Hometurf Touristin'

Today was our day in Granite, before we head out for LoZ tomorrow. We spent it doing truly touristy things, which made me happy :)

First stop: Breakfast!

d'awwwww ♥

^ Let's talk about how Dillon is actually a really good photographer? I don't know why that surprises me, but I really, really like this one - thanks Dillon!

Breakfast at Weezy's: good, simple, inexpensive food.. and cool stuff on the walls:

pretty cool! 

After breakfast, we found ourselves back at Dillon's; I left the boys to their own devices for a couple hours and set off in search of a dress for the wedding. I mean, I brought one, but let's not pretend I'm the first or only one who's ever done that and then decided to go out and find a different one, if for no other reason than out of sheer curiosity of what inventory the local stores have.

Fact: It's the SAME inventory, because they're the same stores that we have in Cincinnati. But just maaaaybe, it'll be something different!? 

Anywho, I found not one, not two, but FOUR dresses, all of which will be donned at sometime in the next year, I'm sure. I finished up my shopping excursion and made my way north to Alton, where the boys were already a couple hours into the afternoon at Fast Eddie's.

colorful chairs! :) 

Matt, Chad & Karrie eventually met us there, and we continued on to Chubby's down the street..

friends! 

 And then it was the Pub House..

charging my phone from the ceiling? sure. 

The night continued on into the late hours when we finally arrived at our last stop; Kenny & Taryn joined us there, along with Mike & Esther and a collection of other friends. It wasn't a bad way to end the night; this time tomorrow, we'll be in Lake of the Ozarks, and in 2 days, Kenny & Taryn will be a Mr. & Mrs.!

It's gonna be a good weekend, I just know it :)

Cheers!

xo | cmd

Boats, BBQ & Block Parties

[backdated entry, woo!]

Yiieee! Breakfast with Ali!
Living two states away from one of my best friends isn't the worst thing in the world, but it certainly is inconvenient more often than not. I was so happy that we were able to set aside some time to get together for breakfast - well, brunch if you're getting technical - in Caseyville before the day got started.

love this girl!

After breakfast, we made a couple of shopping stops before parting ways for the afternoon. I was due out to Grafton with Rob, Kenny & Dillon.

Kenny just bought a Baja a month or two back [these boys & their forever cycle of toys.. hah], so it was an outing on the lake. Dillon scored a coule of stand-up jetskis [di-no-saurs!!] from a friend's boss, and brought one of them out to play for the afternoon, also.

will the old girl float?

We weren't entirely sure if she'd stay afloat, let alone run, but she still had some spirit in her, and eventually got going strong as the hours wore on.

Back on the boat, we took some mental notes of what we did and didn't care for aboard the Baja, because obviously Rob will be investing in a replacement as soon as he finds the right deal.

pretty little baja

The rain started coming down, and we decided it'd been long enough on the river; we headed back and loaded up for the trip back south. I dropped Rob off at Dillon's house and continued on to get ready and meet up with Ali & DeShawn for dinner.

Mongolian BBQ at HuHot? Yes, please!

a lot of eating was done today, clearly.. hah.
huhot mongolian bbq | st. louis, mo



After dinner, I happily obliged the invite to be taken to Strange Donuts, this fun little [and I do mean little] donut shop somewhere in St. Louis. Apparently, it's a big enough deal that people line the street outside of the place at even the latest hours [in this case, 11:45pm]... for donuts.

Ya can't keep people from their donuts, mmkay?

i'll have one of ... the whole case, please&thanks.
strange donuts | st. louis, mo

Oh, it was well worth the trip. Thank you A&D for the experience!!

strange donuts | st. louis, mo

Back at DeShawn's [new!] apartment, we settled in and landed on Mean Girls [Netflix for the win!] to await the arrival of Tim, who was juuust returning from an extended visit to Germany.

trying to work off some of the food i've eaten today! :\

I'm the jerk that didn't get a picture of all of us including Tim, however we did manage a shot of our spoils from Tim's trip. German chocolate for Ali and me... and a light bulb for Damanji.

sorry, damanji.. haha ;)

We visited for a short while before it was time to part ways again,... for now. I headed back to Alton to rendezvous with Rob, Dillon & Kenny at the Alton Block Party, where we stayed until they closed the place down and we were back en route to Jesse's place in Granite.

alton block party!

Good night, Illinois! We'll see you again for a short while tomorrow before we head home.

xo | cmd

H-A-P-P-Y Saturday!

apple tree | granite city, il

First things first:
Places we've - well, I've - never been... and breakfast.

Rob introduced Syd and I to the Appletree Family Restaurant in Granite today. It's not a spectacular venue by most standards, but my hometown has very similar places and I love them... so I wasn't opposed at all.

It turned out to be much more like a diner than anything else, and I happen to love diners. Breakfast was delicious, Sydni was happy... we were all together in the same place at the same time... life's good.

From there, we headed down to a car show in Belleville, hosted in part by a guy Rob works with. Today was the perfect day for this (: 

perfect day for a car show!

And then it was off to Dawne's! It was so good seeing her, and if I'd had my stupid phone with me, I would've taken a picture to commemorate the first time I've seen her in months. She and Sydni had some long-overdue catching up to do, so we chatted for a few minutes and then went on our way.

We stopped by the mall for a few minutes, snagged some Orange Julius and checked out the new trends at Zumiez [luckily nothing spectacular enough to take home this time], and were back at Rob's in no time.

These two got some quality play time in today (:

tug tug tug tuuuuug...

Once the pups were a little tuckered out, we geared up for an afternoon ride out on Rob's [newest] bike. It's sad, but this is the first time we've ridden together.. haha. There's a first time for everything! Ours is just usually... delayed. (:

knockout bike. knockout boyfriend.
all around win (:

We rode over to Jesse's, where I finally got to see his little Zepplin [new puppy!], who is far too cute for his own good. I didn't have my phone with me, so these are borrowed.. but trust, the next time I see this little one, I'll have some shots of my own ;)

zepplin! adorable growin' lil brute (:

The three of us took off in search of a hangout, landing us at a pool table and a drink before deciding not to risk the chances of rain on the bikes for the night. Rob and I headed back to change and trade a chopper for a diesel.

goofball. & i love everything about him.

Before long it was back to Jesse's, to pick up him and his friend Kelsey.. and off to Fast Eddie's it was. We were in the mood for some grub and chick-on-a-stick sounded just about right. Y-U-M. (:

fast eddie's bon air | alton, il

Then to Rajun Cajun piano bar, where Jesse, Kelsey & Rob all failed at convincing me to get up on the stage and play anything. I thought about it, yes, I did... but I didn't. Sorry guys.. maybe next time. Haha ;)


rajun cajun piano bar | alton, il

We dropped Jesse & Kelsey off before our final destination of the night: Bindy's. Alicia made Rob promise the last time he saw her that I'd come by when I was in town next. So... it seemed perfectly fitting, especially with it being Bindy's 24th anniversary party!

♥ alicia!! [not my best picture, but we'll deal...]

This is backdated, fo sho. We made it home, had one of those liquid-encouraged, brazenly-candid conversations on the way, and at that, called it a night.

¡Hasta Mañana!

xo | cmd 

Going Away Party : Part 2

Today, step 1: Stop at the gas station and get coffee.

I ran into Ali as soon as I got there, which wasn't that surprising. What brought me to my senses was the group gift from the crew working at the gas station. See, I've gotten my coffee from the same place nearly every day for the past two years, and in the course of doing so gotten to know each of them a little here and there.

Long story short, they paid for my coffee, gave me an extra muffin and a styrofoam cup filled with beautiful orchids. How many people get that from their gas station staff? How much am I going to miss all of these sweet people???

I walked into work covered with things that I've received as gifts over the past couple of days and weeks here. It was not a horrible way to start my last day here at this place....

scarf: deshawn | flowers: gas station crew
camera lens coffee mug: ali

I had no idea my coworkers had all decided on their own version of a going-away token for me, either.

this, from kyle, of course.. haha.. thanks...

More amazingly, the owl-themed battery of things by which I will remember these people, and enough hugs to last me for a few weeks at least, without them. :/ Haha. Seriously though, I was floored, and walked around for the rest of today covered with owls. I tried to take pictures of everything, but realized I missed the picture of the 1.5-foot tall garden owl that Marc & Diana gave me... to perch in the garden I'll one day have and fend off any intruders....

owl earrings: andi | owl necklace: linda
random turtle earring? - well, it's ali's, from andi, but looked cute with an owl.
owl ornament: marybeth | paper owl: andi | owl scarf: deshawn

Oh, and I cried some. A lot, actually. Like the sissy that I am when it comes to saying goodbyes to people I love. The good news is, we managed to take some great pictures in between the tear fits.

besties | linda.cori.kyle

DRUM ROLL....................

................. CAKE!!
- It's okay, you can get excited. I did. I really did. Andi, our resident baker extraordinaire, came to work today bearing a SMORES CAKE in honor of our potluck. Add that to the fried chicken, pasta salad, Linda's signature [lettuce+] salad, fruit & veggie trays, asiago cheese breads from Bread Co., and drinks, I'd say lunch went well.

Cake. Amazing. I might still be drooling, hours later as I write this. Oh well.


you can totally be jealous. it's okay.
... hello, andi's smores cake. y-u-m.

Oh, and as promised, here's what that frame that Ali got me... looks like with pictures of people we actually know.

frame!! ♥ ♥

*sigh. Lots of crying was done at work today. It's all right though. I'm not actually losing any of these people, just moving on to different places. It could always be worse. ;)

Dinner tonight was at Chubby's in Alton with Rob's mom and stepdad. It was great to see them both and forget to take pictures.... -__- ........... way to go, Cori.... I know, I've been doing a lot of that lately. No worries, though; I'll see them next weekend when I'm back to visit.

chubby's | alton, il

I'm... tired. We leave tomorrow morning for my final move to Ohio. We get to rent a car in the morning, too, so that Rob can get back to Illinois. I just decided I need to turn my brain OFF for now and just go to sleep.

Love & more love to you.. happy weekend, friends!

xo | cmd

Random Outing....

Rob tried bubble tea today. Haha. I don't know whether or not he actually liked it, but I had a great time and I definitely can't complain. We thought to take a trip over to St. Louis and wound up at St. Louis Bubble Tea, right in the midst of what was apparently a campus-wide ice sculpture festival.

I did find some cool sculptures...

abbey road! beatles ice sculpture | st. louis

Rob and I were definitely on Zumiez mode today; I realized that when we walked out of two different aisles in one of the campus shops and looked like brand reps from the Z. Haha.


zumiez addicts......

We'd burned most of the daylight out of the day and still hadn't made it back down towards Belleville. We decided to stop by Alton and found ourselves at Fast Eddie's for a few hours. We ran into some new people and made ourselves quite comfortable chatting it up with some random folks until we found some sunglasses on the floor [love that...]. Yeah, Rob still has them in his car.

rvca, a rum runner & some floor shades. call it a good night (:

One of the things I so appreciate about Rob is that he's about as spontaneous as I am, and when the agenda consists of a blank slate, it comes in handy. We had no plans one second, and the next we were off on our way to Collinsville to catch an appearance of Aaron Kamm & the One Drops. I totally dig barefoot guitarists, so this was a perfect way to round out the evening.


aaron kamm & the one drops | johnny's sidebar - collinsville

Ahhhh, hello weekend (:

xo | cmd