new year’s eve fun
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For New Year’s Eve we were going to go to dinner and a movie. Then we decided not to be old and invited R’s cousin over for dinner before going out to see R’s brother play in his cover band. It was fun, plain and simple…
I made a delicious, vegetarian Hachis Parmentier, which is a French Potato Casserole that I learned from my brother. Mmmm, good! Greg enjoyed being our guest and we loved having him…

We opened party poppers during dinner, which provided us with fancy hats to don throughout the night. Kind of perfect: blue for him, pink for her…

And here we are in the back of our cab as we made our way into the valley for the show. You will notice the beautiful, orange butterfly clip which was my popper present.
Cute, eh?

And, of course, it wouldn’t be New Year’s Eve if there wasn’t a bit of silliness at midnight. Unfortunately, the midnight kiss was a bit flubbed. He wanted a kiss, I wanted a photo. I won…

All was fun and we were home by 12:30pm. Old, but still fun. Maybe?
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holiday review 2009
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Here are some long overdue snapshots from my holiday season…
First, there was a holiday dinner for my work, which was much more subdued than Rory’s. Just dinner and smiling. Here I am with some fellow teachers and with Sheila, our founder and CEO.

After the S dinner, Sheila and I went to a birthday party at a club in Hollywood. I stayed for about 25 minutes before I was ready to leave. Big, Hollywood clubs aren’t really my thing, but it was fun to celebrate Vicki’s birthday! The first photo is of me with Vicki and the second is of the rest of the group…

Later in December I headed to my parents house, which was lovely and restful! One day I drove down to my hometown and got to see my dear friend, Amanda. I finally got to meet her son, Rex. Look how cute and mischievous he looks…

We went out for lunch, stopped for cupcakes and then I got to take a tour of her home…

I wish I lived in Northern California so I could see them more often!
Back at my parents house, Christmas rolled around and we made a flaming cocktail drink that my Dad saw on television. See the flame? It was fun to make, but I didn’t love the taste of it. Mom did, though!

After Christmas, I returned home to LA where R and I had a little Christmas celebration of our own. Here is R modeling the jacket he got from my parents and posing with the new book of short stories by his favorite writer, Kurt Vonnegut.

R gave me a pair of short, black UGGs. Finally, I fit in in LA and my feet stay toasty.

He also got us season passes to Magic Mountain!!! We went last Sunday and had a blast. We heart roller coasters, so season passes to go ride them whenever we want was a brilliant gift.
All in all, it was a great Christmastime!
{New Year’s Eve coming soon…}
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holiday family portrait: FAIL
Filed Under makes me laugh, snapshots | 1 Comment
We tried to take a silly family photo for the holidays. We found a Santa pet costume and decided to make Marceau the cat wear one in our portrait. As expected, he resisted. We tried very hard to make it work several times, but this is what we ended up with…

We’re going to try again after Marceau has had some time to forget the trauma of it all…
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our first tree
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R and I got our first Christmas tree the other weekend. It is a very cute Noble!
First we chose the littlest tree at the lot, strapped it to the car and brought it home.

Marceau sniffed the tree and took to it just fine. He now enjoys sipping tree stand water, a kitty delicacy that we don’t understand…

RJ hung the lights and I decorated.

Since we don’t have a Star for the top, I used my Dancing Pig ornament…

It turned out well, if I don’t say so myself…

Hooray for Christmas trees at home!
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10 year WU
Filed Under family & friends, memories, snapshots, travelin' moon | 2 Comments
A couple of weekends ago I went to Oregon for my 10 year college reunion. It was a blast and I was reminded why I loved college so much…I had kick-ass friends!
There were *many* photos taken by all of us. Here are the highlights from mine:
Erica and I arrived into Portland on Friday, where she immediately had to make an important Doctor phone call. I admit I loved hearing her talk to her nurse and her patient. It made me proud of her.

Kirsten & Emily picked us up and we went to Kirsten’s beautiful, new house, where Lindsey was waiting to greet us. We caught up a little over cheese and crackers and then got ready for the first night of the reunion…
After a long drive to Salem (when did Oregon traffic start to mimic LA?), we arrive at Willamette University, which is just as beautiful as I remember it. First stop? Chicken Fountain! (Too bad in my photo you can’t see why it’s called The Chicken Fountain.

Next stop, mailboxes. Mine was somewhere in this vicinity…

We then spent the next few hours at the reception catching up with lots of people, which was fun, but my favorite time of the night was spent in the bathroom with Lindsey. That sounds really odd, but check out the photos. We thought we were hilarious…

Obviously I had bad aim with my camera…

We seriously turned into giggle queens between photos.
After the reception we went to an old haunt: Magoo’s!
Here are Lindsey & Emily right in front…

We soon moved down the street since Magoo’s wouldn’t accept Josh’s peeling license. Look how cute my friends are…so at home in the Salem bar ~ just like townies.

The next morning we visited our old sorority for brunch. They were so sweet and gave a us a lovely tour of the house during which we reminisced about all the “cool” things we used to do that are no longer happening, like Arrowspike and the Teeter Totter Marathon. Ah college ~ the things we did for charity. I’m not sure if we sounded really cool, or really…uncool. But it was fun to see what decor was still the same and what had changed (for the better)!
Look at the sign they made to welcome us. We made so many big signs and banners during our years (well, not me , probably, but maybe Liz and Kirsten)…

We enjoyed a yummy brunch and took photos in the exact spot where so many college photos had been taken by Dan the Man. (Was that his name or did I make that up?)
Liz, Christine, Erica & Rosie gather food…

Spring Pledge class of 2006…

We look exactly the same (plus 10 years)!

We then wandered around campus and enjoyed the Quad social. We also DOMINATED the free photo booth. We certainly laughed a lot and determined that we are crazy about getting our pictures taken. I mean we *loved* it! Here is my favorite one, stolen from Erica…

And here we are after we purchased Bearcat mementos from the university bookstore…
Here I am with Lindsey, Liz & Emily…

And here are Lindsey, Liz, Emily & Erica, with a fun interjection by Rhiannon & Jeff…

And as if that wasn’t enough fun for one day, we also had a baby shower for Kirsten!
Here, Carrie reads her wishes for Baby Girl Wyatt (aka: Abigail, called Abby????).

For dinner that evening we went to our favorite spot from yesteryear, The Ram, where I enjoyed a delicious micro brew called Barefoot Wit. Only in the Pacific Northwest. Yum, yum, yum. Seriously. The Ram is where I learned to enjoy a good beer…

On Monday, Haven, Carrie, Liz, Rosie, Erica and I stayed at the McMenamin’s Edgefield hotel near Portland. I did not, however, take any photos of this fun time.
All in all it was a fantastic trip, where I finally saw Mt. Hood! Erica pointed it out to me. It’s so weird that I’d never seen it before ~ *wink* (don’t believe me, it’s a joke).
Thank you to my dear friends for a fun-filled weekend. I love you. Let’s do it again soon!!!!
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