Mother's Day Weekend: Part 1

How do you start the perfect Mother's Day weekend?

YARDWORK! 

backyard outta control....

^^ Yeah, so in the midst of us [still, forever likely] unpacking the internal contents of our house, the backyard has gone untouched - specifically the old mulch beds. We woke up early and split the work: Rob took the mowing and weed eating, and I did what I could to get the mulchbeds in the front and backyard under control. It's not perfect yet, but it's on its way! 

wheeeew! 

This whole homeownership thing sure has a lot of little fun extras wrapped up into it.. ;) On the bright side, we wrapped up all the work in a matter of a few hours, and hit the showers to transform from yardwork mode to matinee date mode! 

Throwback to a month or so back when an email popped up in my inbox to tell me Rob bought us tickets to this show as a Mother's Day gift. I've counted down the days and was suuuper excited even on the way down to the arena.. 

yiiiieeee!!!! 

Admittedly I look a little rugged, but maybe that's from five hours pulling weeds and landscaping right before we came down? Haha. Who knows. What I do know was that this show was about to be amazing - and I wasn't wrong! 

love you, mister! 

cirque du soleil | toruk 

cirque du soleil | toruk 

cirque du soleil | toruk 

cirque du soleil | toruk 

By the end of the show, there were enough blue lights to give us a glimpse of what it'd look like if we were all to start roving over Pandora... even without stripes :p

avatar blue! ;) 

It was a really cool show, and if you've got the chance, I would highly recommend it! 

finale!
cirque du soleil | toruk 

We headed home after the show, did one more wardrobe change for the night, and headed back out to meet up with Becky & Will at Rhinegeist. It wasn't a super long night out, but it was fun nonetheless and as always, even more so with great friends in tow. 

hiiiii... 

becky! 

Tomorrow's Mother's Day, and I can't wait to spend it with my two favorites - Rob & Syd. For now, goooood night! 

xo | cmd 

Monday: Mare & Mini-Me

I woke up this morning, a little sad that our last remaining visitor would still be sleeping when we left for work, but would be well into her journey back to VA by the time we were home again.

Or.... this message that came across this morning:

well all right then!

I don't think I was overly surprised that she'd chosen to wander around the city some more before she headed out, so I took my lunch break to rendezvous with her at Sidewinder's in Northside.

sidewinder?
no no, it's actually sheehan / cori

^ I kid, I kid. Even though I literally lived in Northside, with Becky for nearly three months during my initial transition back to Ohio, I rarely explored the little gems that neighbor one another on Hamilton Ave. Marianne of course had her camera ready to go; we took advantage of the beautiful day and trekked a short couple of blocks both ways before I had to return to work.

obey... imelda marcos? | photog cred: marianne

Yeah. So we finally said our final farewells [for now] around 1pm, snagged a couple final photos and I was off to finish up my day back at the office.

sunny day coffee lunch break with this gal.

I don't know if or when I will ever learn to stop assuming things.

Like, in this case, when I assumed Marianne would be at least halfway through her drive back to VA at 4:30?

hahaha yes!



Niiiiiiice. She's really not unlike me in that this is probably something I have done and probably will do again at some point. I can't say I complained, though. I may have laughed a little - probably a tiny cackle when I read it, but either way, I'm not mad.

 

I did however, have to put off evening plans with M&B until after Sydni's gymnastics.

Fun fact here: This little girl is built like me, acts like I did when I was 4 and is more stubborn than a mule. I've seen the pictures and 8mm tape documentation of miniature me [actual me, not Sydni] in my little leotard and shorts, perched atop a balance beam and swinging from the low bar. Aside from the hair on our head, it's nearly identical.

 

Except she's definitely going to be better:

Yes. Most definitely better than  me. It probably has something to do with the fact that I was still throwing handsprings while she was doin' her time on the inside [har har], but who really knows. I LOVE that little athletic girl of mine!

After gymnastics, the three of us headed home to change, and then right back out the door to Dewey's to meet up with Becky & Mare. It's apparently been one heckuva day for all of us; I have to admit I was definitely ready to be home in sweats on the couch.

BUT, not before a chocolate teeth picture. This is another one of those photo moments that will go on repeat for the rest of our lives, I'm sure. We were only missing Ali on this one..

26 february 2013

10 march 2014

^ Some things probably won't ever change..  haha.

We're home now.
We're spent.
We're goin' to bed.

G'Nite!

xo | cmd

Sunday Shelfies ;)

In preparation for our pre-meditated Ikea trip, we voted a big yes to church first. Haha. That of course is not the reason we went; church is always first on the list for Sunday mornings, including an excellent message from Pastor Jeff, as always.

And then, post-church meant the trip north to West Chester. We primed ourselves for the adventure with a pitstop at Panera before that last deep breath you take when you consciously decide to enter the Ikea parking lot on a weekend.

[insert episodic music here...**]

Yes, the parking lot itself is a jungle. To compound the frustration of parking Rob's truck [which we brought just in case] amongst the crammed rows of other cars, we were really there for one thing:

shelf. little... black... shelf.

I dragged Rob to Ikea today because I wanted shelves. Just add this to the list of awesome-boyfriend moments: he agreed to navigate through the crowds in one of the biggest superstores in Cincinnati because I had my eye on an 11x10" slab of particle&fiber board. He's awesome.

To the surprise of both of us, it was a relatively painless experience. Aside from the usual bottleneck at the check-out, this may have been the easiest trip to Ikea I've had yet. It of course helps when you know exactly why you're there, put on your blinders and ignore the other 343,500 sq.ft of stuff you want to take home. We were in and out in an hour, which included a quick peruse over the dining room chair section. Again, at least we need those.

So with six shelves and two wall-mounted lights, we escaped Ikea and headed home. In the 40ish minute drive back, we encountered rain, sleet, snow and warm sunshine. A quick reminder that the midwest is just as confused as we are with this weather thing.

I lent whatever assistance I could to be useful in hanging the shelves and lights in the bedroom. After he figured out a good system to do it, I dismissed myself to get dinner ready while he finished up in the bedroom.

His final product?


before & after

yay, bedstand shelves!
no curtain yet, but that's coming as well!

And... my finished product:

garlic lime chicken, pierogies, zucchini

I'll say that his was way better than mine. We may have over-marinated the chicken, which came out much too sour for my liking, at least. He didn't seem to mind, or he is just great at pretending I'm not trying to poison us both. Less lime, more cilantro next time. Noted (:

Anyway, I think that's a wrap on the weekend. Monday's gonna be here before we know it, whether we want it or not... and we're spent.

G'Nite (:

xo | cmd

It Will Be Okay (:

This whole journey on which I've been for the past year or so now is starting to come full circle. I looked back on some of the entries I wrote towards the middle to end of last year and saw myself then: scared, angry, confused, hurt, in denial, broken..... but more importantly unsure anymore of who I was, doubting my own worth and ability because of it all. I had crumbled, and was starting to pick up the pieces and put them back together. I knew I had a long road ahead of me, with some pretty daunting tasks to accomplish in a short amount of time.
My sister told me in a conversation the other day that through it all, she'd been angry with me: angry for me shutting down, for me not going to her or our parents when we both knew I needed them, but mainly... because she saw me giving up who I was, standing down instead of standing up for myself, and letting someone else dictate my life in a way that was unhealthy from the start. I had become a person that anyone from "pre-2008" would've scoffed at; they wouldn't have believed it was me if I'd told them. I was numb, broken and bitter. I limited my company to a few select individuals, and shut the rest of the world off.

Not. Who. I. Am.
And then....

and this is who i am. we're getting back to that.

I took a dive, head first, didn't drown, and although then I felt like I was alone, I knew deep down that I never was, and I never will be. Things slowly started working themselves into place, both with and against the grain of what I would've liked. I owe everything to some select people, without whom I honestly don't know what I would've done. Among the many who extended themselves to me in the process of getting back: Becky, Mike and Rob proved to be pillars I sincerely couldn't have gone without. I knew then, even in the phase of vagabond status I held for nearly a month, that wherever I landed, things would be okay.

Today marked the end of a weekend: as short as it was and as quickly as it passed, it was sort of the culminating point I'd subconsciously needed more than I could've imagined. My parents have been here for the past two days, and I quickly realized the power of falling back into the arms of family, and the impact that can have on the heart, even in just one weekend. My family is comprised of people who are not related by blood, and have had our battles together, but as I watched my parents leave today, I felt renewed by the entire experience, and I know without doubt that YES, IT WILL BE OKAY.

To save you all from any more of my sappy rants, I'll give you some more menial things, like the fact that my college-esque living room took another step towards adulthood today! Haha. Really, though, Mom & I went out this morning while Dad spent time with Sydni. We hit up a few different stores for miscellaneous things before digging into the real mission: find curtains for the front room. They'd brought me two bamboo blinds from their house, and by the time it was all said and done, we'd found fashionable coverings for the front windows and for Sydni's room. We even hung a clothesline in the back. All around a success!

improvement, yeah? ;)

It was another great day with my family, and I was sad to see them go.
To soften the slight sadness I had about bidding them off, I have this to look forward to:

she's here!!!!! i can't wait. i... can't... wait. (:

Yeah, my best friend is moving back to Ohio, and she's in town doing prep work for it for the next few days. Exciiiiiiiiiiited!!

The last thing I had to share for today: The pictures of the meatballs [aka Sasha & Stella] that Rob sent me. I really miss them both, in all of their rowdiness. Stella still looks like a bat on steroids and Sasha, well... Sasha's still Sasha. Haha. There isn't much to say there, but either way, it was great to see pics of the pups (: 

meatballs! [miss them....]

Good night, blogbots. I hope you had a great weekend... here's to a great WEEK ahead!

xo | cmd

Starting to Look Like Home (:

Day 3: This place is starting to look much more like an actual residence than a storage unit. [Yay!] This is progress!

I took a trip to Walgreens during lunch to do a mass printing of photographs I wanted to frame. There were about 20 all together; I was bound and determined to update all of the frames I have and get those suckers on the wall. I'm guilty of having outdated or empty frames lying around for months on end, so I had it at the high end of my to-do list to get this done.

Funny, how I think some things are urgent, and then I'm reminded that people, not things, are way more important, and there's always time for good friends. I got a phone call from Becky, as I was nearly cross-eyed with an exacto-knife shaving down some photo edges.

Here's how that went:

B: "Hey lady, how's the dryer?"
C: "No issues so far?" B: "Great. How's your stomach?"
C: "Empty..." B: "How's your front door??"
C: "Unlocked."

I love my friends. This is what I saw not even 15 seconds later...


my friends are awesome.

Becky? check. Mike? check.
CINDER BLOCKS?? check!
.... DINNER FROM ELI'S??! cheeeeeeckk......

What an amazing surprise. The two cinder blocks I still needed for the basement, carry-out from Eli's BBQ, and two really stellar people for dinner company. It certainly beats the vibe from last night at WG, but who's keeping score.... haha.

I've been a busy bee this evening. I forgot to mention that I did my first full grocery trip earlier this afternoon. I'd forgotten how un-fun it is having to buy all that staple stuff [paper towels, dish soap, TP, etc.], but somehow managed to remember everything and get home in one piece. I've cleaned the bathroom and tidied some more around the living room.


first grocery shop... done!

OH! And the pictures are hung. Most of them, at least. There are some frames still unaccounted for, which baffled me until I remembered that they're still at Rob's. In time...

PHOTO MONTAGE TIME! [Before + After!]



[still missing bookcase shelves :/ ... ]

I've been a busy bee tonight. Huge thanks again to Becky & Mike for being who they are and for helping out in ways I couldn't even have thought to ask. I'm feeling more settled in the new digs every day, with only about four days really under my belt here.

Oh, and the countdown to Rob visiting continues: 2. more. days.

xo | cmd