Weekend Update

With Thanksgiving being so late this year, Christmas has snuck up on me. I'm generally less excited for Christmas in recent years just because I know that immediately following Christmas is busy season, and I have to say goodbye to my life outside of work (which, who am I kidding, isn't very exciting) for the next 4 months.

But I made an effort the past week to get into the holiday spirit. I took an afternoon off to do all my Christmas shopping and wrapping, I finally got the tree decorated, I attended my work Christmas party and a holiday party for United Way, and now I'm feeling significantly more festive than before.

1. The United Way holiday party, where I bought shoes for a child in need
2. My lovely roomie and I before our office Christmas party
3. One of my clients sent me a GIANT container of pecans. Time to start baking!
4. Some of my favorite girls getting our hair blown out before the Christmas party
5. A delicious festive cocktail (recipe below)
6. Lauren, Holly, and me at the party
7. Our cute little baby Christmas tree
8. My dear friend Whitney turned 30 the night of the Christmas party, and we celebrated in style (and also met Floyd Mayweather at Waffle House at 3 am!)
9. Stovetop potpourri - if it smells like Christmas, we're halfway there!



Cider Pomegranate Smash
from Clara Persis

2.5 oz bourbon
1 tsp lemon juice
6 oz sparkling apple pomegranate cider (Martinelli’s make this)
1/2 tablespoon pomegranate seeds

Fill a tall thin (or short and wide) cocktail glass with ice. Pour in the bourbon and stir to chill. Pour in the lemon juice and sparkling apple pomegranate cider and stir well to combine. Top with fresh pomegranate seeds. Serve immediately.

Stovetop Potpourri

Slice an orange or two, throw in a cup of fresh cranberries, as many cinnamon sticks as your heart desires, and a dash of cloves, cover with water, and simmer on the stove to fill your home with the smells of Christmas. Enjoy!

Making a List, Checking (Things Off) It Twice

Since it is now December and 2013 is almost over (excuse me while I freak out for a second about how fast this year flew by), I wanted to sit down and reevaluate my goal list of 101 things that I'd like to accomplish in 1,001 days.

I've crossed a few more things off my list, and I want to make sure this little journey gets documented along the way! Here's what I've been up to lately:

3. Host a dinner party. CHECK!

I'm assuming having 11 people over for Thanksgiving counts as a dinner party, right? I, however, admit that I didn't cook the entire meal, but I did cook to turkey, so that counts for something.

19. Stay in bed all day and watch an entire TV season.

Sometimes you just need a lazy day to yourself. I've gotten mindlessly sucked in to Gossip Girl on Netflix, and it's just that it's so bad, it's good. And also, can I be Blake Lively? Please and thank you.

28. Visit 3 new states.

I crossed off New Jersey while I was up north visiting my friend in Philly (still working on that trip recap, I promise). I can't say I'm dying to go back anytime soon; the roads are really strange and confusing up there, at least in the twon where I was staying (no left turns, what the heck?!).

68. Start a collection.

I've always had a love for coffee mugs, and when Starbucks introduced their "You Are Here" collection, I knew I had to pick up a mug from every city I traveled to this year.

My Los Angeles mug is sitting on my desk at work..

Now can someone just tell me how I can display all these new pretties?

80. Get a blowout at a dry bar.

Happening this weekend before my office Christmas party. Having someone straigthen my curly hair for me while I sip champagne sounds utterly fantastic.

85. Adopt a child from the Angel Tree at Christmas.

We do this every year at work, and this year I adopted a 9 year-old girl, Vanessa. I'm hoping she's going to like the hot pink sneakers I bought her (all girls like pink at that age, right?)!

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In other news, follow along with me today as I hold the Blog Baton on Instagram! I loved this idea when Mason introduced it, and now my day is finally here! I'll try not to bore you with too many pictures of my accounting day job; I promise accountants can be fun people, too!

Have a happy Wednesday!

My Favorite Holiday!

My favorite holiday has come and gone. But luckily, Christmas is a very close second and it's only 23 days away!

I'm not ashamed to admit I had 4 Thanksgiving meals this year and each one was better than the one before. We hosted our 2nd annual Friendsgiving, my sister was home briefly the weekend before Thanksgiving so we had dinner with her, my office hosted a Thanksgiving potluck on Monday, and then I headed to the mountains for the real thing. Not only did I have 5 glorious days off, but it SNOWED in the mountains! Probably the only time I'll get to see snow this year.

Ah, the greatest time of year!

How did y'all spend your holiday?

Linking up with Sami

Weekend Update x 4

After an unintentional hiatus from blogging, this weekend update will be a long one (spanning a entire month, obviously).

First up:

My dad's 60th birthday surprise in the mountains! My sister flew in from California and then my parents' supper club all came to the mountains to celebrate my wonderful dad turning 60!

Next up:

Gameday came to Clemson for the second time when we played FSU, but we don't really need to discuss the outcome of that one...

Other mentionables in the past month:

Clemson beat Georgia Tech on a chilly Thursday night. I traveled to Chattanooga for work. I took a day off. I got a sinus infection. Mom and I visisted a Southern Living design home in the mountains. I sat through 8 hours of CPE. I visited a brewery. Mom and I visited a Southern Living design home in the mountins. And I stole a puppy (wishful thinking).

Come back tomorrow for an update of my trip to Philly to visit one of my besties!

What all have you been up to lately?

Linking up with Sami

Weekend Update

It's a rainy Monday here and I have an October 15th work deadline looming, so this weekend recap will be short and sweet!

I was working away on Friday when shortly after lunch, I started to feel all achy and flu-like, or like I was coming down with strep. I left work around 4:30 to find I had a 100 degree fever. Don't believe anyone when they say work doesn't make you sick! That made for a really miserable Friday night in bed.

However, I woke up Saturday feeling much better (sore throat but no fever) so I rallied so we could go to Woofstock. Every year, the Humane Society puts on an all-day event with all-you-can-drink from 7 different local breweries, the food trucks come out, and there were 3 bands. Lauren and I obviously don't have a dog but we had no problem stalking other peoples' dogs and trying to kidnap them as our own. I started off the day with a pumpkin cinnamon roll from Neue Southern food truck and it was a little taste of fall even though it was 90 degrees outside.

We left the festival earlier to catch Clemson beat down on Syracuse, then met up with friends at Mellow Mushroom for pizza.

I mainly did nothing on Sunday, which is exactly how I prefer my Sundays to be.

Over and out.

The Land of Fruits and Nuts

It took me a few days to stop mourning the end of my trip before I could write a recap. I'm not even sorry for the cuteness overload that's about to ensue.

Sara and Caroline picked Laura and me up at LAX around 10 am and we headed towards Malibu for lunch. Our only request was that the restaurant have a view of the water, and Duke's certainly delivered. Driving down the PCH and having views of the water reminded me a lot of being in La Jolla, and I was more than happy to soak up the sun and the view of that gorgeous blue water.

The non-stop girl talk and chatter didn't end for the next couple of hours.

Sara's husband Jim is in the Navy, and they live on the naval base just north of Malibu. It was so fun getting to see their house for the first time! Sara had sent me a bunch of pictures when they first moved in, but it was cuter in person!

We hung out at the house for awhile and let Caroline nap before heading to the beach! And trust me on this, nothing gets a 2-year-old more excited than when you ask her if she wants to go to the beach!

The rock in the distance is Mugu Rock and is apparently a very popular place to film car commercials! We even saw a commercial over the weekend that featured this stretch of the PCH! Pretty cool that I've seen it in person now!

Shortly after we got back from the beach, Jim called and told us we should come to the hangar to watch the sunset. We loaded Caroline back in the car and raced back to the beach (less than a mile from the house, might I add) to catch the sunset.

So much happiness in these photos.

Jim had to go back to work unfortunately but the girls headed home, put Caroline to bed, and Sara made an amazing Thai curry dish that we devoured before spending the rest of the night looking through old college photo albums. We can't wait until Caroline is old enough so we can tell her incriminating stories about her mama!

Saturday we were up bright and early for gameday! We had a huge breakfast of pancakes, bacon, and mimosas of course, then headed to the farmer's market in Old Town Camarillo. We picked up lots of goodies to snack on during the Clemson game before we grilled burgers at the house.

We did switch to the Navy game once and awhile for Jim since he was outnumbered!

After we all took power naps, the girls went wine tasting while Jim took Caroline to the playground. We were lucky to catch the sunset again on the beach in Ventura, before dinner at Cafe Fiore downtown (such amazing Italian food).

Sunday was our last day, and since Laura's flight home was much earlier in the day than mine, we grabbed a quick lunch at Paradise Cove before taking her to the airport. Any restaurant with sand as its floor is an okay restuarant by me!

We spent the rest of the day frolicking around LA, visiting the Dodgers stadium (the game was sold out), seeing the Hollywood sign at the Griffith Observatory, and then taking a drive through Beverly Hills and Rodeo Drive.

And just because my heart bursts every time I see pictures of my favorite little munchkin..

I'm imparting wisdom on children one selfie at a time.

I was determined to see a celebrity while I was in LA, and while I was boarding my flight back home (extremely depressed), there sat Paul Walker in first class ordering a whiskey soda. Swoon. He still looks just as good at 40 (!!!) as he did in the first Fast & Furious movie. Yum.

I'm so thankful for best friends like Sara and Laura who I've been friends with since freshman year of college (2006!) and now for little Caroline, who might be the cutest child ever.

The end.

Girl Goes West

By the time you're reading this, I'll already be on a plane from CLT --> ATL --> LAX.

Back in August, my college roommate mentioned that I should get out of Greenville for a bit and come visit her, her husband, and their so-freakin-cute daughter in sunny Orange County. How long did it take me to ponder that idea? Oh, about 30 seconds. She mentioned our other roommate, Laura, wanted to come visit as well and that maybe we could plan our trip west at the same time. A few group texts back and forth discussing logistics, and boom, plane tickets were purchased.

I can't even express how excited I am to see Sara, Laura, Jim, and Caroline (who just turned 2 last Sunday)! There will be lots of hugs, laughing, college reminiscing, beach-frolicking, and perhaps some wine tasting and celeb-spotting in LA.

The three of us at Sara's bachelorette party!

Catch y'all on the flip side!

{Recipe} ~ Apple Walnut Ravioli

Because Lauren and I came home with our fair share of apples from the orchard, I wanted to try some new recipes to use them up. However, I'm not really into sweets and didn't want to bake something, so a savory apple recipe was just what I wanted!

This recipe was probably the easiest ever, only required a few ingredients, and tasted rich and decadent. I made this Sunday night and I'll say that Lauren and I have never met a pasta dish we didn't like.

Ravioli with Apples and Walnuts
from Real Simple

Ingredients

1 lb. cheese ravioli (fresh or frozen)
2 tbsp. olive oil
1/2 c. walnuts, roughly chopped
1 crisp apple (such as Braeburn or Gala), cut into matchsticks
1/2 c. fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped
Salt & Black Pepper
1/4 c. grated Parmesan

Directions

Cook the ravioli according to package directions.

Meanwhile, heat the oil in a medium skillet over medium heat. Add the walnuts and toast, stirring often, until lightly toasted and fragrant, 4 to 5 minutes.

Add the apple, parsley, 1/2 tsp. salt, and 1/4 tsp. pepper and toss to combine. Spoon over the ravioli and sprinkle with Parmesan.

Weekend Update

It seems like I only have time to show up on Monday morning around these parts.  Honestly, all of these recruiting events for work are kicking my booty. I got home after 10 pm three nights in a row last week, after leaving the house before 8 am. Woof.

This weekend, I got to cross another item off my list (visit a food truck!), celebrate the engagement of two great friends (except I managed to not take a single picture of them), and get my life organized before I hop on a plane to California on Friday (more on that later)!

We traveled to the lake to surprise Holly the morning after Trent proposed! I definitely think she was shocked when she came up the stairs to find over 30 of her closest friends and family (2 of her college roommates had driven over 10 hours)! A champagne brunch followed while everyone "oohed and aahed" over the ring. The cutest part was Trent had bought an "engagement ring" for Holly's dog Riley, too!

After raining the entire day Saturday, the sun came out for a mere 30 minutes to show off a magical sunset.

Happy days celebrating friends! Linking up with Sami this fine morning!

Weekend Update

Visiting an apple orchard was probably one of the items on my 101 in 1001 list that I was the most excited about. When I found out it was going to be 70 degrees on Saturday, I grabbed 2 of my best girlfriends and up the mountain we went.

We visited Sky Top Orchard, about 45 minutes from Greenville, and had the best time! I can't believe I've never done this before, but it'll definitely be a yearly tradition from here on out! Now to decide what to cook/bake with all these apples!

The rest of the weekend was filled with the usual, football, friends, a baby shower for a coworker, and a Sunday afternoon nap!

Linking up with Sami

Mumford & Sons

Not going to lie, pretty excited that it's Friday. This week has flown by but also took forever, but maybe I should stop going to concerts on a school night Wednesday.

My favorite people and I saw Mumford & Sons in Greenville, and while I can't say it was my favorite concert (Is it just me or do all their songs sound the same?), they put on a great show. The pretty sunset beside the stage didn't hurt either!

Bonus: I crossed off #61 again!