Shannanigans

Livin' the Dream: Launching a Creative Small Business

2012-01-30T07:41:00.000-05:00

Since launching Bottle Pop Party Company, my event planningbusiness, back in September, I’ve had lots of questions and emails, mostly frompeople dying to start their own business. People working a job that no longerinterested them and wanted out. People with ideas. Their questions ranged from “How did you know you were ready?” to “How much do you charge?” Granted, a lotof these questions were asked of me months ago and I’ve yet to answer them.I’ll tell you why. One…I wanted to give them the attention they deserved andover the past few months, I just haven’t had that opportunity. And two, I needed to see where this businesswas going. I didn’t think I had ANY answers just yet and I wanted to feel moreconfident in Bottle Pop before I went running my mouth, ya know? So here weare, I’m here to answer those questions for all you lovelies who asked. I’msure there are a lot of you out there who may be wondering the same things andwouldn’t think to email someone whose blog they read, so this is for you too.

To make things a little more interesting, I’ve also askedsome of my favorite small business owners to help me out. I picked a few reallycreative people who are in all different stages of business ownership and askedthem for their stories too. So today I'll answer questions and then all this week you’ll hear from my fantastic guests too. I think itwill be fun…and give you the chance to get the inside scoop on chasing yourdreams. So without further ado, I give you…

What was it like to start your own business?

As you all know, I quit working when Gabecame along and I consider myself astay-at-home-mom. Therefore, there was noday-job to quit. No steady income to lose. Any business I could drum up as an event planner would just be a niceaddition to my wallet, we obviously weren’t depending on it to keep food on thetable. On one hand, this is really nice because I can move at whatever pace Ifeel like and not suffer any bad consequences. On the other hand, I have torely on my own determination to drive myself to make business happen. So when I decided to start Bottle Pop, I wasmostly excited. I had, for years, known that I was meant to do somethingcreative and finally put the billions of ideas in my head to use. Of course, Iwas nervous putting myself out there too. What if I went public with it and itflopped? While not tragic, it would be a blow to my self esteem. So to do it and have people respond in anawesomely favorable way, well it’s been pretty darn sweet.

What have you learned so far?

I’ve learned that people willnot bang down my door, wanting my services without me doing something to getthem here. I wanted to carefully controlthe image that my website and social media portrayed so I spent a lot of timeon them. But unless you’re out there telling people to look at your socialmedia, then what good is a fancy website?

How have you been promoting yourself?

I suppose the bestthing I’ve done so far to intentionally promote myself was to contact a bloggerwith a large audience (MODGblog.com) and offer my services. It fell into place since Ilive near her and she’s all about promoting people who do good stuff. Inaddition to that, I think taking great pictures of the things I’ve done andshowing them off is the way to get people interested. Above everything though,is word of mouth. You can’t pay for that kind of advertising. Unfortunately youcan’t control it either. I’ve got to tell everyone I meet, ANYWHERE, about mybusiness. You never know who knows somebody who’s cousin’s wife needs an eventplanner.

What did you have to do to get to the "launchpoint"?

Like I said, I had been wanting to start my own business foryears. My best friend and I would dream up ideas all the time but it neverreally went farther than picking out a good font for our logo. It was actuallymy cousin’s wife who inspired me to just freaking do it. She had posted some pictures of a reallycute, Hollywood themed party she threw for her daughter and I jokingly said,“we should start a party planning business!” Within minutes, we were emailingback and forth about it, making plans to sit down over a few bottles of wineand see if we could make this happen. Those meetings did happen and those planswere made. But after some health issues, she wasn’t able to continue in ourpartnership. I decided that I was toofar into it, too giddy with plans, to let this dream die. So I said I was goingto do it on my own.

Honestly, it was much easier, having someone to dreamwith...to bounce ideas around, to put money in, everything. But when it’s justyou, you get to make all the decisions and you get to take all the credit. It’sgood both ways. So I decided that the first thing I needed to do was create aname that hadn’t been taken, claim the website and get it looking good. I wrotean official business plan and researched the heck out of my state’s smallbusiness laws/guidelines. I wrote list after list after list. I gave myself alaunch date and decided that the main components needed to be in place by then.

How'd you figure out your pricing?

Oy. This is the hardpart. If it were up to me, I’d be crafting up stuff all day long for people forbasically free. Because I love crafting! It’s fun to me! But luckily, myfinance professional husband reminds me to reel it in. Deciding what to chargefor your services, if you’re a service-based business, is tricky and will mostlikely be the part you keep questioning. I use a few different methods when figuringout how much to charge, all of which are explained pretty well here.

I know a lot of planners offer packages, and originally, that’swhat I was going to use too. But I very quickly learned that every single eventis so different and expectations are all over the place, so that wasn’t goingto work. Every single customer of mine gets a custom quote based on theirexpectations.

And I would becurious - how do you get it all done with Gabe at home during the day?!

I’ve had to alter my own title in my head abit. I switch back and forth from SAHM to WAHM all the time. If I’m working onan event and I need to be crafting it up, or researching things online, or onthe phone with a caterer, I do not let myself feel guilty for not spending thattime with Gabe. I consider myself “working”. During those times, he is eithernapping, watching some toons or playing by himself. I’m lucky that he playswell on his own and will let me work at the kitchen counter while he plays nextto me. When it comes to the actual events, most (but not all!) are on the weekends so I’ve relied on John and our parents tohelp out with watching Gabe. It’s not a big deal at all and hopefully itcontinues so seamlessly.

So hopefully that was helpful in some small way. Obviously I have so much more to learn myself so I don't have all the answers. But when I lie awake at night, not being able to sleep because I'm thinking of ways to make an event the prettiest thing I can, I know I made the right decision.

Make sure you come back tomorrow for more small biz inspiration! And if you have any questions, feel free to leave them in the comments or email me at ohshannanigans at gmail.com

Keep up with all the pretties on Bottle Pop's Facebook page too!

These Are a Few of My Favorite Fonts

2012-01-27T08:16:00.001-05:00

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Call up Dr. Zasio, I'm a font hoarder. I download fonts more than you change your underwear. So um, that would be everyday, right? Ok good. Anyway, these are a few of my faves lately and you can get them all at dafont.com fo free, fo sho.

What are you guys doing this weekend? We've got my mom babysitting so I can take John out to dinner for his birthday. I'll also be working on plans for my 1st Craft Day at my house! Basically, I'm opening up my place to any of you that want to come over and craft. We'll have projects to work on, food to eat and chit to chat. It's going to be pretty awesome. I'll post more details in about a week. In the meantime, mark your calendars for April 1. And if you were feeling skittish about meeting up for Always Bloggy in Philadelphia, this is the perfect opportunity, it's just a few hours! Surely you can deal with that, right?

Oh and next week I've got a couple of awesome posts lined up. Any of you interested in planning parties or running any small business of your own will fo sho want to tune in.

Is the use of fo sho twice in one blog post excessive? Doubt it.

Have a great weekend, guys!

Party Like It's the Prohibition

2012-01-26T07:42:00.001-05:00

Wouldn't you kill for a party like this in your honor? Think flappers, prohibition and dark seedy speakeasies. And hard liquor. Always think of the hard liquor. This is going to be the perfect way to say goodbye to your (pun alert!) Roaring Twenties on say, your 30th birthday!

Planning this baby is SO fun. I'm up to my eyeballs in gold spray paint & rum. But not at the same time. I do not condone drunken painting.

all image sources can be found on my Roaring Twenties Pinterest Board

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You can also feel free to hire me for your next party. Serious. How fun would that be?

February's Menu Plan: Handfuls of Russell Stover's

2012-01-25T07:30:00.000-05:00

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Ok lovebirds, I've got February's Menu Plan for you a week early since I've got something special up my sleeve on the blog all next week. Anyway, it all sounds really good this month so I hope you find a recipe or six that you can use. Anything from last month leave an impression? We really liked the Bacon & Gruyere Crusted Meatloaf and the Pierogie Casserole. Clearly we love the comfort foods round here. Now git to clickin. Oh and if you're new around here (hi!), you can click here for menu plans of months past.

1. Sweet Pork Tacos and Cilantro Ranch

2. Rigatoni with Eggplant and Pine Nut Crunch

3. Baked Pesto Chicken

4. Ham & Cheese Sliders

5. Stuffed Peppers with Italian Sausage

6. Sauteed Chicken & Apples

7. Cranberry Pork Roast

8. Fusilli with Spinach, Ricotta & Raisins

9. Mac & Cheese Chicken

10. Jalapeno Kettle Chip Chicken

11. Brie & Brisket Quesadillas

12. Pioneer Woman's Spaghetti Chicken

13. My Fave Rice & Beans served with Tortilla Chips

14. Stick your finger in every chocolate until you find the caramels

15. Green Chili Turkey Burgers

16. Pistachio and Goat Cheese Chicken

17. Soy Ginger Beef and Noodle Salad

18. Chicken Suiza Sandwiches

19. Crockpot Orange Chicken

20. Greek Pastitsio

21. Martha's Beef Stroganoff

22. Chicken Cutlets with Fennel Salad

23. Lazy Girl's Chicken Enchiladas

24. Pork Mole

25. Chicken Cacciatore

26. Italian Crescent Casserole

27. Chicken Tikka Masala

28. Mini Deep Dish Pizza

29. PW's Beef and Peppers

I'm also always on the lookout for new and interesting recipes so if you have one that you think we all might like, let me know! Pinterest only gets me so far.

Peace Sign or Bunny Ears...You Decide

2012-01-23T07:30:00.000-05:00

The evening started out pretty normal. I headed into the city to meet up with my buds, for dinner at the Continental. I already told you guys what an amazing night this was for me...best friends, lots of fancy boozes, yum food, what else do you need?

We sang Happy Birthday to Katie, who turned 31 just yesterday.

btdub, I hope you had an awesome birthday Kate!

then after blowing out her candles, I headed to the ladies room...

when, according to Urban Dictionary dot com, I was Photojacked. I left my camera at the table and didn't, until a few days later, find this gem uploading.

My friends are effing weird. And I love em.

Meanwhile, half of us decided to make it a late night and head out to an Irish pub...because as a wise man once said, I've never met an Irish pub I didn't like. Wait, there was no wise man. I said that. And I meant it. So anyway, after handing my expensive camera over to a drunken Irishman to take our picture fifteen times, these were the results. Now keep in mind, I don't look at my pictures after taking them....ever. I like the surprise. So imagine that surprise when I realize that, according to Urban Dictionary dot dom, I'd been Photobombed.

Oh. The peace sign. Good one.

Oh the peace sign and duck lips. Even better.

Well now you just look like an idiot. You can hear the "derrrrr" coming out of her mouth, can't you?

So listen girlie, if you're out there in your sequin trim tank reading my blog (very high possibility, right guys?), I'm not a fan of you ruining my pictures. I prefer to ruin my own pictures with things like leaning over and backwards in an attempt to be the same height as my shorty friends only to showcase my chin region to the world. So for fecks sake lady, the next time you see me taking pictures in the middle of an irish bar, keep your peace signs to yourself. Wait...is she giving me bunny ears? Well that changes everything. Now I'm pissed.

UPDATE: Thanks to the anonymi tipsters, I found out that this was no innocent case of bunny ears. This b was being straight up rude. So I took it to the Shannanigans FB page, where it was suggested that she was giving us the European equivalent of the finger...or she was slow on the draw in giving the crude fingers-over-the-mouth, vag symbol thing. You know what I mean...Anyway, I'm making it my personal mission to spend my weekends in irish pubs in the city of Philadelphia hunting this girl down to publicly shame her. You with me?

I've Achieved It.

2012-01-20T07:30:00.000-05:00

Well ok, they can't all be winners. But 700 times, I've felt the need to blab my personal biznass to the whole world and that's something to be celebrated. Or to be worried about. Whatevs, I'll celebrate. Wine? Ok. Meanwhile, I don't have anything crazy lined up for this here 700th post. I just thought I'd let you know about it. What I do have lined up today is my boy's 17th month. Feel free to celebrate just the same.

Dear Gabe,

If there's one thing you've mastered this month, it's being self-sufficient. As your dear mother lies around with a herniated disc (yep, verified, more on that later), wishing that she could take the muscle relaxers and pain killers during the day, you make me believe you're doing just fine on your own. Although towards the end of the month, you came down with a case of the clingies, for the most part, you've just continued being an awesome little independent player. You are content to pull 25 pieces of wooden play food out of a basket, squeeze your butt into said basket, then pile the food on top of you. Then bust out of said basket. Rinse, repeat. Hours of entertainment. Thank you for being a clever little thing, you make me smile all day long. In the past month, you've also...

- Gone back to bibs. For awhile there, you were strictly anti-bib. We just dealt with lots of costume changes as you wore all of your food. But once your strawberry obsession started, the giant Elmo towel bib entered the scene and it's been smooth sailing.

- Required a real adult-sized fork at every meal. Should I sit down without giving you one, you make it known that you will not be partaking in dinner without the proper utensil.

- Added a few more words to your vocabulary. Your favorite? Your favorite fruit, the bapple. Side note, I'm trying hard not to be one of those moms that says, "oh my kid knows how to say apple, she says it 'ehhhblurrghh'. Right? Totally apple!!" Your favorite letter is B. You say it constantly. You run around the house, yelling "Beeeeeeeee!"

- Decided that haircuts are akin to papercuts between toes. I made the mistake of taking you to the hairdresser for a quick trim. After you cleared the place with your screams, she was only able to cut the front of your hair. I've been perfecting my ninja cutting skills while you're in the tub to get the rest of it, but you're on to me. There's no such thing as distraction.

I really do love spending my days with you kiddo and I'm so happy you're mine.

Love,
Mama

Snack Attack

2012-01-19T07:37:00.000-05:00

Not to be confused with Zack Attack, the fictional rock band fronted by Zack Morris. Surely a fave with all of you nostalgics out there. Seriously, I had more comments on Monday's trip down memory lane than ANYTHING recently. Crazy kids.

Anyway.

I'm pretty predictable. It's mid-January, so I'm obviously on a trying-to-eat-better kick Who isn't, I know. It's harder than I thought, this whole eating well while being a SAHM. When I was working, I was on a good schedule, chugging my water at my desk all day, eating the same lunch most days of the week, bringing calorie-deprived snacks from home and eating them at the same time every day. It made things easy. Go home, work out, eat normal dinner, done. But now, no two days are the same.

Sure, we sort of have a schedule but mostly that's just for my tiny boss. There's no telling where I'm eating my meals, at what times, and shit, what am I going to dig up to feed myself when I just gave Gabe the last veggie burger? He's constantly trying to get into the cabinets, begging for food like a dog, so snacking is kind of a problem around here. I give him a good mix of graham & animal crackers, cereal bars, strawberries, apples and pears. What do I get? Usually half a sleeve of Ritz crackers and a string cheese while I'm picking up the Cheerio explosion that occurred the night before.

Moral of the story? If snacktime is all the time, then I needed some new snacks. These are my obsessions this week: All are actually enjoyable and give off the impression of being "good for you". In the past I did Weight Watchers and have been counting points for most of my adult life but I'm trying to lose that mindset and just go with overall stuff that isn't complete shit for me. I'll never be a processed, convenience-food-free kind of girl but it's all about making better choices, right?

1 / 2 / 3/ 4

1) I'm not sure what made me pick Trader Joe's Cinnamon Almonds off the shelf. Normally I couldn't care less about almonds or cinnamon flavor but I bought them anyway. And it works. Sweet, crunchy, all that jazz. The serving size is a 1/4 cup but I grab 3-5 nuts in passing and it does the trick.

2) Dudes, let's chat about Girl Scout Cookies. I live for one. The Samoa. I know they changed the name but call it what you will, it will always be the Samoa. (btw, Samoans do the humpty hump). Anyway, I've taste-tested every flavor of every fiber bar out there and this is the best one I've ever had. The caramel coconut fudge bar is basically a Samoa bar. Get some.

3) My mom has, admittedly, been on every diet known to man. When you grow up in a household like that, you get used to eating some crazy stuff that is usually made of chemicals and is trying to be passed off as tasting just like the original. If there's a low-fat, no calorie version of it, we've tried it. Anyway, my mom used to bring home meringue cookies and I was never, ever on board. They tasted like cardboard to me and I wanted nothing to do with them. For some reason, I tasted one recently and kinda dug it. So I picked up a pack of Mint Choco Chip ones. They.are.bang.in, Bangin. I love them so much I can hardly stand it.

4) I always forget about cereal any other time of day besides breakfast. But um, it's totally a viable snack. Yeah, my idea of a serving size and theirs is quite a bit different but I'm working on it. This cereal is currently on sale at target by the entrance. That's why I bought it. But it's good and I've bought it twice this week.

So there you go. Do you have any other easy ideas for me to add into my rotation? Suggestions of hummus will make me vom. Please don't suggest hummus.

Take a Trip With Me...

2012-01-16T07:30:00.000-05:00

Down memory lane if you will.Let's pretend we're in 5th grade and we're having a sleepover at my house ok? The following is what we're going to be discussing:

Notes! Oh how many different ways can we fold these babies before we pass them back and forth?I was an ace at note-folding. An ace I tell you. I had techniques you ain't never seen before!

McNugget characters.Im sorry, how cute are these? And I'm so glad there is a picture of these for posterity's sake because you know our kids won't ever have toys based on deep fried chicken nuggets. Sucks for them.

Young and modern? This was the next step after Teen Magazine. I was not Modern nor was I a teen but I sat my ass in the magazine aisle at Pathmark while my mom grocery shopped and got my fill of lies guys tell for sex. I was ready.

There are no words for the awesomeness that was charms. There are words to describe Clearly Canadian though: delicious, refreshing, bubbly. My best friend and I used to walk over to the Swiss Farms, pick up a Tastykake and a Clearly Canadian and sit on the curb. Good times.

I think it's abundantly clear that I've had an obsession with stationary supplies since I came out of my mom. In fact, I came out of my mom with a trapper keeper, filled with fresh notebook paper and a pencil case full of awesome purple ink pens and blueberry scented markers. Oh and I also had both of these babies. LalalalalalaLOVE.

It's obvious why I mastered this technique. You know I signed my name with this S for MONTHS.

Forget the crown though. I don't know what dork added that.

Who cares if your ears are pierced? Sticky earrings were the shit no matter what!

Yes. Yes. Yes. After Tinkerbell, you move onto the grown up makeup...Kissing Koolers.

This really was my first razor, so gracefully shoplifted for me by my friend. What a doll.

Two McDonald's references in one post? They sure had some effective marketing, didn't they?

Did you guys read this? I was always troubled by the author's name. How the h-e-double-hockey-sticks do you pronounce Barthe???

Ok, let's all make an agreement to not admit that we watched Zoobilee Zoo. Because we're 5th graders and we're clearly too old for that shizz. And you're right, it's effing creepy. But good. Oh so good.

My girl down there in the red jumpsuit was rocking socks with sandals before it was cool. Waiiiiiiiit....

And finally, the reason that school is tolerable. Thank you Miss Frank. Btdubs, what a weird name for a line of psychedelic school supplies for little girls, right?

Wasn't that fun? I'm pretty glad I did this blog post soley for the fact that I can show my kids one day. Then they can roll their eyes and laugh at me. Then I'll laugh at them. And send them to their rooms.

all via by way of one of my favorite pinners Alison. Guys, go spend two more hours looking at all of these. Especially you Kel. (my best friend is the most nostalgic person I've ever met).

Flashback Friday: No Boys Allowed

2012-01-13T07:48:00.000-05:00

I'm flashing back to high school today. High school in general was pretty awesome. I entered it kinda shy and quiet and left four years later as an outspoken class clown. I can't say for sure, but I'm guessing this awesome turnabout of my personality was the product of a single-sex education. We didn't have to worry about what we looked like since our uniforms were all straight fug. If we wore our maroon tights with runs in them two days in a row and they started to smell a bit funky, no one cared. We perfected "the knot" hair-do because we had no boys to impress with blow-dried hair. We just threw it up in a scrunchie right out of the shower and knotted it on top of our heads. We could focus on what type of personality we wanted to be that month without having to impress some boy we had a crush on. We could sit around the cafeteria scarfing fries and rice krispie treats without some d-bag high school boys making comments. We could literally, just be us. I mean, sure there was an all boys school sitting 10 feet away on our campus and every now and then we'd share some classes but they were on our turf. We ran the place and if we wanted to walk around wearing men's boxer shorts hanging out from under our jumpers, then we'd do it.

Unfortch, it seems that this freedom won't be realized by girls in my old 'hood much longer. The Archdiocese of Philadelphia has determined that due to their shit-tastic running of their schools, several of our area high schools and grade schools will be closed. My high school is on that list, Archbishop Prendergast High School aka Prendie. They blame underenrollment. They don't blame the shit show they've created behind closed doors of the Archdiocese. This news is huge around here. Around here, when you ask someone where they are from, they respond with their parish...St. Phils, St. Joe's and the like. It's an identity for so many of us growing up here. And when they close those schools, so goes that identity. When they close the only accessible single sex education institution in the area, so goes that freedom to just be yourself.

1998 was the year of the sweater.

Why yes, that is a Wu-Tang shirt I'm wearing. What of it?

A lot of people are on the SAVE PRENDIE!!!!! bandwagon, filling out surveys pledging alumni donations, plastering their Facebook walls with pleas to keep the place open, updating their statuses (stati?) daily with the school's fight song or wondering if they'd just let them walk through one more time. Not I though. Gathering in a peaceful protest on the school grounds will not move the Archdiocese. They are not moveable. So while I'm forever grateful for the opportunity to have gone to an all girl catholic high school, I won't mourn the loss of the school itself. I've got my best friends, I've got my memories and I've got my personality to show for it.

My super talented writer friend wrote about this sitch much more eloquently. She's one of my favorite fellow alums.

Lucky Me

2012-01-12T08:56:00.000-05:00

Source: Uploaded by user via Margo on Pinterest

I spent much of the past weekend in a constant state of blissful gratitude. Now you guys know me, I'm not one to wax poetic about the beauty of the world around me and being thankful for everything on earth and all that hooey. In fact, I mostly roll my eyes at that sort of thing. But after the weekend I had, I realized how much I do have and man, I'm a lucky girl. I just kept running head-on into things that any girl would be thanking the stars for, ya know? So I did. Instead insert God for stars. On Friday night, I headed into town to meet up with my best girls for dinner. To have money to eat out at a fancy joint and drink fancy drinks, to have the funniest effing friends that make me laugh til my side hurts, to have a husband that asks no questions about how much I'm spending or what time I'm coming home. All good things.

That night turned into a late one and when I finally crawled into bed in the wee hours of the morn, I was dreading the next morning. I even considered leaving John a note, begging him for a late wake-up. But I didn't need to. A late wake-up call happened to the tune of a crumbly McDonald's bag and the cure for all that ailed me. This, my friends, is why I married him. We spent our Saturday at Lowes and playing outside and making lists of house to-do's. Because even if we don't have the money to do everything that needs to be done right now, we have an amazing house that not only gives us shelter, it looks cute doing it. Bonus. We've got a nice big yard for our healthy little son to run around in. See? All these amazing things I've got going for me...it's pretty awesome.

It's weekends like this that I need to re-live on the days when my back pain is relentless and I'm feeling like a less than stellar wife for not cooking dinner. When I'm calling myself a shitty mom for keeping the tv on all day to entertain Gabe. When I'm feeling the tug of the pursestrings when something unexpected comes up. When it's so easy to get down in the dumps for any number of reasons. I've got a charmed life and I just need to remember it.

Funny enough (not funny at all really), I wrote this the other day when I was riding high on the gratitude train in the sky. I was all set to publish it when that stupid effing back pain came back. And when that happens, I was like, meh, I don't feel like dealing with the blog. I don't feel like dealing with much. When I'm not stretched out on the couch in the one position that doesn't send shooting pains down my back, I hobble around the house, with an uncanny resemblance to the hunchback of Notre Dame, silently willing Gabe to be perfectly content with the lack of activity. It blows. I've been to the doctor, been put on medicine but the pain comes back. I'm actually going for an MRI today, praying that they find something in which to attribute this pain. So yeah, it's gonna take some extra oomph today to remember how good I have it. And some valium. Which I had prescribed to take before my MRI so I'm not thrashing about because of claustrophobia. Maybe I should have gotten extras. Mother's Little Helper indeed.

Making Do in My Living Room

2012-01-10T08:05:00.000-05:00

The cleaning, reorganizing and redecorating bug has hit me bad this year. Normally I can't wait to get the decorations down and get the place clean and sparse after the holidays but this year, I'm not going for sparse. I'm going for "decorated". My focus right now is my living room. Here's the deal. When we moved in, we loved the paint color. It's a greeny gray, similar to the middle picture below. Unfortunately, this room is where our old furniture ended up, our old furniture being a charcoal gray sectional sofa (similar to the pic below), a giant matching armchair and a big old tube tv. The furniture clashes with the walls.Yet neither are going anywhere anytime soon.

Another problem I ran into was one that I always said I wouldn't have: letting my child run the show. As in, get rid of the coffee table for his safety. We're now using a tiny little graham cracker covered ottoman as a combination foot stool/coffee table/wipe stash. We also had to block off the back of the tv with side tables so he wouldn't go running back there, chewing on cords. Function over form apparently. Well that's over. Sort of. He's out of the doing-major-harm stage and he's cut back on his cord chewing habit so I can attempt to put shit back together again. Here's the plan:

1/2/3/4/5/6/7

So besides re-arranging a few things, I'm adding a couple new things and shopping my house. Even though it may seem silly to buy new pillows when you have a grubby handed little toddler, we are in major need of them. And they're fairly cheap. I'm adding to the gallery wall that I've been slowly putting together with our new photos...mostly giant Gabes everywhere. And a little splurge on the lighting, mostly because John always complains that it's too dark in our living room. Hmmm, I wonder why. The dark couch and the dark walls? You don't say.

I'm also in the market for artwork. Probably something to DIY. Have you seen any cool ideas? The only thing I can think of is paint chip art and frankly, I've had enough of that.

Also, what do you guys have on your windows? We have nice curtains but we also have the dreaded white mini blinds. I don't like them but I like the privacy and light they offer. Are there any other options for me? Halp.

Anyway, I'm hoping this turns out half decent. Because, as I tell John all the time, for as much as I enjoy looking at pretty rooms and stuff, I haven't decorated anything other than a nursery in awhile. He reminds me that I did two nurseries. Whatever. We're on my side here, not John's.

This is NOT my Christmas Re-Cap, Swears.

2012-01-05T08:12:00.000-05:00

I lied. Sorry.

I know, I know, everyone has already moved onto New Years resolution posts and beyond by now and my sorry ass is just now posting about Christmas. Oh well, grin and bear it. Gabe looks cute, that's all we care about right? I swear, one of these days, I'm going to post something of substance. It's my New Years resolution. There, I made this post about New Years, so we're good now, right? Ok good, let's get on with it.

We host our annual Christmas eve dinner at our house. It's a small crew, our fam, my mom, my brother and his kids. Gabe is suspect.

I finally get a ta-da! out of him.

disclaimer: Every picture taken this Christmas sucked. I don't know why. They just did.

And word to the wise Shan, pea soup green is not your color. Lose it. Meanwhile, that's another one of my New Years resolutions...Stop buying cheap clothes that don't work for me. See? This is clearly a New Years post.

After the oblig photo shoot by the tree, we moved into the dining room for dinner. Two memorable things happened. No, three. 1) Someone, and I don't know who, spilled their glass of fruit punch all over the table. No biggie. Except my elaborate centerpiece consisted of about 89 different pieces, as seen here. Mad scramble to get everything off the table and sop up the punch. Oh well, it only made Gabe's mess that much more tolerable. 2) Gabe learned how to use a real fork. He just picked it up and went to town on his spaghetti and meatballs. And 3) my party cracker didn't have a toy inside! Not fair!

We then moved onto presents. Gabe was a fan. Yeah play tent yeah! That's mine!

My mom gave gabe this guitar that plays The Police. It.is.awesome. Why don't more toys play classic rock?

Gabe says, "May the odds be ever in your favor."

It's a Gabe inabox!

I love this next pic even if it's blurry. Let's all just lay under the tree, ok?

Then we put out candy cane Jo-Jo's and milk for Santa. Note to self: buy cuter Santa plate.

So after Gabe went to bed, Santa came and put up the 2nd tree. I think it was worth it.

He liked it.

Good thing those Christmas pj's came in a two pack. Christmas Eve is not exempt from leakage.

I just thought that one was funny.

I feel like Gabe looks a lot like Biebs in this pic, don't you? Oh and this sled was his favorite gift from Santa.

And while technically it's his 2nd viewing of A Christmas Story on Christmas morn, last year didn't count. This year, he was mesmerized by the Bumpus hounds.

Yay Christmas!

Sorry I tricked you.

Look at Us Frolicking

2012-01-03T07:54:00.000-05:00

Well we finally did it. Ponied up some cash to pay a photographer to take our family pictures. It's so easy to not do it. I came up with a bunch of reasons to keep putting it off with the overwhelming thoughts being 1) good photographers are expensive ( at least in my neck of the woods) and that money could be much better spent 2) I'm less than thrilled with my appearance and 3) I take a decent shot of Gabe every now and then, why pay somebody?

I was wrong. So very wrong. It was worth it. After months of research, where I continued to be disappointed by the prices of photographers whose style I really liked, I finally found Gretchen Johnson. Her talent does not match up with her pricing at all. Plus, she's so freakin personable, it was like being with a friend right away. She was amazing with Gabe too, which says a lot because he's getting to the age where being still for 2 seconds is pretty much impossible. So anyway, here are a few of my faves.

Obviously we bought the rights to ALL OF THEM because how could we choose??

Minty Fresh Dinner Party

2012-01-02T09:33:00.001-05:00

I hosted a birthday dinner party for my friend Adrienne at our house last month. Adrienne loves herself some polka dots and I had been itching to make a mint green cake, so that's where my little theme came from. I actually ended up making two cakes because I was insistent on making a mini cake. After I realized a mini cake would feed only mini me, I whipped up another one of Betty C.'s finest to feed the rest of the crowd. I had seen the swirly rosette technique on pinterest, and surprisingly, I thought I did an okay job for my first go at it.

As per my usual, I didn't use tablecloths, I used Ikea curtain panels to cover the tables. They have a pretty sheen to them, which was kinda perfect for my little winter wonderland thing I had going on.

The placemats are actually pieces of fabric paper that I found on clearance at Michaels. I was okay using them if they were just paper so the fact that they had a linen-type texture to them made them look a little fancier.

Pom pom trim turned napkin rings

I had some mint green tissue paper that I literally stuffed into some jars last minute, mostly because I like a full table. You know, one covered with tons of shit? I just keep adding and adding. Oh green grocery store flowers for four bucks? You'll work.

See that flatware? It's from the Dollar Tree. I thought it looked pretty darn good for being plastic.

I guess I'll let you in on the secret that I was trying to mix my icing to exactly match the little table. Do you do that sort of thing? Get it in your head what something is supposed to look like then go mad trying to make it happen? It also happened when I was making icing for Gabe's birthday cupcakes. Maybe I just have an icing problem? Yeah I think I definitely have an icing problem. On many levels.

I added a quick little paint chip banner tied with minty green ribbons to the chair of our guest of honor. Just for kicks.

And now, straight out of the camera with the dreaded flash, how things looked within an hour or two...

Hope you had a marvelous birthday A!

Oh and I can finally let you in on a few secrets I've been keeping under lock and key! This girl's having a baby! This girl's having another baby! And THIS GIRL went and had a surprise NYE wedding! Congratulations girls, you're all my faves and I am so so happy for you!

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Let's Wrap This Thing Up

2011-12-30T08:29:00.000-05:00

2011: More good stuff happened then bad. We made it out alive. All is well. Here's the highlight reel...

In January, I had a 5 month old but still made it out on the town.

In February, I started sleep training Gabe. Btdubs, he sleeps like a champ these days. Worth it.

In March, we built this dream together, standing strong together, nothing's gonna stop us now....

In April, I posted vids of Gabe using his walker. Go check em out for old times sake. Adorbs.

In May, I gave you a flashback to 1997, when I was 17.

In June, I turned 31 and had a stellar day.

In July, I debuted Gabe's 2nd nursery in under a year. Thank you for not calling me insane.

In August, we roadtripped it to Illinois to see my dad and Kim. Oh and threw a little gnome bash.

In September, I launched Bottle Pop Party Company. It's awesome. Hire me.

In October, I hosted a crew of awesome bloggers for Always Bloggy in Philadelphia. Best decision ever.

In November, I showed you my tiny mime and then flew off to Minneapolis for a crazy last minute bach party.

In December, I made shit festive.

I hope you all have a safe and happy New Year's. I've got a list of resolutions. I'm all about them this coming year. 2012 is gonna be chock-full of good things, I can feel it. And it has nothing to do with it being an even number, which I've been stressing about all year. Suffice to say, being 31 in 2011 was unsettling. Is that weird? Ha. Go pop some bottles this weekend kids! Or go to sleep early. I'm a big fan of both.

January's Meal Plan: Resolution Makers Guaranteed Disappointment

2011-12-29T08:02:00.001-05:00

So it's almost January. Time to resolve to eat nothing but lettuce and fiber one bars. Good luck with that. Here's what we're eating. Btdub, I decided to for-go providing the grocery list. It was a lot of work and it didn't seem that there were too many people making use of it. If you did, sorry pal. Also, sorry for the amount of cheese and broccoli that this meal plan involves. I guess I had a hankering when I was planning. As always, if you liked something from last month's plan, let a girl know so she can bookmark that shizz.

1. Creamy Chicken Taquitos

2. Slow Cooker French Dip Sandwiches

3. Alice Springs Chicken

4. Cheeseburger Pie

5. Taco Salad

6. Cheesey Ham Calzones

7. Skillet Chili Mac

8. Spicy Jalapeno Sliders

9. Bacon Honey Dijon Chicken

10. Ham & Broccoli Crescent Braid

11. Velvet Chicken

12. Pierogie Casserole

13. Chicken Gyros

14. Open

15. Beef & Broccoli

16. Parmesan Pork Roast

17. Herb Chicken Sliders with Raspberry Mustard

18. Beef Empanadas

19. Cheesey Taco Pasta

20. Chipotle Mac & Cheese Stuffed Poblanos

21. Honey Glazed Chicken

22. Ricotta Dumplings

23. Bacon & Gruyere Crusted Meatloaf

24. Chicken & Broccoli Packets

25. Open

26. Chicken & Spinach Stuffed Shells

27. Oven Baked Chicken Fajitas

28. Lynette's Ham & Noodles

29. Penne with Pancetta & Brussels

30. Yogurt Chicken

31. Oven Hot Dogs

If you're new around here, check out my handy dandy meal planning posts of yesteryear here.

And just thinking out loud here, if you're one of my (ridiculously awesome) readers who utilizes the menu plans, would you ever consider paying for this service? Like I'm talking under 5 bucks. And it would include the grocery list. Let me know, kthx!

Merry Christmas

2011-12-23T07:29:00.001-05:00

our 2011 Christmas card

I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas! See you next week!

It's Gettin Festive Up in Here

2011-12-22T09:16:00.000-05:00

I think I'm done. Done shopping, wrapping, decorating...all of it. I thought it would feel good. But I love the hustle and bustle. I keep trying to think of excuses to go back to the Target Christmas aisles (although I felt like they were kinda disappointing this year, anyone else?) and buy buy buy more stuff. Budget? What budget? Anyway, here's the house. It's been a bit tricky this year with the decorating. Little hands like to move things. I didn't want that to completely stop me from decorating, because face it, that's kinda depressing. So I put out things that I wouldn't mind finding shattered on the tile floor. Because again, face it, that's a very clear and present danger in our house. Nothing is safe. No snowman, no nutcracker, no ornament can escape the clenches of a determined toddler.

Tiny scattered toys...standard.

The dog is not a present. His name is Rory and I thought he looked charming under the tree.

Flags from Gabe's birthday party get another use.

Breaking news...the middle nutcracker is now missing his feet.

Lazy cat...also standard.

Hey cute babies!

The extent of my kitchen decorating.

My stairs felt boring so I pulled this fug old garland up from the basement and dressed it up with some ribbon and tie-dye ornaments. The colors match the second Christmas tree that will go up on Christmas eve, Santa-style. See, John grew up believing that Santa left a decorated tree on Christmas. I grew up decorating my tree with my mom weeks before Christmas. There's no way I'm waiting til Christmas eve to enjoy a sparkly tree. So we compromised (a new thing for me). THe big tree went up the day after Thanksgiving in the family room. The smaller tree will go up below the stairs in the living room on Christmas eve. This will be "from Santa". We'll see how many years it takes before I stop compromising. Because really, who the efffff has the time on Christmas eve to put up a tree? There will be bikes and dollhouses to build!

and once again, we venture to the dining room. Sorry for the repeat pictures. It's just so darn sparkly in there.

I've decided that this house needs a 3rd tree too. There's a bay window in my dining room that you can see from the street. It's dying for a tree. I'll be on the lookout for one after Christmas. Where do you guys find the best post-Christmas sales? I feel like Target's selection this year kinda blows and I don't ever really shop anywhere else. Spill the beans...this girl needs some 70% off sales.

16 Months Down

2011-12-20T08:07:00.000-05:00

Dear Gabe,

FYI, your mama and toddlerhood? We're like peas and carrots. For as many feelings of IhavenoideawhatI'mdoing that I experienced when you were an infant, I've got twice as many I'vegotthis feelings now. I guess I just do better with laughing, spunky little dudes running around than silly, sleep-stealing babies that just lie there and cry. And you my boy, are are the spunkiest. As we creep up on your 2nd Christmas, let's sit back, put up our feet and look back on what you've been doing this past month...

- You learned to knock on doors. It's adorable. Your Geeg (GiGi) taught you that.

- You spin around and around and get dizzy. She taught you that too.

- You blow kisses too! Seriously, your Geeg teaches you everything! She does something once and you absorb it like a sponge.

Meanwhile, I've been trying to get you to identify your ears for like 6 months to no avail.

- You survived mama being away all weekend. And as soon as you spotted me, you pointed to me. Now you do that all the time. Again with the adorableness.

- You learned ta-da! Wonder who taught you that.

-You started using utensils on a regular basis. And you've been using bowls and plates without throwing them around. Next up? The spork.

- You tried fish nuggets. And promptly gave me a "meh". Or what I imagine to be a meh.

- And the funnest one of all, you're saying letters! You love saying B and D but you'll also throw in an A, E, I and O. You also make the ssssss sound and you're testing out your l's. It's super duper exciting to see your brain working.

And I'm sure you've done a million other things but I can't keep up with you. Every day it's something new and you constantly crack us up. We love you to pieces Gabriel.

Love,

Mama

btw peeps, the winner of the Thirty-One tote is Emily! Congrats Em, you'll be hearing from me!

Dare to DIY: Chris Tradish

2011-12-19T08:07:00.000-05:00

While it felt like everyone I know on Facebook was out and about at work holiday parties this past weekend, we were where we usually are...at home. And we were Christmasing it up just the same. I did a little late night shopping then came home to teach John how to wrap presents. Now don't get me wrong, he can wrap a present. But can he add the right amount of accessories, including ribbons and such, that I require? The answer is no, no he can't. So while we slammed back Cranberry Gin Fizzes, we wrapped (my own) presents. I had that nice warm feeling inside of holiday goodness. Granted, that could be the gin but whatevs. I'm thinking holiday drinkies might be the new tradition for us. Oh and btdub, it's the 6th and final week of Kim's Dare to DIY Challenge and this week's dare is to Have Traditions. We've got a few of those up our sleeve too.

Since Gabe was born last year, we picked up a Baby's 1st ornament at Target and called it a day. Ideally, I'd like to be one of those moms who hands their child a carefully crafted box of ornaments from every year of their life, as they move out on their own. All sentimental and shit. Yeah, that's me.

So to be that mom, I had to find an ornament for this year. I was checking all of the overpriced ornaments at Hallmark but seriously, they had nothing. So I went back to Target. I scanned the ornaments from the end of the aisle because it was jam packed and saw this baby...

Perfect right? He's a gnome! Or an elf, whatever, same thing I s'pose. I 'm preferring to call him a Christmas gnome. In case you are new around here or just don't pay attention, Gabe had a gnome-themed first birthday party this year. Serendipitous. I am well on my way to becoming World's Best Mom (WBM). Don't try and beat me in that competition. I've been known to cheat.

I guess I can also enter this next tradish into evidence for my case as WBM. It's the feast of St. Nicholas...on December 6. Growing up in my super duper Catholic house, we'd put our shoes by the front door the night before, and the next morning, they'd be fulled with little treats. We'd also put our saddle shoes out in the hallway in grade school that day too and St. Nick would drop by there too. Double treatage. Sweet. So I decided to start that tradition at home. Of course, John, being a non-Catholic/heathen, gave me the side-eye when he heard I was filling up shoes with things.

But he sure didn't give me any eyes but appreciative ones the next morn when St. Nick left a Hershey bar and nerd cards in his sneaks, now did he? Little buddy picked up a Pouty Petey book as well as a fruit pouch. I scored a set of cute notecards, new pens and a Peppermint Patty. Plus, some cute new glittery initial ornaments. What's not to like about this tradish?

Bottle Pop Parties: Punk Rock Baby

2011-12-15T07:39:00.001-05:00

So the other day I mentioned working on the first birthday of a pretty blog-famous blog baby, MODG's baby G. She first posted on her blog awhile ago about wanting to pretty much do nothing for this party. And um, that's where I came in. And when she mentioned that the theme of the party was old school Punk Rock, I might have thought she was kidding. Because, if you read her blog, she does that a lot, the kidding. But nope, she was serious. Then I got really excited because c'mon? That's a pretty effing cool party for a one year old. We all know they don't know the difference anyway, so why not do something awesome?

Oh and yeah, I suppose you've realized by now that I live sorta near MODG, right? Ok, well they chose a little coffeehouse/music venue for the party, called Steel City Coffee House. The owner was awesome. I got there extra early to set up and he let me do my thing without bothering me. He even broke out a 12 foot ladder to catch a rogue giant balloon. Nice guy.

The venue was perfect for this theme, obviously. From the 3D background on the stage to the black and purple walls, all the decor just fit right in. Sometimes it sucks to go all out on a theme only to realize that the location you're using totally clashes.

Speaking of decor, when I first heard the theme, I freaked for a second, trying to figure out what to do. Obviously no one has cornered the market on british punk party printables, ya know? (Clearly I need to open an obscure party theme etsy store) So I had to make my own stuff. I decided on black and red pleather, red plaid and denim. Add in some spikes and safety pins and you're set to go shit-kickin' in your Doc Martens.

This is my proudest creation to date. I had the idea in my head and I promised it to MODG but honestly, I was a little worried about the execution of the fruit mohawk. But it went super quick and turned out exactly as it looked in my head.

I made a shit-ton of these little Sex Pistols flags and had no idea what I was going to do with them. Then I set up the fruit and it hit me. I swear, sometimes the best ideas are the most obvious ones.

The cake. Ohhhhh the cake. It was stunning. MODG had designed it in Paint (what else) and had sent it to me to show me the theme. Well the cake turned out exactly like the design. It was made by my favorite cake girl,

Allison of Allison's Cups n' Cakes.

Oriental Trading...your source for freaking ANYTHING.

Check out these awesome cookies. I didn't have anything to do with them but they were made by MODG's friend, One Preppy Cookie. They were pretty bad ass.

This is my other favorite part, the banner. I was trying to think of something to hang that wouldn't be too cutesy or overdone. So I took a cue from the signs I made for John's 40th, and put little G's face on some punk albums. I thought it was pretty hysterical. A wee baby on a Rancid album? Priceless. In fact, I heard MODG's husband wanted to hang it in their room, which is a pretty big compliment.

Here are some of the albums I made. They look a lot better once they're distorted and printed out. My photoshop head skills leave a lot to be desired.

Pretty cool right? I can't wait to see the rest of the pics from the photog she had at the party. MODG hasn't shared too much about the party yet so if you're one of her readers, consider this your inside scoop.

If you don't already, you probably want to Like Bottle Pop Party Company on Facebook so you get the super inside, inside scoop.

Totes McGoats

2011-12-13T07:35:00.000-05:00

What's worse than an invite to one of those direct-selling parties where you're forced to sit through product demos, play stupid games and drink bad white zin? Then get pressured to buy some crap you don't need? Nothing. Nothing is worse. I think we can agree, as women, that no one likes those things. Kudos to you, independant lady, for running your own business but I prefer to do my shopping with little to no guilt and pressure. But it's not your mom's Tupperware party anymore, nope, the times they are a changing. You are no longer expected to come to my house (but if you still want to, c'mon over) and listen to my friend's schpiel on the line of stuff she's selling. Why? Because we're having a blog party. Consider yourself invited.

So here's your glass of booze. Drink up. Have some virtual dip. Now let's talk about Thirty-One. One of my very best friends, Sarah, is a new Thirty-One consultant. And she wants you to buy stuff from her. I want you to buy stuff from her too. I'm a big fan of supporting my friends. Plus I get free shit if you buy stuff. Oh wait, what does Thirty-One sell you're asking? They sell bags and totes and all kinds of things to keep your disorganized ass organized. And they come in cute prints. And you can get them personalized. Because really, who doesn't love a monogram?

Here's what I'd buy:

a cute little herringbone wristlet

a padded laptop bag

a change purse/going-to-the-bar-money-and-ID-holder

jewelry pouches...I totally need these. And I love a stripe.

You can go check out the rest of the catalog here. And if you'd like to place an order and help a workin' but would rather be SAH'ing mama out, then order right here. Click the link to Place an Order, then select Shannanigan's party.

And what good is it going to one of these things if you don't get something free? Sarah is offering one reader a Thermal Tote of their own, in any print shown below, with embroidery included. That's pretty sweet.

Click to enlarge

Here's how to enter:

1) Be a follower of Shannanigans & Like Sarah's Thirty-One Facebook Page for one entry.

2) Buy Stuff! Spend $10, get one extra entry, spend $20 get two extra entries, $40 for three, $80 for four, etc

3) Book a Blog Party with Sarah and get 3 extra entries.

Plus, if you sign up to work with Sarah as a Thirty-One consultant (only $99 for your starter kit) you automatically receive a free thermal tote!

Meanwhile, enjoy a picture of Gabe and Sarah's son Maks, little buddies then and now.

and just for shits and giggles, here's me and Sarah, circa 1997

Now let's buy some shit!

Dare to DIY: Mason Jar Snowglobe

2011-12-12T09:10:00.000-05:00

Seeing as how I'm obsessed with mason jars, it's really no surprise that my project for week 5 of Kim's Dare to DIY Challenge: Dare to Decorate is a DIY Mason Jar Snowglobe. Have you seen these things floating around Pinterest? Apparently Anthropologie is selling these babies for a pretty penny. However, I'm confused, because don't snow globes have water in them? Anthro's version doesn't. Don't get me wrong, they're adorable as is. Check out the ones my friend Bethany made. Yep, adorbs. But I wanted water in mine to get the full snow globe effect. So I glued my little tree to the lid of the mason jar, shook a little faux snow and glitter in there, then filled it to the very tippy top with water. I screwed that bad boy shut.

Then shook the crap out of it.

A lot of the snow stayed at the top of the jar so maybe I used too much? Who knows. And who knows about the longevity of this thing. I'm crossing my fingers it doesn't leak or anything. But as usual, I really don't care. It looks pretty right now and my need for instant glittery gratification has been satisfied.

Now go check out the rest of the holiday pretties...

p.s. Thanks to all of you that went and offered your help for Operation WANA. You guys are amazing.

Operation WANA

2011-12-09T08:19:00.000-05:00

Do you guys read MODG? Well she posted a teaser the other day about her son's first birthday party and she got some digs about how she spends her money. It was a few rude people assuming a lot and running their big mouths in the comments. Well MODG started questioning how much, as a blogger, she is expected to share about her life. So in a joking way (as if there's any other way with MODG) she called out her readers to leave their detailed financial statements in the comments. The reason I paid so much attention to these blog posts and comments? Because I worked on her son's party this past weekend, which was pretty awesome and I'll tell you about it soon. So why am I telling you?

Well a few people took her seriously in her comments and laid it out there. They described the shitty financial situations they've found themselves in. Well this blatant shock of reality in her sarcastic, joking world pushed MODG to open the comments to people who could help. It's called Operation WANA: We Are Not Assholes. She invited people who are in need to lose their pride and post what they needed. Most have little kids, all are worried about rent, bills and Christmas. Honestly guys, it's heartbreaking. I sat there for over an hour last night, crying and reading. Refreshing and crying some more. Sure, this time of year brings out the emotions in people anyway but when you see a woman, who reminds you of yourself, asking people for help with a Christmas present or some hand me down clothes, well I couldn't not offer some help. We don't have too much extra at our house but I definitely have enough to buy a couple books and an outfit or two at Target for a baby girl, ya know?

So I chose a woman living in Florida with three kids. I don't know her full story and I'm not gonna bother her with questions but her and her husband and have found themselves pretty much homeless and living at a Salvation Army. She needs things for her kids and obviously things for themselves. So I'm gonna send some things. I'm not even sure where I'm going with this. I guess I'm just asking you to help. You can go read the comments and pick someone to help or you can join up with me to help this family in a dire situation. Leave me a message in the comments if you want to do such a thing and we can figure it out. Let's not be assholes.

If I Could Only Buy Booze at H&M

2011-12-08T08:13:00.000-05:00

Remember Thanksgiving? That major holiday that happened like last week or something? Nah, me neither. I'm too wrapped up in everything flavored with Trader Joe's candy cane jo-jo's. It's a serious problem. Anyway, in my rush to get to Christmas present and craft posts, I forgot to tell youse about our turkey day. Well there isn't much to say anyway. We went to John's uncle's house, which is a major change to how things are normally done. Both of our families live close enough so that we hit both in one day. Well add a toddler in the mix and that shizz just ain't happenin. We've got naptimes and bedtimes to think about. And honestly, it's probably for the better.

See, holidays bring out the excessive drinker in me. I looooove me some festive boozin. And when I'm drinking for a few hours, sometimes I don't know when to pack it up and head home. I've totally been the last guest at your party before. Oblivious to that fact that I should leave. Some people might find this troublesome, I don't. I find it um, spirited. So anyway, with a looming 7:30 bedtime, my consumption of the peen greegsh gets limited to non-headache inducing amounts. This is good for everyone involved. I get a nice little buzz that allows me to showcase a smidgen of personality to my husband's fam but not enough where I'm cursing myself the next morning.

So I realized a couple things this Thanksgiving. 1) My world won't end if I don't see my own fam on Thanksgiving.

2) It's sort of possible to get a decent family shot, with a flash, in a basement

3) Gabe needs his hair suck-cutted.

4) H&M for kid shoes. 10 bucks.

4) My husband's a looker

5) Gabe digs his grandpa

6) But is leary of older cousins. Although I feel like Gabe looks like a Lil Rascal here and could run with a much older crowd of boys, roaming the streets, causing shenanigans and whatnot. Do you see that?

So other than outing my drinking problems and my secret go-to for kids shoes, I've got not much else to say. You can now return to your previously scheduled Christmas flavored coffee drinks.

It would Advent-tagious of You to Read This Post

2011-12-06T07:39:00.002-05:00

Man, I'm clever. Anywho, this is my advent calendar! On my chalkboard! Get excited! And I only named it our Christmas Countdown because ADVENT CALENDAR!!!! just doesn't scream fun and festive. So whatevs.

If you follow anyone anywhere on Pinterest, you've seen the multitudes of adorbs advent calendars out there. I knew I wanted to have an adorbs one too. But I also wanted to spend zero money. So here's what I did.

I broke out a box of waxed paper sheets they use in delis. Don't ask why I have these. I bought them in the catering section of my party store though. I folded them up to form little envelopes and taped them to my chalkboard wall.

Then I stamped the numbers on them.

Then I cut up a bunch of squares of paper and wrote down activites on each one. Now don't get me wrong, this took some planning beforehand. And it's going to take a bit of effort to actually complete the activity. Now when I was growing up, we had religious advent calendars where you'd open the little cardboard door to see a Christmas scene. No prizes, no candy, no activities. And it was just as fun. But since Gabe is so little and I love any excuse to make a list, I decided to use Christmas activities that we'd be doing anyway. Like, I wrote down Visit Santa on the night we planned to do it anyway. This makes sense right? Because I feel like I'm overexplaining it.

Grandpa lives in Illinois. And I wanted to introduce Gabe to fingerpaints. So an activity was born.

I've been itching to attempt my own marshmallows but I also have a tendency to be lazy. So we'll see. I also granted myself a no-guilt pass if things don't get done. Well except for visit Santa, we have to do that one.

Dare to DIY: Sundae in a Box!

2011-12-04T21:44:00.000-05:00

I love presents. Getting em. Giving em. All of it. However, I'm usually at a loss when it comes to week 4 of Kim's Dare to DIY Challenge: Dare to Give Homemade Gifts. Of course, when I think "homemade" I think of the normal crap that I've glued together in the past in a last-ditch effort to live up to my craftastic reputation. Never you mind that the reputation is one I made up in my head. In my head, I'm the craftiest thing around. In my head, everyone expects me to churn out a glittered & hot-glued yet useful thingamabobber. In my head, everyone is clamoring for a handmade by Shannon gift. In reality, this never happens. I don't make good gifts. No one I know wants homemade gifts. They want Nintendo DS's and coffee makers and cases of Quaker State oil (srsly). Even last year, I sort of cheated by making snacks. Anyone can make a snack. But this year, I blatantly stole an adorable idea from Pinterest and re-created it to use as gift. And I think it turned out pretty cute.

See, John's got this cousin who has a bunch of kids and they live far away so we barely know them. So I usually try to send a budget friendly family gift. This definitely falls into that category...A Sundae in a Box! Which is better than something else in a box, know what I'm saying? *coughJustinTimberlakecough*

I picked up a couple sets of cute nesting bowls at the Christmas Tree Shoppe for $3.99 per set. Then I added some waffle bowls & fun colored ice cream cones just because they were festive.

Throw in some sprinkles and gummies plus a bottle of magic shell and a fantastic sundae you have.

Turned out pretty cute right? I wouldn't mind if someone gave me one of these. Of course, it also appeals to the theme-lover in me. I think everything in life should be themed. Anyway, thank you Kim, for once again, making me step outside of my comfort level. Go check out the rest of the homemade gifts for ideas too. T minus 3 weeks peeps! 3!

Surprise! Part Two!

2011-12-01T07:33:00.001-05:00

So last time we checked in on our trip to Minneapolis, I think we were shutting down the bar and heading back to our hotel. Since we had no idea if Bethany even had plans that weekend, we didn't make any real plans for Saturday or Saturday night. Turns out she was a free bird and she just stayed with us the rest of the weekend, which was perfect! After lying in bed cursing the world in general for our hangovers, we ventured out for some grub. It was my first time ever going to Potbelly's. As as east coast sandwich afficianado, I thought it was decent. All I really cared about was that fountain Coke. It works wonders.

To all my buddies that suggested I get their cookies, I'm sorry to say I didn't. I wish I did. In fact, I wish I had one right now. But that's neither here nor there. After lunch, we wandered around town. We wandered right up to the 8th floor of Macys for their Santa's workshop thing. As we ascended the escalators pass empty floors, Bethany assured us it would be worth it. And it was. It was so cute. The amount of detail in this place is insane! Add this to the flurries falling outside and it definitely got me in the Christmas spirit. Which I like.

I also like small creepy elves and realistic looking baked goods.

We then headed over to Target. THE FREAKIN FLAGSHIP STORE. As much as I'd like to tell you it was somehow different in some awesome way, it wasn't. It was exactly the same as mine and yours. But it had tables to sit at the Starbucks and look out the windows and watch the snow. I'm pretty sure we sat there for like 3 hours. Just talking. And it was one of my favorite parts of the trip. Talking about anything and everything.

So at that point, our plan for the night was to head back to the hotel, maybe take a nap, then head to dinner. Afterwards, a night in, wearing yoga pants and watching movies sounded good. Yeah, that didn't last long. We picked a restaurant based on some recommendations Nellie had gotten but they had no open reservations. We decided to just head on up and take our chances. Oh thank goodness we did, this place was amazing. It was called Chino Latino and it even glittered. It was meant to be.

The place was hopping. It's an ultra-swank type atmosphere but with a dirty sense of humor. But it wasn't just themey, which you know I love. The food was just amazing, a ridiculously good mexican-asian fusion street food deal. Think nachos & potstickers, pulled pork, tacos & phuket noodles. All so so good.

But um, they had an impressive cocktail menu that was begging to be sampled.

I love a dramatic drink. This blue thing not only tasted good but it had dry ice bubbling up. I have quite the history with dry ice drinks too.

This, my friends, is a Crack Ho Mojito. A mojito is served alongside a few crack viles of flavor add-ins. I know, right? Who came up with this shit?

That there is a monkey humping a donkey.

More restaurants need to serve up hot towels with sparklers, don't you think?

The fortune cookies were fun little surprises. Even if they are incorrect. C'mon, it's A&E!

Ok, so after stuffing ourselves with food and pitchers of sangria, we decided that maybe one more beer wouldn't be the worst idea in the world. So we headed back to the same irish pub we were at the night before. Wow, if we were on fire the night before, we were kinda duds. The only attention we were getting were from grandpas. Seriously. Like really old dudes loved us. But we didn't love them. We actually became buddies with the security dudes and the waitress during our attempts at extracting ourselves from the old dude situation. They were pretty awesome.

But one can only take so much of Santa-look alikes using their white beards as conversation starters, asking us if we'd been good girls. Like, really? Does that work on anyone dude? Cause you're gross. Go away.

Anyway, we stepped outside to find ourselves another good time, only to find ourselves witness to a giant fight. Girls crying, being held back by boys, people running down the block, screaming "Get on the bus!", it was both hilarious and surreal. And I'm a sucker for a good bar fight. The more red faced huffing and puffing and hair pulling, the better. But then again, I was also a fan of G.L.O.W. when I was little. So there's that.

So we headed across the street to another bar Gleuk's, where a terrible band was playing. This is how we felt about them.

Or maybe we felt like this. There was a lot of drinking going on...

But then we made friends with the bartender, who I'm pretty sure now follows me on Twitter. Luckily he had two pairs of ironicly plastic nerd glasses. One for him and one to share!

then 2am came. And the lights came on in the bar. And we felt like this...

So we headed back to the hotel, knowing our flights left verrrrry early the next morning. So much for our self-imposed midnight curfew. But the two-day long hangover I suffered was surely worth it. Seeing my girls again, especially so soon, was so so awesome. I never in a million years thought that this blog would bring me so many friendships. Like real, honest to gosh darn goodness friends. Blogs rule. And Minneapolis ain't so bad either :)

December Menu Plan... Includes Spaghetti with Syrup & Pop Tarts

2011-11-29T07:56:00.001-05:00

Christmas is coming! Christmas is coming! I love this time of year so much. It's easy though, to get swept up in the Christmas activities and going to the mall at 11pm just because you can and leave meal planning to the last minute...if at all. And if ever there's a better month to save some cash, it's this one. I admit, I slipped up a few times during November and some meals I had planned just didn't get made. So, um, if you made the Cuban beef, let me know how it was. But I'm determined to do better this month. I've also changed up my grocery list format. Download it here. I've listed the groceries for the first two weeks on the first worksheet, then the rest of the month on the next worksheet. If you look at the bottom of the Excel spreadsheet, you'll see the different tabs. This way, we're not buying produce on the 1st for meals at the end of the month. If you use the grocery list, let me know if that helps. Alright, let's get to the eatin...

1. Sweet Potato Chili

2. Chicken & Chive Bundles

3. Gorgonzola & Pancetta Smothered Chicken

4. Open

5. Chicken Meatballs with Pumpkin Sage Sauce

6. Eggplant Rollatini

7. Baked Ziti Marsala

8. Spicy Pork & Soba Noodles

9. Kansas City Slow Chicken

10. Tomato Soup & Grilled Cheese Rolls

11. Cheese Ravioli with Walnuts

12. Homemade Pizza

13. Chicken Pot Pie Cups

14. Spaghetti Bolognese

15. Cheesesteak Joes

16. Cheddar Chicken

17. Teriyaki Meatballs

18. Chicken Bruschetta Sandwiches

19. Chorizo & Potato Tacos

20. Creamy Potato Soup

21. BBQ Chicken Quesadillas

22. Basil Chicken Coconut Curry

23. Penne Vodka with Sausage

24. Christmas Eve!

25. Christmas

26. Pesto Stuffed Shells

27. Apple Cheddar Fritatta

28. Fajitas

29. Chicken Enchilada Spaghetti

30. Breakfast for Dinner

31. New Years Eve

Dare to DIY: Cookies!

2011-11-27T19:03:00.000-05:00

Evenin' friends. It's a sad state of affairs when the most productive thing I did all weekend was 1) bake these puppies and 2) artfully arrange them. But hey, it's Kim's Dare to DIY Challenge and I can't not join in . Otherwise, my productivity level would have been a flatline. So anyway, it's week 3 and the dare is to Eat Cookies. Or Make Cookies. I'm not sure which. Probably both. Well I had been wanting to make these Tart Cherry Cheddar Bars for awhile, mostly because of the cheese factor (literally), so this got my butt in gear. And I like making bars as opposed to cookies because they pass for breakfast food without all the guilt. Yeah, I'll justify my way into anything. Anyway, don't be scared of the cheese. It works wonders with the cherry & the crust. In fact, I implore you to tell me what doesn't work wonders when paired with cheese. Nothing!

Tart Cherry Cheddar Bars

Ingredients:

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces and chilled

1 cup sharp cheddar cheese, shredded*

3/4 cup cherry preserves

Directions:

1) Line a 9-inch square baking pan with foil, leaving a 2-inch overhang on all sides. Grease the foil. Preheat the oven to 325°F.

2) Combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and cinnamon in a food processor. Add the butter and cheese and pulse until the flour is pale yellow and coarse.

3)Press half the flour mixture firmly into the prepared pan. Bake just until golden, about 15 minutes. Cool slightly. Spread the preserves evenly over the crust, then sprinkle the remaining flour mixture evenly over the preserves. Bake at 325° until the top is golden, about 25 minutes. Place on a wire rack and cool completely, about 1 hour.

4) When cool, use the foil “handles” to lift the bar from the pan and cut.

*According to America's Test Kitchen where I originally saw this recipe, the shredded, bagged cheese actually works better for this recipe, making the crust even crispier than if you grated your own. Imagine that.

nd in case you are in the market for a bunch of awesome cookie recipes, go check out the rest of em here...

Surprise!

2011-11-22T21:07:00.000-05:00

So on Monday, I alluded to the fact that this past weekend was amazing. If you follow me on the Twit, then you know I jetted off to the land of a billion lakes, Minnesota. Why you ask? To surprise my pal Bethany with a blog bachelorette party. It was everything we wanted to be and more and we couldn't have done it for a more genuinely deserving & appreciate girl. She's so awesome. So let's sit back and hear how this weekend came to be, just one month after meeting her during the Always Bloggy in Philadelphia meet-up, shall we?

While the girls were here for Always Bloggy, we had all gone out to dinner then afterwards, a smaller group of us headed to the bar. That group was me, Bethany, Nellie and Karen. Making it our mission to get Bethany drunk for the first time allowed for us all to knock down a few and get to really know each other. At one point Bethany went to the ladies room and I think it was Nellie, who turned to us and said "we need to throw her a bachelorette party". We were quick to agree but couldn't talk more about it until after the girls had all gone back home. Luckily we did start talking about it almost immediately via email.

After realizing that our schedules just didn't jive that well together (yep, I just said jive) and that there is always the possibility for more babies on the horizon (not me per se, but both N & K are moms too), we realized we need to do this thing sooner than later. And when it came down to planning, we decided to just do it now, before the holidays kicked in and we'd basically lose a few months in all of the hubbub. We figured even though her wedding is next year, why the hell not? We like each other and wanted to see each other! Now!

So how to surprise her? We chose Minneapolis for it's proximity to B's home in Wisconsin. Because as cute as her hometown may be, we knew that the big city was where we needed to be. So being the frequent flyer, high-powered business lady that she is, Nellie convinced Bethany that she'd be in Minnepolis for work and asked her if she'd like to come do dinner & drinks. Luckily B agreed. We all flew in Friday morning and met up at our hotel before she got there. We stayed at the Radisson downtown which we kinda just picked out of nowhere. But it was pretty swank for the price and convenient to everything. Oh and I highly recommend tracking down Allen at the front desk to give you the low-down on where to go. You know, for when you plan a trip to Minneapolis. Right? Anyway, we managed to decorate it a little bit and lay out the bachelorette paraphernalia that we pulled together last minute like a unicorn tiara, macarons and champagne...very Bethany-esque paraphernalia.

Once we heard B had arrived, Nellie went down to the lobby to meet her. She brought her back to the room to drop off her bag and this happened.

It was the cutest thing. She went on and on. In fact, go read her blog for a quick recap of her reaction. Go, I'll wait.

Ok, so once we settled her in, we cracked open a bottle of champagne for a toast. Btdub, thank you Team Liquor in Minneapolis for supplying us with all our booze. Go Team Liquor! (best name ever). That toast turned into a a glass or two of wine, then the totally smart decision to head over to the Saks Outlet across the street for some buzzed shopping. I had wandered over there earlier and had spotted an entire sequin section that was literally calling Bethany's name. Plus, we had to make sure she had a bachelorette appropriate outfit, right? And what screams, Hey males! Give me attention! Buy us drinks! better than sequins? She picked out a rose gold-ish sequin dress that literally made dudes stop in their tracks. It was that good. In fact, the other three of us, mature cougar mothers that we are, managed to round out the on the prowl night with leather, sparkles and leopard print. But she was clearly the center of attention, just as she should be.

After dinner at Mission, we headed down the street to Seven, which boasted a covered rooftop deck. After concluding that Minneapolis is full of um, characters? We headed outside, where we asked the nearest dudes where the closest irish pub was. Not only did they give us directions to a great one, they posed for a pic!

We headed over to Kieran's where we stayed our welcome. If the mission was to get attention and get hammered while doing it, I'd say bravo girls, mission accomplished. Here is a small sample of non-incriminating photos.

and my new wedding portrait...

Seriously, wtf? Who is this dude and why does this look like our wedding's first dance? Let it be known that the smile on my face is because I see the waitress dropping off beers at our table, not for this dude. I am what you'd call...waaaaasted. Don't worry, John knows I only have drunk eyes for him. And beer.

And now for some things that were hilarious to us but now come to think of it, are probably just inside jokes. The whole weekend, we kept getting asked where we were from, how we all knew each other, how we met, blah blah blah. Well as much as we love the internet, telling people we met on our blogs just wasn't as much fun as the new story we came up with. So after this weekend, we are now all alumni of St. Marguerite's or West Chester Academy (we couldn't pick one), our high school boarding school in ~~Arizona~~ ZURICH. Aren't we fascinating? Oh and our school mascot? The fightin; Chocolate Watches. Get it? They're Swiss. Ha. You can imagine all of the hilarity that this story caused us. And how many dipshits believed us. Especially when we told them that our favorite thing about boarding school in Switzerland was the airport. Srsly. Kids, this is what beer does to your brain.

Anyway, we did it up just as bachelorettes (and their old married friends) do. It was a ton of fun. And even though we thought this would be the highlight of our weekend, we managed to have the best time the whole rest of the weekend too. But that's a story for another day.

Dare to DIY: Dare to Entertain

2011-11-21T12:51:00.000-05:00

Hey guys! So after having the most amazing weekend ever, which I'll tell you all about later this week, I came home from the airport and set my dining room table. Why? Because I'm crazy. Oh and it's also Week 2 of Kim's Dare to DIY Challenge: Dare to Entertain. This week is all about one of my faves...tablescapes. Check last year's comfy cozy table here. Anyway, I'm sure I've mentioned in years past that I love the look of a table that's always set, not just at dinner time or special occasions. But I can never bring myself to do it. As much as the creative, festive half of my brain loves the idea, the other half makes fun of it for kinda being pointless. And a cat magnet. Seriously, my a-hole cat will totes jump up and bat the crap out of anything not glued down. But I've decided that boring, logical Shannon is gonna get a sock in her mouth because creative, festive Shannon wins. And she wins a pretty dining room table, dressed in her Christmas best.

Since we don't do Thanksgiving, I can go right ahead and skip right on through it with my decor. I always do my dining room in peacock blue and green for Christmas, so when I realized I had this extra blue flat sheet lying around, that puppy became my new tablecloth. As per usual, pretend those wrinkles aren't there. Ironing a sheet is not my idea of a good time.

I added a my normal little set-up of cloches and some Christmas sparklies. Oh and I pulled out a set of china given to me by my godmother. It was her husband's mom's set and when they moved to California last year, they offered it to me. I've kinda got the reputation for needing multiple sets of these sort of things.

Anyway, I know this is totally gonna make me cheery and Christmas spirit-y every day until Christmas. And the more of that, the better. We've got to keep boring, logical Shannon down, know what I'm sayin?

Gabe is 15 Months!

2011-11-18T07:10:00.002-05:00

For someone who prides herself on documenting the crap out of everything, I haven't done the best job in keeping up with Gabe's monthly updates. I've been busy, um, raising a toddler. Seriously, I've got a toddler. Look at him!

Dear Gabe,

Today you're 15 months old. There's a saying out there about the days being long but the years being short when you're raising kids...that's totally true. I go to bed every night completely exhausted. Completely fulfilled and thrilled with my job, but yes, exhausted. You are all over the place. You'd always rather be outside, grasping a stick or two, scaling the hills and investigating every inch of our yard...and our neighbors' yards too. Once your out though, it's hard to get you back inside. You um, throw a fit every time. Somehow though, even your fits are cute.

You also love love love books. Whether it's standing on your truck book or handing Daddy your Fluffy Scruffy book, you can't get enough. Catching you out of the corner of my eye, sitting indian-style on the kitchen floor, book in your lap...it thrills me.

You spent the better part of the month teething. I'm pretty sure you're close to a full set of chompers. You won't let us in your mouth long enough to count them but there's at least 12 teeth in there. You know what they're good for? Apparently eating graham crackers. And animal crackers. And ritz crackers. When you turn into a cracker, we'll know why.

And you're such a giggler. You'll turn it on for random people at Target or at the bank and unleash the biggest fit of high pitched giggles. It's pretty awesome. And you're pretty darn cute.

Keep up with the being awesome Gabe. You are so so fun and we love watching you run around the place, sometimes in your diaper, slapping your stomach and laughing your little head off.

Love,

Mama

Dare to DIY: Be Thankful

2011-11-14T08:58:00.000-05:00

So today starts Week 1 of Kim's Dare to DIY Challenge and this week's challenge was to Be Thankful aka make some Thanksgiving crafties. Well if you saw me in action last year, you'd think I ruled at this type of thing. See, last year I made DIY No-Sew Crushed Velvet Pumpkins. And ya know what? That tutorial is freakin popular. It brings a ton of traffic to my little blog here. So obvs. I felt a ton of (self-induced) pressure to make something kick-ass. And um, I buckled under that pressure. So instead, I made a Book Page Wreath.

It was super easy and I was able to use all sorts of supplies I had on hand in my stash. There are a billion great tutorials out there. I just used the first one that popped up on google. And let's just put it out there that I made this Saturday night at like 9 alongside a glass of mediocre Malbec. I can't vouch for the uniformity of my paper cones. And I will now stop apologizing for my wreath and get on with it...

Crap cell phone pics add to the charm

I figure the sentiment is a sublte nod to the meaning of Thanksgiving and sums up how I feel bout those dudes I live with. I like em a lot and they make life pretty darn awesome. So I'm thankful for them. And you guys too.

Scentsy Giveaway Winner

2011-11-11T08:42:00.000-05:00

Congrats Leigh from Kesler Expressler! Your house will be smelling fine in no time. Scentsy should probably hire me now for taglines.

Email me your address Leigh!

ohshannanigans @ gmail.com

The rest of you? Go buy stuff from Susan. And have a good weekend!

Two Babes on a Davenport in a Living Room*

2011-11-10T07:34:00.009-05:00

*Wayne's World, Wayne's World, Party.

My friend Katie's got a handful of weeks left of her maternity leave so we decided that while she's getting the hang of this whole mothering thing, we'd get together once a week to hang out. And since we all know that I'm not into joining mom groups or making other mom friends with women I meet in Target, I take any chance I can get with my actual friends that just happen to be moms. (Sidenote, I'm totes still bitter about that b never calling me).

I know, right? Teeny squishy baby? Although squeal-inducing, DOES NOTHING FOR MY OVARIES. I feel like every other mom out there with a kid Gabe's age is already talkin bout babe #2 (or even already knocked up with #2). I'm like uhhhh, yeah, maybe? Someday?

I did however, watch Nora, while Katie ran some errands and while it was only for a little while, I got a small taste of what it would be like with two kids. Whereas with Gabe as a newb, I barely put him down. When babe #2 shows up, you have no choice but to put them down so you can wrangle your toddler from jumping off the piano bench.

So when in doubt, bribe him with puffs. Non-moms, puffs are God's gift. Melt in your mouth crunchies that taste like cardboard.

We played our own version of People/US Weekly/Other trash magazine's "Who Wore It Better"? Kidding. Don't answer that. We just happened to dress our kids in matching outfits that day. Kinda cute. Oh and don't judge for the Dino-Mite Dude patch. I wish I could rip that shit right off the clothes. Although, it's better than mommy's little boyfriend or something else equally creepy.

Anyway, we propped these kiddos up next to each other to try to get a pic and while all my pics are blurry, the progression of Nora falling over is kinda hilarious.

NomNomNom

Timmmmmberrrrr

Heh. Cute, right? The photoshoot possibilities involving two kids *is* sorta tempting though. So maybe another kid. Maybe.

Meanwhile, you know what starts on Monday? Kim from Newly Woodward's annual Dare to DIY. This will be the third year I'm participating and I can't get enough of it. You should totally join in. DO IT.

Presents for You: Scentsy

2011-11-09T07:28:00.000-05:00

So back in August, when we went to Illinois and met up with Kim, she gave us a tour of her charming, blog-famous home. The moment I stepped in, I was like, this place smells ridonk, what is it, I want it, give it to me. She told me it was Scentsy, which I had never heard of. I later found out all about it. In case you are as clueless as I was, Scentsy is a catalog company that employs consultants to sell their delicious-smellin' wickless candles.

Now as a mom and a mom blogger (name that horrible commercial), I've now banished open flame candles from my house, at least during someone's awake hours. I've got a little set of hands that now reaches higher than before to inspect everything that I've got sitting on tables. And we just can't be having toddlers inspecting fire, that would NOT BE SAFE. Sorry flame candles, you are soooo 2009. You're out and Scentsy's in.

Well imagine my surprise when one of my readers, Susan, emailed me a few weeks ago to introduce herself and let me know she was praying for my fam during my brother's health scare. Awfully nice of her, wouldn't you say? So we go back and forth with the emails and whatnot and I find out she's a Scentsy consultant. And guess who hooked me up with a couple different varities? Yep, Susan. She asked me what scents I like. I told her that I liked the smell of Christmas trees and boy cologne. She nailed both of them. You break off a couple pieces of whichever scent bar you're feeling that day, pop em in your warmer and turn it on. Within minutes, you're house is smelling awesome, which if you're me, is either like you're at a Christmas tree farm or Macy's cologne counter.

The full size warmer is now living on my kitchen counter...

The plug-in is now living in my bathroom...

Sharp dressed man? Yes, yes he is.

And today, my girl Susan Kopp, Independent Scentsy Consultant is offering a fabulous giveaway to my readers! One lucky reader has the chance to win 1 plug-in and 1 bar of their choice! All you have to do is 1) be a follower of Shannanigans and 2) visit Susan's site and find your favorite product and then come back and tell me what it is!

Susan's Scentsy Catalog

One last thing, Susan is also offering a special gift to readers who make any purchase this week, please email her at SusanMKopp@gmail.com to get the details. Be sure to mention Shannanigans! This giveaway will end on Thursday November 10 at midnight EST and I'll announce a winner on Friday morning.

Speaking of winners, the winner of the Shabby Apple necklace is Laura! Congrats Laura, I'll be in touch!

Presents for You: Shabby Apple

2011-11-07T07:05:00.001-05:00

Hey guys! So I've had the awesome luck of being approached by a few people who would like for me to give you some presents. And who am I to deny you some free stuff? So of course I said yup, bring me your finest free shizz. I'll share it with you this week, along with my regular blog posts if that's quite alright with you guys.

First up, I've been hand-selected (ha) by the (most likely) very well dressed folks at Shabby Apple. They would like one of you loverlies to own this necklace...

Isn't she a beaut? She's called the Light as a Feather necklace and I picked her because you can wear it with anything. She's simple but unique. Kinda like my brain. Anyway, if you'd like to be rocking this necklace, all you need to do is Like Shabby Apple on Facebook and leave me a comment telling me you did so.

For additional entries you can...

Like Shabby Apple on Twitter
Follow the Shabby Apple Blog
Like Shannanigans on Facebook
Follow Shannanigans on Twitter
Blog, Tweet or FB about this giveaway

Yep, that's a ridiculous amount of ways to enter. Remember to leave a seperate comment for every extra entry. This giveaway will end Tuesday at midnight EST and a winner will be announced Wednesday morning. It's open to US readers only, sorry international pals.

It's Over

2011-11-04T07:25:00.003-04:00

As of three weeks ago, we have officially and successfully weaned. I started the process back in September when my goal was to gradually get down to three nursing sessions a day, then two, then one, then nada. Well to my surprazz, we went from three sessions to one session within a few days and Gabe didn't even flinch. He didn't have grabby hands towards my shirt or even make any signs of wanting to nurse at all during the times we were essentially skipping. We continued to nurse in the morning when Gabe would wake up, around 5:30 am, and go back to bed until 7 or so. We did this for a few weeks, mostly for my sake. I wanted the cuddles and I wanted the extra sleep. I was terrified that once we stopped nursing in the AM that Gabe would be up at 5:30 and be ready to go. But finally, I decided enough was enough and that we had to cut out the morning nursing. It was getting uncomfortable and I wasn't able to fall back asleep...which defeated the whole purpose.

So one Saturday morning, when Gabe woke up, John took him downstairs and gave him breakfast. From that day on, we were done. And you know what? Since then, Gabe has been sleeping in a bit later, sometimes even until 7:30, which is freakin awesome. We've gotten through a bad teething period and the past couple days have been smooth sailing. Of course, any parent knows that as soon as you talk about it, it will change, so I'm just enjoying the relatively easygoing little guy we have right now and a sleep schedule that totally meshes with mine. Plus, I'm having zero emotional issues, which is a nice break. I feel like I've been on a hormonal roller coaster since giving birth. So, I'm crossing my fingers that Shannon is back to being Shannon. Life, right now, is good.

Putting my still present milk supply to good use...

Meanwhile, the normal thing for kids to do once they are done with breastmilk or formula is to start on cow's milk. So I picked up a gallon of whole milk and proceded to give Gabe a taste. He responded unfavorably...you know, which the blechhhhh face. I tried again and again. I tried different temperatures, different flavors, different varitties all together. He refuses to drink them all. The only thing he drinks these days is water. Of course, I've been pumping him full of yogurt and cheese and mixing milk into his food whenever I can to get his dairy in but it's baffling me as to why he won't drink it. Has this happened to anybody else? In my head, every kid drinks milk. But in reality, I'm pretty sure that's not the case. So short of shoving a bottle of YooHoo* in his face, I'm at a loss. Suggestions?

*I know YooHoo is not milk. But I did not know that YooHoo is a social network. Did you? Should we all join?

Tiny Mime

2011-11-01T06:53:00.000-04:00

Fun fact: Homemade costumes are in my blood. It will take a hell of a lot for me to not piece together a costume for my kids.That's not to say that I don't love a cute store-bought costume. I might have considered a certain airplane get-up from Target as backup.

Fun fact: Last year I wanted to dress Gabe up as a "French Man", you know, curly mustache, baguette, the whole shebang. But I picked Mr. Peanut instead. This year, I couldn't get the French Man outfit out of my head...which obviously led to this, a mime.

Fun fact: I assumed the makeup process would be the most annoying part of getting this costume to work. Turns out, the kid hated the beret. Can't imagine why. What man about town doesn't appreciate a good beret?

Fun fact: Catching pale as a ghost Gabe out of the corner of my eye really freaked me out.

Fun fact: This kid is awesome

Fun fact: I did not dress my baby up as a bumblebee or a prisoner.

Fun fact: Gabe's 1st official Trick-or-Treating went pretty darn good.

Bottle Pop Parties: Under the Sea

2011-10-31T08:36:00.000-04:00

I don't think I could have asked for a better client that this one. The process started with me providing a list of 7 or 8 themes and after a lot of discussion, according to the client, the birthay girl chose an Under the Sea theme. The only thing she demanded was that she have Nemo on her cake. Other than that, I was free to run wild. Now you might think run wild means an unlimited budget and live goldfish party favors...it doesn't. It meant that since she was one of my very first bigger clients that I was stretching every dollar to get as many cool things done that I could. And I know the client, she isn't in to completely over the top stuff that really has no purpose. So I tried not to go overboard and just focused on a few areas. So without further ado...

Under the Sea!

I was pretty proud of my backdrop here. I begged the party store clerk to sell me these 5" balloons since they don't normally sell them. Therefore I had a limited number so balloon safety was a major concern. MAH JOR. Luckily everything stayed where it was supposed to. And although some faulty measurements and backlit background doesn't make for the picture-perfect version I had in my head, I'm pretty sure the general public couldn't care less. Look! Bubbles!

Note to self: Find out about 18 foot ceilings (approx) before planning hanging decor. Because you will have to scramble to make it work. It's all worth it though to see that little birthday girl's face! She's gorge.

So back to Nemo. I have to admit, I didn't really want full on Disney Nemo happening on the cake, ya know? So when I found the paper printables, which you'll see below, and I thought they were adorable, I emailed Katie Gumerson Design & Decor to see if she could whip up a matching set of fondant cake toppers. Man, I wish I had this talent. They matched exactly and were so freakin cute. I also asked her to make a "Nemo" to match the rest of the oceanic crew. And she succeeded. Birthday girl was convinced and this theme-loving girl was happy.

See? Aren't these little creatures cute? I'm normally not one to pick some party printables and pepper the whole party with them. Or use so much alliteration. But I liked these and since I printed them myself, it was cheap. So I crafted up a slew of adorable party hats and noisemakers. Which actually got used. So that's nice. What didn't get used? The jello aquarium. I made individual ones for the dessert table and a big one for the table. But for some reason the big one didn't set and I realized it didn't even matter, ya know?

And just to make things crystal clear, most ideas were found on Pinterest. And thanks to my girls on Facebook for reminding me what a sea urchin is. See, you can Like my page on FB and help me with my burning questions. While you're liking things, feel free to boost my ego by liking Bottle Pop's FB page too. Could I have any more FB pages going? Geeeeez.

You know what ruled about my client? I proposed a menu with cutesy names that included peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on the new fish-shaped bread, pasta salad, crab dip, seafood chowder, etc. And she made her husband a grocery list and off he went. She was into all of my ideas! It was awesome!

I had originally planned to hang the fishing nets from the sun room ceiling and fill it with balloons but once I realized the angled ceilings were sky-high, that plan went out the window. So I did it in the family room, along with a little mantle decoration. So basically I took a deep breath and realized that this looked just fine too.

And finally, the favors. I filled a little bag with gummy lifesavers and swedish fish and called it a day on the candy since there were enough sweet things on the dessert table. Add a bunch of other fish related things and we were good to go.

So it turned out pretty cute, right? I'm realizing that no matter how much you browse the internet and want to make magazine-worthy parties every time, you are basically working with what you've got...real life budgets, real life houses, real life opinions. And that, my friends, is the lesson of the day.

November Menu Plan...Not Just Leftovers

2011-10-28T07:50:00.000-04:00

I swear, wasn't it just like yesterday that I posted October's menu? I'm pretty sure it was. Anyway, I've got November's menu plan here for you. Hopefully it helps you not be a kitchen spaz. Can you guys give me some feedback too, like if you used the menu at all and if you liked anything in particular? Or if you plan to or whatev? Thanks buds. Okay, I'm planning on cooking a lot more than I did in October so the menu is a bit fuller and the grocery list longer. Bt-dub, click on grocery list to download this month's grocery list. I also don't plan to have a fridge full of leftovers after Thanksgiving...mostly because I couldn't care less about Thanksgiving food. Turkey, meh. Stuffing, meh. Sweet potatoes, meh. It just ain't my bag. Ok, here's what *is* my bag:

1. French Dip Sandwiches

2. Open

3. Citrus Chicken

4. Happy Joe Taco Pizza

5. Open

6. Crispy Pesto Gnocchi

7. Pork Carnitas Tacos

8. Turkey Polenta Casserole

9. Open

10. Pumpkin Chili

11. Open

12. Mushroom Risotto

13. Butter Chicken

14. Slow Cooker Cuban Braised Beef

15. Cheeseburger Sliders

16. Open

17. Quinoa with Turkey Sausage

18. Beef Brisket Casserole

19. Crunchy Garlic Chicken

20. Honey Lime Chicken Enchiladas

21. Mini Meatloaf

22. Buffalo Chicken Potato Casserole...I know, say wha???

23. Open

24. Thanksgiving...wine and pie for me, thankyouverymuch

25. Autumn Chopped Salad & Grilled Cheese

26. Open

27. Green Chili Turkey Burgers

28. Tortellini Spinach Bake

29. Baked Chicken Parmesan

30. Open

Keep in mind I keep Wednesdays open because I'm on my own that night while my husband is busy being a nerd. And a random weekend night is usually kept open for when I am tired of slaving over a hot stove all week and I request a McDonald's 2 Cheeseburger meal. Plain. With a coke.

BLT Pizza

2011-10-27T07:28:00.003-04:00

Once a month, I like to have homemade pizza night, usually on a Friday. I know, we're living it up over here. Gettin craaaaazy. Anyway, homemade pizza night, hereafter referred to as HPN, is usually comprised of whatever we've got hanging out in the fridge (except for the cans of Miller Lite). It's an excellent way to use up leftovers and I'm of the school that thinks that if you've got enough cheese to smother it with, almost anything will taste good baked on a nice slab of pizza dough. Am i right or am I right? Or am I right?

So on this particular evening, we had some leftover um, bacon? I'm not sure how that happened. We are a bacon-loving household. But somehow I found some wrapped up, hidden beneath a bag of tortillas that *needed* to be cooked that night, ya know what I'm saying? Like, on it's last leg bacon. Is that gross? Not when you sizzle that shit up and make BLT pizza with it!

Do you guys have HPN at your place?

Bottle Pop Parties: Mason Jars

2011-10-25T07:49:00.000-04:00

So most companies, if they know what's good for them, take advantage of social media. There are people whose job it is to sit around and blog, tweet and update their status on Facebook. Can you believe that? Why isn't someone paying me? Geeeeez, I do this ish for free. Anyway, my point is that even though I make zero monies from this here blog, I've got a corresponding Facebook page and Twitter account for it. And I use them. So when I started Bottle Pop Party Co., I knew I had to set up accounts for both. But man, keeping up with all of them is a bit much. So there was no way I was starting a separate party blog, especially when the internet is already saturated with them. Plus, I figure you dudes would want to check out what I'm up to party-wise, right? So since I'm just going to post the stuff on my personal blog here, you can feel free to pin the crap out of any good pictures and get me famous on the Pinterest. I'd love that. Speaking of Pinterest, is it cool to pin your own things? Self-promote if you will? I've been wondering about that...

Anyway, this past weekend, I was handling a dinner party. It was a religous group that has a catered dinner every year in the fall. They gave me their specific menu and I called up my trusty caterer, Main Line Catering, who I've worked with a bunch of times. For a fantastic price, they provided all of the food, drinks, dishes, everything. Like Super Grover, I showed up. Well I showed up with table linens, centerpieces and menus to try to add a bit of cuteness for very little money. I also brought John, who served the food. Cheap labor, ha.

I just dropped some tealights into a few lace and jute twine wrapped mason jars and set them on burlap runners and called it a day (night).

I also designed these cute little mason jar menus and tied them off with a piece of twine as well.

And as much as I'd love to have picture perfect lighting everytime, I'd dare to say that most events happen indoors, at night. So here's the general look.

Of course, as soon as dinner was served, the overhead lighting went on and sorta ruined the ambiance. Such is life. Ya gotta see what your eating, ya know? But all of the guests were thrilled with the food and service. I even got a bunch of compliments on the menus and they all took them home so yay me!

I also had an Under the Sea 3rd birthday party this past weekend that I'll share soon!

He's Ready for His Close-Up

2011-10-23T20:13:00.000-04:00

Since I've stopped doing Gabe's monthly photoshoots, I've seriously been slacking in the photog department. In fact, a few weeks ago, my mom asked me to print up a recent picture of Gabe and I realized I hadn't taken any in the month after his first birthday. On one hand, that's sad. On the other hand, the hand that I'm choosing to wave around, I realize that I've taken more pictures of that little boy in his first year than any human ever needs and dammit, I need a break. But I won't lie. I miss our little photoshoots each month. So I'm definitely loving the holiday firsts that pretty much require moms to pick out a cutesy outfit and snap away. Things like jumping in piles of leaves, picking out his first pumpkin, pulling on his first turkey wishbone…that sort of thing. It all satiates my need for a little mama/little buddy photo time. And of course, once again this year, I’ll need another adorable shot to grace the Wellington Christmas card. Last year, we ordered our cards through Shutterfly.

Omg. I want to reach through the computer and pull back a tiny little 4 month old!

Anyway, Shutterfly rules. Plain and simple. The holiday photo cards are high quality and the colors come out so vibrant. I can't wait to get the photoshoot going for this year's card so I can pick out something cute. Oh and btw, they've got photo calendars too. Because you know everyone who's anyone will be rocking a Gabe 2012 Calendar with all of his monthly photos from this past year. Let me know if you're in for one. They'll be selling like hotcakes. Delicious, fluffy hotcakes.

Always Bloggy Finale: A Novella

2011-10-20T07:26:00.004-04:00

Alrighty, I'm here to wrap up the rest of the Always Bloggy weekend. Check out our campfire s'mores bar and our Philadelphia sightseeing and even our welcome bags, if you missed it. And this might get wordy so bear with me.

Ok, so somehow the weekend just kept getting better and better, so that by the time the girls had to leave, I was legit sad. The whole weekend, I had girls in my house, watching my boy, cooking in my kitchen, kicking back on the couch...and it was awesome. In fact, as soon as Nellie arrived from Seattle on Friday afternoon, she volunteered to wrangle Gabe while Bethany and I did important things like arrange graham crackers *just so* and swipe on some eyeliner. She's got a son around Gabe's age so I thought nothing of it and headed inside to shower. However, as I was sitting there doing my makeup, a thought occured to me. I had just handed over my son to a complete stranger. (Did I mention Nellie had de-lurked to tell us she wanted to come meet us? So awesome. But yeah, a stranger). I should be a little more cautious, right? So just to assuage my guilt, I crept over and peeked out through the blinds. Yep, there he was, wandering around the lawn and there she was, following right behind, just like I assumed he would be. We joked about it later on, but the moral of the story is that I felt immediately comfortable with these girls and it was more like a girls weekend than a meetup...which really, how much better can you get?

So anyway, let's bring you up to date on the weekend happenings. We had gone sightseeing on Saturday then stopped at Jim's Steaks on South St so that the girls could get a real cheesesteak. I gave them all lessons on how to order, and after a brief gluten allergy quandry, we took our steaks and inhaled them. Then it was back home/hotels for us. We had dinner reservations that night at Limoncello in downtown West Chester, a cute little college town. After waiting forEVER for a table that was supposedly reserved we were finally seating and the feasting could commence. Most of us picked a wine partner and split a bottle. Because really, how else do you become better friends with somebody other than eye up that last glass and wonder who's gonna get it?

So after lots of awesome food, hilarious conversations, labor stories, pan flute-playing and more drinks, the night came to an end. For some. See, we had a pretty diverse group of ladies, including one with child and one not quite the legal drinking age. So while some went home and got a good night's sleep, some of us um, didn't. Some of us found the bar playing old school Mace and DMX and shut.it.down. Some of us drank nine vodka and cranberries. Nine. Btw, that somebody was Bethany, who had alerted us to the fact that she had.never.been.hammered. Our mission that night was to change that. And we did. Proudly.

Some of us crawled up on dumpsters because it seemed like a good idea. Some of us shared secrets you share with your best girls. Some of us came home, found my emergency bottle of champagne and drank it out of tumblers while cuddled up in bed together.

Oh and all of us got a big old FAIL on picture taking this entire weekend. All we could come up with is like one normal pic and crappy cell phone pics. I guess that just means we were having too good a time to care, right? Right.

So Sunday morning rolled around. Ow. After heading to bed around 4am, this girl was not feeling so hot. You know what made me feel better? Nellie & KP arriving at my house with bags of groceries and Nellie proceeding to make us all breakfast. I know, right? Could she be any more awesome? Don't think so. I was complaining to whoever would listen that I'd like to be the sort of person Nellie is (besides tall, blonde and hot). The kind that just cooks, cleans and babysits at someone else's house because she can't sit still. Me? I'm just lazy. But I get points for wanting to be like that, right?

Ok, so next up on the agenda was doing some shopping. First stop...terrain. Of course. It's sparkly and magical and full of pretty pretty things. So off we went...

Ladies and the gourds who love them -- Bethany and KP

Normal picture alert -- Bethany and Lauren

I ordered everyone into the firepit section and made them drape themselves in wool blankets. No matter it was creeping past 80 degrees. No matter at all.

Since we had gotten a late start to the day *coughhangovercough*, most of the girls had to get on the road. Turn those smiles upside down. But John told me we couldn't build bunk beds and make everyone move into the guest house and call it Camp Shannanigans, so home they went. But you know who stuck around for another day? These girls...that's Bethany and Nellie if you weren't paying attention.

We decided to skip any more shopping and head back to my house to relax. And by relax, I mean, we all busted out our laptops and hung out on my couch. Because what's a blogger meetup without some blog talk? At some point, we decided more food was a good idea, so John and I took the girls down to our favorite authentic Mexican restaurant. A shit-ton of chips and tacos later, we were all ready to head to bed. Unfortch, we had to start the next day out by taking Nellie to the airport. Bethany and I held back our tears and embarrassing breakdowns while we said goodbye for now. Then we pulled our shit together. We had a baby to visit!

We drove up to visit Lizzie Beth so that the two of them could finally meet and we could all oooo and ahhh over little Hunter. Btw, Lizzie Beth has this mothering thing DOWN. She found time to look awesome AND make us lunch. Thanks LB! Plus, that little peanut of a baby is adorbs!

Totally not my pic. I stole it from LB's blog. Hope she doensn't mind.

After we were all exhausted from keeping Gabe from trying to climb LB's stairs, we took off. Bethany had a plane to catch and I had tears to let flow. So we dropped her off and she flew back to the land of cheese, leaving the Wellingtons to fend for themselves again. And that my friends, was Always Bloggy in Philadelphia. For the most part, it went according to the loose plan that Bethany and I had crafted. But what surprised us is how close a group of us got over one little weekend. So yeah, just awesome. And yeah, we're totally gonna do another one. Bethany and I are already planning the opening ceremonies...

HeyHowAreYa

2011-10-19T07:56:00.003-04:00

I've noticed (and by noticed, I mean I jumped for joy each time) that we've got a few new readers round these parts. And if there's something I love, it's new readers. So the first thing on my agenda today is to say hey. And welcome. And I love you. Wait, too soon? Ok, scratch that. I kinda like you. Consider this me rolling out my welcome mat and hanging my pineapple above my door, the international (or national, I dunno, I just made that up) sign for hospitality. Ok now we're acquainted.

That's Gabe. He's the star of this show. He's 14 months old. For the first year of his life, I dressed him up in costume every month. I told myself I would stop, even though it was hilarious and addicting, but it was also a pain in the keister. So I stopped. We're reduced to taking regular pictures.

I quit my 9 to 5 when he was born to stay home. I got bored so I recently launched an event planning business. It's pretty awesome.

I'm married to John, who wins best blog husband...voted by me. In fact, the moment you hit follow, he probably sent me a text to make sure I knew. Nerds. Anyway, I am a big fan of running an awesome home. Cooking, cleaning, keeping shizz organized, all that. I keep my hot glue gun plugged in and a supply of bakers twine on hand at all times. I love boozing it up with hilarious people and laughing until no sound comes out.

So now you know. And knowing is half the battle.

And there comes a time in every blogger's life where she opens it up to the crowd. Do you guys have any questions you're dying to ask? Like how well can I parallel park? Like what kind of flat iron I use? Like how bad do I have it for Mark Wahlberg? No? You don't care about any of those? Ask me something...anything, so I don't look like a moron here. Thanks dudes.

awesomely, Chi, real bad

Pickin a Punkin

2011-10-17T08:44:00.000-04:00

Mornin friends. Man, I don't know what it is. I can't get it together lately. Well I do know what it is. I've got two parties booked for next weekend, so I'm up to my eyeballs in party crafting. Which, don't get me wrong, is awesome and kinda what I'd most always rather be doing. But two parties in one weekend? Talk about throwing myself into the fire, ya know?

Anyway, we went to pick out our pumpkin this weekend. And thankfully, the weather was just about near perfect, unlike last year with a two month old and gale force winds. And since there's really not much to say about a pumpkin patch, let's get on to the photo dump.

The Oooooo face...my fave

and this time last year. What?!?!?

In Hawaii You Get Leid, In Philly You Get Snacked

2011-10-14T07:38:00.000-04:00

So last time we talked, I told you about the s'mores bar. Oh yes, it was sweet. Literally and figuratively. Luckily we bought enough s'mores supplies (including those delicious After 8 Mints that come in their own envelopes) to feed an army, so I don't have to tell you that come 9:30 pm, my choices in snacks this week have been plentiful. But moving on, I'm still not done talking about Always Bloggy. I've got a bunch more to say. Hopefully you don't mind. And um, if you do? Have a s'more and wait it out.

So when the girls arrived on Friday, we welcomed then with open arms. Those who arrived a bit late received drunken running hugs. Ask KP. She got one of those the moment she pulled into my driveway. But after getting accosted, they each recieved an Always Bloggy Welcome Bag! How exciting, eh? A bag of SWAG, aka Stuff We All Get.

If you read Bethany's blog, you'll recogize those gorgeous little nametags she's known for. Basically as soon as we decided we should have cute name tags, I told Bethany she had to make the little award ribbon accordians. I'm pretty sure they were the highlight of the weekend. Seriously, aren't they just darling? And I don't throw out the word darling too often.

Ok, so onto the SWAG. It was mostly just snacks. But who doesn't love snacks? No one! And Philly is known for our snack foods, so I don't have too much else to work with.

What's a Woozie you ask? Oh only the most stylish insulated wine glass sleeve around! They're designed to keep drink temps constant during summer or winter...and let me tell you, they work. Woozie was nice enough to provide fun little monogrammed Woozies for each girl attending Always Bloggy. So not only do they keep your drink the ideal temp, they keep everybody's booze straight! Win win! And the cute packaging is always a plus for this girl. I'm pretty sure that black and white polka dot ribbon came right off of my wedding invitation. Obviously, me and the Wooz were meant to be.

Ok, let me tell you about these pretzels. Yeah they're delicious, no surprise there. But what's awesome about them is the company that provided them. Let's be honest, when we went looking for some SWAG, we hit up the Pennsylvania General Store. When they said they'd be happy to donate some chocolate covered pretzels to the welcome bags, we were stoked. When I picked them up and saw them, I was amazed. They totally hooked us up. Big bags full of pretzels for each girl. So seriously, if you need anything delicious, check em out, they totally ship all over. And if you've got a hankering for a chocolate soft pretzel, they've got you covered. Thanks PA General!

So once the fire was going and the wine was flowing, this girl pretty much forgot about her camera. For a blogger meetup, there sure was a lack of cameras around all week. So this about sums up our first night. It was a lot more fun than these pictures would lead you to believe.

Bethany noticed the heart shape in this log. Of course she would.

Woooooz!

Lauren & Bethany woozin it up...

Like I said, I've got lots more to yap about. But I've also got a baby getting his molars in. And I'm not sure if it's that or he's just coming into his Irish temper because this kid is throwing some fits! I'm talking shaking his clenched fists, crying red face. If it weren't so funny, I'd feel bad. Anyway, it's tiring. So meh about that.

ANd a quick update on my brother. He has been discharged and his home recovering. Things are looking good for him! I really do appreciate all your prayers and the emails and tweets. And to those of you who chatted me up for the first time because of him, thank you. Did I mention you guys rule? Cause you totes do.

A Rustic S'more Bar If You Will

2011-10-12T07:31:00.001-04:00

When Bethany and I first started dreaming up plans for Always Bloggy, we decided that no matter what, we'd have a little welcome campfire. Some wine, some s'mores, some blankets, oh it would be adorable. Plus, staring into a fire is a socially acceptable reason for not speaking, should there be any awkward silences. Um, luckily I filled those with my drunken antics, so no worries there. But we decided to cash in on the "serve everything bar-style" trend that is all over the interwebs and do up a s'more bar. Ours is obviously not the first but when we planned the general idea over g-chat 1000 miles away from each other, then rushed around last minute during Gabe's naptime to pull this shit together, we were pretty darn pleased with the results.

Obviously first on our list was to decide a color scheme for the night...I suggested gold, brown, white and raspberry. We then continued to spend more time than necessary narrowing down what color raspberry is exactly.

Jumbo marshmallows look enticing but when it comes down to it, it's almost too much mallow. I know, crazy, eh?

Bethany crafted then packed the adorable signs and garland and flew them out here with her. She chose cutesy crafts over shoes. That's my girl.

Yep, pina colada marshmallows. Delicious by their damn selves. Available in the baking aisle at Target.

So we set this up for the girls then set up some hay bales and chairs around the fire pit and made John get our fire going.We uncorked the wine and set about getting to know each other. The weather even cooperated, getting slightly chilly that night. You couldn't see it, but Bethany and I were mentally checking off everything on our to-do list. This meet-up was actually going according to plan...

#AlwaysBloggy #BestWeekendEver

2011-10-11T07:38:00.002-04:00

I looked forward to this past weekend for months. Ever since dreaming out loud here on the blog about wanting to meet all of you blog friends of mine and actually hatching a plan with Bethany, I'd been counting down the days. We made plans and schedules. We emailed and coordinated. We put it out there and a lot of you responded. Thus, Always Bloggy in Philadelphia was born. As the months passed, some bloggers committed to this crazy plan while others had to bail. We didn't care. Beth and I were just pumped that this was happening at all. And if no one showed, and it was her and I sitting around a fire pit with a shit-ton of chocolate and marshmallows, then we were okay with that too.

So it turns out, over the long weekend, we had an awesome group of ladies fly and drive in to hang out. Somehow I wasn't nervous at all. I loaded up my little buddy and we headed to the airport to pick up my partner in all of this, Miss DreamySparklePants herself, Bethany.

She walked off that plane and right into our hearts. Ha. No seriously, she did. The combination of her sweet Midwestern naivety and ready-to-unleash-in-the-big-city spunk charmed the crap out of us.

You know when you meet someone that you feel like you've known your whole life? Well that was us. We were immediately chatting/talking shizz and cracking up like we'd been doing it for years (like, in person). We ran errands, we cooked, we crafted, we sat in silence in front of our laptops, we tag-teamed taking care of Gabe. And it was awesome.

Friday afternoon came and the ladies started rolling in. That night sat around my house, getting to know each other, grubbin on the mashed potato bar then heading out to sit around the campfire. B & I had set up a s'mores bar which we were supremely proud of and patted ourselves on the back no less than 24 times. But that deserves a post of it's own...you know, when I plop my Bottle Pop watermark on it :) Obvi that shizz is going in my portfolio. Ha.

So I got hammered that night, but purely for unselfish reasons. I wanted to make people comfortable and fill uncomfortable silences with my mindless blabbering. Mission accomplished. At least on the second part anyway. But hey, I had a good time so that's all that matters, right? RIGHT?

So the next morning, we headed into the city to get our history lessons on. Philly is full of historical shit so we had to pick and choose to get the most out of our day. We skipped the line of 90 tourists to see the Liberty Bell and made do with a peek through the window. Bell...crack...done. Independance Hall, while famous for something called the Declaration of Independance, is pretty boring. And again with the lines! So we headed to one of my favorite tourist spots, Elfreth's Alley, which is the oldest residential street in America. And it's charming as all get out. For reals.

I shudder to think of purple shutters

Window boxes a plenty

kitties saying hello!

Um, how many of you want window boxes hung up with rope? I do. I would pin this picture if I were you. If not for the boxes, then for the cat.

sass

Then we headed over to the home of the O.G. seamstress, Betsy "the Black Widow" Ross. Betcha didn't know this bish had a handful of husbands that all died, did you? Go check my friend Kate's blog for a schooling in B. Ross. Kate has pioneered the show CSI: Revolutionary Edition. Kate is also mothereffing hilarious. Seriously, if you don't know Kate, I would run, not walk, to her blog and make friends quick. She will entertain the shit out of you. I will provide proof in a second.

This is B's house.

This is some crazy cat lady feeling up B's cat statues. Oh wait, it's just my newest internet bff, Nellie! This tall drink of water (pronounced wooder) flew in from Washington...STATE. How cool is that? Across the country to hang out with us. Awesome. Love her to death.

Oh and here's that proof. Kate is just a good time.

discussing battle plans. clearly.

Btw, we spent more time playing around in the B. Ross gift shop then we did in her house. I highly recommend the gift shop.

Afterwards, we meandered over to the lawn at Independance Mall and complained about the 80 degree weather and our insistence on wearing cardigans.

KP loves Philadelphia THIS MUCH

I hate my haircut that much too. Way too short, way too mom-ish. Luckily by next week it should be halfway down my back.

Ok, so word to the wise. If you're ever visiting Philly by car and want to stop and see the famous Love sign in Love Park, don't, I repeat, DON'T park in the garage underneath of it. By the time we made our way above ground, we had side-stepped our way around puddles of urine and AIDS. The smell alone nearly wiped out the Always Bloggy crew. And nobody wants the Aids on their shoe.

Ok, so that's it for today. To sum it up, this was one of the funnest weekends I've had in a long time. These chicks are hilarious, crass and pretty much the shit. I loved them. Like loved as in, I've got a few new IRL friends. Just what I asked for.

Scared

2011-10-05T07:34:00.001-04:00

Hey guys. Hope you're having a good week. I've had a pretty scary one. If you follow me on Twitter, you know that I've been requesting prayers for my brother Josh since last week. I hope he doesn't mind me sharing but what happened was one of the most heart-wrenching, terrifying moments in my life. You see, he went in went in for gastric bypass surgery last Tuesday. I saw him on Wednesday and he was looking great and in good spirits. He even walked me to the elevator. Sure, his ass was hanging out the back of his hospital gown but he thought it was hilarious. The other patients' retinas were most likely burned by the sight of it, but he cared not!

I got a call from my mom Thursday night. She told me that Josh hadn't been feeling well and there seemed to be some complications. After a quick procedure, his doctors determined that he needed emergency surgery. My mom thought I should come to the hospital. So I went. That drive was horrible. All I thought of was the horror stories I've heard about bypass surgery and my mind, of course, goes to the worst case scenarios. I knew this was serious and I spent most of the drive trying unsuccessfully to hold back tears. I couldn't help but imagine the worst. This was my big brother, who I'm so so close to. The thought of something happening to him was too much for me to handle.

I got to the hospital and waited with my mom. The surgeon finally came out and told us what had happened. I won't get into it but it's a good thing they got in there when they did otherwise, this story might have a different ending. My brother might not have made it. But he did. They were able to repair the damage that had been done. He was now in the ICU. We walked in and saw him. Once again, I couldn't hold back the tears. Seeing my big, strong brother laying in bed, unable to talk because of a breathing tube down his throat, hooked up to a million machines. Ughh it was horrible.

Over the next few days, he'd stay in the ICU, under careful watch. He'd slowly get better. We'd play charades to communicate with him and squeeze his hand to comfort him. It was a scary couple of days. A lot of you were praying for him, right along with us, and I appreciate it. It means a lot.

They were finally able to remove the breathing tube and Josh was able to talk again. Yesterday, they moved him out of the ICU and back to a regular hospital room. But not without charming the crap out of all his ICU nurses. See, Josh is a nurse manager himself, so he's the perfect patient. He knows what's going on and how to treat the hospital staff. Plus he's got a sense of humor, which is hard to find in the ICU. Like me, they all loved him.

Anyway, my heart is finally light again after a couple of crazy days. And just in time too. The Always Bloggy in Philadelphia Meet-Up is this weekend! I told Josh that if he got better by this weekend, he could come hang out with all the beautiful blog ladies. We'll see if that's incentive enough. And if you're the praying or good vibe sending type, we'll still take them! He's definitely got a longer recovery ahead of him now than he planned and I just want him back to normal. Thanks friends!!

October's Meal Plan...Check

2011-09-29T10:18:00.000-04:00

Hey guys. So it's officially my favorite time of the month...menu planning time. I guess it's the list maker in me that gets stupid excited over this task. I usually like to share new recipes and whatnot individually when I make them but since it's now starting to get darker earlier, decent pictures of meals aren't likely to happen. So I thought I'd share my menu for October and link you up to things I'm going to try. Now I won't be able to vouch for new things but I tend to stick to what works...and this month, it's comfort food.

October is kind of a busy month for me, what with having the girls here for the Always Bloggy Meet-Up, plus a couple of parties I'm planning, so I'm leaving more than a few spots open. But if you have neanderthal/Kindergarten palates like I do, than you should be able to use this menu and add in whatever staple meals you normally do. Or you can pick and choose. Whatevs. But in the event that you want me to do all the work for you (doesn't happen often, I'm a lazy sonofabitch), then here is my grocery list for these meals. In using this list, I assume you have normal shit on hand like olive oil, salt, brown sugar, cumin, balsamic vinegar, garlic, the powders (garlic/chili/onion), soy sauce and season salt. If not, add it to your grocery list. Ok here we go...

1) Penne with Roasted Asparagus and Balsamic Butter : So, so good

2) Autumn Chopped Salad & Grilled Cheese

3) Chicken Florentine

4) Ham & Cheese Sliders : Bangin

5th through the 9th OPEN

10) Rice & Beans: One of our fave go-to's

11) Lemon Chicken

12) OPEN

13) Breakfast for Dinner: You choose!

14) Velvet Chicken

15) Baked Pesto Chicken

16) OPEN

17) Sweet & Sour Kielbasa

18) Creamy Chicken Taquitos

19) OPEN

20) Teriyaki Meatballs

21st through the 23rd OPEN

24) Tangy Porkchop Bake

25) Chili: I guess I have to admit that we eat the canned stuff...and like it

26) OPEN

27) Country Salibury Steak

28) Slow Cooker Orange BBQ Pork

29) Ham Steak & Pierogies

30) Tacos

31) Halloween!

Periods, Potter & A Future Scholar

2011-09-27T07:29:00.000-04:00

That's the theme my friend Kelly came up with for our pal Katie's "Special Day". You see, in my group of friends, anytime you have a major life change, like getting hitched or birthin a babe, you get a "Special Day". It's different from your shower, more intimate if you will. Our little group of ladies tailor a day according to your likes, interests, life stage, stage of waddling and whatnot. You can see what we did for my friend Sarah here or what my pals did for me here. So back to Katie. She was due to give birth on 9/24/11. We knew we were cutting it close two weeks ago, but we managed to get a day when everyone was available and we did our thing. After taking her out to lunch, we came back to my house to celebrate "Periods, Potter & A Future Scholar". Periods as in period films, books, etc...Katie's a fan. Her nursery theme is Beatrix Potter and both her and her hub are pretty smart so we're thinking the wee babe will surely be a future scholar. See how that all ties in together? Clever clever!

So I set up a little tablescape, pulling crap from around my house for the Periods portion of the day. Then I hit up goodwill for some old books. I hit the jackpot with an autobiography of Marie Antoinette that had a ton of great pictures. Pictures that Katie happened to recognize the moment she saw them. Because she read the book. See? We're good.

You might be wondering what a jar of colored pencils has to do with a Victorian library. Well the Potter portion of the day would require us to do some coloring. We made a Peter Rabbit banner for the nursery. And didn't finish it. Thus the lack of photos.

Anyway, I thought it ended up looking cute and so did Katie, so that's all I care about.

While we colored, we played Kings and Queens, a game Kelly & I made up over Facebook chat one day. In order to win prizes (small random gifts from us), Katie would have to guess the answer to several riddles featuring famous Kings and Queens (as in gay dudes). Once again, my supremely creative bff Kelly came through with 20 genius rhymes...like so...

I generated cards using this site.

Once she guessed, we would reveal the answer from my chalkboard wall. These were all covered up before the game.

This sort of game entertains my friends and I to no end.

Anyway, we also had spinach dip and cookies, so you know a good time was had by all. Unfortch I had to duck out early because I had spent the day in debilitating pain. I was convinced I had a kidney stone because the pain was what I remembered it being. A six hour layover in the ER that night proved otherwise. It's purely muscular, which means no end in sight. It also explains the weeklong blog silence. So um, sorry bout that. I've been hopped up on narcotics, muscle relaxers and steroids all week. It sucks. I'm thankful for my husband and having fam that came and watched Gabe for me while I was useless. Boo to chronic back pain.

But moving on...it's a good thing we we were able to get together because only a few days later, a wee lass made her appearance!!

Introducing lil miss Nora James. Isn't she a beaut? Congratulations Katie & Andy, she's perfect. I should know, I got to go hold her!

This was my first baby-holding since Gabe was tiny. And man, it was weird! SO TINY!! I liked her though, she's a lil peanut. And that pose she's doing? With her hand up by her face? Totally my fave baby pose.

Yay babies!

Flashback Friday: The Honeymooners

2011-09-23T07:28:00.002-04:00

My friend Jackie lives in California. I've been out west quite a few times now and I've loved every city I've been to. San Diego was perfection on a plate. Los Angeles fueled my post-high school dreams and I left a little piece of my heart in Santa Monica. San Francisco was lovely and it needs more of my attention. I'm pretty sure we even found ourselves in Compton at one point. Not sure though. Anyway, whenever I see Jackie gallivanting all over the golden state, I get a little twinge of jealousy but mostly I get wistful and nostalgic. Once I told Jackie that I honeymooned out there, she put the pressure on for a h-moon flashback. So here we go.

Before our wedding, way back in 2006, John's parents let us pick from any of their timeshare locations, which was extremely nice and generous of them. However, they're more of the let's hike through a forest type of vacationers where as I am the let's run around a luxury hotel room and oooh and ahhh at the little shampoos and conditioners type of vacationer. So our choice in destination wasn't that hard to narrow down. We picked Monterey, CA as our spot. From there, we planned on driving to Napa/Sonoma then onto San Francisco. Don't get me wrong, I was totally excited to see these places and was thrilled it was even an option. But when we pulled up to our hotel, I was kinda in shock. It was definitely swank. We stayed at the Monterey Plaza Hotel & Spa right on the water.

Every morning, the breeze from the water would come through our French balcony doors and it was seriously heaven. At night, we'd hear the whelps of the sea lions doing their thing out on the rocks. It was awesome.

We walked down Cannery Row (of John Steinback fame) and ducked into tourist shops, ate chowder from bread bowls, hit up the Monterey Bay Aquarium and other assorted toursity things. I love being a tourist.

We received some free whale watching passes so we hit that up at the crack of dawn. Of course, I was the dork who didn't plan for chilly weather so I bought a sweatshirt while we were there. And um, John looks like a baby here.

And we actually saw a shit-ton of whales before we both fell asleep sitting on a bench at the back of the boat. Romantical.

We did the Seventeen Mile Drive, which left us awestruck at the gorgeous natural sites and the ridiculous community of Pebble Beach. Riiiii-dic.

We also spent a lot of time drinking and smoking on the decks of our hotel. I'm pretty sure we were the only smokers in the state of California at that time, which left us with a lot of looking around and wondering if we were going to get in trouble.

We headed up to Napa, did a few tastings, then (unknowingly) drove over a gigantic mountain and wound up in Sonoma, I think? Either way, the vineyards are all like postcards. We did the tours and the tastings, which really are never big enough, ya know?

And um, you know I almost peed myself with excitement when we saw this teeny little winery. Think of all the personalized schwag we could buy! Who cares if the wine tastes like ass, it's got our last name on it! Posters! Fleece coats! Wine glasses! Oh yeah, they saw us coming. We bought a shit-ton of Wellington souveniers. And did you know that the great state of Pennsylvania hates booze-lovers like myself? We are not allowed to get booze delivered to our house. So we thought up an idea ahead of time. We brough one of those old-timey hard shell suitcases and left it empty. We bought tons of wine, wrapped it in dirty clothes and packed it up. Genius.

We also hit up San Francisco but only for a day, which I definitely regret. The main thing we wanted to see was Alcatraz and that took a huge portion of the day, so we kinda rushed around seeing a few other things. It was pretty awesome though and I'd love to go back. Anybody out there live in SF and want to host us? I didn't even get to see Lombard St! Meh!

Alcatraz was fascinating and creepy. We loved it.

We ended our night as we prefer to end every night, with ice cream.

So that was it. It was awesome. It was relaxing. Lots of memories. Everything a honeymoon should be.

Where did you go on your honeymoon?

Kitchen's Closed

2011-09-15T07:20:00.002-04:00

Nursing has been good for Gabe & I. After a few days of figuring things out, we got into a routine and stuck with it. It involved him nursing whenever the hell he wanted and I was okay with that. On one hand it meant that my boy was getting all of the benefits of my breastmilk and I was happy to provide it with him anytime. On the other hand, it might have meant that I was also a little lazy. Oh, you want to nurse? Oh that means I have to sit on the couch and catch up on Real Housewives? Go right ahead. You can also go ahead and fall asleep on me and I'll just sit here. This about summed up the first few months of Gabe's life. Then we started venturing out and I learned to nurse in "public" (aka my car or Macys bathroom) as well as mastering the pump and dump. We were good to go. Then he started eating real food and things got even easier. He was less dependant on me for all of his meals and I felt a good bit of freedom. But he still nursed A LOT.

Over the last couple months though, nursing changed. Once my sleepy, cuddley baby, Gabe now turned into a yoga instructor and his moves were all downward facing dog and shit. He got himself into some positions that would baffle a yogi...all while still latched on. Luckily for me, it was only occasionally painful and mostly amusing. And for as many times as my mother-in-law would ask, I rarely got bit. However, it's only gotten worse. He latches on then begins by grabbing his one foot, while sliding the other foot towards the floor. If not for my firm grasp on him, I'd be without a certain very necessary appendage (assuming nips count as appendages). Take these antics and multiply it by at least six times a day and we've got quite the quandry. Plus, I'm now under the assumption that Gabe is no longer nursing for milk at this point. I am basically a giant pacifier. And honestly, I'm tired of it.

So I've decided to wean him. I always said if he started pulling at my shirt when he wanted to nurse, I'd be done with it. And dude pulls at my shirt, so I'm done. Not cold turkey or anything but a definite blow to his normal routine. At my mom's (basically my pediatrician) advice, I started by cutting out one early evening session. It sucked. He cried and got pissed off and basically clawed at my shirt. This reaction just convinced me I was doing the right thing. So little by little I distracted him with his water cup or some puffs and eventually we got through to the next meal.

I'm now at the point where I'm trying to do 3 nursing seshes a day: early morning, before naptime and before bed. I don't look forward to it because it's all Gabe knows and he's clearly not thrilled with going without. Then we'll go down to two, then finally one in the morning. After reading Kristal's very similar post about weaning, I'm holding a little more hope that this will go smoothly and that Gabe will be happy and well adjusted and maybe even sleep a lil bit longer in the morning. I can dream, right?

By the by, I am super proud of myself for nursing Gabe this long. Yep, it wasn't always convenient and there were those days early on where it felt like hell, but I really feel that I did G a great service by sticking with it. So yay me! Keep your fingers crossed that this doesn't totally suck and I'll keep you updated!