Whirlwind of Craziness

Yes... that's been my life since Thanksgiving. I haven't sat down for a moment!


The drama picks up on Saturday after Thanksgiving... in the morning Allison and I went to O'Neys for a cute new haircut. It turned out fabulous! Right after that we headed to Rita's Bridal Shower, where I was the "official" photographer. We had a blast and laughed a TON! Who knew my aunts/family were so funny!? They sure know how to throw a party, though. That evening I spent a significant amount of time creating a photo slideshow of the shower pictures for Rita. It was constant tweaking once I got everything edited and arranged. Now, it's just figuring out how I can get her a copy of it with music...


Sunday was our post-poned Creamed Turkey lunch and putting up Grandma and Grandpa's Christmas tree. Mary and I took tree-duty while the rest of the family raked leaves for hours. I also did a test-run on Rita's wedding make-up. Not too late, I took Allie back to OSU and went home, myself.


On Monday I worked at CSCC, and directly after work I headed down to Georgetown, KY for my facilitation the next day. Tuesday and Wednesday I helped facilitate the diversity material for the second time. I think it went pretty well! Wednesday evening on my way home from work, I stopped in Cincinnati for dinner with Vicki and Dan. Yay! Thanks for meeting me! The pizza and salad were delicious. Thursday and Friday were back to normal work days. Friday evening it was back to OSU to pick up Allie for the wedding and heading to Dayton. That night we had a pizza night "rehearsal dinner" with the whole family. We also played intense games of "Mad Gab" and "Loaded Questions."


Saturday was the big wedding day, my first official photography gig. I wasn't nervous or stressed at all about the photography. I was stressed about getting the hair and makeup done and still having time for pre-wedding pictures. That sort of worked out. I will stick to one activity per wedding next time, since I was the make-up artist/stylist/photographer/coordinator/DJ. I think I got a lot of great pictures. I haven't posted on Blogger in so long because I assumed my next post would be wedding pictures. However, it's taking much longer than planned to edit 400+ pictures. At the same time, I've learned a TON about Photoshop. I've learned to remove things from the background (shadows, random objects, etc.), tame teenage acne, remove red eye, layer a black and white over a color image, slightly desaturate the image, crop, apply and adjust filters, etc. So, we'll see how they turn out, but not until I get them ALL done! Christmas is my deadline. That evening we headed back to Columbus so I could work on Sunday. The only eventful thing that day was my doggy Beginner's course that just began had 9 dogs in it! After work we decorated the inside of our house and put up our two artificial Christmas trees.


Monday was a normal day. Tuesday was agility class (which both dogs had their best day - even after being off for several weeks). After work that evening, Adam and I went on a Christmas decor shopping spree. We spent way too much, but the house looks amazingly cozy and festive! I made Adam get on the roof to put up Christmas lights while I took care of the porch and bush lights. It's very bright - like a marquee in Manhattan. :) He was on the roof until around 11:30pm (when it began to sleet). I'm such a slave-driver!


Wednesday morning we woke up to a winter wonderland. I delightedly shoveled the driveway and sidewalk with my mini-shovel. Brutus had a vet appointment that morning that we slid to. The poor guy was so traumatized. They said they did not need to extract a stool sample, the poor guy offered his own - haha!! Pretty gross, huh? Anyways, this was our planned day to cut down our first real Christmas tree - of course, in 6 inches of snow. My tutoring was cancelled due to the bad weather. I spent the day trying to find a tree farm that was open. We found one by Polaris, but they only would allow 4-wheel drive vehicles up their snowy driveway. Of course, I insisted that we go. We ended up parking in a housing development across from the farm and walking up the driveway. Then we faced the issue of the trees being covered in snow, but we dusted one off and found a nice 6.5 foot tree. We chopped it down and had no problem with it being wet or snowy, so we put it up that night. We listened to Christmas CDs and put all our ornaments up. It looks very nice as well. I also purchased suction cups for our wreaths. So, now we have wreaths and burgandy bows on all our windows and porch lights. We also have candles in each one of our windows. It looks so classic and cozy. :) I love our house!


Thursday was another normal work day. Friday I just had to tutor, and then had a girls' night with Sharr and Shayla. I made a ton of homemade finger foods and dessert - delicious, if I do say so myself. We had a great time chatting and drinking homemade Sangria. We stayed up pretty late. It was a nice relaxing time with no boys (Adam spent the weekend at a Silverchair concert, then RedsFest, Nate's Birthday Party, then the Bengals game).


Saturday I worked in the morning. I also spent the evening doing some online Christmas shopping - that's definitely the way to go when you're too busy to go to the stores!


Sunday was another work day at PetSmart. That evening I drove home and got ready to drive to Ann Arbor, MI. I was taking part in a facilitation at Toyota on Monday. However, there was a ton of drama surrounding it and the CEO of our company ended up having to go to dilute racial tensions and merger bitterness. Plus the class was all upper management big-wigs. It turned out okay, though, and I got to facilitate a portion of the class. And, I'll be honest, they paid me way too much to go and sit for the majority of the day. I won't complain, though! I have another training coming up in February.


I returned home late Monday night to find the house all light up with lights and candles and a beautiful Christmas bouquet from Adam. I also found out some super-great news from my hubby.... however, that will be revealed later. It's a surprise for now. It was great to be home again!


Tuesday was a small chance to recuperate. I only had agility and tutoring. Agility went okay... the dogs were a little less focused. Tutoring was great. Dustin and his family are so sweet... they bought me a Christmas gift and he was so excited that he wanted to give it to me then! They also gave me two movies to borrow ("License to Wed" and "Surf's Up"). I will bring Dustin a movie next week.


Wednesday I worked and went to an "interesting" webinar. The entire hour and a half was basically about Facebook. Geez... What a waste. It was about how we should create profiles and use it as an advising tool. It was about how we should be more "chummy" with our students and try to get into their world. What it was really about was creepy male advisors (who presented the topic) who were stalking their students and trying to fit in. They didn't quite get it when we asked about ethics and blurring the professional boundary though... Gross...


Yesterday (Thursday) was a long work day for me. And today is yet another long day. However, it will be over in 3.5 short hours. This weekend is Adam's 28th birthday party! Monday is his actual birthday, so I'm taking off work a bit early for dinner and a little somethin-somethin afterwards. So this weekend should be busy and snowy. I hope it doesn't interfere with his party!


More posts and pictures to come soon.......................................................................