2009 Year in Review

It seems so weird to me that it's New Year's Eve and tomorrow it's going to be 2010. I know I haven't updated in a while so I thought I'd do a special "Year in Review" post for today. I don't remember every single thing that happened in each month but I'll do my best to remember all the highlights. 2009 was definitely one of my best years.

January -
A year ago today I was in downtown Chicago with my (not then) boyfriend, his brother's and a few friends from college. It was also the first time that the bf and I kissed. Not at midnight, thankfully (although we did kiss at midnight), it was a few hours earlier that day. We were still in our awkward, beginning relationship phase, but it was definitely a fun night. I also started my last semester as an undergraduate student!

February -
I was anxious for Valentine's Day to arrive because I wasn't sure where I stood with the bf. Was he looking for me to be his girlfriend? Was I just a friend who he occasionally kissed? I didn't know! And I'm sure I annoyed the hell out of my friends with my CONSTANT over analyzing. The bf and I hadn't made any plans for Valentine's Day, actually, I don't think we even mentioned it to each other. He eventually told me that we were going to go visit his brother in Chicago for the long President's/Valentine's Day weekend. I thought ok, but wasn't banking on it being romantic or anything like that. I ended up making him red velvet cupcakes and bringing them to his house before we left. I guess I made the corner to fast and ended up sending the cupcakes flyging and ruining all of them. I was more than bummed. Anyways, I thought we were heading to his brother's house and he ended up surprising me and had gotten a hotel downtown Chicago for us instead. We ended up walking downtown, going to eat at Ditka's, and spending Valentine's night at a cute little wine bar that I can't remember the name. They even had Spanish guitar players and flamenco dancers.

March -
I spent a week with some of my best friends at an all inclusive resort in Cozumel, Mexico. It was amazing. I did nothing but sit by the pool all day long and eat nachos and chips and salsa. My roommate and I would be so tired by the end of the day that we'd be asleep by 9pm. Much to the annoyance of some of our other friends who wanted us to go out with them in the evenings.

April -
April drop the last month of my undergraduate experience. It was also my brother's 18th birthday and the first time the bf officially met my parents (and the rest of my over sized family) at his joint birthday party with my cousin. Thankfully it went well. The next day my dad's side of the family had an Easter gathering where all of us cousin's had an easter egg hunt like we did when we were little children. Except now we're all in college. Let's just say it was HILARIOUS.

May -
I graduated with my BSW on the 3rd. I also started the oh so fun job search for the summer. I clearly didn't put as much effort as I needed to because I didn't end up getting anything so I instead spent the summer dicking. Which I was totally fine with :). The bf also graduated graduate school with his MBA and and got hired as a full time employee at a place he had been working at during his college experience. I got him a massive grill he had wanted for a while as a present and he got me my Nokia phone.

June -
The bf turned 26 that month. I bought him a birthday cake that had his name on it with balloons (he's not a fan of box cakes unfortunately). We ate cake, and then that night we went out to a really nice sushi (the bf's favorite food,....unfortunately) restaurant and then went to see a movie. It was a pretty low key day. I got him a really nice dark wood box that was engraved with his initials and inside were matching silver and black leather bond flask with his initials, cigar holder, mini flask, lighter with his initials and cigar cutter. The bf got himself a little birthday present and bought an 8 week old german shepherd puppy

July -
I don't remember a whole lot from this month, it must have been slow. I do remember that for the 4th we went to the bf's brother's house for the weekend. We took the puppy for a walk and looked at all the fancy apartments and walked the Boston symphony fireworks on the television.

August -
This month brought the end of the summer and the start of graduate school. I also got the internship that I had been waiting to hear from and started at the end of the month.

September -
Labor Day weekend the bf, his brother's, their girlfriends/wives and a few friends went camping.....behind the bf's brother's massive house. We waited to long to make reservations at regular campsites and ended not finding a place that had availability. So we said screw it and set up tent's in the backyard. It ended up being extremely hot that weekend so it was nice to be able to go inside and be in the air conditioning. And to have TV, hehe.

October -
I turned 24 this month. My birthday fell on a Thursday which happened to be my super long day at internship so I was a little less than excited. However, my bf actually set me flowers to my office which was a huge surprise and something that no guy had ever done for me before. We ate lunch together and I went to his house that night. He had gotten my favorite pizza and made me my favorite cake. Two cakes actually. I love that boxed white cake with the confetti chips in it with the matching frosting. He made two cakes and had one with the white sprinkle frosting and one with the chocolate sprinkle frosting. I loved it. And then we watched The Office.

November -
The semester had been pretty rough for me so I was really looking forward to Thanksgiving break. It was also the first Thanksgiving that I would be bringing a boyfriend with me. So I was excited.....and extremely nervous. My parents had gone down to Chicago the day before and my brother and the bf went first thing Thanksgiving Day. It went well. It was a crazy house and everyone ate way to much. The bf and I left that evening and went to his brother's house to stay the night. We got up early the next day and headed downtown to do some shopping.

December -
This month has been crazy. I finished my first semester for graduate school and all A's!!! I was so ecstatic when I looked online to see what my grades were. I have one semester left and I'm feeling really good about finishing up. This past semester was really rough and I'm not taking as many classes so I know I'll be fine. Christmas was really good and I ended up with a lot of loot. I got a new Sonicare Toothbrush, over $3oo, more candy than I know what to do with, socks, a sweater dress, a new mini compter (from the bf!!!!!!), Super Mario Brother's for wii, and concert tickets to the Black Eyed Peas. Yeah, I did real well. The bf and I headed up to his dad's house in for a long Christmas weekend. It was really fun and nice to get away and relax. We were supposed to head out west to spend New Year's with some friends but we decided to just come back and spend New Year's here. After being away for so long we were kind of ready to come home and have a low key night. Per the bf's request, I'm making a steak dinner with a mushroom cream sauce, macaroni and cheese and roasted garlic mashed potatoes. I'll update on how that goes....hehe.

So like I said, 2009 was a really good year. Especially considering the mess 2008 was. Here's to hoping 2010 is the best ever! I hope everyone has a safe and great night!

the day from hell: school edition and this stupid challenge that i've already failed miserably at

I'm so exhausted right it hurts to think. Today was one of the worse days on my whole entire existence. Otherwise known as finals week. Or day. Because apparently it's appropriate to schedule MSW finals all of the same day. As well as all of our end of semester projects and papers.

I studied all day long yesterday. I didn't stop studying until after 1:30 am and then I woke back up again at 5:45 am to study more. I gave a presentation this morning and turned in a research paper at 9:30 am. I had a 14 page final my brain hurt. Then I had another final that made me cry as soon as I walked out of the room.

I've never tried so hard in my life as I have this semester and all I wanted to accomplish was to get a 4.0. I actually thought I stood a chance. Until today.

I feel so incompetent and helpless. And I hate it. I'm mad that I didn't study more, but I couldn't fit anymore information in my brain.

All I want to do is cuddle in my bed and sleep this day away.

But I still have to post today's Best of 2009 Challenge. I totally forgot to do Friday and Saturday's entries. Don't care. Today's entry is "Blog Find of the Year: That gem of a blog you can't believe you didn't know about until this year."

Easy. City Girl's Blog. Witty, smart, entertaining, not to mention some of the best advice ever. Seriously. Go, read. Thank me tomorrow.

Day 4: Best Book

I just barely remembered that I hadn't posted my entry for today's Best of 2009 Challenge.

"What book - fiction or non - touched you? Where were you when you read it? Have you bought and given away multiple copies?"

I'll keep it short, because just like yesterday's, I don't really have much to say on this topic. I enjoy reading, I really do. But between reading for school, studying, working, internship and everything else I do I just don't really remember to sit and read a book. It's bad really, because I have a stack of about 8 books that I've been meaning to read since March.

So I'm sitting in my bed and I'm trying to actually remember what books I've read this year for fun and all I can come up with is the Twilight Saga and The Pursuit of Happyness. How sad is that? Actually, I remember my brother buying my Breaking Dawn at this exact same time last year.

Anyways, I've decided that it's pretty shameful that I haven't read any decent pieces of work this year and I'm hellbent on changing that this next year. In order to make that happen I'm proposing for one of my New Year's Resolutions that at the beginning of each month I set a goal to read a certain amount of books and then at the end of that month I'll do a book review of sorts.

Good idea, no?

Have a good weekend!

Day 3: What did I get myself into?

Today's post for the Best of 2009 Challenge is "What's an article that you read that blew you away? That you shared with all your friends. That you Delicious'd and reference throughout the year."

Really? I've been thinking about this one since I saw it two days ago and I still got nothing! I'm not much into the reading, unless you count celebrity gossip magazines and the occasional Cosmopolitan. Which, as you can probably tell, don't have the most fascinating reads.

I don't really want to pick anything from any of those magazines because who really cares about why Tiger cheated on his gorgeous wife with a girl from VH1's Tool Academy of all people or public places you've gotten caught doing the dirty?

(Although I'm very interested in all those things, no judgement.)

So, I'm going to tweak this little prompt here so that I can actually have something to post for it. Instead, I will be posting about my favorite magazine of this year and why.

This won't come to any surprise to those you know me in real life, but the magazine that I've discovered this year that I have to buy every month (serious, why don't I just got a subscription for crying out loud?) is Food Network Magazine.

(See, no surprise there...)

My favorite issue to date is definitely this months holiday issue. I've found myself with a whole lot of people that I want to do something nice for this holiday season, but I just simply can't afford to buy gifts of appreciation for everyone.

(Especially since I went a little bit overboard with the bf's present. And by a little bit I clearly mean A TON.)

The issue this month is full of cute little gifts to give people that are meaningful and not that expensive, especially if you already have a few of the pieces. One of my favorite gift ideas for bosses and co-workers are little jars that you by and layer with different ingredients depending on what food item you are giving them. The one I'm thinking about doing for people is the chunking chocolate chip christmas cookies. First you fill the jar with the dry ingredients like the flour, baking powder and sugar. Next you layer in cocoa powder, and then red and green M&M's, then white chocolate chips, then crushed cashews, then chocolate chunks, and then finally toasted coconut. The end result is a jar nicely layered with all of these goodies. Other things you can make are curried lentil soup, blue cornbread with pineapple, holiday panettone and spiced hot cocoa.

They also have an insert for 50 different holiday cookie recipes which I can not wait to try. There are a few recipes that I've already dog ears so that I remember to make them soon.

Anyways, back to the magazine. I know it makes me sound super nerdy and all "Susie Homemaker" but I can't help it. I can sit a flip through the recipes or search online for recipes or watch the channel all day long.

(Side note: We were having a discussion in my mental disorders class about eating disorders and I warning sign is that the individual is so obsessed with food that they only watch or read food related things. YIKES!)

Anyways, if you are looking for some good holiday recipes or cute food related holiday gifts I highly suggest that you pick up this issue!

Day Two

Today's post for the Best of 2009 Challenge is Best Restaurant Experience. "Share the best restaurant experience you had this year. Who was there? What made it amazing? What taste stands out in your mind?"

I had to think about this for a while because the bf and I go out to eat a lot, and it's hard to pick just one experience that was great. I guess the first place that stands out in my mind is this little wine bar we went to in Chicago for Valentine's Day this year. The atmosphere was perfect for the holiday, not to cheesy but still romantic. The lights were low and I think there were candles on the tables. It was a cozy little place with couches and high tables. It was not as packed as you would think a cute little wine bar would be on the weekend of Valentine's Day, which I liked.

I can't say that we actually got any food there. We had met up with the bf's brother beforehand to eat at another restaurant downtown. We just had a few drinks and some desserty type things to share.

I think the thing I liked about this place was the live music. I think they had brought in a Flemanco dancer and a small Spanish band to play their guitars. It was really nice and fit the setting perfectly.

I don't know why this particular place stands out in my mind, maybe it was because this was the first Valentine's Day where my boyfriend actually planned something special and took me somewhere for the weekend.

(Wait....is that sad?)

Either way, it was a good weekend :)

Day One

I guess there is this little challenge going around the interweb about the the best of 2009 and what better way to jump start this blog than to participate??!

Today topic today was on the best trip of 2009. This is pretty easy. I spent spring break this past March in Mexico and that clearly takes the cake over various trips to Chicago and Wisconsin. (Although all of those were pretty darn fantastic as well.)

I went with a group of friends and spent a fabulous week sitting by the pool, sipping fruity drinks, eating way to much cheese and mexican food in general (seriously, all inclusive resorts are not good for my body image), doing aqua aerobics, avoiding the ocean like it's my job, eating more, watching old school Beverly Hills 90210, and catching on much needed girlie time.

My friend and I would be so exhausted by the evening that we would fall asleep watching tv at like 8pm. Much to the dismay and frustration of our other friends.

It was fabulous and I want to go back. I miss being so tan....

oh yeah, i do have a blog

Hello friends. It's been a while. I know. I've been kind of hating this blog. For many reasons. So I decided to do something about it. I changed a few things and revamped some old posts. Nothing your going to notice I'm sure. But it makes me feel a little better.

Anyways, the point of this post....

Last weekend was Thanksgiving. And I want to discuss the events of my weekend as well as list out a few things that I'm very, very thankful for. A little late? Yes, but go with me.

Thanksgiving is kind of a big deal in my family. For as long as I can remember I've always gone to my grandparents house in Chicago and spend the day with my mom's side of the family. Then my mom, aunt and myself would wake up at some god awful hour of the morning on friday and go shopping.

This year was no different. Except I brought my boyfriend. This is a big deal for me people, I've NEVER brought a boyfriend to Thanksgiving before, let alone a family function. I've never really wanted to bring a boyfriend before. Not for fear that my family would embarrass me and he would be traumatized. Nope, I was afraid of my boyfriend embarrassing my family. The bf and I woke up Thursday morning and set out for Chicago. We got there around noonish and just kind of hang around watching tv until dinner. We stayed for a few more hours after dinner until we drove downtown where we stayed the rest of the weekend. It was a success. He survived a day with my crazy grandpa, 5 children under the age of 7, yappy dogs running a muck, my loud cousins and the general ridiculousness that is my mother's side. He helps that he's from Eastern Europe as well.

Also, can I please talk about how I'm positive I have the best boyfriend in the world? I'm thankful that he calls me out when I'm bring absolutely ridiculous, I'm thankful that he cooks me food the majority of the time, I'm thankful that he tivos 90210 for me and then watches it with me even though he absolutely hates it. I'm thankful that he fills up my gas tank without telling me. And when he kisses me goodnight, or when we're sitting on the couch. I'm thankful that even when my cooking endeavors don't always work out, he still eats it. I'm thankful that he fixes my computer when it breaks and helps me make posters and presentations because I'm completely useless with technology. I'm thankful he downloads silly movies and music I want and got Netflix so he can introduce me to shows like "Worst Week" because he knows me so well.

And about fifty thousand more reasons but I'm sure you guys are beyond nauseous now.

Pretty much it was a fabulous weekend. And now that it's December I am so excited for Christmas. Get this? The bf and I are road tripping it. We're taking my dad's suburban and hitting up Wisconsin for Christmas weekend and then heading west to Nebraska for New Years. And then back to the Midwest to start my last semester of graduate school!

I really want to get this blog back on track and I'm going to try to post more often and comment more on your blogs!

Hope all your weekends were spectacular!