Christmas at our Apartment

It's the holidays and besides summer this is my absolute favorite time of year. I love all the holiday parties, decorating, baking, and of course gift giving!

Attached is a picture of our "Christmas nook" this year. It's Alex's and my first Christmas together. In years past we always had to mail eachother gifts because of the handful of states that used to be between us during this time. It's just so nice to not have to do that long distance thing anymore...it was a bear to get past that!

My mom gave me some of her gargantuan antique ornament collection for our tree. I love the antique glass ornaments...so classic:-) The oldest ornament I have is pink and is from the 1800s...we were extra careful with that one!

Saci is the best and leaves it all alone, because she's the best behaved dog EVER.

Last night we took her to a coworker's apartment where we had an amazing meal and we introduced her to their Welsch Corgi puppy. For the 1st 20 minutes she was the biggest wuss and ran away from the puppy that was sooo much smaller than her. But after awhile she began to play with it, after realizing that she could use her size and speed to her advantage. They both fell asleep right after we left, having played for 2 and a half hours!

Yesterday I met Rachel Ray.....I have pics. so details and photos will follow!

Favorite Things :-)

Just now while eating a few oreo cookies I was inspired to write a list of some of my favorite things from completely random categories:

Favorite Store Bought Cookie: the OREO of course. I love dunking them in a LOW mug of milk. I emphasized the "low" because nothing's worse than trying to cram your hand down a skinny glass of milk trying to achieve maximum dunkage with the 5 centimeters of milk at the bottom. so GO OREOS, esp. double stuffed......but I try to be good most of the time ;-)

Favorite Smell: Ok, I have 2. The smell of warm, freshly baked doughnuts (i'm bad) and the smell of fall when you walk outside on a crisp day and you smell the burning of leaves and or wood. The only downside of the latter smell is if your hair has just been washed it now takes on the smell of smoke. small price to pay.......although I do have a weird habit of smelling my own hair throughout the day......WeIRdo!!!!!

Favorite time/day of the week: Around 6pm on Friday, you have the anticipation of the upcoming weekend and the work week is a distant memory. It's usually the evening Alex and I brainstorm which eatery in Austin we have yet to try and go and TRY IT!!!

Favorite TV channel: The Food Network by far. No surprise for most of you since my first two favorite things on this list have to do with food, as does most things in my life. The Food Network is ALWAYS the first channel I surf to when flipping on the tube. I know way too much food trivia, just the other day I schmoozed onlookers with my knowledge of orzo. My favorite personalities on said network are Giada de Laurentiis and Tyler Florence (and no, I don't just like him bc his last name is Florence!!!)

Favorite mode of transportation: Boat boat boat!!! I love being on water on a sunny day. There's something so liberating about the whole experience, plus you usually can't beat the scenary. Is it just me or are people the most happy when they're on boats? Well except Alex who has chronic motion sickness and avoids boats at all costs :-(

Favorite animal: Dolphin. I swam with them once when I graduation from highschool and went on a cruise with my family to the Caribbean. I had a weird experience that day when the dolphin was supposed to come up and look as if it were kissing my cheek. (you've all seen those poses)...well I was the over-zealous teen in the group and of course was the first to go. The dolphin lurched towards me with a little too much force and nailed me in the temple. Damn IT HURT. but moments later it compensated for the mishap and we managed to get my photo taken with it. The funniest part of the whole situation is that we were being video recorded at the same time and at that moment in the video they have it in slow motion. So me getting mauled by the dolphin is in super slow mo....pretty awesome, I still love dolphins despite this :-) The above pic was taken at the cove where we swam with the dolphins, two dolphins pushing you through the water via your feet is an awesome feeling.

Favorite childhood memory: Playing Marco Polo with my Uncle Dave and brother in our grandparent's pool in Scottsdale, AZ. Each summer Ryan (broham) and I would visit our grandparents and our Aunt and Uncle in Scottsdale for about a month. The anticipation we had before going out there each summer was enormous and once we got there we would just hang out with the fam and play all day long. I get so nostalgic whenever talking about it because of how carefree and happy I was at the time.

Favorite post-adolescent/adult memory: The entire semester I studied in Florence '04 at SACI. Need I explain why? The entire time I felt so grateful and so alive. From the places I saw to the relationships I came home with. It really was the best time of my life :-)

I can feel fall!

Ok, I know I live in Austin, TX and our highs lately have been in the high 80's....but I can still feel fall. Especially this morning when I took Saci out to do her morning business. The air was crisp, the sun made the sky the perfect shade of crystal blue, and a light breeze moved over me that made me happy. The low 60s in the morning feel great and I can't help but wish that they were the highs of the day.

Today, Alex, my mom and I are volunteering downtown at the Lance Armstrong Cure for Cancer Event. There's a big bike ride for the event and we'll be helping the riders register and collect all that they'll need for the next day (power bars, water bottles, yellow liveSTRONG bracelets, and such). I did it last year and hearing the inspirational, yet heartbreaking stories of the riders brought me to tears. It's especially touching when you see the children affected by the horrible disease...but this event is about the positive and about finding a cure and being strong along the way, it's a special event!

Saci is being demanding at present and looking at me with eyes that say, "why are you typing and not petting me?!?"

I have to go pet my dog!

Ankle in Distress....however, making progress with the wedding

So this past Friday, I'm on my lunch break like normal. Alex and I occassionally meet at th apartment for lunch in an effort to save money and spend more time with the pooch. After eating a plate of scrambled eggs and sausage links (we had almost zero food in the house) I was on my way down the stairs and totally bit it on the VERY LAST step of probably 55. I wasn't even wearing heels, I was in flip flops. After falling the pain was so great I couldn't hold back the tears.....so I called Alex blubbering that I had really badly twisted my ankle and that he had to turn around on his way back to work. (I know, I'm a brat). I hobbled back up the stairs with an already swollen and bruised foot. Saci was esctatic to see that we had returned so soon. After icing and propping my ankle up for about ten minutes I decided that it was ok for me to go back to work and just prop it up there for the rest of the day.

It's been two days since the "accident," and it's still swollen and has even more purple bruises. YUM. Hopefully, it'll be better soon, I hate being restricted.

Even though I shouldn't have, on friday evening Alex and I went to a Round Rock Express game with my office. It's the Astro's minor league team. It was cool since we had box seats and free drinks and food. Our team lost but the firework show at the end made up for it.

Yesterday my parents wrote us a check for the wedding. It's exciting because now we can procede with signing the wedding contract and putting down our first deposit. After which we'll get an exact date and time and can start arranging plane tickets and living accomodations there. Oh, and I emailed the school we studied at in Florence (SACI) and asked if we could use the SACI garden for pictures and reception-like fun after the wedding. To our surprise they were very excited about the entire thing and even asked if they could take our picture for the school newsletter. It'll make me feel like a SACI celebrity :-)

I've recently purchased some Italian grammar and verb drill books, hopefully I can become a little more well-versed before we make the trip.

Attached to this post is a picture of the SACI garden!