So Where Have I Been?

In my absence, I have been uber busy.  Okay.  Not really.  I pretend like I'm beyond busy, but I'm really not - at least through the week.  In an average week, I'm busy on Monday nights teaching CCD, but any other night I'm pretty much doing laundry, blog stalking, watching TV or hanging out with the husband.  Fun, right?  The weekend though can be somewhat hectic, like last weekend.  Friday night we had a game night with some other couples, Saturday we had homecoming all.day.long and Sunday we had brunch with my family.  It really felt like we did not stop, but we had such a good time.  Especially with Homecoming.

The college that my husband and I went to is a smaller state school that does not have a football team, so Homecoming is held during basketball season.  There are several events throughout the week for the students and then the weekend is dedicated to several alumni events.  We participated in the the Saturday events starting with the alumni chili cook off.  The husband and I participated with our good friends from college.  We knew we had to really step up our game and not just make good chili because a chili cook off is rarely about the chili itself.

 

Our setup

The setup was nice enough.  We had crackers and cheese and individually wrapped pieces of cornbread.  We even had a personalized bobble head.  The other contestants were wary, but then we pulled out the secret weapon ... and then they were shaking in their boots.

Personalized.Aprons.

Yeah, that's right.  Personalized aprons.  They were key for many reasons.  One they were handmade and personalized and just overall awesome.  Second, they had our names and graduation years on them.  We are standing in reverse order, but starting with the guy on the end he graduation in 2004, his wife graduated in 2005, I graduated in 2006 and my husband graduated in 2007.  Third, they had our Greek organizations on them.  This was absolute key because the current students who were in the organizations automatically voted for us.  

The result for all of our hard work?  We won.  Oh yeah.  You are currently reading the blog of an award winning chili chef.  You are honored, I'm sure.  

After the cookoff it was time for the game, which we of course won.  We were lucky enough to enjoy the second half of the game from the University President's suite.  We're kind of a big deal.  People know us.  (Not really, more like we know other people).

The night ended with an alumni reception and my husband and I both won door prizes.  

Overall, I'm saying this year's Homecoming was an absolute success.  Next year we plan on coming back to defend our chili trophy.  I see a dynasty in my future...

Grab Bag

This week has been crazy since I have started my NEW JOB!!!  I just love saying that.  It makes me feel a special and warm and fuzzy.  Lame, I know, but that's just me.  So since not much has gone on this week, I thought I would just share some random odds and ends.

The J-O-B

First of all, I really like it so far.  I won't go as far as to say that I love it because I don't want to be one of those girls who goes too fast and gets all giddy in love before the relationship has fully formed.  However, I will say that so far, so good.  I don't want to divulge too much information about what I do because these here are the interwebs and you really can never be too careful, but I'm happy with it.  It is a good marriage of a lot of my interests and my talents.  There is a lot to learn, but it's manageable.  I don't look it and have this feeling that I'll never learn it.  The people are wonderful so far.  Everyone is so nice and welcoming.  You know how every group seems to have at least one Scrooge?  I haven't found one yet, and I've met everyone - which wasn't hard since it's a very small company.

Make-up/Beauty

Yeah, I'm going to be lame and write about this.  As I mentioned previously, I have a new interest in watching YouTube Beauty Guru's.  I know that people have probably been watching these videos for years, but I just found them, so to me, they are brand spankin' new.  I now have an interest in using makeup in different ways and trying new products.  While all this fun, I feel like my skin in taking a beating.  I have never had good skin.  Actually I feel like as a teenager, I had decent skin, but as I've gotten older it's gotten worse.  I have been trying to find some affordable products that will help, but along the way I have found aspirin masks.  Now again, there are probably some of you reading this that know all about them, but to me they are new so I'm going to share.  

Basically you just take some aspirin, crush them, mix a few drops of water, a dollop of honey and mix together.  It makes a paste that you smear on your face and leave it there for about twenty minutes.  I just tried it tonight so I can't tell you if it's helped my skin or not, but I can tell you that it has left my skin feeling soft and smooth.  I would show you a picture, but I'm not brave enough for that!

Droid

The husband and I are super cool and finally entered the world of Android and Apps.  We got the LG Optimus from Sprint and I think the best part of getting it was, it was free.

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So if you have a Droid or know of some good apps that I have to have, let me know!

Weekend

I'm so ready for the weekend.  While I am liking(loving) the new job, I am ready for the weekend.  We have no major plans yet, which are the best kinds of weekends.  The husband does have a basketball game to coach tomorrow night so I am having some girls over for a girls night.  I'm so excited about this, as I rarely do things like this.  We plan on watching a movie, ordering pizza, calling boys, fixing each other's hair and playing light as a feather stiff as a board.  Ok, we're not really doing all those things.  I'll let you figure out which are real and which are fake.

Anyway, I hope everyone else is having a great week and I hope to actually write something of substance soon!

Grrr...

Today was my last day of my time off.  I took Monday and today off because well... I had to take today as a "furlough" day and so I thought why not take Monday too?  So I did.  Besides I had to use my PTO because otherwise, I'm probably going to lose it.  Especially after this Friday - but THAT is a different post for a the very near future.  Anyway, I'm both happy and sad that today was my last day off.  Sad because that means I have to go back to work and happy because I get to become a functioning member of society again.  Well that's not totally true.  Yesterday the husband and I did spend the entire day Christmas shopping and lunching with some friends.  If stimulating a lagging economy isn't being a productive member of society, I don't know what is.  However, between today and Sunday I've been real lazy.  Sure I cleaned both days, but when I hardly leave the house I feel like a lazy hermit. Furthermore, one can only watch so many episodes of One Tree Hill, Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars before one's head explodes. 

I did have these grand plans to write a few blog entries, all which included pictures, and then I realized I couldn't find my USB cord.  Such is my life.  So I'm frustrated about that.  Why is it, I can never find the darn thing when I need it?  If I don't find it within the next few days, it's going to be okay because I am getting a Nikon Cool Pix for Christmas so there's always that. 

So instead of getting a post about the fun stuff I was going to write about, you get me, complaining.  How lucky!  Oh!  You can also take a look at my To Do list for the rest of the week.  Some of the stuff probably makes no sense whatsoever, but maybe next week it will.  Cryptic much?  In looking at it, I probably should have tackled some of it today, but... Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda.

Oh and I just remembered - I have a DZ family dinner for tomorrow night too!  Funny how the things just add up. 

I hope everyone had a great Tuesday!

I'll Be There For You

Day 9 - A Picture of Your Friends

I am fortunate to have several groups of friends.  I have my high school friends, college friends and post college friends (who coincidentally co-mingle with my high school friends).  It's not that I intentionally keep the groups separate, it just kind of works out that way.  

This is my Delta Zeta Family (I'm the second one on the left in the black dress).  This is a bit old, I believe it was taken over a year and half ago at Senior night for my grand little (in the red top).  My little is standing next to my grand little (red hair, wearing black and white) and the other two are my great grand littles.  I love my DZ family and we try to get together at least once a month.  I love it because it keeps me connected to the present chapter.  They are a wonderful family and there are several girls in the chapter who are amazed that we still get together.  It's a tradition that I hope to keep.

 

In case you were wondering who my DZ Big Sister was, here she is!  She is truly one of my best friends.  Whenever something major happens in my life she is the first person I call.  She is the reason I joined Delta Zeta and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be the person I am today without her.  She is a wonderful persona and great friend.  I consider myself very lucky to call her a friend.

 

These are the after college friends.  Please ignore the fact that this looks like some sort of class picture.  This was actually taken at the end of a weekend vacation we all took to Gatlinburg, TN. We all look a little worse for the wear because literally right after this was taken we hopped in our cars to head home. That weekend was so much and I would love to do it sometime again.  The group has changed a bit though as nearly everyone in this picture now has a baby and it makes it hard to get together as much as we used to.  They are still a great group of friends and I always enjoy our times together.

 

 

My bridesmaids.  They were a mixture of family and friends and I am blessed that I had such wonderful people surrounding me on my wedding day.  

 

My high school/grade school friends.  We may not see each other on a regular basis, but these are the people who are known me the longest.  They know my past and they know my present.  They are very important people to me.  These are the kinds of people you want around you for the rest of your life.  We can go a while without seeing each other, but once we do it's like no time as passed.

And I could add soooo many more, but I think this covers my "close" friends.  I can't wait to meet yours!

 

And I am a Material Girl

Remember when I said the only thing I wanted for my birthday was a purse?  Well since then, I haven't been able to stop thinking of other things I would like to have:

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I'm going to be honest.  I don't own anything Lilly, and I don't really care for much of her products, but this?  This I must have.  It's from the sorority collection and it's the Delta Zeta print.  Of course, I MUST have it!  It's got tiny turtles on it for God's sake.  Now if only I could convince my husband that I need a $118 scarf...

 

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Have you smelled Bath and Body Works new scent Dark Kiss?  It's amazing.  I believe it's a mixture of Berry and Vanilla.  It truly is awesome.  Seeing as how I have a coupon, that sucker is probably coming to live me sometime today.

 

Via here

I'm longing for my house to smell fall-like.  There is just something about the cinnamon and spices of fall.

 

Via here

I have been really wanting a new cell phone.  While the HTC Evo is at the top of my list that probably won't be the phone I get.  A girl can dream, though, right?

 P.S. Go back an entry for my 30 Day Challenge post!