Thanksgiving 2011

Posted on November 28, 2011 by Kelly

(Taps microphone) Ahem, is this thing on? Is anyone still out there?  Yeah, I didn’t think so.  I’d say sorry for the disappearing act since Wednesday, but I’m not.  Sometimes a real vacation means a blog vacation also, and I fully enjoyed the last 4 days in PA with my family.  I also seem to have gained about 12 lbs since Wednesday, but that’s neither here nor there.

We were set free from work at noon on Wednesday, and I immediately hit the road for home.  A little over 3.5 hours later, I was parking in front of my friend Alexis’s house for a get together with my friends from home.  A bottle of wine and half a container of buffalo chicken dip later, I rolled myself out the door and finally made it home to my mom and sister.  Well, sort of, my sister almost immediately peaced out for night before Thanksgiving bar activities, and I made mini pumpkin cheesecakes.  Well I tried to anyway, apparently I was more drunk and tired than I thought, because I lost about half of them when trying to get them out of the container the next day.

cup cake holders to cover up the damage

Actual Thanksgiving day was lovely.  I managed to drag my sister out of bed and over to the gym for a “pre stuff your face” workout, and took her through my lifting routine.  I still think she’s having trouble lifting her arms over her head.  We ran into my ex (the one who dumped me at Applebees) and that was sufficiently awkward, and it was even more fun to run into him again on Saturday!  Twice in one weekend after going more than a year, haha, perhaps Dar and I will be frequenting a different gym when we’re home next month.  Although that could be entertaining to watch…

Anyway, my sis and I dressed in our Thanksgiving best (fall themed colors) and made it to my Aunt Pat’s house by about 3 pm just as the turkey was coming out of the oven.

 Soon, it was time to feast, and feast I did.  I also brought sweatpants to put on after dinner because pencil skirts were not made for eating.  Or sitting for that matter, mostly they were made for standing and making your butt look good.

corn, stuffing, turkey, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole and a roll I never touched

cousins at the dinner table

My sister and I were home and passing out on the couch by 9 pm, and after 12 hours of sleep, were up and ready to tackle decorating the house for Christmas.  By the end of it, my forearms looked like they had been mauled by a bear (damn fake trees) but the house looked festive!

window stickers

After our decorating duties were complete, my sister and I had a nice little movie date and went to see Breaking Dawn.  We’ve pretty much seen every Twilight movie in theaters together since they started coming out as part of her birthday celebrations, so we couldn’t break the tradition now.  We both loved it, and I called exactly how they would end the movie.  One year to go until part 2! Also, if my admitting to loving Twilight makes you hate me, I understand.  I realize the ridiculous message the books send, but I can’t help it.

Wow this is getting to be a long post, so to summarize the rest of the weekend; wine, winter white cosmos, Crazy Stupid Love (twice), wine, traffic.  The end!

I hope you all had a lovely Thanksgiving weekend as well, unless you’re from Canada, then I just hope you had a lovely weekend!

Filed under: Daily, Weekend Wrap- Ups | Tagged: | 10 Comments »

Come Onnnn Holiday

Posted on November 23, 2011 by Kelly

Well, if my commute this morning is any indication of what traffic will be like later, it’s not looking so bad.  There was absolutely no one on the road and I made great time on my drive in.  Last night however, not so much, but I’ll try to remain positive for right now.

My cross-fit workout ended up getting cancelled yesterday, so instead I did 2.2 miles on the treadmill and the pyramid push-up workout.  I again used the 5k sport training course that simulates hills and was huffing and puffing up that 3% incline.  The 56 push-ups again kicked my ass, and I felt like I had spaghetti for arms for the rest of the day.

I headed home after work to tackle the packing situation for my trip to PA, and I’m pretty sure I packed my entire closet. I couldn’t decide what I was going to be in the mood to wear, so I brought everything.  I packed 4 pairs of jeans and 2 pairs of leggings for a 4 day trip.  I have problems.  In my packing though, I realized my closet consists mostly of blues and grays, so mom feel free to buy me colorful clothing items for Christmas.

Other things I accomplished last night?  I bought two new bathing suits for my trip in two weeks.  I was only going to get one, but then I remembered I’m going to Vegas in April and a sequins bikini is most definitely necessary.

Tropical Getaway

 

I figure, with those two suits, along with the Tory Burch sandals I scored at a Nordstroms sale not too long ago I am set as far as buying new things.  Now, I just hope they get here on December 5 like VS has promised me.
After I managed to squeeze the last clothing items into my large suitcase, I got around to painting my nails.  I have a new obsession, and it is the OPI Gold Shatter nail polish.  So far I’ve done red and gold, and now purple and gold.
The red and gold combo will absolutely be broken out for Christmas.  Alrighty, I’m off to countdown the hours until I can hit the road! I hope it’s around 2.  Have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.

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Not Even Trying

Posted on November 22, 2011 by Kelly

If you live in this area, you know that rain + early holiday travel = not good things for traffic.  Last night at 5 pm when I was trying to leave work, I pulled up the traffic.com app on my phone (a must have I think) and noticed that every road on my dashboard had traffic at an 8 and building.  Delays ranged from 18-25 minutes for a 4 mile stretch, and I realized it would take me well over two hours to get home.  Instead of wasting gas and getting annoyed, I made the executive decision to park my ass at the Dogfish Head Alehouse bar and wait it out.

If you follow me on Twitter, you know I’ve expressed concern about eating alone in restaurants before.  They stem mostly from the fact that I don’t like people, and don’t really want to have to make conversation with strangers.  I don’t care enough.  Last night I talked to strangers and lived to tell about it, haha, I even got a free beer.  It wasn’t so bad, and I ended up sitting there until just before 8 when traffic finally let up enough to drive home.  I hope traffic tonight isn’t nearly as bad, but once again, it’s raining.

Prior to treating myself to a spontaneous dinner out I managed to squeeze in a lunch time work-out.  45 minutes on the elliptical followed by abs and stretching.  My hair, desperately needs washing today.  The whole blow drying the sweat out of it only works for so long.  Today I’m supposed to participate in a Cross Fit work-out with two other co-workers, so we’ll see how that goes.

I’m really hoping to get out of the office by 2 tomorrow so that I can start my journey up to Philadelphia for the Thanksgiving holiday.  I have mini pumpkin cheesecakes to bake and birthday drinks to have with my sister.  Judging by the state of the parking garage this morning, I’m thinking most people have already started to take off, so hopefully we get out early.

Try not to think of today as a Tuesday, technically it’s Thursday! Have a good one!

 

 

 

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The Difference a Year Can Bring

Posted on November 17, 2011 by Kelly

On this day last year I was on my third to last day of work at my old job, and four days away from running my first half marathon.  I was also eating lots of carbs and cheese, yum.  Now?  I would probably pass or have a heart attack before mile 6 of a half and would like nothing more than to curl up and cuddle with a loaf of garlic mozzarella bread and some ravioli lasagna.  Oh how times have changed.  However, for those running the Philly half/marathon this weekend I LOVED the course, but beware of the hills.  They snuck up on me and made my tight IT band cry.  For funsies, here’s my recap.

I wish I had the desire to do another race, maybe in time.  Training down here for the Cherry Blossom 10 Miler just wasn’t as fun for me as training at home was.  Oh well.  Yesterday I continued my streak of workouts, by darting across the street during a break from the pouring rain and completing a lunchtime 5k.  No speed records were broken, but I did use one of the programs that changed the incline to simulate running a real course.  You know how long it’s been since I encountered anything resembling a hill?  A long time.  It was a sweat fest, and I rinsed off, dried the sweat out of my hair and came back to work somewhat red in the face and probably a little smellier.

Year-end performance reviews are due at work tomorrow, which means I need to spend today writing about how amazing I am.  You would think I’d be good at this, ya know since I have a blog where I write about myself every day, but I am seriously struggling.  How many different ways are there to say, “I am awesome at my job, and my clients love me.”

Anywho, this time next week I’ll be home with the fam for Thanksgiving and I can’t wait.  Apparently I’m making Pumpkin  Cheesecakes for dessert, and Col I have a recipe for Cinnamon Rolls I want to try.  Happy Thursday!

 

 

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Friendsgiving 2011

Posted on November 14, 2011 by Kelly

Well hello and happy Monday to you!  I had a crazy busy weekend that involved wedding related errands with my bff, crazy amounts of cooking, spending time with out-of-town visitors, and of course lots of wine.  Let’s get to it, shall we.

Friday morning I drove into DC to pick up my friend Meghan, in visiting from FL, and her fiance to accompany them on some errands with the promise of a lunch in the future.  Our first stop was back in Alexandria to order all 8 bridesmaid dresses for their upcoming May wedding.  I had my measurements taken, and then the woman tried to tell me which size dress she recommended ordering based on those measurements.  It was larger than the size of the sample I tried on a few months ago, which I informed her had actually been too big.  So back into the sample dress I went, it was still too big, and I ended up with a size smaller.  Bridal salons and their crazy desire to put you in something two sizes too big.  The woman was kind enough to tell me that I was lucky my chest was so small, because that dress would not fit anyone who had cleavage.  Thanks.

After finally getting all the dresses ordered in the respective colors and sizes, the three of us drove back into DC  for lunch and to pick up the wedding bands.  I got a sneak peak of them, and they’re gorgeous.  Especially Meghan’s band of diamonds :) .  Our afternoon wrapped up around 3:30, at which point I drove myself home, parked it in the living room and did not move for the remainder of the night.  It was glorious.

Saturday kicked off bright and early with a 10 am football game, where I scored a touchdown because I am awesome.  I had one or two other catches and we pulled off a 1 point win.  After a quick post-game stop at Starbucks, Adrienne and I headed home to slave away in the kitchen for the rest of the afternoon.  For Friends Thanksgiving this year, I was in charge of the turkey and green bean casserole and Adrienne the stuffing.  Our house still smells delicious, in case you were wondering.

the turkey, covered in a butter, thyme, and lemon zest rub

In past years, I’ve always just thrown the turkey in a bag with some poultry seasoning and onion and called it a day, but I found a recipe in a magazine this year that I really wanted to try.  Along with the butter rub, there was an onion in the roasting pan, lemon juice squeezed over top with salt and pepper, and onion and lemon stuffed inside the cavity.  (Side note: the scream that came out of Adrienne’s mouth when I pulled the giblets out of the body was hilarious.)  Into the oven for about 4.5 hours, basting after two hours had gone by.  My baster melted by the way, that was cool.

Ta-da!

Is that a good looking bird or what?  It tasted insane also.  I think my favorite compliment was, “Wow, this is even better than my moms.”  Winner.  I also took on another first time project, gravy from scratch.  As we were cutting it close on time, I had to multitask while whipping up the gravy.

Just doing some cooking with my hot rollers in, the usual.

Luckily, Thanksgiving can’t start without the turkey so it didn’t really matter how late we were.  We eventually made it out the door, turkey and gravy in hand, to head over to the dinner location.  Trying to figure out how to transport a 21 lb turkey without making a mess was another obstacle, but we managed.  Finally, it was time to eat.

Friendsgiving Success!

I stuffed my face full of my favorite things, and then the drinking games commenced.  It was a great evening, and I really felt like we were back in college.  That’s the great thing about continuing a tradition that started way back then, it automatically brings you back.

JMU Friendsgiving 2011!

JMU Friendsgiving 2006

Yesterday involved a lot of couch sitting and hanging out in pajamas.  The perfect way to spend a Sunday in my opinion.  Now, there’s only 7.5 work days to get through until real Thanksgiving!

Filed under: Daily, Weekend Wrap- Ups | Tagged: , , , , | 11 Comments »

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