Friday, September 30, 2011

Where We Were and What We Did

So we were in one of the biggest cities in the world, and aside from NN taking my picture every 5 seconds, we visited some really cool attractions.  Be warned...this post is extremely picture heavy and of course rich with my wonderful wit!  Most of the pictures do not do justice to the items being photographed.


This was one of the most amazing things that we saw the entire trip.  The lights flash, like a strobe light, the first 5 minutes of every hour.


The grounds of the Eiffel Tower are a really peaceful place!  This is one of the few shots that I actually took.  I may have to expand NN's name to include Camera Nazi.


Here I am in front of the Lourve museum.  In true French aloofness, (yes that is a word), there was some type of heavy smoke in certain sections of the largest museum in the world that houses priceless works of art, but they only shut those parts off to the public instead of evacuating them.  Makes perfect sense, right?  We decided to not be part of the potential disaster and left to grab lunch.


Before the smoke issue, we did get to see the Venus de Milo.  For the record I had to take about 10 shots before I finally got one with none of the other 10,000 people in the museum.



I know this pic sucks, but it is because people are idiots.  The sign clearly says not to use a flash when photographing this painting, but people don't care, so the museum decided to put it behind protective glass.  Thanks a lot bad-etiquette-museum-goers.


This is not really a famous painting, as a gigantic painting.  I would venture to say that it was 4-5 stories tall.


All you Tour de France freaks will love this shot!  This was another of my favorites!


Picture #406 taken by NN of me and the Champs Elysses behind me.


I'll be honest I am not usually one for going to look at historical monuments and buildings, but the Pantheon, along with the Eiffel Tower and Arc de Triomphe were some of the most beautiful places we visited.


Inside Notre Dame, where many people failed to obey the huge sign.  I guess it is like the saying, 'We hate to be rude, but we're French.'  (Name that movie.)


NN is enamoured with this place.


We almost did not go to the Luxemborg Gardens, but it was so much fun to grab a chair and  just hang out.  The Gardens feel like a smaller version of Central Park.


See, my fellow Houstonians, fall does exist, just not here.  The Gardens even look like Central Park!

Early next week I am going to post pics from all of the eating we did on the trip.  Thank goodness we walked everywhere or otherwise I would have to throw away my scale!  Have a great weekend!

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Where We Were (Part 1)

Let me start by saying I have now had my picture taken by my husband approximately 832 times while we were on vacation.  Homeboy LOVES to take my picture, even after an 11 hour flight as  I tell him not to do it or he will be really sorry.  I really feel for any children we have.  Anyways I am guessing that you realized by now that we had the good fortune to visit Europe this year.  Unfortunately the little OCD gnomes did not sneak in and finish putting the house together while we were gone. Oh well.

So where exactly did we go in Europe you ask?   Well take a look at the photos below and enrich your European history.


I felt all Sherlock Holmes in this pic of Parliament in London.  (Can't wait for the second one to come out around Christmas!)  We got on an open-air double-decker bus tour and it was a lot of fun, until it started raining.


Did you know that Big Bend is actually the name of the bell in the tower, and not the name of the tower itself?


Ok I have to state for the record that NN took most of the pics.  This one in Amsterdam still puzzles me, though, because he is not a beer drinker.


The canals in Amsterdam are really pretty, and it was a beautiful fall day, unlike the summer temps here in Texas.  This was actually the view from our room.


And of course there was Paris!


So my crazy husband is somewhat obsessed with getting the perfect shot that he takes himself, and has sucked me in to his craziness.  I think I have about 10 more versions of this particular shot.


This little church was only a few blocks from our hotel.  In 2 more years the church will be celebrating its 850th Anniversary.

In the coming days I will have more pictures of places we went and the awesome food that we ate.

Monday, September 26, 2011

Back to the Grind

Today we go back to work from our wonderful vacation.  And since no one likes going back to work on a Monday, much less a Monday after vacation, I thought I would share one of my favorite places to buy office supplies. Now I am guessing that you are not really supposed to use these at your place of employment, but then again you are a grown adult, so you must make your own choices.  Enjoy browsing Knock-Knock.

And since I could not get the pics from Knock Knock to link up, here is a pic of my bestie and NN since they usually provide much of my laughter.  They also like to tag team harass me, though at the end of the day I know where my bestie's allegiance lies.


Friday, September 23, 2011

My Favorite Season

Today is the official start to fall, my absolute favorite season.  The leaves start to change, the weather cools down, and football is going strong.  I came across this really cool idea for decorating pumpkins when I was reading a blog called Glorious Treats.  Glory has some really great ideas and recipes, but this is one that I think even my chaotic mind can handle right now.  Check out her step-by-step tutorial here on how to make Jeweled Pumpkins.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Europe Rules

When I get back I am going to post some of our vacation pics, but for now I thought I would share some vacation posts from our previous Europe trip 3 years ago.  We were very fortunate to be able to spend most of our time in Italy on this particular trip.


It rained something fierce when we were in Venice.  I was not prepared for the cold and wet combo.  This time I will remember to pack an umbrella.


Venice was still wonderfully beautiful and has the best tiramisu!


This is the view from our room in Sorrento in the Amalfi Coast area.  You should go if you ever get the chance.  It was simply beautiful.


Over my shoulder is Mt Vesuvius and Pompeii.  Again simply beautiful.


Just in case you missed it...one more pic.


This was the view from our table at breakfast.  As you can guess we cannot wait to go back!


The Trevi fountain in Rome, where you are supposed to throw 3 coins with your right hand over your left shoulder into the fountain and make a wish.  Throwing the coins into the fountain is also said to ensure a return trip to Rome at some point in the future. 


The Coliseum from a different perspective.


We ate way too much gelato, but it was so good!

Have a great rest of the week!

Monday, September 19, 2011

Where in the world are we?

For those of you that I have not bored to death with the details, we are on a very long overdue vacation this week.  Where exactly are we you ask?


While this is not a photo from our current trip, it does hold one major clue as to where we jetted off to visit.  This particular picture is from about 6 weeks or so after I decided that NN was not a stalker, but just really over-zealous, and decided that an all-expenses-paid trip to Vegas sounded like fun.  I mean it's not like I was going to get married there...again. 

Friday, September 16, 2011

Happy Birthday Team Leader

Today the Team Leader turns 3!


It seems like just yesterday we were bringing her home,


or taking her outside for her first snowfall.


Now she is all grown up and a full-blown peanut butter addict. We hope you have a wonderful day at Rover Oaks and that you get all the peanut butter you can handle at Yappy Hour!

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Disorganized Chaos

Life has been nothing short of chaos for the last couple of weeks.  We finally are starting to get a little more settled, and we have met several of our neighbors.  It is finally starting to feel somewhat like a home.  I had this plan that I was going to take some pics of the house now that it is a little more put together to prove that I wasn't really just camping out in the media room 24-7 watching movies and football and yelling for someone to get me another drink, but then our camera started acting up and my cleaned up spaces became not so clean.  So in the spirit of chaos here is what I have.


See what I mean - things started out so well, other than the picture is blurry as crap - sorry!  The family room is coming along nicely, from this angle.


I even got all inspired and put this table next to the fireplace.  Not sure if it is staying there, I mean we could always win the lottery and then I would simply have to help the economy by completely re-furnishing the house.  You never know....


We even bought a grill and the Nutrition Nazi got it all set-up.  At this point I am thinking we are in gold star heaven we are doing so well.


Then I am reminded of the 218 pictures that line my walls, similar to this, that still need homes, and heaven forbid the Nutrition Nazi to hang them.


And the piece de resistance is the crap that I am still refusing to deal with in my dining room.  What is really sad is that I only took pics of the areas that looked somewhat ok.  The really bad areas will never be seen.  I am hoping that while I am work one day someone will come over and finish it all, and I can truly fulfill my dream of sitting up in the media room hollering for NN to get me another drink.  Maybe one day.

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Home Sweet Home

So we finally got moved into the house over Labor Day weekend, and it was nothing short of organized chaos.  Many thanks go out to all of the wonderful people who helped this weekend - we couldn't have done it with out you!  I promise to have more shots as we get unpacked, but here are a few from this weekend.


As I told my mom on moving day, there were so many people at the new house, it felt like  I should be serving appetizers and drinks.

Our movers really had things under control.  I am guessing Jeff warned them of the incident from the night before with furniture delivery from a store too. (See pic below)


Things are starting to come together slowly, but surely.  My BFF Type A would not let me leave it at this, though, so I continued grinding on it for several more hours.


Oops - a minor casualty from the furniture delivery guys Thursday, who shall remain nameless, but they really will save you money.  (Jumping up and down while pulling money out of back pocket).



I guess searching through all of the boxes looking for the hidden squeaky ball, that we do not let her play with on a regular basis, wore her out.  She was so proud of her accomplishment - see pic below.



Have a great weekend!