Wishing you...

...a Happy Halloween!!

We hope you have a spooktacular day!

Dan & I’s night will consist of passing out candy to the kiddos (we get bombarded every year with trick-or-treaters), while Lexi barks her face off because the door bell is ringing every 5 seconds.

Shoe Of The Month

I have decided to start a “shoe of the month” on our blog, (insert spot light & introductory music – ta-dah!), which will feature a photo of my favorite shoe/one that I have purchased/one that I hope to purchase in the future & the link to its website. A while back Dan put me on a restricted one-pair-a-month shoe purchase, so I don’t have the free reign of purchases that I used to, but that doesn’t have to stop me from browsing! A little part of me understands where he’s coming from – I mean we do have to eat.

Now that Fall is here I’ve been sucked into the bootie craze that’s everywhere. You know the ones I’m talking about with the peep toe, closed toe, rounded toe, pointed toe; the ones that just reach the ankle; the ones with a kitten heel, no heel, stiletto heel, wedged heel...really any kind of bootie. I really need to invest in a black & gray pair for the winter months (Love, stop rolling your eyes).

So as I was typing this post, I decided to share with you my favorite websites to buy shoes. I do prefer to go into the store, try them on & purchase them - there's just something about that new shoe smell that hits you when you open the door...heavenly. Alright, I need to get back on track here - below are my top websites:

1. 6pm.com (if you haven’t heard of this website yet, you’re missing out...free shipping.)
2. victoriassecret.com
3. bodyc.com (their selection is small, but each pair I have ordered from them has been good quality & quite comfortable.)
4. charlotterusse.com (be careful – their heel height is dangerous so be sure to check that first thing.)
5. endless.com (this was recommended by Sandra Lue; their prices are a little high but you also have free shipping, free return shipping & 365 days to return a purchased item – in my opinion that’s well worth it.)
**Don't forget to check out retailmenot.com to look for coupons that you can use on the above websites.**

Check back on November 1st to see the shoe of the month & find out if my shoe taste matches yours. =]

West Virginia Birthdays

On Sunday, October 9th Dan, Lexi & I drove to his Dad's house to celebrate Jackson & Aurie's birthday. We were excited to see the kids & getting some time to spend with the family...it was such a beautiful day. I took several photos & a couple videos while we were there. Once we ate some lunch, the kids got some energy & a little hyper, including Dan.
Dan implementing the scissor hold on Jackson.

I'm not going to tell you what Dan did here, but if you know him well enough you can probably guess.



Arden & Skylar

This would've been a cute picture had Dan not been in the background being goofy.

Since Jackson started asking to open his presents, we decided to distract him with cake; here's us singing Happy Birthday to him & Aurie:


Kelly & Rylee
Jackson finally getting to open his presents.
Dan & Rylee
Arden practicing her french braiding skills on me - she's pretty good!
Arden & Aurie.
Lexi :]
Don & Rylee (little Bridger is peeking behind the chair).

Skylar asked me to video her practicing her cartwheels & Arden decided to get in on the action [warning: this video contains some baby butt crack & neon green undies]:

My Favorite Things

~My heated seats on a chilly Fall morning.

- Shoes, lots & lots of shoes.

~ Getting in the car, turning on the radio & hearing one of my favorite songs playing.

- Sleeping in.

~ Relaxing Friday nights.

- Lip gloss.

~ Lexi's playful growl.

- Bubble baths.

- Dan's goofy dance moves just to make me laugh.

~ Chocolate.

- Love stories.

~ Dinner talks with my family on speaker phone.

- Pasta.

~ The feeling after a great workout.

- Margaritas (on the rocks & no salt).

~ Girl talk.

- Surprises.

~ Saturday morning breakfast.

- Fuzzy socks.

~ Birthdays.

- Thursday night TV.

~Freshly painted nails.

~Scarves.

Roller Skating?

Hell yeah! On September 30th the girls from my office decided to get together for a happy hour after work, but instead of doing our usual Uncle Julio’s happy hour/dinner, I came up with the idea of going roller skating & then going out for drinks/dinner. The only roller rink that was close enough for us to drive to was the Skate N Fun Zone in Manassas, VA, so we decided to go there & then head to Don Pablo’s. This place didn’t allow cameras/cell phones on the actual rink so I only took 2 pictures the entire time we were there: Li getting her skate legs!
Ready to get on the rink & hopefully not break anything.

I had such a great time skating with the girls – so much in fact that I really didn’t want to leave. Unfortunately, they close the rink down from 7pm – 7:30pm to get ready for the “Teen Skate” on Friday nights, so we had to leave. We then made our way to Don Pablo’s. Here we are just having a good ole time: Li & Sandra
Christine & Me

Thankfully not one of us got hurt during our skating fun & no one fell either – although there were a couple scares with a few of us trying to stop & eventually having to skate into the wall in order to do so. I will definitely go again & can’t wait for next time – maybe I’ll have Dan come with me....get ready Love!

Dan's 30th Birthday

...was on Thursday, August 4th. To celebrate, he went golfing with his Dad, brother-in-law, Glenn, & his brother, Tom. I had arranged a birthday dinner at his favorite restaurant, Don Pablo’s, & invited his best friend, Greg, & Greg’s girlfriend, Amanda, to join us. His birthday present from me was a new Sirius satellite radio for his truck & I baked him his favorite cake: After dinner & drinks, the 4 of us went back to our house & had cake & ice cream.

Since Dan was turning the big 3-0 I thought it was appropriate to have a surprise party. He usually despises his birthday & definitely doesn’t look forward to it each year, but this year he was open to the idea of celebrating & even welcomed turning 30. I coordinated with a bar in Ashburn a little over a month before August to have the party (Ashburn Sports Bar & Grill); I also took him there for dinner several weeks before to make sure he liked it & also liked the food.

We had part of the bar filled with family & friends, including my family who was nice enough to make the trip. Dan was totally surprised & even though I thought he knew exactly what was going on a few weeks before the party, he had absolutely no idea - thankfully. =]

Now on to the photos! Below is a video that I took when Dan walked into the bar & everyone yelled “surprise!”

Unfortunately, I cut the video short just as he was saying “now this is a surprise!” He was so cute & very happy.

I also put together a slideshow due to the amount of photos that I took, friends took & family took. Enjoy!


We all had a great time & of course the birthday boy did too. Throughout the night he made comments to me such as, “this is so nice;” “I’ve never been surprised like this before;” “you did a great job;” “I had no idea!” “Thank you so much.” All of the stress that came with planning this party & trying to keep it a secret was well worth it when I saw the smile on his face as he walked in the door.

Happy Birthday, my love. You deserve only the best & I hope you enjoyed yourself on your special day.

Bummed

Towards the end of summer I came up with 3 activities that I wanted to do. I figured if one of them didn't pan out then I could just move on to the next. Those 3 activities are: (1) boxing, (2) roller derby, and (3) play in a women's basketball league.

Boxing has been in the back of my mind for a while now, but I just never had enough guts to actually pursue it. I decided to take a kickboxing class at LA Boxing to see if I really enjoyed it & then I could go from there; I went with my friend, Amanda, who also wanted to try it out. The class was a fantastic work out & it totally kicked my ass - I loved it. The whole kicking concept got a little old once my shins started to bruise/become raw, but I loved the boxing. After the class was over & we were stretching, the instructor informed us of their "Amateur Night" & how you can only participate if you're a member of the gym & have been properly trained. That is exactly what I want to do - I'd like to take lessons/be trained how to box & then at the end of my training I want to spar with someone who is of equal talent. After listening to LA Boxing's rates, I realized that my plan may not pan out exactly as I had hoped. The monthly rate was ridiculous & on top of that you had to pay your trainer their hourly rate for individual lessons. I just couldn't justify spending that much money, nor could I afford it for as long as I would need it. At this point I'm still at square one, but I refuse to give up on this idea. Now....on to activity #2.

Roller Derby is offered through our county & it's a one time annual fee to participate; the team is also involved in local community service & sponsors several groups in our area. I came across the website about a week after my whole boxing let down & got pretty excited. After doing some research on the sport, I had decided to sign up for their email list & also planned on attending their "Booty Camp" in October. After a few weeks of searching for gear, i.e. roller skates, pads, helmet, an email was sent by their captain stating that some of the people who are interested in their team may have the wrong idea of their type of roller derby. They don't practice, they don't keep score at their "scrimmages" & they don't incorporate all of the rules of normal roller derby. Basically, if I am looking for a competitive team, I needed to go elsewhere & she listed the website for the DC Rollergirls website. Well, DC is way too far for me to be traveling 3 to 4 nights a week for practices, including games which are also played in Richmond (insert frustration here). I was pretty bummed by this. Now...on to activity #3.

Joining a women's basketball league should be pretty easy, right? Well, apparently I just have no luck with these things. The first website I went to, which was recommended to me, I already missed the cut off to sign up & the others that I went to only allow "team" sign ups, which means you can't sign up as an individual & have them place you on a team - you have to have a minimum of 6 players per team. Unfortunately, I don't know 6 women that would be interested in joining a team, who also know how to play the game & lives in Loudoun County. Ugh! My first thought after striking out at all of the above was...really? You would think that living in a state like Virginia, instead of Pennsylvania, I would have access to a lot more opportunities & be able to make certain things happen.

I'm hoping that within the next month I will be able to inform all of you that one of these activities is being done or I will have other ideas to pursue. Everyone cross your fingers for me!

My Love...