Dave.

This one's a little harder.

It's Friday; that's reason to celebrate when we're talking about the work week. It started off like most Fridays do, with that weekly added perk to each of us, knowing that there were just hours left until another weekend. And so it went, for the first couple hours, until one of my clients called to ask me if I was 'doing all right...'

Doing all right? Well, yeah, of course I am - it's Friday! 
... But I didn't know. I didn't know that he'd be calling me under the assumption that I did know about the passing of my former franchisee, boss & friend, Dave. Apparently this happened on Tuesday, after an accident that had left him in a coma for some odd days prior to Tuesday.

I had no idea. I had no words, and left my poor client hanging on a promise to call him back after I collected myself. I called Chris first, then Elisa, and gathered myself enough to finish the rest of the day until the visitation this afternoon.

It's surreal to think that he has passed. There were so, so many things I revered and respected about Dave, as a person, as a businessman and entrepreneur. It hurts to try and grasp the pain and loss that Lizzy, Nancy & the rest of the family is experiencing now, and it hurts to know that he is gone.

dave :) 

a "typical" laughing day with dave!

My heart breaks for their family & friends, and for everyone who has now lost him as part of our community. I'm forever indebted to Dave for providing me the avenue to move back to Cincinnati when I did almost 4 years ago, and for the opportunity to be a part of establishing our office from the ground up. I learned many things from Dave, both professionally and practically, and I will always give him credit where it's due for that short, short window of time that we had him as part of our little Express family. 

express office 2712 | sales summit 2014
cori. elisa. dave | nashville, tn

Dave, you are so very missed. I'm thankful for having been brought into your path and learning from what we did. We'll all see you again one day. Until then, keep an eye on us and know that you are missed. 

I have hopes that the weekend will improve from here, but I'm left feeling a little empty after learning of this, and seeing Lizzy & Nancy for the first time in months today. My prayers for the family, and for a soul lost all too soon. 

Peace, light & comfort.. 

xo | cmd

Elisa's Last Day

Ugggghhhhhhhhhhh....

Today was Elisa's last day at Express. I've got a few different sets of emotions to deal with today...

One of them is sadness, because of the obvious reason that she's an awesome person, inside and out.
Another is that she's been my sole, stable source of sanity and clarity at work, and in the past 3 years, we've been through the ringer here at our office. Literally only Elisa can fully testify to and re-live the history of this office, and I don't know what I would've done without her!

Far unlike a few [one recent in particular] members of the Express team who've come and gone, she's an honest person and a friend before anything else. Our team won't be the same without her, but we have no business telling her not to go and pursue her dreams!

E - you're awesome, and I'm so glad that our paths crossed on this journey that started as coworkers and will continue as friends long after this! THANK YOU for keeping me sane, for laughing with me, for understanding the frustrations and celebrations of our job, for dealing with crazy [from coworkers to associates and everything in between!] and for always being there to talk sense into me when I thought I was in over my head. I'll see you asap when I visit that-a-way in Chicago! :)

my gift from elisa... isn't it supposed to be the other way around!? :o

Tomorrow we'll be flying solo with Clarissa, and while I'm super excited to launch off into our next chapter, it's going to be a very strange feeling doing it in her absence.

MISS YOU ALREADY, CHICA! See you soon :)

xo | cmd 

Welcome, Clarissa!

We welcomed a brand new member to the Express team today!! Elisa is leaving at the end of this week to prepare for her launch off to grad school, and after several unfruitful weeks of searching, we found Clarissa, who is going to be taking her place. I'm super excited to see our next chapter with her! :D 

welcome aboard!!

I was also pretty excited about lunch.... not just the salmon & green beans, but the fact that I actually remembered to bring it to work. I mean, that's half the battle, right? Haha.. 

Elisa and I took a breather [our first of the day, really] around 3:30, and opted for ice cream... because we were both embracing our inner fat kids today and it sounded awesome. 

and it was awesome!

How'd we never know about this place before?! Not cool...

It's awesome. Cute, small, locally-owned and operated... and delicious. :) 

Time Warner Cable on the other hand, has some absolutely ground to make up, and will stay in the doghouse until the end of time. While I understand it's a luxury, and this will certainly sound like a first-world rant... we signed up for this because we are blessed with the means to support it, and because we enjoy watching it occasionally. So given those two things, the fact that we spend more time speaking with customer service about our lack of service than actually having service is irritating. 

We're almost on board with whoever else has ever though and/or done this... 

last straws.. 

And I suppose if that's the worst thing that's happened to me today, we're okay :). 

It's Monday, and it's sunny. This is gonna be a good week! 

xo | cmd

That's a WRAP

Ya know, for a short week, this one was pretty stuffed!

Today was Dave's last day as active franchise owner for my office. It's a bittersweet thing to recognize, given the near two years of ebb-and-flow progression and digression that has led us to this point. My heart is happy to see him step into full retirement, and to know that our business will no longer serve as an added distraction to the things he hopes to accomplish from here on out. I do have some admitted sadness to see him go; there are so many things about Dave that we have come to love, and he has certainly been a part of our small office family. 

Dave, we wish you the best in your next ventures. Thank you for all that you've given us through your LLC and of course, for lunch today! What an excellent way to celebrate YOU! 

elisa with the mexican guac
cori with the thai chicken
..... typical 

It seemed as though our final farewell was far less ceremonial than we'd originally envisioned, but the time came and went, and that was that. It was a typical Friday on all other cylinders, with the weekend finally in our hands. 

pop... pop.. pop pop pop popppp....

Dinner plans took a spontaneous turn, and we found ourselves with bellies full at Los Cazadores. We enjoyed our casual family dinner date before heading back here to enjoy an otherwise uneventful night with each other :).

Here's to the weekend! 

xo | cmd

Dillon's HERE :)

Iiiiiiiit's FRIDAY!!!

womp womp womp

Sydni was thrilled as well that it is Friday, but not so much by the fact that there was still the day itself to complete. Such is life, mini... it'll be okay ;)

At lunch, I took Elisa to REI to take advantage of the REI sale that just started. It was my chance to figure out how I would be taking advantage of my membership, and also to assist her in buying her first hammock! [Eno's are on SALE through next weekend, folks.... FYI!!] While she was scouting out the Single Nest that spoke to her, I made notes to share with Becky:

yesssssss please 

We rounded out the lunch hour with lunch itself - sushi!

yummmmmmm! 

Syd's dad and I traded weekends, a switch prompted by Mother's Day that worked out perfectly given that Dillon arrived here in Cinci tonight! It was just in time to head north to Soccer City, where I'd obliged a last minute request to sub in for Becky's team.

This was Becky and me for the few hours we were there:

goalie / forward

This was the boys [Mike, Dillon, Rob]:

sidelining with popcorn... 

Again, this was Becky and me:

doin' work...

And THESE were the boys:

for the record, they got it. hahaha

All in all, a pretty solid night - there was even a PK that I was able to stick in the lower right - I have to admit it felt pretty good to get some laces exactly where they were meant to go :)

pre & post pk! 

The hilarity continued after the game:

you don't wanna know... hahaha

I'm so excited that Dillon made it here safely - it's about to be a great weekend!

xo | cmd

Summer's ALMOST Here

Hiring Event [Job Fair] Number 2!

thank you, brown mackie college! 

Elisa and I were the only Express reps onsite today, among many other local employers and potential employees. In the midst of the hustle and bustle, Elisa and I determined that these events are definitely the best way to both take a breather from the daily routine, as well as capitalize on marketing and recruiting opportunities!

express onsite - day 2! 

Elisa and I are only so creative on days like this, but when the routine we hammered out is ideal the way it is, there's really no reason to reinvent the wheel.

So that meant day 2 of Coffee Emporium, followed by Ault Park, but this time we were able to track down two trees that were ideal for hammocking! [YIIEEEE!]

I convinced Elisa to try mine out, as she's recently expressed interest in buying one of her own. She loved it!

elisa!!!! i think she's been sold! 

We eventually traded spots; I switched out my yoga mat for my hammock, and spent the rest of our mini break accepting my favorite kind of beauty: the simple kind.

ault park

Summer's almost upon us! I picked up Sydni after work today, after her final field trip of the year.

she's ready for summer, too... clearly .. haha

It's been a relaxing evening at home, which is just what we've all needed at the midpoint of this week. Summer is within reach; I can feel it!

xo | cmd

Wednesday - OWN IT!

It's... JOB FAIR season! I scheduled our first two bigger events of the season for today and tomorrow; we loaded up our gear yesterday to prepare for today and headed off in full Express thunder to see where the day would take us.

First things first though: Let me just say that any day that starts like this... is guaranteed to be a fruitful day, regardless of whether or not we're out hiring:

.... a few of my favorite things!

^ I love that, over and over again!

Sooo... yeah, there was the job fair. It's the first of two that Elisa and I have scheduled this week, and I have to say that it went very well! We even stumbled across Kelly, from the Eastgate office - coincidentally one of my former colleagues from the Days of OLD... aka Clearchannel [that's a different story.. haha]

express cinci central | express eastgate

It's not often that we get out of the office for hours at a time, but it's a fun change of pace, especially when the halls are buzzing with potential candidates and business partners!

fun at our hiring event! 

The job fair came to an end, allowing us a small window to take lunch and whatever else happened to accompany that.

Therefore,
Stop #1: Coffee Emporium.
Stop #2: Ault Park:

catching some sunshine!!
ault park | cincinnati, oh 

We returned to the office and finished off the day before parting ways for the evening. I thought it fitting to continue the evening in like fashion, in the gap between work and volleyball:

sideyard hammocking! 

After a few hours, it was time to head to volleyball [by a few hours, I mean 10:20 PM, *le sighhhhh]. It was tournament week, so we plowed through our games at the back-to-back pace that comes with tourney weeks.

We played, we played and played some more, and a few hours later, we stood as league champs! Given that we're a 4C team in a 6D league, I probably wouldn't have predicted this to go any other way, but it was still a blast getting back into the structured league play of Grand Sands, and I'm proud of my quad team.

Yay, team!

martin. cori. beth. paul
league champs!

It is LATE. I am tiiiiiired, and it's an early day tomorrow. See you then!

xo | cmd

Sunshine, BBQ & Boats [Well, Kinda ;)]

Perks of our centrally-located office [sometimes]:

yay, local swag & discounts! 

^ Rob will appreciate that :) :).

The downside of working in an office is that, when the weather is beautiful and beckoning, we're limited in the amount of time we can allocate in the sunshine.

i. need. [some.] sunshine! 

Elisa and I took full advantage today of the clear skies and traced a very familiar route through the outskirts of downtown to Findlay, where we of course had our free reign of lunch options.

.... I finally settled..

eli's bbq. bare feet. happy heart. 

We ran into Duy, as we often do since he works across the street, and managed a mini convo/catch-up before it was time for us to return to the Express homestead.

The day wrapped up in its usual fashion, and I made my way excitedly home to get Sydni and continue on to the house. Rob had promised Syd she could help, and made sure to follow through on that promise:

this girl 

Happy Tuesday, ya'll :) I hope the sunshine's been good to you today! 

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

Sunshine, Coffee & Happy People!

Cincinnati, you're BEAUTIFULLLLL!!!

Today was just begging for exploration; the sun was out, the temperatures were tolerable, and the sky was as blue as I've seen it be :).

Lunch = Coffee Emporium, and I'm definitely not sorry.

coffee emporium! 

coffee emporium

We work in the city limits, yes, but I'll tell you one thing that I do love about Cincinnati is the plethora of ways to escape that, even if just for an hour or so.

iced coffee + sunny patio + green all around = love, love, love! 

"trying to figure out the selfie... hehe"

 And TOES! 

bare feet! ♥♥♥♥

To continue the beautiful day, I rendezvoused with CHRISTINE! This definitely took me back about four years to our days with the ACS, when I had the opportunity to work with her on one of the Relay for Life campaigns in Illinois:

relay for life - 2011?
belleville west hs | belleville, il 

the eagle otr, may 2015!
otr - cincinnati, oh 

I love catching up with old friends!! :) So great to see you Christine, and I hope the rest of your visit here in Cincinnati is awesome!

I made it home with dinner for Rob, and got to work on finishing up these, that are going in the mail first thing tomorrow: 

send 'em out! 

*WHEW. It's been a day! Tomorrow is finally Friday; here we go!

xo | cmd

HELLO, MAY!

It's MAY!

I'll spare you the Timberlake/N*Sync memes today; I got mine in yesterday, hah ;).

So YEAH, it's Friday, it's May 1st, and today was... awesome.

To start off, the sun was out. That doesn't sound like a big deal to most people, but when you live in OHIO, in MAY, the weather can be doing any number of things other than being tolerable. The good vibe was set for the day, and it grew better and better as the day wore on.

Elisa and I escaped the monotony of work for the traditional Friday lunch; Northside was our destination, and after a beautiful back patio timeout with delicious chicken wraps at Melt, we stopped by Sidewinder for some iced coffee.

not too bad for a day in the city! ♥

And when you're in Northside at Sidewinder, you don't not go to Chicken Lays an Egg right across the street. In fact, you go and you try on all the sunglasses. Because they're awesome, that's why!

stolen from e's IG

snazzy. 

Love.
Work ended, and the routine led me into Milford to pick up Sydni. She was out within 10 minutes of the car ride home, like usual, but not before giving the universe another priceless kid quote:

Syd: Mommy, is tomorrow my day off? 
Me: Yes; it's Saturday! That means you get to sleep in! 
Syd: YEAH. It means we can do whateeeever we want! Except play with knives.
Me: Yeah... ummm.. except that. 
Syd: Perfect. Don't wake me up tomorrow morning. 

^ Gotta love kids, hahaha. Not five minutes after she said that, this happened: 

zonked. 

We made it home only to change our clothes and head right back out the door; Rob had the excellent idea to take an evening hike before dinner. I thought that was an amazing idea, so we headed out to Withrow for a short jaunt around the property, which culminated at an overlook to the Ohio River. 

giant tree... perfect for climbing! 

little nature girly

Back in the car, our bellies were rumbling; we voted a Friday night family dinner date in Eastgate, but not before a pitstop at Family Christian. To my heart;s joy, not only did I find a new 365 devotional, but so did ROB! ♥♥ This is a pretty big step for us to do together, and I'm prayfully confident that there is growth beyond measure in store for both of us.

#truuuuuuuuuth.

We finally made it to dinner before heading home for a few minutes of unwind before bed. It's been a long and fulfilling day; my heart is happy with my simple little life  and I'm anxious to see what tomorrow has in store!

xo | cmd