Category Archives: Misc.

Friday Lovin’

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Happy TGIF everyone!!! First off, I want to say how much I enjoyed reading your “I Give Myself Permission To…” comments – it really warmed my heart and I loved hearing all that you give yourself permission to do. (And if you haven’t yet read the comments I suggest you do  – they’re a lovely read by some awesome ladies) ;)

And I think we should especially keep that “I Give Myself Permission To…” mentality in mind when there are days that are tough and we feel especially anxious or stressed – I think it’s ok to remind yourself to say “I Give Myself Permission To…relax, do a fun exercise class, grab a treat, get a pedicure, etc. Do whatever you need to do to bring happiness back into yourself/your life so that you can enjoy everyday to the fullest :)

I also want to say thank you so much for your feedback about my iPad conundrum on whether or not a) I should get one? and b) if they’re compatible for blogging? After reviewing your advice and especially great tips from the lovely Sarah and talking about it more with my parents, we decided that they’ll all get me gift cards to Best Buy. I think that’s the perfect option so that I can weigh my choices at the store and compare the iPad (they sell them now at Best Buy) to all the other laptops and see what will work best for me. I’ll definitely post about it once I make my purchase :)

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Anyway, most of you follow me on twitter so I think a lot of you knew what I was up to…

So yeah, that’s pretty much the only excuse as to why you haven’t seen blog posts from me this whole week. And to be honest, I just needed a break and I’ve just had an emotional week – last weekend was an emotional one for me in regard to some personal stuff…

Although there was a bright light in that I had the most amazing day with my friend. You know those friendships where you can pick up right where you left off and like no time has passed? I think it’s been about a year since I’ve last seen her and every time I do it’s simply amazing. We actually mentioned to each other that we never feel any anxiety or nervousness upon seeing each other – I’m always so relaxed with this girl and am laughing non-stop with her. She’s got the most awesome sense of humor and personality – there was a reason why we’ve been such great friends since Kindergarten and Girl Scouts, we just have a great connection. I love her dearly and can’t wait for our next get together :)

And I think this photo speaks for itself of just how much we can have when we’re together…

My mom is simply awesome – she got her groove thing on at our wedding ;)

So back to the other parts of my weekend, it was an emotional one and it’s stuff I won’t discuss here, but will say that I just didn’t want to force a “happy go lucky” post when I wasn’t feeling in that mood at all this week. All I felt like doing was focusing on work and tackling my Christmas shopping – which always makes me happy – love buying gifts for my family and friends :) And, I’m happy to say I got every person done, yipeee! Except for Todd…still thinking about that one! Above all else – today is Friday, I woke up on the right side of the bed, I got a fun night planned for tonight, and I’m ready to make this weekend a better one.

So with that, it’s Friday and I love my Friday Lovin’ posts because it just simply gives me a chance to tell you all what I’ve been loving lately. Like more delicious holiday finds from Trader Joe’s…

Delicious is all I can say – trust me

And we got our mini Christmas trees decorated!!!

They look kinda funky, but cute, haha! We weren’t about to do real trees again this year – we did that once and it was such a mess (p.s. we have hardwood floors!). Don’t get me wrong, I do love them and our family got real trees throughout my childhood, but it’s just not for Todd and I. We have plans to buy a fake one once they go on sale after Xmas to use for next year!

More penguin decorations…

When you turn him on he changes colors from blue to green to yellow to red – too cute

Papa penguin

And these lovelies…

(source)

Here I have the shaft unfolded all the way up

It’s hard to see in the pics just how lovely these boots are – and super comfy!

I bought them last Saturday with my friend and I couldn’t pass them up. Regular price $150 and got them on sale for $112…I think that’s a pretty great deal, don’t cha think? ;)

And I’ve updated my blog theme to “Bouquet”…I can’t stop changing the look of my blog and I think I’m really loving this one…

And my lovely coworker got me on to this great new holiday feature for your blog – in the Settings you can choose “Show falling snow on my blog until January 4th” – in the pic above you can kind of see the white dots – that’s the snow. I love it – super cute and festive

And the other day, I got a shipment of this deliciousness…

That there on the left is a magnum bottle – whoo hoo!

In which I’ll be enjoying with these lovelies…

And then it’s off to here (our fav spot!) for some more shenanigans and good times :)

I’ll give you a hint as to what we’ll be indulging in…

Yes pleaseee!!! ;)

Hope you all have a fantastic Friday and a wonderful weekend! I know I sure will…tomorrow I’m meeting up with this wonderful friend to bake up some delicious pecan pie cookies – never tried them before and I definitely can’t wait for our baking extravaganza :)

Questions:
Any fun plans for tonight or this weekend?!
If you shop at Trader Joe’s, what’s your favorite holiday treat right now? Mine is the Cookie Butter!!!

3 Years Ago Today…

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I married my best friend and the love of my life. It was the most special, best day of my life and everyday since then has been better than the last…

I absolutely love this picture…my most favorite one from that day :)

Todd and I have been together for a total of 8 years, we were just babies when we met, me at 21 and him at 26. I’ll never forget that day I spotted him in the gym and instantly had a schoolgirl crush on him…little did I know he had his eye on me too ;) And I’ll never forget the night we met…it was a typical night out with my sister and girlfriends at our local lounge bar, I instantly spotted him walk into the door and my heart skipped a beat. Our eyes met from across the room, he so suavely came by with a round of shots, left them at our table and so coolly said “thought you ladies might enjoy these”, and walked away. Butterflies were swirling through my stomach and I knew I couldn’t leave that bar without meeting him. Through the help of my wonderful sister, we nervously met and instantly hit it off, chatted and danced until midnight, and I knew from that very moment he’d be my husband. I couldn’t imagine my life without him and I can’t wait to see what this next year will bring for us, I have a feeling it will be a very special and exciting one indeed :)

Happy Anniversary
When years are passing by like days,
and in my hand your hand is placed,
a knowing smile crosses your face,
a simple touch can still make my heart race.

When I can see my soul in your eyes,
and you see your soul in mine we realize,
that a love so deep can harbor no lies,
where our only tears shed were happy tears we’ve cried.

I love you as much now as I ever did before,
if possible, I may even love you more,
all starting from a feeling we did not ignore,
a feeling of connection we chose to explore.

I don’t know what it is that you saw in me,
what I saw in you was the utmost happiness
that can ever be,
even more so on the day when you and I
became “We”,
I can still smile and say with love and
truth Todd, I love you…Happy Anniversary…xoxo, Shayla

Our weekend was spent celebrating this very special day…Saturday we went over to my parents house for dinner and we were gifted with not only delicious, amazing food cooked by my wonderful sister and her boyfriend, but also with very special Anniversary cards and gifts. I truly have the best family in the world…

I spy Puffins!! ;)

...and there’s The Good Life on hubby’s arm :)

Muah!

Blogging action shot…and the hubby thoroughly enjoying his wine ;)

A look of shock when the hubby planted a shrimp in my mouth!

Action shot of delicious wine a flowin’

My handsome daddy

My beautiful mommy

Snackies!

My dinner

Hubby’s dinner

It was an awesome night spent with loved ones and I couldn’t have asked for anything more :)

It’s a busy one here at work today so I’m going to save what we did Sunday for tomorrow’s post. It was such a wonderful, special day so be sure to come back here to see all the fun we had in S.F.! :)

Questions:
What weekend fun did you have?
How did you meet your significant other?
How many years have you been together with your S.O.?

Friday Lovin’

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Happy Friday everyone and I hope you’re all having a great day so far! First off, I’m loving that this Monday the 26th is our 3 year wedding anniversary!! Time flies by so fast and I can’t believe it’s been 3 years since that very special day that was the absolutely best moment of my life…

Todd has plans for us Sunday that will be a surprise to celebrate Part 1 of our anniversary, and Part 2 will take place October 8th for the San Francisco Hornblower Cruise! We’re Club Chandon members and were invited to attend the cruise on October 8th and it’s an extra special one since we’ll be joined by the Blue Angels…I know my dad is loving that part – don’t worry dad we’ll get lotsa pictures for you ;)

I’m also loving a new find I found at the grocery store the other day…

Pumpkin Spice Bagels??!! Yes Pleaseeee!

Today was the day I felt like having one for breakfast and it was nothing short of being absolutely amazing and delicious…

And I’m loving that tomorrow I get to spend the day with the people I love the most…

And with that, I’m off to enjoy my Friday :) Hope you all have a wonderful day and I’ll see you all back here Monday!

Questions: Any fun plans for the weekend? What are you loving today?

 

A Week Of Rest, Enjoy The Ride, & An Epic Smoothie

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Hello Friends! How is everyone’s Tuesday going so far? I’m glad to hear I’m not the only worrier around here…and like Shanna mentioned, I know that will only get worse for me once I’m preggers, ah! I least I have all you soon-to-be mommies out there to go to for advice ;)

Quite a long post title but I didn’t want to leave anything out since I find it all important! So if you happen to hop on over to my Fitness page every so often or know that I’m a huge fitness enthusiast and love to get my sweat on most days of the week, you may notice then that that will be entirely missing this week. Say what?! Yes, I am taking this entire week (M-F) off from exercise. No gym, no spin, no strength training, no yoga, no nothing. And you know what, I think my body needs it and will be greatly appreciated for this rest. Especially since oh I think the last time I ever took this much time off from exercising was 1982?! Ha, just kidding ;) But in all seriousness, it has been a very very long time and with our getting ready plans and feedback I’ve received from ladies who were in my shoes and had to back off from exercising when trying to get pregnant, I think this is what my body needs.

I have to admit that the thought of 5 days in a row of not burning those extra calories and not getting those endorphins fired up bothered me a bit, but it’s what I need to do and just the mere thought of how badly we want this made me quickly get over it. And too, I have to remember that it’s not “all or nothing”, which I have a tendency to always think in that manner. I have to remember that next week I can add in some low intensity walking and strength training and it’s not like I’ll never ever be able to work out again…it’s not the end of the world and things could be worse.

I think from the very beginning this is what my body needed, but it takes awhile for this stubborn Taurus to come around, and some perspective and advice from my family and tough love from the hubby who I can depend on to tell me what I need to hear, helps too ;) So far today I’m feeling great with this rest, but come Friday I’m sure I’ll be feeling antsy, but I’m going to brush those feelings aside and remember that more than anything in this world I want our big plans to come true :)

And if you have a moment today, click on the link below to be taken to such a wonderful video with such great messages…thanks mom! :) And it reminded me that in this life of ours we need to remember to make the most of it, and simply, enjoy the ride…

Enjoy the Ride

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I was in the mood for a smoothie this morning (when am I not?!), and it was purely epic. My smoothies have always been pretty amazing in creaminess and taste, but this one is on a whole other level. This ingredient had something to do with it’s pure epicness…

Whole Milk!

Lately I’ve been researching ways to increase fertility, and they say that having a serving of whole milk daily helps with the good ole baby making…could be a bunch of hype, but I’ll take my chances. Especially since it creates the most amazingly creamiest smoothie I’ve ever had…

Cue the angels…Ahhhhhh ;)

Here’s what you need to recreate this beauty…

1 cup Whole Milk

1 frozen banana – I used a small one

1 scoop Vanilla Protein Powder

1 tsp xanthan gum

Enjoyed with a handful of Peanut Butter Puffins and coffee once I got to work :)

P.S. Never ever make a smoothie with Silk Almond Milk and xanthan gum together…it was a horrifying, gloppy, inedible mess! In the past the Almond Breeze brand worked with the xanthan, but not the Silk brand. I’m not sure why either, but take my word for it. So if you’ve experience xanthan gum not working for you, play around with different types and amounts of liquids and you’ll get the right creamy consistency.

And I just realized this morning that my last fashion pic was a month ago, ah the horror! ;)

So here’s a pic of my outfit today…one that’s simple and am loving lately…

Icky camera phone pic, sorry! But you get the idea.

Hope you’re all having a fabulous Tuesday and go get yourself some whole milk ;)

Questions:
What were the most amount of consecutive days you took off from exercising?
What kind of milk do you drink and/or use in your smoothies?

Weekend Recap

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Happy Monday everyone! Hope you’re all having a great day so far and are coming off feeling refreshed from your weekend! First I want to say how much I enjoyed your responses to my “Stop Trying To Be” post – you ladies are all so fabulous and we’re all finding that joy in being ourselves and that true happiness comes from that :)

And you may have noticed I changed the background to the ole blog here. I’m not sure if this is exactly a good thing, but I love aesthetic changes (especially to my blog) so you most likely may be seeing more changes around here, just a lil fyi ;)

I had a wonderful relaxing weekend with my family and hubby had a boys weekend fishing up at our cabin in Lake Tulloch. Here’s a lil taste of the fun and yumminess they had…

My hubby, his cousin, and a ridiculously delicious hamburger the size of my head :)

So while the boys enjoyed fishing and eating man food, us ladies (me, mom, and sis) had a girly day full of girly food (salads & fro yo!) and activities (pedicures!)…

Cupcake and Cookies ‘n’ Cream fro yo with mini M&M’s, cheesecake, heath bar, kit kat, and reece’s pieces

A nice close up pic of my tootsies for you ;)

It was a perfect, relaxing day! :)

That night I had come to the realization that the older I get the more of a worry wart I become, so I was more than happy to spend the night at my parents house since I don’t like being home alone anymore. When I was younger I would love to have the whole house to myself, now I’m afraid the boogey man will come and get me ;)

It was a great evening spent with my parents and the next morning was special since I got to relive one of my most favorite childhood memories – Sunday Football with my dad and mom! It was a perfect weekend spent with my family and kept my mind preoccupied while the hubby was away :)

With it being Monday it’s a busy one here at work so I better be off! Hope you’re all having a great day and I’ll see you back here tomorrow :)

Questions:
What weekend fun did you have?
Do you enjoy being home alone or does it worry you like me?!
Do you find yourself becoming more of a worrier the older you get? I definitely have!