Weekend Recap

This weekend Nick & I headed back to Wisconsin!  It was so so good to go home!!

We got into town pretty late on Friday night, so we didn't really do much...

Saturday 

I went bridesmaid dress shopping for my sisters wedding...it was a bit of a disaster at the bridal shop...

To start with - they wouldn't let us make an 'appointment' for bridesmaids dress shopping, they said they only reserved 'appointments' for brides.  Fine we said, we knew what we were looking for and they said they would reserve a few fitting rooms for us.  My sister had picked out her color and designer and had called ahead and they said they carried 'a bunch' of dresses by that designer.  

Turns out 'a bunch' was 6.  Fail!

We tried on what we could, and when the shop realized it clearly wasn't going well - they became quite snarky.  It was awful.  They told us they could take our measurements, so we agreed - but then they refused to show them to us.  (I'm sure they didn't want us to go order the dresses elsewhere...but they really shouldn't have offered to take them in the first place, they clearly knew we weren't ordering from them)

After we left the shop, we ended up going back to my parents house for lunch and then just shopped online and ordered our dresses.  It turned out to be fine - but the shop was extremely un-helpful!

These are the dresses (and the color) we picked 

(the long dresses are being hemmed to the length of the short one)

After the dresses were ordered and the 'non-family' bridesmaids left, we went over to visit my Grandma.  My Gramps passed away in December, so it's still a bit of an adjustment period for all of us.  When we got there, my Grandma gave us all hats she had knit!

So of course we needed to model!

 We spend Saturday evening just hanging out at my parents.  Nick cooked us up a delicious meal on the grill and we just watched a movie!  It was so nice and relaxing!

even the dogs were relaxed!

Sunday 

We got up early and headed back to MN....as you heard in my previous post, the roads were awful!!

We spent 200+ miles driving though this..

Yuck!

I hope you all had a fabulous weekend!!

Snowy Sunday

Nick and I had a great weekend back in Wisconsin....  

(More to come on that in a future update..)

Unfortunately we got stuck in a winter storm during our drive back today...  Ugh!  It was awful!  I hate winter weather!!  It took us almost twice the usual amount of time to make the drive back.  Yuck!

We've spent most of the evening just relaxing after the very stressful drive....

Here's a few pics from our drive... we drove for 200+ miles in this...  (awesome)...

As soon as we got back ... we walked around the corner to one of our favorite bars...

This was definitely necessary....

Happy Sunday!!

What I'm Loving Wednesday

Today I'm linking up with Jamie to share what I'm loving....

In no particular order.... here are a few things I'm loving this week!

this weather

don't get me wrong - it still isn't warm by any stretch of the imagination in MN - its MUCH warmer than it was last week.  I absolutely hate winter.  I mean hate it.  I want to curl up in a ball wrapped under about 50 blankets in my nice comfy bed....and sleep from about Nov-April.  'Why do you live there' you may ask?  Well...I'm not exactly sure is our answer.  We're both WI natives - so we're used to winter.... and even though neither one of us enjoy them - we still can't seem to leave for a warmer climate...

This week                                 Last week

my job

yes, I actually said it.  I really do love my job.  I work for a large corporation (30,000+ employees) however, I'm located in a tiny 15 person sales office.  We frequently describe ourselves as a 'family'.  It's great, everyone is friendly, and it's a relatively low stress job.  I'm honestly quite blessed.  I've had jobs that I've DREADED going to every day - and I give thanks often that this one is so great.  My office is way up on the 30th floor of a building - so when it snows (which it does often here) it's almost like we live in a snowglobe!)  We also have a relaxed dress code (hello blue jeans everyday!!) and did I mention we play 'put for a buck' mini golf on Fridays?  Oh - and I won $20 in the Superbowl pool over the weekend!



Friday mini-golf



'snowglobe'



Superbowl winnings!!



donald driver

love him. love him. love him.

I'm (slightly...ok majorly) obsessed with the Green Bay Packers.  Nick & I both are 'owners' of the team.  (ie - we both spent a ridic amount of money to 'buy' Packers stock a few years ago when they went on sale).

anyways..

Donald officially retired today.  He has been with the Pack since 1999 - and is literally my favorite player.  Such a class act.  He's humble, generous in the community and overall a wonderful role model.  This is the type of person you would hope EVERY professional athlete could be.  He is someone you WANT young children to look up to and to aspire to be like.

On the field he holds the Packer franchise records for receptions, yards, number of touchdowns and is 2nd in regular-season games played (to Brent Favre...yes, the spelling was intentional - look for a future post on how NOT to be a role model)

Off the field - he has helped countless people both in the Green Bay area and nationally through the Donald Driver Foundation.  He hosts a golf outing every year, a celebrity softball game, football camp, pool tournament and charity dinner/auction.  The foundation provides scholarships as well as helping families in hard financial times - this man is seriously amazing.  Not to mention - he did win a season of Dancing with the Stars!



seriously... who doesn't like to look at this???

  

my amazing hubby

Seriously. I'm lucky.  I know it.
No marriage/relationship is perfect - but ours is pretty awesome.  We can truly just be ourselves with each other.  We are both pretty independant people and I love that our relationship allows us to not only spend time together, but also to be ok with doing our own things. 
I love that he cooks me yummy meals (frequently, since the only meal I really cook is breakfast...)
He drives me to work every morning, its great because we get an extra 15-20 minutes together every day on the commute in.  It's also great because then I don't have to drive and can just take the lightrail commuter train home at night.



the view on our drive to work

  





us...being 'us'  (and supporting our beloved Green Bay Packers!!!!)



What are you loving this Wednesday?

Weekend Recap

Wow, another week gone by and again I've been terribly delinquent with my blog posts...

Today I'm linking up for a weekend update!  Here's a quick recap of our weekend...

Thursday...

I went to dinner with my sweet friend Emily.  We used to work together and have really kept in touch after I changed jobs.  We met in St. Paul at Bangkok Cuisine Thai restaurant.  The food was so yummy and it was so great to see her smiling face!  She told me all about her recent trip to Istanbul & I caught her up on the wedding & honeymoon details!

Friday - Ladies Night...

I met up with some new work friends of mine for a night out in Minneapolis' North Loop.  We started with dinner at Black Sheep Pizza.  Of course we had to start with a pitcher of wine!  :-)  After we'd had our fair share of food and drink - we continued our night with stops at a few local establishments (and a lot more alcohol!)  Needless to say Saturday morning was not a great time to be me!  :-)

Here are a few photos from the night....don't judge us... It was ladies night!

Saturday...

We did some more house hunting.  We saw a few townhouses in a different area of the city than we had previously looked.  We liked them - but not really enough to consider an offer.

After house hunting we spent the rest of the day relaxing.  It's been SO COLD here, that we really didn't want to leave the house. 

 

Superbowl Sunday...

Nick and I went to brunch at the Chatterbox.  It isn't too far from where we live and they offer a pretty good brunch selection.  After brunch we went and saw the movie Zero Dark Thirty.  It chronicles the efforts over 10 years that led to the raid that ultimately killed bin Laden.  I thought the movie was pretty good.  I honestly left wishing I could work for the CIA!!  I think it would be fascinating to work on projects that are so important and have access to all that top secret information!  I had read the book 'No Easy Day' - which sort of tells the same story.  It was interesting to see how the story lines overlapped!

We spent Sunday afternoon finishing up our Thank You notes from our wedding.  We were married 5 weeks ago and have been seriously slacking on getting them done.  We were so blessed to have had so many wonderful gifts that I really wanted to get everything written and in the mail.  Mission (finally) accomplished!!

We really didn't do anything for the Superbowl.  Our beloved Green Bay Packers weren't playing - so we really didn't have much motivation to watch.  I do have to say that I thought Beyonce ROCKED that halftime show!  Dang!  I wish I could look like that!!

Well that's all for now - my goal for this week is be a much more avid blogger!!

Since I've been gone....

Wow... I knew I wanted to start a blog, however, I didn't realize the discipline it would take to sit down and write every night!!  Here's to hoping I get a bit better at keeping up with this!  :-)

Here's what we've been up to the past 2 weeks!

I traveled to Omaha for work...

My team at work are all field based- there are about 20 of us scattered all across the US - so we meet a few times a year to discuss projects/strategies to better serve our customers.  It's great to see people face to face and learn what my counterparts across the country are working on!  

Of course there is always the perk of hanging out with my teammates & getting to know them outside of work - all while going out for dinner & drinks at yummy restaurants!! 

We went house hunting

Nick and I are looking to buy a home.  Having just gotten married & both recently finishing up our masters programs, we finally have some time.  We're still not sure exactly what area of our city we want to live in - so we set out exploring what we could buy for our budget in different areas....

It was not as glamorous as the TV show makes it out to be.... Yuck!  We spent an entire weekend driving all around the metro area looking at homes and didn't find a single one that we liked!  A few realtors told us this was a 'low inventory' time - so we're just keeping our eyes open for something we like to come on this market.  (I have a feeling there will be many more posts about this!)  ;-)

We had date night...

We've been sooo busy the past few months with the wedding & school - that we really haven't had a 'date night' in forever.

We went to a fun little Mexican restaurant (on a recommendation of a friend)

The food was YUMMY!

Then we went and saw the movie 'Flight' at a theater near our house.

The past few days have been spent just hanging out and relaxing...

Check back soon for more updates!!