself to eating out for lunch to one time per week.  It is going to be hard, but I think we can do it!  Not only are we going to be saving a lot of $$$, we'll be eating healthier and feeling better.

How often do you eat out?  Are there any recipes that you have posted about that you can share?  I'm in the market for a few new ones!  :)

 

WorkWear Wednesday - Holiday Party Edition

It's that magical time of year again - the time that companies host holiday party and co-workers engage in drunken dancing, story telling, and other mischief that generally doesn't happen around the office.  What to wear definitely takes some consideration.  This year I have several parties on the agenda, each calling for a different level of dressiness.  I have a feeling I'm not the only one in this boat!  So, I bring to you, the special Holiday Party Edition of WorkWear Wednesday...

Ruched Cotton Cowl Neck Sweater in Red Lacquer from Victoria's Secret  $29 

Skinny Leg Eva Curvy Fit Jean in Dark Indigo from Express  $80  

Michael Antonio Mckort Boot from Piperlime  $50

Stone Linked Drop Earrings from Express  $25

Rhinestone Bangles from Express  $27

Plainweave Ruffle Front Jacket from The Limited  $128

Sequin Front Tank in Ivory from Express  $40

Drew Plainweave Slim Ankle Pant from The Limited  $65

Botkins Pump in Bordeaux Suede from Aldo   $60 

14K White Gold Garnet Stud Earrings from Target $38

2028 Blaze Teardrop Pendant Necklace from Macy's  $28

Cotton Slub Turtleneck in Black from LOFT  $27
Tiered Party Skirt in Dark Raspberry from The Limited  $60

Lace Overlay Stretch Bracelet from White House Black Market  $44

Jet/Hematite Teardrop Earrings from White House Black Market  $44
Crystal Scroll Chandelier Earrings from White House Black Market  $34

Vanyo Bootie Pumps in Midnight Black from Aldo  $70

Cascading Ruffle Dress in Black from The Limited  $63

Chinese Laundry Lyndia S Pump in Black from Nordstrom  $70

Jet Bauble Earrings from White House Black Market  $24

Couture Shag Bracelet from White House Black Market  $58

Multi-Stone Teardrop Earrings from The Limited  $25

Happy Wednesday!

Christmas Decor Rundown

Wednesday through Sunday of last week consisted of completely decorating our house for Christmas.  It feels so good to be done and to be able to enjoy it!

My mom would be so proud of my ornament organizational skills...

Mid-process...

All finished! 

This is our family tree.  We've always put it in our family room before, but decided to put it in the formal living this year.  I think I am going to like it in here, even though I wasn't sure of it at first. 

I have already wrapped some presents!  I like to do it the second they come home so that 1. the girls Haley can't peek and 2. I like to enjoy them in all of their wrapped glory and 3. I like them sitting out to torment the girls.  ;)

Here's the tree from the dining room looking into the foyer...

Some of my favorite ornaments:

And here is the family room (sans Christmas tree, but with plenty of garland!)...

I love these glittery poinsettas from Hobby Lobby:

Our office manager makes the most beautiful wreaths...

And here is our entry table.  I found the Christmas Countdown printable here.

Our other tree is in the girls' playroom and is pink and apple green to match the playroom decor...

My favorite ornaments from the girls' tree are...

I have always love love loved Christmas and Christmas decorations.  I can't wait to see pictures of everyone else's as well!

Oh, and don't forget to send me your wildest Christmas wish for the Christmas list blog hop.  You can email me (applesfalling(at)gmail(dot)com) or leave a comment in any post.  I'll list all of the wishes with links to the respective blogs on Wednesday so get them to me by tomorrow (Tuesday) night.

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving holiday weekend!