A Few Updates...

So, I haven't written a blog post in a while, so I figured I have to mention something this week. Well, nothing extraordinary has really happened. Being Rob's roomie has been great, and we haven't had any fights about designated space yet ;-) I'm currently trying to talk him into rearranging the bedroom furniture to create a more open floor plan, so we'll see how that goes. Apparently if we move the bed we need to move the TV, but it’s mounted to the wall, so we would need to buy a swivel mount, and by then we might as well upgrade the TV. HAHA! So, what seems like a pretty simple switch-aroo might turn into a home makeover. Stay tuned!

This past weekend was Jamie & Jessica's Couples Baby Shower. It was so much fun! We decorated onesies, played bingo, had prizes, food, and they got some really great presents for their baby boy. He's due at the beginning of April, and he had better not arrive before I get back from Europe. I'm ecstatic for them!

As for work, I can't complain ;-) I've been putting in some extra hours so I'll have extra cash when I leave for Europe. Which, by the way, is in 17 days!! Holy crap! Bambi, Abbey, and I are freaking out! We've been watching travel videos of the places we're visiting, taking notes, and shopping like crazy ;-) I'm just praying for good weather. That's all; I don't care if it’s cold or overcast, I just don't want rain. The temperatures between the two cities are a high of 60 degrees and low of 40 degrees. That's awesome! Now, just give me some sun, Dear Lord!

This upcoming weekend I'm visiting my older sister in Nashville to make some jewelry, and then hit up the Flea Market. I love making jewelry now! Abbey hosted a jewelry-making party a couple of weeks ago, and now she has me totally engrossed with this newfound hobby. I love that I can pick whatever color and design I want, and it looks so professional when I'm done. I went out after the jewelry party and bought like $100 in beads and tools to start my own kit. HAHA! I feel so crafty ;-) Mom and I have already made some great pieces, so I know Christine will love it.

I'm starting to realize that my "melodramatic" life isn't so melodramatic, more so just fun to write about ;-)

A pearl set I made

Mom and the jewelry she designed

The earrings I made at the party

Unhealthy Eating...

This past week has been crazy hectic and I'm ashamed to admit that I've been eating out way too much. I'm the type of person who usually eats a small breakfast, followed by a lean cuisine or salad for lunch, a sensible dinner, and a few snacks throughout the day. Don't get me wrong, I do have a piece of chocolate after lunch and occasionally stray from my normal eating habits, but I pretty much stick to this routine. One week ago (last Thursday), Rob and I ate at Chili's for a quick dinner before we did some grocery shopping. This past Friday, my favorite girlies and I had dinner out at Olive Garden, followed by watching Eat, Pray, Love and Investigation Discovery. Word to the wise, don't watch this show late at night when you are by yourself, have no weapons, and are easily scared. Anyways, on Saturday Rob and I ate at Soups and Scoops for lunch, although it’s like a home-style family-owned business I still consider it 'eating out.' Then, we traveled to Cherokee, N.C. where we ate at the casino buffet for dinner. This was after Rob won over $4500 on a slot machine! HA! It was awesome, and I couldn't have cared at the time where we ate dinner. The next morning, we ate at Paula Dean's Kitchen for breakfast, which was great but heavily stuffed with all sorts of carbs and unhealthy-feeling foods. This is when all of the eating out started to catch up with me. I felt sluggish and just generally unhealthy. The food was so heavy on my system I didn't even eat a lunch. For dinner, we went to Lauren and TJ's house to watch the Superbowl and had homemade petros, which is the most normal dinner I've had this week. Monday night was Jessica's birthday and we all went and ate at Wasabi. Tuesday night, I met up with my good friend, Nikki, and her baby boy for dinner at Applebee's. I hadn't seen her in like four months, so I was really just there to catch up with her, but of course I ate. Last night, I had my Europe-traveling buddies come over to watch videos on the locations we'll be traveling to, and Rob brought home a pizza from Pizza Hut. Ok, so basically I feel disgusting. It's not so much I feel guilty, or that I'm gaining weight (surprisingly I'm not....at least not yet), but I feel gross and sluggish. So, starting tonight I'm getting back in the swing of things. Rob and I need to get back to making more dinners at home. I enjoy his cooking much better than any restaurant we've gone too anyway, so it shouldn't be too hard. We've even planned this year's Valentine's Day meal at home, our own homemade fondue dinner. Yummo!

When in Rome...and Paris!

I just have to say I am super-pumped about my trip to Europe in 35 days. HOLY COW...in 35 days I will be flying to Paris and Rome with my two girlfriends, and I will get to see some of the most historically significant architecture/monuments on the planet! Up to this point, I haven't really considered myself as having been out of the country. Yes, I've been to Jamaica, Grand Cayman, Mexico, and some of the Virgin Islands, but I haven't really been out of the country. This is because I haven't slept in another country, ate several meals in another country, or experienced the culture in another country. I have only taken cruises out of the United States, and been on foreign land for eight hours at a time only to return to the safe haven of the boat. So, this trip to Europe is technically my first real experience traveling out of the country. Anything can happen. I could get mugged. I could get food poisoning. I could be sleeping in a dangerously-located hotel where they don't change the sheets. Sure, all of these things might possibly happen. Even Rob says, "You know the movie, Taken? If you get abducted and sold into the slave trade, I don't have the skills to get you back like Liam Neeson." I'm pretty sure my girlfriends and I are alittle old for anyone to want to put us in the slave trade, but we'll be smart and safe all the same. I like to think of all the lifelong memories I'm going to create just by taking a single eight day trip. In Paris, I'll sip a real cappuccino at a corner café. I'll see the Mona Lisa at the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower, Château of Versailles where Marie Antoinette resided, the Arc du Triomphe, the Cathedral of Notre Dame, Le Moulin Rouge, and I'll cruise on the Seine River. I'll try new things, like escargot and real champagne from France. In Rome, I'll see the Colosseum, Roman Forum, Palatine Hill, the Pantheon, the Piazza de Spagna and Trevi Fountain, the Vatican, St. Peters Basilica, and the Sistine Chapel where Michelangelo famously painted the ceiling. I'll have real, genuine, authentic pizza, gelato, spaghetti, and so many more things I can't pronounce. I'll probably gain a ton of weight from all the food I'll be eating, but I'm excited about it all the same.

In the United States, the oldest man-made architectural monuments you can visit are around four hundred years old when explorers first arrived. In Paris and Rome, monuments and historic places have been around for centuries, and many places pre-date the time of Jesus. When put into perspective, it just makes me realize how much of the Old World I haven't seen. Matter of fact, I haven’t seen anything! As an anthropology major, there is nothing more exciting than studying the archaeological remnants of mans past. It's mind-blowing to think that the Colosseum was built in 79 A.D. and it's still around for my viewing pleasure. I'll see where gladiators once fought to the death just to entertain the Roman citizens! I’ve been researching each city, and the more I read the more excited I get. I might seriously stroke out. I recently learned if you dig three feet under the surface at any place in Rome, you will find ruins. Well, I say to my fellow travel buddies, be sure to pack a shovel!

The Eiffel Tower

Musée du Louvre

The Arc de Triomphe

The Roman Forum

The Trevi Fountain

The Colosseum

Real Italian Gelato!

The Sistine Chapel

See a Linkin Park concert...CHECK!

In the summer of 2001, Christine (my older sister) introduced me to Linkin Park's first album, Hybrid Theory. I was on a twelve hour drive to New York City with the rest of the family, and I remember her playing "Crawling" for the first time. It was different. It was hard rock. It was awesome! Once in the Big Apple, I found a street vender selling burned CD's for $5 (this was a new business at the time, and we didn't have a CD burner at home. Yes, I realize purchasing this CD was illegal. Yes, I'm criminal). I found the Hybrid Theory amongst the music selection, paid the vender, and played that CD till it broke. Literally. I physically played it so much that it started skipping even though it was scratch-free. This actually happened again, and I'm now on my third copy of Hybrid Theory. Linkin Park's second released album, Meteora, was even better. It was an awesome compilation of songs and I'm probably on my third copy of that as well. The third Linkin Park CD released was a remixed collection of the first two hits and was titled Reanimation. It was like rediscovering my favorite songs all over again. Pure genius. The fourth CD released was Minutes to Midnight with the hit "New Divide" featuring in the Transformers movie. It was a great CD where they also experimented with some slower beats and new topics. The fifth CD, A Thousand Suns, was released in September 2010, and I remembering counting down the days to its release. The overall theme of the newest CD was very different from the previous ones. The first CD contained songs about built up pressures, expectations, and anger surrounding these issues. This newest released CD is politically and historically based. Just as I have grown and matured, so have Linkin Park and their choice of lyrical topics. I love them more than any band on the planet. So, when the 2011 tour dates were released I jumped on the chance to finally see them in concert. See, when I started liking Linkin Park they had already toured for Hybrid Theory. When Meteora came out, I couldn't get off work to go see them in Nashville because all my other coworkers had asked off. When Minutes to Midnight was released, I was dirt poor. I couldn't afford a slushy at sonic. So, I missed my chance yet again. Now, there were no excuses and nothing was holding me back. Rob bought us tickets to the Atlanta concert on January 23rd for my birthday. I was ESTATIC, and that's an understatement. The concert was everything I had hoped it would be. I had wanted to see Linkin Park in concert so bad that I thought I might cry at the concert (which would be hilarious while watching a rock show). Rob said he'd leave me if I cried ;-) So, I kept it together, sang my heart out, cheered till my teeth hurt (seriously!), and had the time of my life. I'm taking that memory to the grave. Last night was one of the greatest nights of my life, and I don't care if that makes me a dork. Mark it off the bucket list.

Moving On Up...or In

For the last several months I had been pondering my living situation. I slept at Rob's condo six nights a week, but I didn't officially "live" there. All the necessities were present: hair products, flat iron, makeup, and some clothes, and on occasion I caught myself calling his place my "home," but I still didn't technically live there. So, after much discussion with Rob I have finally moved in!! Yippie! Hooray! And as some others had said, "Finally!"

The best part is not having to carry around an overnight bag every day. I used to have to prepack my clothes for the next day and then after work would repack it again for the following day. It was the most annoying thing in the world and I practically lived out of that bag for two years. I think Rob wanted me to move in because he hates doing laundry, and he knows I don't mind doing it. Anyways, now I have easy access to my stuff and don't have to make so many trips around town. I consider this a big step for Rob and I, and I know he thought I would just come in and redecorate his bachelor pad. I've been good though, I've only got new bedding...and curtains...so far ;-)

The Duvet set (I knew we'd both agree on this neutral one)

It's Just Allergies...

Since Rob and I have returned from paradise, I've had some kind of a mystery sickness. I knew it was allergy related because I had congestion, headache, sore throat, and occasional cough. How did I know it was allergies and not some deadly disease I caught while cruising the islands?? Well, simple. I didn't have a fever, body aches, or chills. I felt completely fine, if you excluded my entire head. See, whenever I return from a vacation in a very different environment from Knoxville's current state I get sick. I always have. I should just start taking off a week for vacay and the subsequent week for recovery of the vacay. It's like clockwork, very predictable. Anyways, something I didn't know was that I've had this "sickness" since before I left on vacation. That's different. I starting getting the sore throat 3 days BEFORE we starting heading back to the U.S. Once I got home, the headaches starting getting pretty bad, the sore throat was horrible (because of my nose draining), my face felt like someone ran it over and then dropped it from a 10-story building, and the cough started. During all this, my teeth were sore to the touch, and I was so worried I had cavities that I made an appointment with my dentist. Long story short (too late, HAHA!), turns out I have a severe sinus infection. The tooth soreness is from drainage of the maxillary sinuses behind the molars (I never knew this). Anyways, so I've had this infection for over 10 days by this point, and it's gotten so bad that I have developed a cough. Many people don't know that if you have a sinus infection you need antibiotics. It's not just something that goes away on it's own, it'll just get worse if you don't treat it. So, I'm on antibiotics and some severe sinus congestion pain meds, and I'm definitely starting to feel better. If you run into me on the street, you'll see that I am blowing my nose every two seconds, coughing a lot, and look like I've been to Hell and back. But, don't be afraid, I'm not sick or contagious. It's just allergies.

A New Beginning....

Happy belated-New Year! I know I’m a bit late, but this year has already been extremely busy. Rob and I went to Lauren and TJ’s New Years party, and actually were awake to watch the ball drop. This was a first for us. I know that’s sad… ;-)

Sunday, we left for our cruise and had an absolute blast!! Here’s the quick run-down of our trip.

Itinerary: seven day cruise to the Bahamas, St. Thomas, and St. Maartan.

Cruise Specifics: Freedom of the Seas, Royal Caribbean International

Weather: low 80s during the day, high-60s at night ;-)

Planned Excursions: Snorkeling and Ziplining

Most Anticipated Activity: the couples massage

Cruise Highlight: bringing $100 to the craps table and a couple hours later leaving with over $500! Boo-Yah! I walked away!

Cruise Downer: post-Zipline muscle aches and pain (I couldn’t walk for 2 days!)

Best Souvenir Bought: Nikon D3100 kit (and saved over $100!)

Scariest Moment: Hmmm, probably the taxi ride in St. Maartan to Loterie Farms Zipline

Best Moment: Spending seven days with Rob (and his cell phone was off!)

Worst Moment(s): Missing our kitties at home

Funniest Moment: a Q&A session with the captain of the ship

Best show onboard: Drew Thomas’s Magic Show (the guy from America’s Got Talent!)

Best Money Spent: the massage ;-)

Worst Money Spent: a $120 Bingo T-Shirt (hope you like it, Dad).

I only included a few photos from the cruise, because most are posted on Facebook. Enjoy!

St. Thomas

St. John

Enjoying our formal dinner

St. Maartan sunset

Cococay, Bahamas

Snorkeling off the coast of St. James and St. John

Dressed up for dinner and a show

Rob, the master zipliner