what's in a name?

oh my gosh. this is so hot right now, at least on Facebook.

Rules to naming your BABY (at least according to GQ, which is a very reliable resource!)

This is hilarious! I would really love to print this and mail it to a few people I know, but I won't because I will pretend I have better things to do with my time...like make fun of their ill-named children's names! whoops! what a B i am. oh, how i love to point the finger and laugh. that's terrible.

But in all seriousness (because I was just joking about the last 3 lines...I swear!), I think this obnoxious name game of these poor kids has got to stop! people are making up names and making their kids sound like the most ridiculous jokes ever! dumb. everyone wants to be "SOOO UNIQUE" that they just start sounding as dumb as everyone else who thinks they're being so very non-mainstream. get over yourselves, folks. or if you just cannot resist affectionately calling something Katniss or Zane, just get a houseplant and name it your imaginations wildest creation. Heck, even a dog or cat!

moving along, the high today is 70. 70!! what the hell! I am wearing jeans to work today! it's cool enough for JEANS! How does that even happen? Oh, i actually DID my hair this morning too. I curled it...my house wasn't too hot to do anything other than a bun right out of the shower, so I styled my 'do! I look presentable! it's such an unfamiliar feeling.

Next weekend Kenny Rogers is coming to Minnesota, and I really want to see him! He will be in concert in Albert Lea, MN which is a small town about 90 minutes south of Minneapolis. I think it would be a great time, fun people watching, and it happens to be part of the County Fair celebration so we would maybe even get to eat some trashy, unhealthy fried food and throw a few bucks down the drain while attempting to win a cheap, useless prize. Doesn't that sound awesome!? I LOVE fairs, so I am fully on board. Hopefully I can convince James that a 3 hour roundtrip drive is worth it! Come on...The GAMBLER!! 

**BONUS** It will also provide ideal circumstances to wear my cowboy boots and some sort of redneck, fair going ensemble. wahoo!! Now I need a paisley or gingham dress!

Well, let's get on with the weekend. I'm ready for some time on the boat - maybe Sunday will be my lucky day! 

Happy weekending!

Chia Pods.... yeah its been a very busy month!

Time flies...Summer is too awesome to be spent on a computer, blogging to no one about nothing. hence the long breaks between my posts, in case anyone has noticed. no? tear. 

it's already July 24th. Yes, 2 full days after Prince George Alexander Louis was born. Have you heard? Yeah, my dear friend Kate just had a baby boy and he's now 2 days old. I don't get to see her much as she lives in England, but I am hoping to see her soon. Oh, and her son. Yeah, I suppose her husby can join in on the fun as well - that William is really a gent. 

Here's a new product I just HAD to try. It was $3 at Whole Foods and although I admit I was skeptical, it truly was delicious! Next time I head to WF I will definitely pick up some more.

What is it? It's basically a yogurt, but with Chia seeds! And NO, it's NOTHING like rice or tapioca (I just threw up in my mouth) pudding. You canNOT taste, hear or FEEL the seeds in your mouth. In fact, this tasted like a mashed up, cold banana. I don't know if it was my mind playing tricks on me or if it was the real case, but it also kept me full for 3-4 hours. That never, ever happens to me with yogurt (unless i add lots of granola). in my opinion, it's worth the higher fat content to stay satisfied/fuller, longer. 

I've had a renewed found love for chia seeds - I even put them in some brownies i made a couple days ago. I didn't measure them and used them in place of oil, but I think they turned out just deliciously! I am happy with the results! I highly recommend it.

Here's a fun snap from 2 Fridays ago when dearest Olivia slept over. 

in addition to eating more than our fair share of cookies, we watched Wreck It Ralph (LOVED this movie!), did our nails, went to the play ground, beach, pool, and made star shaped pancakes! Olivia was a great little buddy to Nash and helped take him on a walk, even!! She learned what "Independent" means, and also what the expression "how the cookie crumbles" means. it was a fun 24 hours and although I was exhausted by Saturday evening, it was so much fun to spend one on one time with her and her imagination. She is so witty - were we all this clever when we were 6? dang. she is amazing, and i never get tired of hearing what she's going to say - or see what she's going to do - next!

OK so here's a hilarious and adorable picture I saw in an email and had to save. i thin it's the goggles that make me laugh so hard, but i don't know - it could also just be the complete personification of the pup. either way, it's so cute.

Guess that's it for today. ha, maybe this week - or month! will try to write more soon, but time is short these days! I am even surprised that tomorrow is Thursday already!! Trash day, Heidi day (trainer at my gym), and the day before Friday! So many big things on the horizon. oh, just so many...

bussing home today - wish me luck and a spot near the AC! 

hello, July!

have i discussed these Fresh Bar granola bars yet? if not, then all i say is go buy them and eat them and love them. they are delicious and satisfying and not bad for you. natural. simple. yummy. do it. keep them in your fridge...they are not crunchy like typical granola bars, but that's okay with me because they also have better ingredients than typical granola bars so it's really a WIN all around! found near the dairy/faux-dairy section coolers at Whole Foods.

we are doing a second bathroom reno! it's awesome! here we have the darling James ripping off one of the blood red walls...yes, the red idea was terrible. it looked better in our imaginations when we opted for the crimson walls. oops. no matter - they are GONE now!

I will update with more pics as they become available. (read: as I remember to take them and actually post about it all. it's summer! i don't have TIME to blog this nonsense.)

Next i must share a recent discovery of awesomeness. YES, this nullifies the above photos of the healthy granola option...however in my defense, I have purchased only ONE box of these crazy-good peanut butter poptarts and i still have 1.5 left...i have had them for over a week. that's pretty amazing self control on my behalf! anyway, if you like poptarts and peanut butter then buy these and enjoy. keep in mind they are 200 calories PER pop tart, so be careful with the over-dosing (something I am prone to doing when it comes to peanut butter anything).

Finally - here is a blurry picture from two weekends ago. this is our immediate neighbor's tree on their immediate neighbor's house! (also happens to be the house my parents used to own and I once lived in!) we don't really experience tornados or extreme, sever weather here in Minneapolis, however when we DO get a "big storm," it is the talk of the town - especially when it knocks out power for over 500,000 homes and rips thousands of trees right out of the ground. luckily for us, we have no trees land on our roof or harm our home or being. we did, however, have to sleep with no A/C or fans that night...no problemo for me! James, on the other hand, was not thrilled with sweating all night. i don't know how he survived Oklahoma summers for so many years of his life. He is more sensitive to the MN heat than almost anyone else I know. :) 

Saturday James and I popped into the Mall of America to quickly run 2 errands... so basically we spent about 3 hours at the mall! oops. OH well, it was only in the mid 70s and mostly cloudy so we didn't miss any suber-fab weather or pool time. just as we were about to leave, James suggested we check out his favorite Western store - they were called RCC Western Store but they changed their name to the Boot Barn. Kind of cheesy, yes, but still packed with amazing Western gear! hooray. My favorite find of the day was, undoubtedly, these amazing boots! Unfortunately for me they were only available in mens...maybe that was really a blessing in disguise? yeah, i'd have bought them in a heartbeat! James didn't really love them like i did so he passed.... damn. i love them. I hope they found a home with someone! love them!

This week is a little bit shorter of a week, as we have a half day on Wednesday and Thursday is my favorite holiday of the year (well, tied with NYE and Halloween. haha!), Independence Day!! Anything Red, White and Blue, I am ALL ABOUT IT!! LOVE me some "FOJ" !!!!! Pretty sure I have my holiday attire picked out and ready to roll, on land and at sea (errm, i mean river or pool). cannot wait!

Happy Monday! 

U-S-A!! 

may the best shoe-WIN.

feet. today's topic of blogarrhea  is feet. hooray!

Does anyone else do this? I call it a Shoe-down or Shoe-wars. Pretty much every single day (or more than once per day, depending on the weather and if I am doing a few different things/"outings" in one day) I hold a few rounds of shoe-wars. You know, since I don't have the best fashion sense out there (but enough to be able to lightly make fun of others' faux-pas!) I have to try on about 9 million different shoes to see which one looks the best, or at least the one that looks less-ugly than the others. So here is what I do. Try on two shoes at the same time, as depicted in the photos below. Then I decide which one looks better. L or R. Then I keep that first round champion and try on another shoe on the losing-foot. Which kick shall conquer? Whatever my choice, i keep it on and dig around for a round three contender. This will go on for either as long as I have time, as long as I can think of how far I will be walking that day, and until i get so fed up i just bite the bullet and go with one. It has luckily only happened once where I wore two different shoes out in public. i didn't even notice - it was my sister who called me out on it while we were walking in to target! oops. fortunately for me I really didn't care because what was I to do, aside from buy a new pair of shoes at that moment!? I already looked like a bum, so I figured what the heyyyyy, roll with it! it definitely provided endless laughs at the time - and still does!! 

The winner was the nude bootie. I think it was kind of wet out that day so I didn't want to end up with wet feet!! I am even wearing these great shoes today - right now! I love them!

do my toes look long? I've received, ummm, comments in the past regarding my finger-like toes. I am not offended, but I do find it humorous! I can pick all sorts of things up with my toes, and I am confident I would be able to legibly write my name with them too - at the very least, my right foot. not too sure about my left foot. 

One of the most humorously amazing things i've ever seen in my life was witnessing Travis Andersen pick up a baseball with his toes!! That was back when I was about 16 and we were on the baseball bus heading to a game in Red Wing. Ahh, the delights of high school boys. on a bus. MEMORIES!

now i'm off to get a pedi! this weekend MIGHT bring us some sunshine, so we must make sure my tootsies are ready to shine!

ooops, I did it again! twice.

I guess a great way to tell if you've slacked on your blogging is when you post basically the same posts in a row. sorry about that redundancy! 

If i had more to BLOG about, I would. But I don't, really! I mean, I can come up with about 99 things to b!tch about and things to make fun of people over, but I am trying to be a little more positive these days. 


OK, how about how much I am craving sushi lately? Despite the lack of summery weather that usually brings on my urge for sushi, I still am just pining for it! Maybe tonight James will treat me to a little yum yum sushi!! fingers crossed, but i don't have high hopes.

is this for real, or just a mean trick? 

because this looks like heaven to me and 

I definitely want a WHOLE lotta THAT goodness.

thank you, Taco Bell.

Yup, I must be hungry because in a pinch all i think and write about is food. I gotta go find something to eat.

Ciao!

turn up the heat!

Today is June 3rd and it's about 63 degrees and partly cloudy... I will repeat - JUNE 3rd and about 60-something degrees. That means cold. For June. Warm for January, but ridiculously COLD for June! What the heck is up with this weather? I know I shouldn't complain, given the much worse weather in Oklahoma (tornados, galore! yet another reason to never live there!), but still... we should be at the pool and on a boat and sweating! not freezing and bundling up in long jeans and sweatshirts. ugh. oh well. enough of that.

So here area couple photos of what's been brewing since I last posted, ohh you know, forever ago!

boom.

(photoshop pic courtesy of my high school friend 

Rob Hopster and his brilliant imagination!)

OH NO HE DIT-INT! well, kids, YES he did! And I agreed...to marry him! That was back in April, here we are in June, so I guess i am a tad bit delayed in the fun news. It's been a great time sharing the news with friends and family and thinking up silly ideas for the wedding plans. Maybe more on that later.... And YES, for those who know me, I most certainly am distracting myself constantly by catching a glimpse of this gorgeous new SHINY thing on my finger! SO PRETTY!

Next, I need to give a quick opinion about some mascara I recently tried. I feel like i already wrote about this, but maybe not? Well, because this subject is so near and dear to me I find it necessary to talk about it, maybe even twice.

Last year I used a mascara called Blinc. Every heard about it? Well, it's pretty awesome. Instead of painting your eyelashes, it "tubes" them. What does this mean? Have you ever seen when girls body paint a swimsuit into their nude bodies? Think Sports Illustrated or Playboy... right, they paint their body and to wash it off they have to, you know, suds up and all that paint runs down into the drain. Is everyone picturing this? So somehow my post went a little PG-13, but hold on because it will make sense soon. I hope. OK, so back to painting - the paint on their bodies is like paint on our eyelashes. When we cry (which, we do), or sweat (definitely what I do), get stuck in rainstorms (if your life is a romantic comedy, I guess, and you still look pretty with rained on hair), and wash off mascara, we get that mess of black crap streaking down our faces. gross. Enter our friends at Blinc. They decided to reinvent the process of applying and removing mascara completely! So instead of washing off the body paint think of Marisa Miller simply putting on and taking off clothes! Voila! No messy paint running down her in the shower and into the drain...no messy mascara clumps running down our faces and making us look like sad clowns, zombies, or extra creepy mimes. Instead, the mascara tubes just come off like little pieces of rubber, almost! it's seriously the most amazing way to remove mascara, ever. no harsh rubbing, oily remover or stained faces. it comes off so simply I almost can't explain it! (Hence my XXX comparison to body paint versus actual clothing.) Now back to the Blinc review. I love how easily Blinc comes off and it does go on pretty easily as well, although you have to be somewhat quick about it because it seems to dry up a littler faster than normal mascara. The type I used last year was their original formula and brush. My gal pal wears Blinc and it is AWESOME on her. She has the kind of eyelashes that are very long and thinner, so it definitely highlights what gorgeousness she's got going on, naturally. But with me, I have a lot of eyelashes - very thick and have more natural volume, so all Blinc did for me was make me look like I had about 7 really long eyelashes. A cool look, but not best for me on a daily basis. Well, a couple months ago I saw that Sephora had a new Blinc formula and wand made to increase volume (music to my ears!). So I bought it and was sadly disappointed. Although the brush was improved and looked like ti would help fan out the "tubes" a little better than the original formula, it sadly had to go back to Sephora because it still just looked too...spacey? Like I had too much space between my eyelashes? Luckily I have also fallen in luuuurve with the greatest non-waterproof mascara of all time, Benefit, Yes, They're Real! mascara. No joke, if you buy this you will first cringe at the $23 price tag, but after a couple days of rocking these luscious lashes and receiving endless compliments, you'll be so happy you tried it and splurged on it. And yes, you will most likely continue to buy it. I have been using it since maybe October of 2012 and just love it! It makes my nice eyelashes (not trying to brag...but I do seem to get a lot of compliments on them, even sans my Benefit magic!) very nice and is pretty easy to wash off. Now, if I go on a beachy vacation or to the pool (or, hopefully soon, to the BOAT!) I will switch back to my go-to, L'oreal Voluminous waterproof. This is THE BEST waterproof mascara ever invented and I can never get enough of it. It is $6 but I'd pay much more. Much more. 

so here is a pic from March... 

I think i posted it already, but she really cracks me up 

and I had to just get a little more show time with it. 

She is hilarious and only getting quirkier and sillier!

and i love it.

What else is going on...hmmm, well we've been looking around a little bit for a new house, but I think we've decided to just redo the kitchen and upstairs bathroom in our own house and stay put a while longer. Let me tell you, it's been a lot of fun thinking about paying for a kitchen and bath reno AND a wedding!! no stress, what so ever! can you sense a little sarcasm? :) just kidding, it could be worse. trust me.

hopefully mother nature wakes up and revs up the temperatures soon. I'd love to have a couple days out on the boat this summer instead of just going to the tanning bed (wait, no I don't do that. uhhh...) and bundling up all the time! trying to stay positive. must stay positive!

Happy Monday...I hope it's a warm and sunny one!

Gpa's 80th Birthday!

So here are a few snaps shots of the last four or five days. the second one is pretty significant to me (James, me and a stuffed green bear) because I have long teased James about winning me a prize at a fair. One of the things I told him when we started dating (eons ago), was that i was so excited he was a QB because then (clearly) that means he is great at fair games and should be able to win me lots of prizes that i can later give away. haha. finally, on April 6, 2013, he won me a stuffed animal prize!! no, we weren't at the fair, but we were at a dive bar in Small Town, Minnesota and he won it in one of those arcade games called Clean Sweep... also known as "The Claw" for those of you who love the movie Toy Story. Anyway, it was a really fun trip to the dive bar, big family photo, and grandpa's birthday celebration. definitely a great trip!! I love my family!

BLINC brand voluminous mascara...not worth it, save your $. sorry Blinc.

at the Side Bar in Cold Spring before Grandpa's 80th Birthday Party...

my quarterback has finally won me a prize! 

of course, it is a CHEERLEADER! hooray!

Cool Cat Olivia on our way up to Grandpa's...this kid has it ALL!

Grandpa's Birthday cake! MMM! Marble...it was so yummy!

We are forecasted to get 6+ inches of snow over the next 36 hours...so far it's dry outside, about 38 degrees. I cannot believe we are getting SNOW so late in the year! What the heck! it's a major bummer, but as long as spring gets here in the next couple weeks I think I will be ok. :) maybe. Sure am getting impatient though! I am so tired of putting on a jacket and gloves every time i walk Nash!! (I tell ya what, in a world where our worst worry is about the weather, i would say I am pretty darn blessed. you can't control the weather, so you may as well deal with it the best you can. things could be much worse...so I'm counting my blessings here!)

It's tuesday! workout it done for the day, so it's an evening i get to spend doing whatever i want!! wahoo! probably finishing taxes! holla. jealy? 

haha, didn't think so!

happy shoveling! 

PS - current song? Nasty Girl by Vanity 6. such a great song... from Beverly Hills Cop. Love me some Eddie Murphy!