Weekend with Reeders

It's Sunday night and Monday is right around the corner. Boo. I.don't.like.Mondays.

Who does I guess?

We had a fun weekend though! We kept our nephew Reed while his parents had a weekend off and partied down in DC and my in-laws kept our niece Paige.

It was an attempt for each kid to get undivided attention, which as you know doesn't happen a lot when you have siblings.

The weekend was full of pizza.

Snuggles and movies. Which, btw, Reeders is SUESSED with The Polar Express! OMG! We're over a month out of Christmas and he is still all about his Christmas pjs and wanting Santa to bring him a Polar Express.
It was so funny! He must have watched it 4 times over the weekend. He knows all the words and actually tries and act out scenes! HAHA! Remember, he's 4 1/2 years old.

Brad just came in here and asked if I wanted to watch it again just for fun. NOT! Seriously though. I remember those days.
My favorite movie when I was a kid was the original Grease. No kidding, I probably watched it every day for at least 2 years. I knew(and still do)the words to every song!

Giving that Reed is all about trains we took the light rail into Uptown Charlotte Saturday. He told us this was his favorite part of the entire weekend.

CHUGGA CHUGGA CHOO CHOO!

The weekend was also about hitting up some of Charlotte's kid hotspots. Imaginon was on that list giving that it's a super nice children's library and theatre and it's free.

Discovery Place being another.

It's a hands on interactive science museum for kids which includes a Rainforest exhibit and much more.

A bed of nails...

The weekend was also about doing fun stuff at home like helping bake cookies!

The weekend also consisted of a trip to McDowell Nature Preserve and several walks around our neighborhood.

Overall, a great weekend! The only snafu? Budster.

Wowzers.

Jealous pooch.

While we were Uptown at the museums Buddy decided to let us know how he felt about Reed being around for the weekend by pi--ing on our guest bed in the room where all of R's belongings were.

Nice..eh?

Given -- this is nothing new for Buddy. He did this when Brad and I first started dating. Yep...we stayed over here one weekend and took a leak all over Brad's bed. Bright yellow p-ss. At least it wasn't that bad this time.

Well, that's all I have for today!! Back to watching the SAG Awards.

Gifts

I might get lashed out at or seem selfish with this post but it is something that TOTALLY bothers me.

In a mere three weeks Brad and I will be married for a year and I’m sure most of you have heard the whole – your wedding guests have a year to give you a gift rule right? Well, there are several people who attended our wedding that have not given us gifts. Yes, it bothers me but I’m sorta over it even though it makes you wonder why?

Did they forget? Are they just cheap? I’m not talking about friends and family who traveled from far away to be at our wedding I’m talking about people who live right here in town. And I'm not talking about those in town who gave us gifts at showers. That counts.

I’m talking about the ones who came, ate, drank, danced and gave nothing. Not even a card.

Just seems tacky. Don’t you think? Especially for those people whom I gave wedding gifts for their wedding, baby showers(one of which was a few weeks before our wedding).

Which takes me to the next part of this topic.

I was recently sent a baby shower invite for a family member who is having her second and lives far..far..away. They’ve been trying very hard and I’m very excited for them. But.. I’m not very close with them anymore and even more?
I gave them a gift for their wedding some 7-years ago even though I did not attend but got nothing from them for our wedding. Seriously? Now I get this invite and am expected to buy a gift?
I think not.

Am I just being snotty? Just for the record. I have never been to a wedding where I didn’t give something. Back in the day I may not have had a lot of money to give big gifts but I gave at least gave something decent.

Updates and Reliving My Childhood Past

Hey bloggies! Sunday Funday around here! More on that later but I'll get right to a few updates from our world.

Budster has been getting a lot of treats lately and that makes him one happy doggy. A new organic pet store opened by our house and they are all grain free! I bought him some treats made out rabbit. He loves them.

Brad and I joined a bowling league and we started playing this past week. Two words. I.SUCK! OMG!
I have to practice. This happens everytime I get back into bowling. I have to get my groove back. It will happen.(hopefully)

I took this picture when we first got there when all the professional players were wrapping up their game.
They got mad at me because of the flash. Sorry! LOL!

Here's a few of us from our group. There are a few guys too.

We hope we can meet some other couples in our league to hang out with. Sure would be nice. I'm all about making new friends. That's nothing new though.

Brad got bored last weekend and decided to finally paint our guest bathroom and change out the cheesy light fixture.

He took this picture after he stripped all the decor down.

Here's the after. I think it looks pretty good! I'm thinking I might find an 'S' to go above the towel rack.

Now onto Sunday Funday! I've been talking for weeks now about going roller skating. It was my favorite thing to do as a junior higher. Literally, every Saturday night I would hit up Leo's Roller Land in Baton Rouge.

MyDad would never just 'drop us off' at the skating rink though. He would stay and grade papers or read while we skated. It was so embarassing! I never could figure out why he refused to let us be there alone.

Well, looking back at it I now know why. Can you guess? Dirty old or even young men. Yes.

No dirty old men at the skating rink we went to today though.

That's right! Me and my friend Amanda hit up a local rink today and got our skate on!

One of Amanda's friends owns the rink. Brad opted out of this fun adventure to sit on the couch and watch football with Buddy.

Here I am getting laced up! I had not skated since a Big Sis Lil' Sis party in college.

I was anxious at first but soon realized it was like riding a bike! Here's a picture of the rink after they made everyone exit to announce those having a birthday party there.

So FUN!! We are totally going to do this again! We skated for a couple of hours and I was reminded what a workout it really is! My butt, shins, and feet were hurting not to mention I was sweating like a pig!

I actually noticed several older couples at the rink that were there for the exercise. IPODS and all.

Amanda's friend also told us that there is one father who brings his daughter there 6 days a week and they skate together. Can you imagine? I guess the daughter totally loves it.

She also said there are entire families who come every Sunday to skate together. Cool or what?? I hope to be one of those parents that joins in on the fun instead of sitting on the sidelines. That's no fun for the kiddos!

The rink was also decked out with a play area for kids and an arcade. I racked up some tickets on skiball!

Check out the almost 3-year old next to me. When we first started playing skiball he walked up to my friend Amanda and immediatley took over her game.

I was thinking. Where are his parents? They finally ran over and got him. Smart kid. I've never seen a kid that age put tokens into a machine and press a button so fast.

Yes, go ahead and say it....I'm a dork but you know you love it!

Early crew call for me tomorrow. 6am! OUCH!

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Friendships

This is something I think about often and have wanted to write about here for some time now.

Friends.

I’m not sure if it’s the way I grew up with moving around but I have always had an eclectic group of friends. What I mean by that is that I don’t just have one ‘group’ of girls but instead a hodge podge. For instance – when I have my holiday cookie exchange each year generally I have everyone go around the room to tell how they know me because of half of the women don’t know each other. I was the same way in high school, in that I was friends with people from all different high schools not just the one I went to. College the same – I had friends from my campus job, my internship, other sororities.

The cool part about this? All of my closest friends are the same way in their lives. They have friends from different parts of their lives and strive to keep in touch with them.

Which leads me into the next part of this post. The friends that you make during the different stages of your life.

If you look at this picture there are girls from each part of my life. Birth(family), high school, college, first job, and so on. Half of them had never met each other until the weekend of my wedding, even though they had heard dozens of stories about one another.

Throughout the years there have been other girls that I became close with and that were my ‘gal pal’ at one point in time but, now we aren’t in touch. Some of them I might be ‘friends’ with on Facebook after all these years but haven’t talked to them. I have thought to myself how weird it is that we were such good friends and now we are not and it has nothing to do with a falling out.

I think it’s just that we don’t have anything in common anymore. It still saddens me though.

Now – getting to the real part of this rant. I have had several co-workers over the years tell me that the people that I have in my wedding I will most likely not talk to in 10 or 15-years from now. The reason? You grow apart with differences in spouses, what stage of life each one might be in and so forth. I personally, know that my Mom is only in touch with the family members that stood in her wedding and to me that is sad.

I really work hard at these friendships and no matter what happens hope to always be friends with these girls even though not a ONE of them lives in the Carolinas much less Charlotte. I know it works both ways but I really hope I don’t fall victim to what my co-workers said. I want to grow old with each and every one of them and get to know(or continue to know) their kids, husbands and even pets!

What about you guys? Are you friends with people that were in your wedding? Do you work hard to keep your friendships alive no matter what the distance?

Playing Matchmaker - Adria 35-years old

Today is a little bit different here at Dee's Adventures.

After much encouragement from my favorite cousin I'm playing along with Kelly's Korner's, Show Us Your Singles.

I hear that 2 couples who met through Kelly's last blog post like this are now getting married. So... Who Knows??!

If you are new here than you may not know that I got married just one year ago at the age of 34. I concentrated on my career and social life for many years and never met the right guy.

It, like many other women, wasn't for the lack of trying though. I did Match.com, got setup with friends, co-workers, you name it.

If you need a refresher check out this post, and this post.

Therefore, I am playing along and featuring a very dear friend of my cousin Alayna.

Adria.

I met Adria when I crashed their trip to St. Simon's Island this past Labor Day and I am here to say that she is SUPER COOL!

So, here it goes.

Adria is 35-years old and lives in Little Rock, Arkansas. (She's the one of the left in this picture)

She's a residency doctor looking for a normal, nice guy.

A Nevada native transplated to Arkansas, her friends are training her to be Southern.
She has a crazy work schedule for another two years, and is looking for someone who understands that arrangement.

She still has plenty of time for friends, family and a significant other, she just does not have a 9-5 job at this time.

She loves to travel, read, spoil her pooches, and visit weird Arkansas festivals. She's a UNLV graduate, but is learning to appreciate the HOGS.
Do you ladies know any great guys around the 30-40 year age range in Central Arkansas? Coffee dates the first time would be a great idea!

If so, please email me at deestephensadventures@gmail.com

Can't wait

*This post is a part of the "Show Us Your Life - Show Us Your Singles!" feature on Kelly's Korner blog. To see more singles, visit Kelly's blog by clicking here*

Our Year in Review

It's January 19th and I'm doing a Year in Review? Well, yes...I am.

I did it with the help of Shutterfly, which I am a huge fan. (Note: this is not a paid post just my personal opinion) I signed up for Shutterfly 7-years ago and have over 100 albums on my shared site. Can you believe? This girl likes to take pictures!

After creating albums I share them with family and friends who order pictures and in return Shutterfly gives me credit for free pictures, photo albums, etc.

This past week they sent me credit for an album and here's what I did with it. Since my embed code didn't work click here to view it.

Me A Runner?

First things first.

Go and congratulate my blogging buddy Cindy on her completing a half-marathon in Arizona this weekend. She's a REAL runner!

Woohoo!!
So, as for me -- I'm going to a place I said I would never go. I'm trying to convert to running instead of high-speed walking for exercise.

Who would have thunk?

I ran cross country one year in high school and wasn’t a fan. Probably because I was the last one ‘in’ all the time. Other than that though my anti-running philosophy has come through my years of yoga and hearing my one instructor talk about how bad it is for your joints.

So, therefore – I have stuck to walking and I really enjoy it. So, my effort to switch to running is nothing more than a way to challenge and push myself to get my ass back into shape.

To help motivate me -- Brad, and I(along with a group of friends),have decided to run The Cooper River Bridge Run down in Charleston, SC in April. It's a 10K.

So, I started ‘training’ if you will, this weekend. I ran/jogged on the treadmill Saturday and yesterday for starts. I’m not going to lie – I did walk about 5 minutes of the 30 but I think it’s a pretty good start.

But..I’m not at that point yet where I look forward to going to the gym and running like I did with walking. I hear all these runners talk about the RUSH, endorphins, etc. but I’m not there yet.
Granted it has only been 2 days. My question is – when will that addiction kick in so I can drop 10-pounds still eating the same things I eat now?? HAHAHA!!

Really though. For those of you who run – are you addicted?

Wish me luck bloggies! I hope I can stick to this! I'm pretty sure I can -- it's all about the mind!!
Happy Tuesday!

Happenings and Randomness

TGIF! It was a short one giving all the snow we received here in the Southeast. There are a lot of neighborhoods that are still iced in and several school districts canceled school again today for the 5th day!

That's a LOT of makeup days! Kids will be going to school on Saturdays, holidays..Lord help us!

Because of all the snow up in the mountains and giving that we have a long weekend --we're debating on whether or not to go skiing Sunday or Monday.

Generally MLK weekend is crazy busy but I'm sorta thinking that might not be the case this year since kids will be making up days?

Now, if only I can convince Brad.

As I mentioned earlier this week -- Buddy loved playing in our winter wonderland -- that was our backyard. Now it's just a hockey rink. Solid ice.

But, on Monday our neighbor, who has a super-nice Nikon, took some pictures of Buddy and their dog Pinky playing.

Check them out!

I love his ears in this one!! Yes, both dogs are still on their leashes. This part of our common area is way too close to the road and I'm a paranoid Mama.

Looking handsome.

I LOVE this one with the snow on his nose.

Like I said before - our backyard/common area is solid ice which makes it difficult for poochies to use the potty.

Buddy has been slipping and sliding and isn't real keen on poo-pooing on ice. I guess he's not the only one. Look what one of our neighbors did. They carved out a circle so the dogs have somewhere to go.
Brad and I joked that it's the big 'toilet'. HAHA! Sorry for the dark picture. I took this last night.

With all the cold weather we've been having Brad busted out his favorite sweatshirt. Other blog friends like Sara have posted about their hubby's favorite shirts before too.

Well, this one takes the cake. It's a hooded polo sweatshirt he got when he was 13-years old and he still wears it!

It may not look too bad from this angle..

BUT..it does from this one! He seriously wants to get patches for the arms so he can wear it in public.

NOT! Granted it is soft and I too, still have sorority party t-shirts I lounge around in because of that. But...going out in public? I think not.

Other happenings around here:

* We start playing in a bowling league this next week. Every Thursday night -- we're playing on a team with some of our friends. Should be fun. It's a first for me!

* We're about one-month from our one-year wedding anniversary. Can you believe? We're still trying to figure out what we're going to do to celebrate. We're thinking snow skiing like we did right after our wedding. I think that would be a fun tradition to do every year. Don't you?

What about gifts though? The first year is paper? Ideas? I need all the help I can get.

Have a great weekend bloggies!! CIAO!

HOLLA

Hmmmmmmmmm. Tard or what?

I'm posting these pictures because
my MIL wondered what I looked like as a kid. What do you think?

Here's me at my 3rd birthday. I wish I was 3 again.......

And................at whatever age. Have I mentiioned my age ???

Snow Days Cont.......

Hmmm...Not sure I'm up to being a stay at home Mom. I say that now and it may come back to haunt me.

Today has been a great day because:

* got dressed as if I was going to work. Switch into sweats looking and looking hot ;)
* took The Buddy for a fun walk in the snow
* conference call with work
* talked with editor from work about what needed to be done for my video
* stripped and washed bedding
* washed all the laundry that had not been done over the weekend and hung it to dry
* cleaned and reorganized two closets
* made Pioneer Woman's tortilla soup
* another conference call
* vacuum the whole upstairs after doing it this weekend
* talked to Mom
* another walk with Buddy
* get ready for hubs to come home

Tons of funs? Hmmm.. Brad, himself recogonized I was a bit bored. Could I ever be a SAHM? HMMM..probably not.

For now it's all about the SEC winning the National Championship~!!!

Snow Day!!

It's the first snow of 2011 here in Charlotte! We knew it was coming and it's still coming down as I sit here and write this post.

Later this afternoon they say it's going to switch to sleet and freezing rain which is NOT fun. Especially if it causes us to lose power. BOO! I've got my fingers crossed.

I got up and showered, got dressed and was planning on going into work. But..then I got a text from my boss who said she tried to make it Uptown and turned around.

Brad went ahead and braved it in the JEEP but plans on staying only a few hours then coming home and working from home.

So, while he was driving Uptown Buddy and I went out to play in the snow.

Here's what it looked like early this morning.

Budster loves him some snow. He runs, digs, runs some more and repeats.

He doesn't get off the leash much when it's not a fenced in area but today was a treat. He played with a neighbor's bulldog.

They had a blast! I'm sure we'll go back outside in a few hours for some more fun.

I have a few conference calls for work and other than that I'm cleaning and cooking. Looks like the roads will be even worse tomorrow so I'm not sure what will happen with work then either. Much different from my days in TV news where you went to work no matter what because you covered the storm. I used to have the station come pick me up so I didn't have to risk wrecking my car!

More to come. Tootles!

Brad's Birthday Fun

We went out last night for Brad's birthday and had a blast! There were around 15 of us at dinner in my old neighborhood at 1900 Mexican Grille. We love that place and it was great because it wasn't crazy crowded for a Friday night.

Here's my attempt at a picture of our table. No such luck. Oh well..

Our friends Stephan and Eileen joined in on the fun. I'm now aware that they do, in fact, read this blog so I thought I would give them a shout out! WHADDUP?!

The waiters came out and sang Happy Birthday to Brad and he was a good sport about it all!

Too funny!

Afterwards we went upstairs to Loft 1523 and then to our old hangout -- Jackelopes for a little bit of ski ball.

Not everyone made it to Jack's but a few of us did. You can tell Brad is having a good time in this picture!

Overall, a fun night and Brad is officially making this the weekend of Brad. Tonight we're keeping it low key though and probably going to a movie.

Happy 33rd Bradster and happy weekend blogging peeps! The forecasters are predicting snow for tomorrow night. We will see!!

Happy Birthday Bradster!

Happy 33rd Birthday to my hubby Brad!! I originally planned to surprise him tonight by having a group of his friends and family show up at dinner but a few nights ago I caved and told him about it.

He didn't mind, in fact, he's excited about it! So, Monday's post will cover tonight's shenanigans. As far as what I got Bradster for his birthday?

Well, he's not real good about telling me what he wants. Instead he wants me to 'surprise' him. Nice. NOT!

He likes 'fun' gifts instead of practical. Very unlike Dee. I wanted to get him new luggage. He said 'that's not fun'. No but it's NEEDED and a video game really is not.

I refrained and instead got him a hodge podge of things. A travel coffee mug for him to take to work, a CD, gift cards, and a lunch box. I know, you're probably thinking lunchbox? For reals?

Yes, for reals. Now that Brad works downtown like me he packs a lunch. Saves money folks.

Well, that's it for today! Happy Birthday Brad!!

If I had won the lottery...

I'm sure most of you have heard by now that two people will split last night's Mega Millions jackpot.
One in pohdunk Washington state and another in Idaho.

A Big Bummer that it isn't Brad and I splitting it instead.

Maybe next time...
Right?

A girl can dream can't she? Let's see -- what would I do with the money if I won the lottery?

Here's my short-list:
* Pay off the town house we're living in and my old condo that we rent out. Keep them as investment properties.
* Buy our dream house here in the city.
* Buy another dream house in the NC mountains
* Furnish said houses with the help of an interior designer
* Of course, find a good investment banker and invest..invest..invest..
* Put money back for our future children's college funds
* Buy new cars
* Donate a portion to a charity of our choice. Probably something to do with veterans and cancer research.
* I know we would help family out. So we would go ahead and pay for Reeders and Paigee's college
* AND..Last but not least. Travel the United States and the rest of the world!

That's not too much is it? If I had won last night I think my first choice of vacations would be to jump on a plane to Jackson Hole and stay in the nicest resort there and ski for a week. Wouldn't that be fabulous?

What would be the first thing you would do with the money if you were to win the lotto?
Happy Humpday!

"Stuff"

It's back to the grind here in 'Dee's World'.

The holidays were fun and full of fun,family time, rest, relaxation and a few moments of TCB(taking care of business).

Let's begin with New Year's Eve. As most of you know I'm not much for the big downtown party but instead house parties.

This year our friend Stephan invited us over to his house for food and drinks and a little Ryan and Dick Clark.

SIL Robyn and BIL Jeff stopped by on their way to a NYE 80's style.

Loving the wig and the DD shirt fo sho!

One of my Charlotte besties, Amanda, came with us. Always fun to hang with her.

A little bubbly to toast with at the stroke of midnight. Stephan is a bachelor and doesn't own flutes hence the wine glasses.

All in all it was fun except for getting home at 4am after we waited 2-hours for a cab to get to his house! NOT FUN!
I don't do late nights like that well at all. I just feel gross and nasty. Kinda like a loser the next day for sleeping late.
This is nothing new. I was like this when I lived in VEGAS too. Late nights.. no bueno!

Moving on to other 'stuff'.
Check out my cute candle holder MIL got me for Christmas. LOVE IT! I stuck it in this random wine bottle that is not decorated.
I do have some other 'decorative' wine bottles I plan to use it in for future parties, etc.

Since we got home from the Bahamas Brad has been rolling change like a mofo with his change sorter he got for Christmas. He had YEARS of loose change in jars, boxes and his car!
GRAND TOTAL?

WAIT FOR IT!

$170 -- $20 of it was in pennies alone!

As far as my Christmas presents? We got the prints hung. Don't mind Brad's mound of folded laundry to the left.

Also, I got all of the Christmas taken down and repurposed my hurricanes once again.

And.. last but not least.

The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

I had gotten a little behind on my Real Housewives watching but during the holidays I got all caught up! WOW!! I think the Beverly Hills one is the best one yet aside from OC!
Camille? A b—tch. And her friend ‘Medium’? A lunatic, drunk crazy woman! OMG!

I also got caught up on the Atlanta Housewives too and Kim Z. never ceases to amaze me. How embarrassing that she thinks she can sing.

I was going to do a whole post about the Housewives series since I’ve been watching them for several years now. Overall while I think the shows are entertaining isn’t it sad to see how many of these women end up in divorce or, are in the middle of them now, after they start participating in them?

Let’s see(help me out if I forget some):
· Tamara and Simon – OC
· Countess and her man – NYC
· Jeana and the baseball player – OC
· Vicki and Donn – OC
· NeNe and Gregg -Atlanta
· Camille and Kelsey – BH(we already knew this one was downhill before filming ever started)
I predict Taylor and her hubby from BH will be the next.

Well, enough trash talk from me today. Happy New Year and happy new beginnings!