yeap. it is only 10 days until Christmas, and 3 days until i am home! and maybe being at home, with less responsibility for a week, will give me time for fun & festive “christmasy” things – like Christmas blog posts?

Things have been busy around here. Quality of Life dinners, Football Hall of Fame celebrations at the Waldorf (swanky!), Christmas work parties, birthday dinners, explicit spin class, cleaning, unpacking, repacking, babysitting Auburn family in town for the Heisman, and lots more! Needless to say, I have LOTS to share, but have had not time to get it from my fingertips to the keyboard! Back with lots of color and love soon! xoxo

Christmas is in full force here in NYC, I am even contributing to the festivities with a 3′ tree inside my apartment. It smells of evergreen, and the christmas tunes are playing loud!! Doesn’t get much better than that.

I love this time of year in the City. Every street corner you turn you find yet another little pop up shop Christmas tree vendor. So for me this year, instead of the parking lot at K-Mart back home, it’s the corner of Greenwich and Chambers. I’ve quickly realized that it’s okay for traditions to evolve over the years. I might not be bundling up (b/c it use to be REALLY cold after Thanksgiving) with my Mom, Dad, Big Brother and Baby Sister. We’d get hot chocolate, probably because I had not tolerance for the cold, and head to the “Christmas Tree Man” that setup year after year in the parking lot adjacent to K-Mart. My brother and I would meander through the trees to pick out the tallest, most perfect (and probably meaning most expensive) tree we could find. Mom would have to approve first! We’d also pick out a little tree, known as the “kid’s tree”. This one was adorned with colorful lights, and all the ornaments we’d made or bought on family trips. The “big tree” was elegant and beautifully lit with white lights. They’d load them in the back of Dad’s truck and we’d head home. Then poor Dad, some how managed to carry our 8′-9′ tree inside all by himself. It didn’t end there. A little left, no now a little the right. Okay, not pull it back towards you a little…WELL, IT HAD TO BE STRAIGHT! This usually ended in a little frustration, followed by sweeping up all the stray pieces that sprinkled the floor from the car to the house. But we all still had BIG smiles on our faces. I would be chomping at the bit to decorate it RIGHT THEN, everyone else seemed a little exhausted. Funny enough, it seems year after year it ended up being just Mom and I hanging all the ornaments. Everyone else seemed to bail after two or three. Oh the memories. So you know, change, even little change, can be hard. I miss these days, but when I find that “teary” feeling coming on, I just try to reminisce on fond, fond memories of Christmas time when I was younger. I remind myself to be thankful of those times, and look forward to the new and exciting things to come. However, I still cannot wait to go home before Christmas, wrap presents with Mom, sit by the fire with a lit Christmas tree as a beautiful backdrop, and relish in the moment as we make new memories!

*Mom, after watching you make gazillions of bows year after year after year. Well, I still cannot do it near as well as you. You just have all these little tricks, and I cannot quite get them right. The whole twist thing when you’re making the bow? I am trying to master it!

Hey Folks. It’s been a while. A long while. Since I last posted: I flew South. Thanksgiving came and went. I spend lots of time with family, close friends and my SISSY. I ate a ton of yummy food. Auburn beat Alabama in Tuscaloosa, and took the #1 spot in the BCS. I flew back to NYC. I Christmas shopped, cleaned, cooked dinner, and hung stockings. It’s been a whirlwind. Whew! But I am so THANKFUL for every minute of being home, and since that time is so special I do not take even one single moment for granite. I am THANKFUL!

I am really thankful for my sweet sister. This girl is my heart. Five years younger than me, and I still look up to and respect her SO much. She is the most outgoing individual you will ever meet. She has a heart as BIG as Texas! Last Wednesday night we curled up in her BIG king size bed to dig through memory boxes of old cards from our friends and family. We were pulling out all the ones from my grandma-who has recently become very ill. We gathered up all the cards she’d ever given my sister and me. And I mean she never missed an occasion to send a card, so it was A LOT. Birthdays, graduations, Valentine’s, Christmas, other random holidays, honor society inductions, you name she sent a card. They were the sparkly, colorful, 3-dimensional, musical, fun cards too. So we filled Andrea’s bed with a puddle of “glittery tears” as we read aloud ALL of the cards. Grandma knew us both all to well. It was so special because every card for Andrea pointed out her cheerful spirit…after all it’s really contagious. If I just had an ounce of what she has. Not only did the cards bring light to our sprits, but to Grandma’s as well. She is a lady of grace and beauty. She always thinks of others before herself, and we especially felt that love as her only two granddaughters. It was such a blessing to have lots of time to spend visiting with my sweet grandma, and recalling wonderful memories.

And on another note. I have another wonderful memory that I will pass along to my grandchildren one day. It isn’t quite as touching, but it’s memorable. My dynamic duo and I here, along with my dear friend Amory, cheered AUBURN on to victory AND WERE THE FIRST THREE PEOPLE TO WELCOME THE AU TIGERS BACK TO THE LOVELIEST VILLAGE ON THE PLAINS. Yeap, you read that right the first. I’ll admit we did “act a fool”, but who cares, right? It’s hard to control your Auburn spirit. We were heading down College Street towards Toomer’s Corner, then heading to the Athletic Department to hang with the other fans who were out at 10 pm to welcome to team back home. Well, as we deceded the small hill to the side of the library, lots of blue sirens back flying up behind us. Our hearts raced, and then fell straight to our feet in fear, for a few seconds, before we realized it was the team escorts for the buses. However, we were “in the way”. So we pulled into the hotel and conference center parking lot. And by pulled I mean took a right hand turn on two wheels. Then basically all three sprung out of the car before we’d stopped, and sprinted to the curb where we jumped up and down and screaming “War Eagle” as the team passed by. We either looked like three hard core fans or three drunken girls. And that story will most definitely live on…

So as you can see I had a lot of extra fun on my Thanksgiving getaway back home. Not only did we have a turkey feast, we had family time and football extravaganzas!! Hope your Thanksgiving was HAPPY as mine!! Night, and have a Happy Monday as you enter a new week!