Hello, August!

Where did this summer go? I saw a quote earlier today or yesterday somewhere on Instagram: 

June & July lasted 4 seconds.

(They're not wrong).

I feel like this Summer has flown straight past me; I gathered that much when June hit and I was in Panama, and then proceeded to spend the rest of June out of state on the weekends. July wasn't much different. Now we're here, it's August 1st, and today was a GOOD DAY to slow down and enjoy it.

I got drafted to head northward for my office's weekly interview round-up in Warren County. Ashley's on vacation this week, and I'm the next closest geographically, so off I went this morning to Lebanon. It was a standard morning of interviews, new employee orientations... all the fun stuff that comprises my day-in-day-out. 

AND THENNNN.. 

helloooooooo, gorgeous!

I'd never been to the heart of Lebanon, so I typed in 'coffee' and waited to see what happened. As it turns out, there are at least four coffee shops/houses in cute little Lebanon, so I picked the first one and saved the rest to explore another day. 

I picked right. 

This is exactly what I picture when I think of quirky little cafe/coffee joints: It was tucked into a row of street-side businesses, decorated like a parlour, and covered with chalkboards and coffee-themed things. The board inside the doorway reads, 'FUN FACT: We have a different flavored coffee EVERY DAY!' And obviously this was where I was supposed to come, because I have an irrational desire for this stuff. 

^^ lampshade ceiling ^^ 

Approaching the counter to order food is a serious affair for me, although not as serious as trying to find a place to order the food in the first place. So I asked what the most popular dishes were on the menu, and was told that both the chicken salad sandwich and cornbread salad were award-winning (literally) items. Let's DO IT, because I am in no way a fan of making my own decisions at a food counter. 

how your food is delivered at royce cafe & coffeehouse:
ADORABLY.

I've never had so much non-salady salad on one plate. Frankly, I never even knew that was an option.

And then I saw this, which will be promptly displayed in my office when I get back to the homefront. I made it a point to thank the owner after this entire lunch experience for doing this, because not only is it a step and statement of faith to add scripture to a lunch order, but it told me that they'd thought well enough about how to encourage people, even if just for a second.

love, love, love.

On my way out, I ordered a Red Velvet Mocha, after again having asked for the most popular vote. Sure, let's do it... and omg this was the right choice kthanksi'llbebackbye. 

wifi password, also my life motto. 

SO FOLKS, if you're ever in or around Lebanon (OH), GO HERE. :)

And if you're ever in or around Eastgate (or Fairfield, don't forget!), go to Jungle Jim's and definitely buy escargot shells five-foot long dog ropes and mochi and most definitely 3 giant buckets of pop boba.

the filipino food aisle... 

Say yes to dog toys. Especially those that are taller than you and can withstand the force of two 70 pound dingos at home.

Today was a beautiful day, and August is here.
Let's do it!

xo | cms 

Training & Posters

I spent the morning at our Eastgate sister office, immersed in a half day's worth of training; I have to say that as frequently as Express promotes and hosts various training sessions, and as frequently as I continue attending them, I still never fail to bring something new back from the experience.

The second half of the day finished up in the office, and I ended the day with a poster that I ordered to commemorate my trip with SonRise to Panama. It's been just about 3 months since the trip, but I still think daily of those villagers and the Panamanian team. If I'm called at any point to return there, it won't be too soon!

panama :) 

One more day and then the weeeeekend!

xo | cmd

Pre-Mother's Day

Every once in a while, my company offers us the opportunity to partner up with some of our greatest assets, in the form of training seminars that bring us all together for even just an hour. One of those was scheduled for today, so Elisa and I took advantage of the break from our daily grind. We headed over to the Eastgate office for an hour of refreshment training and actual refreshments [thanks, Chris & Co.!]

We are officially all set: We are... CareerBuilder Aficionados!
.... or something like that. Haha. Either way, it was an awesome refresher course and a nice breath away from the normal routine.

Afterwards, we had an actual lunch break built into the afternoon, so we took to my neck of the woods, given that we were already over that way. We were in search of coffee, so we made a stop by Luckman. Good call! :)

We gathered up our drinks, took in one last smell of the coffee shop brew and headed back to the office to finish up the week. We were within an hour of the ending another solid week when the door opened and in sauntered the delivery guy:

ahhhhhh!

^^ Happy EARLY Mother's Day to me!!! Look at these beauties!
Syd and Rob sent me these, with that adorable note, and I didn't even see it coming. These two... I mean seriously. They're the best. I have no idea what I would do without them and I am so grateful to have them.

Speaking of Mother's Day, we head north to The Dren Lodge tomorrow to celebrate with my parents and family. I'm pretty stinkin' excited!

For now, it's THIS and then bed.

because that's a no brainer. 

Seeeee ya on the flipside, blogbots!

xo | cmd

What Year Is It?!

I had a very mixed response to a lot of what I saw today.. haha.

First things first, we are all aware of the recently-plummeted gas prices. I've seen post after post of my friends fueling up for pennies in comparison to what was nearly $4 per gallon just a month back. Per gallon prices of under $1 have been spotted in several places, and while I didn't manage that, I can't say I'll complain at all about the $1.57 I paid today. I'm in college all over again!

is it 2003? i'll take it! 

On to the rest of the day: Our business' subject matter is considerably slow at this point in the year; most of our key decision-makers are nowhere to be found within 2 days of the new year, which left us with a bit more flexibility with our lunch hour than is typically afforded. We took advantage of it as a unit; Carri, Elisa and I made our way down to Findlay Market, a short trip during which we learned Carri's never actually ever been [until today!] to Findlay.

We gladly cured that ;).
And while we were there eating, we spotted a rather spectacular doppelganger!

and now, it's 1950?
i'm wholly convinced mr. einstein was in the building.

I'm telling you, I don't believe I've ever seen such an uncanny resemblance..

amiright?!

So we ate lunch and chatted some with Becky; Carri got her first full experience of the awesomeness that is Findlay Market, and we headed back to the office to wrap everything up. Today was the last day that we'd all convene this year [wild thought!], so with an extra pep in our steps, we tied up the loose ends and bid our office adieu until 2015.

At home, Rob and I headed out to pick up some last minute things for our trip to Illinois, made a pitstop at Jungle Jim's and eventually landed at Fuji for dinner.

chicken katsu, sushi & rice
fuji steakhouse | cincinnati, oh

^ Dinner brought me full circle back to the present, here in 2014, which we'll leave behind in Cincinnati and return "next year." Tomorrow's going to be a jam-packed day, so for now it's off to get a head start on the sleep I won't be getting tomorrow night, haha :)

G'Nite!

xo | cmd

Christmas Is... Surprising!

To fully convey this morning's [awesome] message from SonRise, I figured I would do it the easiest way possible!

YES, YES & YES :)

Today was [hopefully] our final excursion into the mayhem entitled Christmas Shopping. We wrapped everything up within a very reasonable time frame, and even managed a pitstop for lunch afterwards:

sometimes these things happen..... 

Fast forward about 6 hours to now; house is cleaned, laundry's done, gifts are wrapped & I... feel... blessed :)

See ya on the flipside!

xo | cmd

Such. A. Sweet Little Sunday! ♥

Happy Sunday, Guys & Gals!

Hey listen, first things first: if you didn't make it to church this morning, or even if you did and just want a small, extra boost for today, here's THIS from our Pastor Jeff's message this morning. This is fantastic, so naturally I wanted to share it with you!


Thank you, Pastor Jeff & the worship team at SonRise! What an awesome morning!

With some sort of weird, collective sense of enthusiasm, we set out after church to do some more Christmas shopping. I know, I know - the Christmas spirit has me doing some things this year that are far outside my norms. Accept it and move on, mmkay? ;)

Just kidding. We had a blast. We found ourselves for the bulk of our mini outing right back at Meijer, where we originally found our little Christmas lights. We were short a few strands yesterday, so today we snagged some more, and a few stockings for the mantle to go along with.

And, because it's mandatory whenever we find ourselves near mechanically-activated anythings [horses, rocket ships, teacups... whatever...], there's this:

love my little cowgirl ♥

We made a stop by GameStop in search of BioShock [FOUND IT!!], and ended up heading home with a Wii system as well, for one heck of a steal. [It's Christmas, c'mon!]

gamestop .. ohhhh, the fun ;)  

We were home in no time and spent the next hour or so battling each other on MarioKart. I hate to admit it, but Syd's not half bad at this, and while she was up jumping all over the room to play, she somehow managed to hang in there and have a blast!

.... Don't worry, Mom, we didn't spend all night in front of the TV [or in this case, thanks to Rob the resident enginner, the projector on the wall....]; after about an hour of Wii play, we dug out the ponies and played the old fashioned way:

♥♥♥♥♥

I am one seriously lucky mama in this house. This has been another incredible day with loved ones, awesome message this morning at church and a day to enjoy each other.♥ Not a bad way to start the week!

Goooood night!

xo | cmd 

Express Training, Continued

It's what we DO!

welcome, ya'll.. 

I arrived at my original Express home in Eastgate this morning, chose my seat for the day's training session, and looked up to see the caped Express man [that Chris won during the auction at last year's sales summit] staring back at me. Haha. I immediately Snapchatted that to a few select people who would understand it, and was thankful when Chris eventually moved it to the other side of the room.

And yes, I had to dress up for this occasion, which I figured was the perfect excuse to don this little diddy:

who is this person?!

And yes, that's in the bathroom. Judge away ;).

This may have been one of my favorite training sessions so far; there was so much information covered and I plan to be quite intentional in exercising some new practices for the day-to-day grind. This is prep for Sales Summit.. should be fun!

The best part of my day, though, wasn't being away from my own office for the entire day, but rather picking up this little tuckered-out bug after work..

kindergarten is tough. 

That's not bad for a Thursday. It's already Friday tomorrow! Woot!

xo | cmd

Tales of Traveling Team Members

How's this for a Friday: Spending the entire day training?

Haha. It really wasn't that bad; actually, it proved to be a nice interruption in the typical flow for Lizzy and me. We met at the Eastgate Express office [my original Express home] for a day's worth of extended training, conducted by our corporate ventures. Thankfully, we work for a company with an objective of making continued training well, fun.

express swag!

We also have a company that puts its logo on literally everything it gets ahold of.

So yeah. Lizzy and I are trained, and ready to take over the world, according to our training today. :)

It's Friday, and I'm home now with my little family.

Happy weekend!

xo | cmd

Sicky Saturday

Today definitely didn't turn out like we'd planned, but at the end of it all, I'm thankful for my resilient, funny, and likely lactose-intolerant little trooper.

We started our Saturday off with an array of miscellaneous errands. That landed us in Eastgate, where we had a small bone to pick with Time Warner [shocking, I know]. Sydni had no qualms though, and perched herself on a tiny stool in front of a tiny computer with a tiny game on it. She, in all her itty-bittyness, looked a lot like a miniature college student, and naturally that warranted a picture. 

i can't handle it sometimes (:

^ See? My studious little girl, complete with leggings, boots and a thermal vest. It's like I picked her straight out of a Miami University kids catalogue. Don't worry, MU friends, I still love you.. but you have to admit the standard campus dress code is a bit predictable. ;)

Anyway, we checked things off our list one by one, and even stopped for some Orange Julius before moving on from Eastgate to Target.

I'll fast forward through our trip to Target, and absolutely through the ride home after that [at least the picture part, because there are none to document what happened... BUT, I can and will safely say that I now firmly believe that Sydni is following in my childhood footsteps of being just about completely lactose intolerant.

How do I know this? I have an incredible boyfriend who took my car straight to the carwash to shampoo and vac out the backseat as soon as we pulled into the driveway. I busied myself cleaning off what was left of the rejected ice cream [+ sprinkles & all.....] from Sydni, her clothes and shoes. She has never thrown up like this; my immediate instinct as a mother was to call someone, but as I inspected her face, breathing, mouth, eyes and behavior as she was in the shower, she already seemed to feel better. I figured I would give it a few more minutes before I summoned an army of paramedics, and realized she would go through two more, far less intense vomit episodes before her belly finally ceded.

No. More. Ice. Cream.

Poor girl. :(
We spent the rest of the afternoon parked on the couch in piles of blankets, making sure there was no more belly aching to be had. By the time the evening rolled around, she was safely munching on some crackers, and even hopped up to start filling her piggy bank [which was our purpose at Target, earlier]. Rob donated a half a water jug's worth of coin to her collection, which she diligently dropped one......by...... one.... into her new bank. 

super saver!

I suppose four years with no major puking incidents is really not all that bad. Lesson learned, right?

.. Right (:

I promised some dinner in return for Rob hanging back with Sydni for a couple of hours while I made a brief appearance for Carolina's birthday. I'd promised her sometime back that I would at least come by to say hello before the gang headed down to OTR for the evening, so I visited with them briefly at Dancing Wasabi while I waited on my to-go order.

myself. carolina. ika

Happy, HAPPY birthday, Caro! I'm sorry again that Rob and I couldn't have gone out with everyone tonight, but I promise we'll get together again very soon and celebrate the right way.

For now, I'm back home with a boyfriend who has definitely outdone himself today, and a happily snoozing little girl who hopefully has a better day tomorrow.

I'm a pretty lucky girl.

xo | cmd

Taking Advantage of Beautiful Weather

Today... was... BEAUTIFUL.

But before I was allowed [dictated by me, just so nobody thinks Rob's a monster, hah] to go outside and enjoy it, there was a small price to be paid:

a small price to pay to spend the day outside!

I'm also saying that because it's a pretty big accomplishment for me to want to do laundry on a Saturday. I don't know what got into me... haha.

ANYWAY, the first really nice day in a few months very obviously warranted a day on two wheels. Rob brought the Harley out and we built our agenda one item at a time around wherever the bike took us. Our first stop: Eastgate. I've been procrastinating on a couple of things, but we finished up there in no time. AND, because I am spoiled out of my mind sometimes by this guy, we came home with this in the bag: 

his & hers.
hers... was not cheap.
she... is a lucky, lucky girl. ♥

 ^ Yeah. I'm the lucky girl who landed a guy she doesn't deserve. I've been out of this stuff for months now, primarily because my last one was 'stolen by a stalker' [not my words, but it was needed comedic relief at the time, and a story for another day....] and I couldn't justify buying a new one. Thank you, boyfriend! ♥

sunshine & flames [that will be gone, soooon]

We were in love with this day. Our list of errands carried on at a pace decided by the breaks in our leisure cruising. I think the entire midwest population was in need of a day like this, and I hope everyone was able to take advantage of it the way we did!

pilot & co-ri. heh ;)

And, what makes us even happier than being out on the bike all day?
... How about adding Eli's to that mix?
Yes. Yes, that's a sure favorite.

happy little wind-bristled folk (:

 And Eli's.

as sloppy as it is delicious.. and worth every single napkin!

We finally made our last stop to get a couple of new walking harnesses for the dogs; I've spied several of our neighbors and other random dog-walkers in the past few weeks using step-in harness systems, so I figured it would be worth a try for the meatballs. Stella, being as stocky as she is, can somehow still wriggle her way out of the standard buckle harness, so I was prettyyyyy excited when we completed a half mile circle with no escapees!

success!

For dinner, we found ourselves at The Varsity B&G down the road, a spot introduced to me by Brittany & Co. We originally thought we'd be out on the town tonight, but after all the fresh air and constant running of the day, we're ready to curl up and call it a day.

We're old... we know. ;)
Haha. G'Nite!

xo | cmd

Snowy Sushi Run

This weather has been something. The Farmer's Almanac this year didn't lie in predicting harsh conditions this winter. We had planned yesterday to go out for a sushi night with Becky, but after watching the sleet come down in waves and settle over everything, we all voted it an unsafe venture and rescheduled. She wasn't available tonight, either, so Rob & I hopped up into the diesel and made a break for Fuji over in Eastgate. 

goooood call!

Yyyyum. It's been ages it seems since the last time I ate there, but it was a good decision tonight and I think we've found a hibachi home here. Win!

And yes, the snow is still coming down. It's everywhere.

Be safe out there, friends!

xo | cmd

Simple Enough..

I'm pretty sure this is foreshadowing of the.... well, rest of my life: 

.... she insisted.

Yeah. It's cute now, when she's only helping me sign my own name at the Sephora checkout... I'll hang on to the cuteness of it now, before she's 16 and this same image gives me nightmares. Hah.. Anyway, that was the early part of our evening: running errands and [me] listening to [her] stories about dragons and princesses and some random butterfly that is now part of the character roster in her diatribes. It sounds like a funky little bunch; I love her imagination, and it was everything I could do to refrain from interrupting her laughing not at her stories, but moreso in awe of her on-the-spot creativity. Some say she's my kid..... hm... ;)

It's an early night here at the house.
I'm okay with that.
♥.

forever yours, little monster.

Sydni time > Blog time.

xo | cmd