holiday blanks!

hi friends!  i’ve been taking a break from blanking, but since these are holiday themed i just couldn’t say no :) 

1. "the best way to spread christmas cheer is..." being cheery! i am always so happy around the holidays, and i think the best way to make other people cheery is being cheerful yourself.

2. the holiday season is  definitely my favorite time of the year.  this year is a little weird with graduation and the move, but we are making the best of it.

3. when it comes to holiday decorating...  i go all out! our décor is a little bit more wintery – lots of golds and silvers.  but there are some wreaths and red and green candles and things we put out. i love it all.

4. the thing i look forward to most about the holidays is  family, gift giving and christmas caroling.  i know that’s three things, but i could never just pick one!

5. my favorite holiday tradition is  probably our christmas cocktail party.  this year is our 6^th, and each year it gets a little bit bigger and a little more fun.  my family has a lot of great traditions, but they have been changing over the past few years with the death of my great-grandmother (she was our family matriarch), so we are trying to come up with new family traditions.  with four sets of parents, we don’t have too many traditions that we do year after year besides our own christmas cocktail party.

6. this year my christmas plans include  moving.  yeah.  we are kind of up in the air on what to do for the actual holiday, but it sounds like we will be out east somewhere.  my dad is big on wanting to rent a house on the cape, but if that doesn’t work out we will all be in ny.  like i mentioned, my family is trying to come up with some new traditions…

7. my favorite holiday food is champagne.

high high #27

every year, PI and i go to the nutcracker before christmas.  it's one of our traditions, and we usually go all out.  there's a fancy dinner beforehand and sometimes cocktails after the show.  but one of my favorite traditions of ours.

and today, we got our nutcracker tickets! and, of course, we are having dinner before at our favorite place ever.

the denver ballet does an amazing job. can't wait for our holiday themed date among the insanity occurring in my life right now.  i have a serious case of senioritis.  i can't concentrate on any homework and can only think about the move, christmas, shopping, our party, and christmas themed cocktails.  true story.

ok, gotta try to get back to reading about american political thought.  boo.

downstairs bathroom update!

hey all.

so i don’t even know if you remember this, but a looooong while ago i mentioned how we were going to have to re-do the downstairs bathroom. well fast forward practically a year, and we are finally underway with bathroom renovation #2! of course we have tons of great reasons why this didn’t happen until now… but the important thing is we are getting it taken care of. it’s funny – there is always this huge wish list of things we want to get done in the house someday when we have time. but now that we are renting it out, we have a fire lit under us to start working through this list.

there are a ton of smaller things we have done, but the biggest project by far is finishing up the bathroom. so, the first step: new tile in the shower!



shower all ripped out - notice the basement behind?

in my fantasies [yes, as a grown woman i know fantasize about things like this] we got a new shower pan, but hey, we are on a time and budget crunch now. i was at least able to get the shiny white subway tile i wanted – we are going for a subway look. now i know what you are thinking – dirt and grime and rats in the bathroom? we are going to somewhat model it after our old F stop in brooklyn – carroll street. so we [this is the royal ‘we’, not the literal ‘we’, because of course PI is doing all the heavy lifting while i finish up school] left the top few rows of blue tile that were not damaged by the moisture of the shower, and the subway tile will be underneath.



subway tile with original tile above

looking great!

our old subway stop in brooklyn

 

 

so the sign won’t actually be in tile, but the decals go over the tile, and with the border… well, it will look pretty damn awesome. it’s definitely a change of pace from my typical eclectic, mixed bag, morrocan-french-bohemian décor look the rest of the house is. the new sink should arrive in the next week and i’ll change up the décor in there a bit before the holiday party.

besides the bathroom… it’s been pretty busy but pretty much the same. lots of homework, but i have another class wrapped up now so just two more to go. they are slowly dwindling – and it’s just over two weeks until graduation. it can’t come soon enough!

as soon as i have a little more time i will catch everyone up on our trip to LA for thanksgiving – maybe this weekend?

til next time!



i think i'm going to boston.

so as soon as i got home from class i put on pandora for some background study music.  (fyi: my go-to station is 'early jazz radio.'  it's amazing.) 

anywho, this is the first song that came on:

if you can't see it, that would be 'boston' by augustana (don't judge; it came up on she & him radio).  so, the song may be a little a little depressing, but it was just a good sign for me.  all the time i kind of go back and forth on this whole move to boston thing, but i have been pretty optimistic and excited lately.  and i love finding little signs from the universe that my life is headed in the right direction - especially in times of change.

high high #26

guys, this was in my email in box this afternoon.



WHAT?!  i am graduating with honors.  i can't even begin to say how actually happy this makes me.  when i think about when i first was going back to school how impossible it all seemed, i never even thought about honors.  i actually said i wouldn't walk in my graduation ceremony because, 'it would be different if i were graduating with honors,' i justified.  and now that i am, i am going to walk in my graduation ceremony.

which means i get to go buy a new dress :)

and, in case you were wondering, graduation is now less than a month away. 

BIG changes coming.

so for a little while now, i've been hinting at some major news coming.  and the day is finally here where i can share it!  it's been so hard keeping this a secret for some time, but now that we have told our close family and friends i can finally share with you all our BIG secret!

the next chapter of our lives is about to start...  

we are moving to boston! 

ok, pick your jaws up from the coffee table.  i know.  it all just kind of happened over the past few weeks - but we are starting to get incredibly excited about our new adventure.  now you can see why things have been so quiet around the blog - i am not exactly known for my secret-keeping skills.  PI got an amazing job offer that would have been crazy to turn down.  so off we go - leaving our jobs and renting the house we have spent the last two and a half years turning into our home.  it is bittersweet - i love our home, our neighborhood and our family [mom] and friends [girlfriends!] here, but it's just time for something new.  and we have never been ones to turn down a new adventure.  

we are listing the house for rent because we just couldn't bear the thought of selling it.  it makes me pretty nervous, but i am trying to keep a very positive mindset - this is just our path right now and everything is going to work out lovely.  it always does.

life is just amazing.  just like eighteen months ago i wrote about how my life was going to change because i was going to make some big changes in it by going back to school.  well, school is over in exactly 35 days, so it's time for me to start the next chapter in my life after i am done.  forcing me to quit my job, leave my home, move to a new place - all just after i graduated and the election finished up.  it's a sign of something new to come and i can't wait to see what it is.

but for now, i have to go back to the poster which changed my life -

'open your mind, arms and heart to new things and people.  some opportunities only come once - seize them'

til next time...    

high high #25

it was a pretty amazing day.

it started out with work, but it got kind of amazing afterwards.  PI & i went to pick out or christmas party invitations from our favorite stationary shop [i CAN NOT believe that it's already time for christmas party invitations!].  they are amazing - can/t wait to share pics!

but after, mom and i had an amazing spa day at  izba.  we had body masques, beating with banya leaves, and an amazing rubdown by a man named dimitri.  after we were sufficiently relaxed, we went for wine and cheese at cellar.  i would highly recommend it :) 

it was an amazing relaxing mother-daughter day... and we don't do it often enough.  it was pretty awesome.

hope you enjoyed your saturday!

xoxo
 

election day = happy day.

if you are reading this, i hope you have already voted.  if not, stop reading this, go vote, and then come back.

ok, much better.  i hate to be so negative on election day, but i'm a little frustrated.  today people are a little happier, talking about how amazing our country is because, unlike MANY other nations in the world, we still have elections that are [for the most part anyway] pretty fair, and we still have the right to vote and elect our leaders.  but up until today, i have heard and seen online many, many negative comments about the sad state of our electorate. 

they get too much political junk mail. they don't want to live in a swing state and see all political ads.  they are tired of polling questions and robocalls.  they say they aren't going to vote because they don't like either candidate, or they say they are voting for the 'lesser of two evils.'

 it drives me crazy. 

because you know what people?  this is what a democracy is.  you get those calls and you see those ads because you have a right to choose.  and i feel liek a lot of people don't know this... but if you don't like either candidate, you can actually do something about it.  vote for a third party candidate.  we have those, you know.  make your voice heard.  volunteer for a third party candidate.  sign a petition for campaign finance reform and laws against citizens united.  don't just complain.

yes, our system is not proportional representation.  but if you don't like that, guess what?  make your voice heard.  our democracy hinges on participation, and complaining doesn't count.

i can't help but wonder friends...

how different would our political culture look if people spent as much time participating and making changes as they did complaining?

all right, i'll get off my soap box now.  i just want to encourage everyone to go vote.  and if you aren't voting because you don't like the candidates or our system, then do something.  get involved, make your voice heard, and enact some change.

happy election night :) 

weekend with our favorite couple

hey friends! i don't know about you, but we had an awesome weekend.  we drove up to glenwood springs to hang out with one of our favorite couples ever.

it was a nice little getaway.  it has been so unbelievably busy around here that i can't even explain - or share just yet - everything that's been going on!  but all in good time my friends.  a great way to pass the time from homework and other stresses is drinking with friends i learned.

PI & LP

you know you get along too well when you both make goofy faces at the same time

the boys strutting

 

hope your weekend was as awesome as mine :)

we finished the weekend off with some tacos and mojitos with momma at a local el camino.  lots of big changes to discuss.  wish i could say more now... but it will have to wait just one more week folks!

happy sunday evening and i'll be back again soon!