Three Phase Saturday!

Phase 1: Prep the Lexus for her new paint job.

this guy ♥

doin' my share! 

I had to cut out early and leave Rob to finish the rest of the work himself; I was pushing time to get ready and get myself to the chapel for Lizzy's wedding!

Phase 2: Wedding Bliss! #BlumVollmerVows

elisa & i @ the blum-vollmer wedding!
summit country day school | cincinnati, oh

congraaaaatulations to mr. & mrs. vollmer!!! ♥

Lizzy. was. BEAUTIFUL!! Congratulations, again to her and her new hubby!

From there, it was back home to rendezvous with Rob, clean up again and head right back out the door for the third and final trip of the day.

Phase 3: Becky's Birthday!

happy [early] birthday!!!!!!!!!

For those of ya'll who don't know, but for some reason care to know, Becky was my RA my freshman year at UC. It was friendship at first soccer practice; she was a keeper and I was one of those bouncy midfielders tasked with sprinting up and down the field while she kept an eye on the goal. She introduced me to each of the Cincinnati soccer arenas, and can be blamed, on several grueling occasions, of inviting me to run every. single. stair. [yes, every single stair] in Nippert Stadium. As a sidenote, for those of you who've never been inside a college football stadium, that's a LOT of freaking stairs, and you kind of want to meet some sort of immediate demise like, halfway through, if not sooner.

SOMEHOW, despite our frequent death runs through Nippert, repeated blood drives at Hoxworth and sessions of us either stripping off or washing our soccer shin guards post-game and choking ourselves on the putrid smell, we stayed friends, and grew into our post-college days as such.

yep. all around, yep. 

NOW, I can easily say she's been a lifeline to me over the past few years specifically, and I wouldn't trade that for anything. There's not a friend more loyal and respectable than this gal, and I'm proud to call her that. Happy birthday, to a truly incredible friend, coach and mentor. Love you, woman!

my date ♥

^^ That guy [we'll save my tribute rant on him for another day] was my date, and I'm reminded daily, especially at special events like this, that I picked a good one. I am one lucky girl.

Happy painting on little Lexi tomorrow, Rob.
Congratulations, Lizzy V!
And... Happy birthday, Becky!!

And for the rest of my blogbot loves : Happy Saturday! ♥

xo | cmd

Breaking Even & Bye-Bye, Boat!

Oh, the power of Craigslist.

dun dun dunnnn...

Over the years, I personally can attest to the convenient wonder that is Craigslist. Buying and selling online was never really my thing; throughout high school, many people I knew used Ebay. One guy I dated in HS bought a car off Ebay, and traveled something like 6 states away to go look at it before he bought it. I remained skeptical to the whole idea of committing myself purchase whatever it was, from some random person. I mean c'mon, I'm a 90's kid, and if you want to gauge our range of adaptation, think about this:

Kids born in the 80's are probably the last generation of kids whose baby pictures weren't taken on cell phones.

Mind blown with that one, a bit.. mine at least.

Anyway, I hit college in the "big city" of Cincinnati, and was introduced to all kinds of things, including Craigslist: An online community of buyers, seller, renters, wanters, givers and takers who were all... local? So I could drive 15 minutes to a mall to meet someone selling an ipod, rather than blindly buying it online and risk being severely disappointed? Sign me up.

Everyone's a newb at some point.

I started relying on Craigslist for my first point of search whenever I'd decided I needed a bigger-ticket item. There are of course horror stories from both buyers and sellers on Craigslist, so I am still to this day grateful to have been fortunate and fruitful after my repeated usage...

I found a roommate on Craigslist. She turned out to be awesome, and we're still friends today.
She and I found our apartment on Craigslist [it only seemed fitting...]. 

with trisha! 2008 & 2014

stella bella!

I bought a car off Craigslist. Sure, the fuel pump had a seizure and died just a couple weeks in, but reading up on Saabs after that, I realized that was probably imminent, and went on with life.
The next several places in which I lived were also from Craigslist, along with countless other random things: appliances, a snowboard or two, skiis, cell phones, laptops, cameras, camping equipment, etc.
I even had a few pets over the years who came off CL. My little rescue love Stella is herself a CL ad, answered by moi.
I counted myself a Craigslist aficionado.
And then I met Rob. No, I didn't meet him on CL, haha..

Where I thought I was a guru at positioning myself on Craigslist, Rob blew me out of the water: Cars, trucks, boats, motorcycles, rental houses and a lot more than I would've probably ever felt comfortable dealing with over Craigs. Sure, people buy/sell/trade things all the time; what Rob does that I don't get is to somehow manage to squeeze every. single. penny either into or out of whatever it is. I love it!

Today was one of those bittersweet days. We said goodbye to the big red lug of a boat that Rob bought around this time last year. Rob decided to list it a couple of months back, but was biding his time waiting on the perfect bid. 

hitching it up to its new owner :(

Of course, it always helps to remember that bidding farewell to one just means that we're now in full-fledged quest for the next one..

whoa.. haha

Rob's madly scouring Craigslist again now, with his eyes set on a couple of potentials. One of them is in MO, where we'll be this weekend.

Oh! I also almost forgot to mention - CONGRATS to my team at work! We've broken even, just after a year! That's a HUGE accomplishment for a new office, and I couldn't be more proud to have been a part of that effort. It's the up-&-up from here! :D

We of course celebrated with lunch, which was decidedly at Trio Bistro in Kenwood. I felt like I'd been there once before, but I still can't put my finger on when, or with whom. Either way, the food was delicious and it was great to have all of us together to celebrate such a cool achievement! 

thai flatbread

proscuitto flatbread

Yum! Congrats again to my awesome team. We're pretty awesome, in my books :)

I think this is gonna be a good week!

xo | cmd

Reality Isn't So Bad!

I went to bed last night with something like a sinking feeling in my stomach. After I purposefully wasted the entire day yesterday doing absolutely nothing of any productive value [wait - does vacation photo editing count?], I figured today would present me a stack of mayhem higher than the front door.

I was wrong. I work with two girls who did more than an ample job of holding down the fort last week, and I owe them huge, huge thanks for not creating a debachle out of anything while I was gone. Elisa & Lizzy - thank youuuuu!!!

Anyway, it was almost nice [I've gone mad, I know it.... ] being back in the office today, finding my routine groove with a twist of Jamaican mentality [no worries, mon!] to tackle the duties of a Monday.

After work, I picked up Sydni, who I absolutely could not wait to see! Last week would've been like any other week really, with her at her dad's, but there's something about being out of the country that made the time feel doubled. I was more than ready to see my mini.

With Sydni back, our family at home is complete with Rob, myself, Syd and our dogs. It's chaos, yes, but I missed them all last week and am glad to have them back.

I even managed to get some meal prep done for the rest of the week! Jamaican eating has me spoiled now, not for its elegancy necessarily, but for the frequency in which we were fed. Now I'm lazy and don't feel like lifting a finger to do anything around here. Hah.. just kidding. Luckily for me, Rob had some initiative to fix an ailing screen door problem, which helped light a fire under my tail, too.

the subcontractor

before & after, because rob is awesome (:

Here's to the first week back!

xo | cmd

Lizzy's Birthday | Jesse's Here

I love Fridays, and I love birthdays. Happy birthday, Lizzy!!


hbd, lizzy!

Today happens to be both; we celebrated our owner's daughter [& also our sales rep]'s birthday today, in true Express fashion. 

the sweeterie!

Cupcakes. Why? Because we love food and we love The Sweeterie in Mariemont.
You should, too. ;)

Fast forward to now, when I'm just waking up three hours later, from that nap I told myself would be a half-hour snooze.. Hah. Jesse is here for the weekend, and he and Rob are heading out for some quality guy time. Fine by me. I'm heading back to bed.

G'Nite, ya'll!

xo | cmd

Brakes? What Brakes?

My morning routine typically starts with leaving for work. Yenno, something basic like that.

Well, I didn't get very far. I didn't even make it out of the neighborhood before my brakes completely gave up the ghost and stopped working for good. I somehow managed to coast back home and into the driveway. Rob came home for a bit to inspect the damage; we ordered some brake parts to be delivered to his work later on today, and he headed back. Lizzy was kind enough to come and get me, so I eventually made it to the office. 

well.... yeah.

Two hours late, but made it no less. Thanks, Lizzy!

After work, Nancy took me home. I think I needed today if for no other reason than a clear reminder to appreciate my [usual] mobility. I coordinate things daily with people reliant on public transportation, so often that I lose sight of how grateful I should be for having a car that functions. Anyway, I made it home just before Rob showed up to save the day [again].

He wasted no time digging into the back brakes on poor little Subie.
I'm glad he did, because it... was.... a mess.

poor subie

whoa!

he. is. awesome!!

Kalyn called in the midst of it all; she was looking for something to do in the gap between work and our 9:30pm volleyball game. She stopped over and we headed to Eli's, because YES. That's why ;)

It was then home, food and a little more relaxing before our journey over to Hahana, where we put up a big WIN before calling it a night.

*Yawn. What a day!

We'll see how these brakes hold up tomorrow. If I'm right, these puppies will have me stopping on a dime. My mechanic's pretty awesome ;)

See ya then!

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

New Family Members!

... The Express family, that is.

Today we opened our office to a couple who will be the newest members of the Cincitucky Express family [Cincinnati + N.KY]. They'll be taking over a territory that was vacated by another owner a year or so back; today we welcomed them to our office to conduct interviews for their first staffing consultant.

welcome to the express fam!

Quick rewind to this morning... just really quick:

ohio.

^ Ohhhhhio, STOP IT!
Yeah, that's snow. Yeah, it was like, I dunno, almost 60 yesterday? Yeah, it's April. I know I'm not alone in wishing this crap would just..... go..... away. *Sigh. Mother Nature- 1, Ohioans Wishing for Warm Weather - 0.

Anyway, we lightened the drab start with the new owners; that's a special occasion for us, which also means food. If there's one unspoken Express standard, it's the provision of food at everything that could be considered a gathering. Shoot, we have office lunches here every single Friday. Today it was Chris bringing donuts, a pot of coffee to go around, and a bowl of greek yogurt+berries+honey. Nom, nom freakin' nom!


beauty in a bite!

After work, it was off to start my Easter preparation. That meant a trip to the dollar store to pick up a collection of plastic eggs, miscellaneous little trinkets and toys to fill them, some last-minute things for Syd's Easter basket and a few other things. I may have gone slightly overboard this year, but hey... that's the fun part!

Happy Tuesday, friends!

xo | cmd

MANIAC. MONDAY

This was probably one of the most taxing Mondays I've had in a while. Yes, today I had a Case of the Mondays.

My job requires me to sometimes act not only as what I'm titled, but also as a babysitter to people who neglect to show up to work. I will never for the life of me understand the dynamic behind being in desperate need of work, as so many claim to be, yet refusing to fulfill a commitment to work when it's offered. Either way, it proved to be a cardiac kick-start to a Monday that would quickly turn into a whirlwind.

Granted, I kind of like the whirlwind of activity. It's indicative of the ramp-up we've long been awaiting, and after this brutal winter, I think we're all ready for the change of pace. I'm not complaining.

I was a little bummed that Sydni didn't have gymnastics tonight, due to it being Spring Break week, but that just meant she got to come home and help make spaghetti for all of us and cuddle up with the brand new blanket that was shipped to her & me from nomorerack, compliments of Mr. Rob (:

nomorerack = j o y in this house! ♥

^ Nope, no real reasons to complain. I'm exhausted from trying to keep up with the day, but the influx of business [albeit rather sudden, all in one day, haha.. ] is a much-needed break in the lull of wintery inactivity.

I think this will be a good week!

xo | cmd

Happy Birthday, Elisa!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ELISA!!!!

happy birthday!!

Elisa's birthday is TODAY! I have the pleasure of working with this girl, and I must say she's pretty awesome. Coincidentally, I knew her brother from college, long before I ever met her, and then when I did finally meet her, we realized both of us are part of adoptive families. Pretty cool. (:

Anyway, birthdays are great excuses to indulge on things that otherwise have no permissable justification. Erego, meet the box of cupcakes from The Sweeterie that Nancy brought to help us celebrate Elisa's birthday and our blatant disregard for healthy eating.

hello, ya gorgeous thing, you!

I assumed that, since it's also Michael Jordan's birthday today, that anyone sharing such a momentus birthday would be watching this gem to celebrate:

boom.

^ We discussed this movie here at the office today and how, when we were kids watching it, it was one of the classics of that time. However, to watch it now means realizing that MJ really just... isn't a good actor, nor is this movie nearly as entertaining as it was when I was what, 10... 11? If anything else, it's almost more creepy than anything else, but even then I still relish this as one of those staple movies from my middle childhood years.

That being said, happy birthday to both MJ and Elisa!

I still feel behind from the weekend; tonight's supposed to be producing some nasty weather again, so instead of heading to the gym like I was supposed to, I'm here at home working out in my living room and avoiding any extra time on the roads. It's nuts out there.

Happy week, blogbots!

xo | cmd

Snow. Snow Everywhere ❄❆

One of these days, I'll start paying more attention to the weather forecasts.

no, i was not prepared for this.

I stepped out back to let the dogs out and found my neighbor calf-deep in the snow in his driveway, clearing his car. Apparently I wasn't the only one caught off-guard by the white mess. I was a little upset that it all looked so powdery, and well... fun .. and instead of playing in it, we'd all be heading to work. Schools, I assumed by the trails of kids I saw toting sleds down sidewalks as I was driving in, are closed today.


it's so pretty!

The commute to work was slow but steady; thankfully Nancy pardoned us all to arrive later due to the road conditions, and as much as we just inched along, I'm certain that extra hour or so made a huge difference. I have to admit that although the roads looked like junk, it was otherwise a pretty drive. This, once again, is the midwest. This is what winters in Ohio were like from my childhood. (:

snowy roads & snow-covered trees

And then there was work... which was mildly productive in spite of the weather. Nancy treated us to lunch, so naturally there was no protesting a baked potato in the middle of the day..


guilty eats.. and it's only tuesday... haha

^ No worries, though. I made it to the gym after work and in my own pained silence, trodded away at burning off whatever I could for the day. It was leg day, so of course my lower extremeties at this point feel more like noodles than limbs, but hey..... worth it ;)

Dinner post-workout was well worth it.

ooommmm nom nom nom (:

And then, as I was checking over everything for the evening at the new digs, I peeked inside the mailbox to find that Rob had beat me to the punch in having something delivered to the house! Sneaky, that one... Apparently he ordered facemasks. I couldn't decipher a company name from the shipping address, but it doesn't really matter; they're pretty nifty.

+ jacket + helmet = alllll set!

I told him I was wearing this thing to work. In the minute or so that it took me to sport one and snap a picture, I have to admit it got a bit toasty. Oh, the stuff available to us.. hah.

Anyway, I can feel the soreness encasing my legs the more I sit here, so it's time for a goodnight stretch session and some sleep.

*Crossing FINGERS for no. more. snow tonight! ❄❆

xo | cmd

OHIO HOME {Literally! ;) }

A whiiiiiiiile back, I ordered some window decals from a grassroots company here in Cincinnati. Hometown pride is a big thing around here; I'm admittedly on the bandwagon, because I tend to think I should be proud of where I am. And I am. It's not sheer perfection, but it's home nonetheless and undeniably a part of my identity. Now that the Subie's here, I thought it better late than never to get this puppy on display!

yes, subie.. and yes, us... we're home! ♥

My next matter on the Ohio pride agenda is a Home-T. Updates on that later, hah...

For today, it was the standard schedule of work, lunch {Naked Pizza, with the pleasure of Lizzy joining us!}, and back again to continue trodding through this whole moving thing. The poor Subie's getting a workout between the two houses.

A quick update on all that [aka, status check on the new mess I'm building out of things from the "old house"]:

♥♥♥

^ I couldn't help it. I stacked those up just to get the rack started, and didn't catch the aesthetic cuteness of it until a couple of coats were on their way in later. Adore. Adore. Adore.

But seriously, I've started outlining the rooms with boxes and piles of things; I hate that this whole moving thing is practically a science to me by now, but it still doesn't make it any less agitating:


this is how grown-ups make messes....

The mess is temporary, Cori. Haha.

Anyway, that's the most exhilirating update out of this neck of the woods. I've done all I can do for now. Tomorrow = Rob, Jesse & Anna arriving with truck, boat and lots of stuffffff.

Here. We. GO!

xo | cmd

Monday Blur

Today started off with all of us here in the office, wrapping up payroll and some other loose ends before 2014 gets here. Halfway through the day, the bosses decided we'd be wasting our time if we came in tomorrow, so now, we're off for the next two days! WOO!

I took a break for lunch to run out and take care of a couple things, primarily dropping off lunch to my dedicated stand-in babysitter.. haha.


hello again, piada (:

I got back to work just as the USPS truck was pulling in. The driver jumped out with two little pink boxes and headed our way; needless to say, Elisa & I were pretty excited about our Julep drops!

julep time!!!

Also in work news, we had our weekly afternoon meeting today, since we won't be here Wednesday. Dave & Nancy [we've collectively coined them Dancy, for short reference] told us that Lizzy will be stepping in to fill Nikki's vacancy as our sales person. We are definitely surprised, but I have a good feeling this will be a great step in the right direction. WELCOME ABOARD, LIZZY!

It looks like 2014 is going to be a big year for this office.. and I'm excited (:

Back at home, Rob and I started knuckling down once again on the logistics [an ever-irritating process at this point] of transporting all of his things from Illinois here over the next couple of weeks. We decided at the last minute that rather than wait until next weekend for me to take him back, we'd just get that part out of the way over the next couple of days. So with that being said, we packed up a couple bags, and along with Sydni and the pups, jumped on the road. I captured our starting point of spontaneity...

t-minus 5 hours. let's do it.

I count myself blessed a thousand times over for such an adaptable little girl and cooperative furry twins for taking this last-minute trip in stride. They did so well for the trip; actually I think Sydni had way more fun than the dogs did, but nobody's really counting ;)

hilarious. allllll. the. way. there ;)

We made it here to Illinois safe and sound, and for now, we're resting up for whatever it is we're bound to accomplish tomorrow. We might even get around to celebrating the new year, too, but we'll play it all by ear :).

G'Nite!

xo | cmd