Summer Bucket List

Gooood morning y'all! I originally planned to do an outfit post today on office-appropriate attire that will keep you from completely melting in this Georgia heat. But that will have to wait for tomorrow since my morning has been spent picking paint colors for our entire corporate office, kitchen, bathrooms, production center, etc. Soooo let's throw up a little prayer that I at least make half of all these employees happy with my choices. I do NOT want to go down in the company history books as the girl that picked the awful paint colors.

ANYWHO.

I figured I'd share with y'all my summer bucket list instead. I wrote it onto this handy dandy chalkboard project I undertook a couple weeks ago (and still need to hang on the wall). I've added a few things since, so here's the full list. And if any of you Southeastern ladies have any other awesome ideas please let me know! And keep in mind homegirl is on a budget.

1. Atlanta Botanical Garden (Check! Went to Cocktails in the Garden a couple weeks ago, sponsored by Lilly Pulitzer, and actually won the raffle they were doing! Goodies included an insulated cooler, murfee scarf, necklace, men's tie, ID wristlet, and gift card!)

2. Shoot the Hooch (AKA tubing down the Chattahoochee River with some adult beverages)

3. Dekalb Farmer's Market (This is on the agenda for this weekend! I'll make sure to take some pics!)

4. World of Coca-Cola (Still surprised I've lived here for a year and haven't done this yet. I LOVE Co-Cola!)

5. Hike Stone Mountain (Again, surprised I have yet to do this.)

6. Movie on the Green

7. White water rafting on the Ocoee (I LOOOOVE white water rafting on the Ocoee. Love it. But no, really. I love it. )

8. Atlanta Food Truck Park (Check! Went with my Bible study girls a few weeks ago and we had such a blast.)

9. Amicalola Falls

10. Lake Lanier (Check! Nick, Mason, and I went for the 4th of July.)

There are also a good number of restaurants on this list that I've been meaning to try, but seeing as I'm practically on a spending freeze and eat grits and biscuits for dinner every night, I'm not going to include them here.

What are y'all hoping to do this summer?!

Back at it

Ok y'all. It's been five months since I last posted. FIVE! Tee-totally unacceptable. Especially since one of my New Year's Resolutions was to blog regularly. (But we all know how resolutions go...)

 Anyway, I'm back at it. And this time I should actually be able to stick with it. So here's some quick updates...

 1. In just a couple weeks I will have lived in the awesome, fabulous, gorgeous, super fun town of Atlanta for a whole year. I think that's cause for celebration.

 2. Work is great. Enjoying my job and the people I work with.

 3. Joined the Junior League! Whoop whoop!

 4. Was accepted to FSU's (GO NOLES!) online MBA program and classes start in just over a month. EEK! I'm super excited because I'm a total nerd and actually really enjoy school.

 5. Puppypants (AKA Mason) is doing great! He's all grown up now (cue sadz face) and he brings SOOOO much joy to my life. I'll have to video tape his "salsa dance" sometime. He gets so excited to see people that he wags his whole backside and it looks remarkably similar to something from Dancing with the Stars.

 7. Joined a Bible Study back in January and receive daily blessings from the amazing girls I've met and grown with in the past few months.

 That's about all I can think of right now. I plan to catch up on all of your blogs ASAP and hope all is well with everyone! So for the sake of actually posting something of interest to people, I thought I'd start with a book review (seeing as I'm a bonafide bookworm).

The lovely CBK suggested I read Rules of Civility by Amor Towles. The story is set in 1930's New York City and follows the stylish, exciting, and whirlwind events that are set in motion after two friends fortuitously meet a wealthy man on New Year's Eve in a side street jazz bar. I absolutely loved this novel and thought Towles' writing style was perfectly in line with the era he was writing about. I highly recommend this book to anyone looking to lose themselves in the glamour of NYC and experience the determination of the human spirit in Depression Era America. Run, don't walk, to your closest bookstore. You won't be disappointed! 

Are y'all reading anything great right now? Let me know!

My View

February Photo Challenge Day 1 - My View Today (and every Monday through Friday

Ok so let's pretend that I posted this yesterday when I was supposed to... This is my lovely little cubicle. I'm working on making it a little more homey. Maybe I'll add a little desk lamp or fresh flowers when I can afford them. Stay tuned later in the day for another post on today's photo (words)!

February Photo Challenge

Yes, I realize it's not quite February yet (ALMOST!), but it's my favorite month so I'm already super excited. In the next few weeks I have a whirlwind of exciting things happening. My very first hair coloring experience is happening this weekend and I'm a mixture of nervous and super excited to try something new. But not drastic. Not ready for that yet. Next weekend my momma is coming to visit and we have all kinds of fun things planned, including a trip to Scott Antique Market and Momma/Daughter mani/pedis! And then the NEXT weekend is my 23rd BIRTHDAY! The bestie and her hubby are coming up for a fun weekend of Atlanta shenanigans and then relaxing quality time in Blue Ridge at their family cabin. I could not be more excited!

But back to the title of this post. To hold me accountable for posting more regularly, I've decided to join in on this February Photo Challenge that I see a lot of you lovely ladies will be doing. And it just so works out that on my birthday the photo is of a drink. :) Champagne anyone??

Can't wait to see what some of your photos are!

Introducing: Puppy Love

Hey y'all! I know, I know. I suck at blogging regularly. It's one of my New Year's Resolutions to be better about it, though, so hang in there with me! Things have been INCREDIBLY busy. NTP got a job, lost the job (agency lost some big clients and had to make cutbacks - last one in, first one out kind of thing so keep him in your prayers please!), had a great Thanksgiving with the family in LaGrange, planned and threw an awesome, if I do say so myself, office Christmas party (for 200 guests), managed to make it home for Christmas after a wreck on the way to the airport (bummer, I know), and survived the remaining days of 2011 with... wait for it... a PUPPY!!!!

Yep, that sweet little face you see is my new little man, Mason. We named him Mason Rhett because it kind of looks like he has a dark mustache, just like Mr. Butler. :) He's a sable cockapoo, half cocker spaniel half poodle, and we love him. The bestie would tell you that I have my pulling out my hair moments because he's definitely a handful (thanks for listening to all my whining Ky), but the sweet cuddly moments make all the peeing on my carpet and biting my brand new J.Crew sweater worth it.

Here's some more photos of the little nugget. Bear with me, they're iPhone photos so they're not the best quality ever, and we don't have very many because we're too busy trying to keep him from eating everything in sight. But more to come, I promise! And if any of you have any awesome training tips we'd be more than happy to hear them! The potty training is going pretty well. It's the biting that we're struggling with right now. And when we say "NO!" he seems to think we mean "Oh that was so fun, keep jumping at momma's face and biting her hair!" Sooo yeah. Help please.

Hope everyone is doing well and that your New Years' Resolutions stick!

War Eagle Weekend

So this past weekend I had an awesome girls' weekend with my momma. She's an Auburn alum and I've been a lifelong fan (although I do bleed garnet and gold) so we thought it would be fun to go to a game together. Turns out her old roommate from AU has season tickets (the good kind with free food) so we got some great seats. Here's a few of my favorite pics from the game. Check out that Auburn sunset!



And the night was made even better by a great win for the Tigers (and FSU). We stayed at my grandparents' house in LaGrange on the farm and I got to eat at some of my favorite LaGrange comfort food, see my grandma at the nursing home, and get a ride around the farm with my daddy. The leaves were all bright oranges, yellows, and reds and it was just so gorgeous. Now I'm looking forward to heading back for Thanksgiving and doing some target practice. :)

Hope everyone had a great weekend and are almost halfway through a great week!

Good News & Good Friends

It's been busy, busy, busy as usual, but I'm so happy to update y'all on a few things. First off, NICK GOT THE JOB HE WANTED! Champagne for everyone! Well, we had champagne. Y'all can celebrate as you see fit. Second, I got the results back from my last girly doctor's visit and everything is back to normal! Double yay! Third, saw another doctor yesterday about some ridges I have on my fingernails and she thinks I just have a simple circulatory problem (no autoimmune diseases - but she's doing another blood test just in case it's something hereditary - momma has the ridges too) and that I just need to keep my hands warm! She turned the AC wayyy down in my examining room and sure enough the tips of my fingers turned blue. I never noticed it before, but I HAVE noticed my hands are always cold. Now we know why. So she told me to stop stressing (I think I've heard that before...) and lay off the coffee. Ummm... we'll think about that one. So anyway, GOD IS GOOD!

Now on to my fabulous weekend with my two besties, Ky and CBK. We had a BLAST going to the FSU vs. Maryland game, watching FSU kick butt, then going shopping and out for margaritas, obvs. Here's a breakdown of the weekend.



Hope everyone else had a fabulous weekend as well! I'm trying to catch up on all of your posts! Be patient with me!

Love, hugs, good news and good friends...