Garden of Love

I am in love with these new (to me) forever stamps! They make me want to write letters upon letters upon letters!  Keep an eye out on the snail mail!

Benny and the Jets

Last night we celebrated Kathi's birthday at Benny's Pizza in Marysville.  (Kathi is my very best coworker and friend!)  This place was so much fun!  There is a huge patio with a permanent stage for live bands, a ton of tables, two outdoor bars, and, of course, incredible pizza!  We had an awesome time hanging out and enjoying each other's company and the night was simply perfect - the weather, the atmosphere, the band!  I can honestly say that we all had a blast!  (Not that I didn't think we would, or anything!)

Happy Birthday, Kathi!  Thanks for introducing us to an awesome new (to us) venue!!

Peace, Love & Drool

This weekend there are two major dog festivals in our area.  Today was Wagfest - a dog friendly (and vendor friendly) festival of tents, treats, and toys.  Tomorrow is Woofstock - a dog friendly and people friendly festival of bands, booze, and (furry) buddies!  Woofstock, you see, has a bunch of live bands playing in addition to being dog friendly and dog centered.  It's nice that we can bring our BFF (that's Best Furry Friend, we learned) with us to some outdoor events.  Most pet owners know that that typically is not an option.  We decided that we would attend Wagfest this year.  Not because we had to pick one or the other, but because we've been to Woofstock (we went one weekend when I came in town to visit.  We didn't have a dog then...) and we wanted to check out Wagfest.

This is what we have to say about Wagfest:

1. We really need to train Jack to walk with us instead of him walking us.

2. Retractable leashes are not recommended because there are sixteen other leashes at any given moment around you and it literally takes two seconds to be tangled with all of them...

3. The resemblance of dogs to owners is ... scary!

4. We Jack got a ton of dog swag.

5. Dogicatures actually exist and can be done in conjunction with charicatures.  (See comment #3.)

6. It was a beautiful day!

7. We will certainly be checking out the Prairie Oaks Metro Park on another day with our furry friend in tow!

Enjoy our Wagfest adventure below!

One Week Until the Best Time of the Year

(I would have to argue that the post title is debatable, but I won't go there.) 

Brian, this one is for you.

Sushi Rock

Oh my gosh!  Let me tell you about Sushi Rock!

If you like sushi, then you will love this place!
If you like modern, then you will love this place!
If you like good music, then you will love this place!
If you are reading this now, and you answered "yes" to any of the above 'if's', then, I'm telling you, you will love this place!

We met up with Will and Tara on Friday night to celebrate Will moving to Los Angeles and Tara visiting from Los Angeles.  We have missed Tara a ton over the past year that she has been in Cali and are certainly going to miss Will when he moves there.  BUT, like any other move we've recently experienced (ah hem, Canada), we are also very excited to have yet another awesome place to visit!

Not only did we get to experience an amazing new sushi jizzoint, but we also got to hit up a new lounge called Fleur, which I thought was called "Floor" until we got there and I actually saw how it was spelled.  Fleur is a champagne and vodka bar in downtown Columbus.  Let's just say I liked Sushi Rock a lot better, and, for the record, it might as well be called "Floor".

Will, we will miss you dearly.  Tara, we already miss you dearly, but we cherish the moments we do get to spend together and are definitely looking forward to visiting you both in L.A.!

Hakuna Matata

What a wonderful phrase!  Hakuna matata!  Ain't no passing craze!  It means no worries for the rest of your days!  It's our problem free philosophy!  Hakuna matata!

Not only is this from one of the greatest Disney movies of all time, if not the greatest, but it is also a very handy and meaningful phrase!  Especially when you are at a loss of what to say, what to do, where to go...words.

Most of you know that my current job situation has been less than ideal.  For a long time.  We're talking months and months long time.  We're also talking everything is less than ideal: the working conditions, the lack of getting paid, the attitudes, the headaches.  Everything.  Quite frankly, the ship is sinking; it's sinking fast, and I'm not going down with it.  Well, not anymore at least.

This is my last week.  Friday is my last day, and it really can't come soon enough.  I don't know where I'm going to get a job.  I don't know what I'm going to do.  I don't know how long I will be up in the air until I land somewhere safely, but I do know that I won't be continuing to get further and further behind in what the company owes me.  And I won't have to put out fires every.single.day.  And I won't have the headache of dealing with this situation.  And I won't, I certainly won't, be sinking with the ship.

Hakuna matata.  I don't know anything else, but I am comforted knowing that Simba went through hardships too, and Timon, Pumbaa, Rafiki, and the rest of The Lion King crew were there to help him through.

Now, if only I was a cartoon...and lived in the African Safari...and had jungle animals pointing me in the right directions...and madrill baboons bopping me on the head when I needed some sense knocked into me...  It's time for me to take my place in the Circle of Life.  It looks like the winds are changing, and change is good!

Hakuna matata.

Pink Turtlehead

When I was in college, studying horticulture, I took many plant identification classes.  I loved them.  I loved knowing the scientific names.  I loved identifying plants on quizzes and exams.  I loved learning attributes to similar and completely different genera, and I loved being able to use that knowledge to help me identify the plants around me.  I also found a few plants that I loved based solely on their names; pink turtlehead is one of them.  (Yes, recall the post of how I sometimes act like a nine year old?!  Here is your example: I use every chance I get to say 'turtlehead'.)

Besides the name, I also love that this plant has lovely pink blooms that flower at the end of summer and into fall, a time when I feel like there are more plants starting to fade from the summer heat than not.  It's so amazing to have something else that provides yet another bloom before fall starts.  The turtlehead grabs a tinsy bit of summer and reminds us that it [summer] is still here!  And, I love the fact that turtleheads are so low maintenance (read: easy to grow for people who pretend to have a green thumb)!  We didn't have to do anything to these guys to get them to flower and they look great!  Now that is what I'm talking about!

Without further ado, please welcome our pink turtleheads - blooming for the very first time, in our new house!  We planted them earlier in the summer!

(For the record, here are some other plants that I love because of their names:

-Gayfeather - We planted some of these at the same time we planted the turtleheads.  They died.

-Paul's Glory - A hosta cultivar.  I always want to add 'hole' to the end of that one, but I don't.  I know, so juvenile...When will I grow up?

-Christmas Fern - The scientific name is Polystichum acrostichoides.  I feel like it's the perfect precursor to a horticultural dispute, "Why don't you go Polystichum acrostichoides?"  (Obviously, that doesn't make any sense, but it sounds threatening, right?!)

-Toad Lily - A bit of an oxymoron, don't you think?!)

(And, for the other record, I have never put any of these plants in any of my clients' designs.  I don't think I could explain their attributes without cracking a smile!)

Turtle, turtle!

O-Town or Bust!

Parting is such sweet sorrow.

This weekend we celebrated my family's departure to Ottawa, Canada at my Aunt's house in Maryland.  In addition, I was able to spend some amazing, quality girl time with my best friend, Tamara, while Brian spent some amazing, quality boy time with his boys:  Than, Jeff, and Patrick.  (Boy time included, but was not limited to: "fishing" (I don't believe they caught anything), drinking, late nights, good conversations, good people, and buffalo shrimp...in Florida.  Girl time included, but was not limited to: laughing ... a lot, talking, drinking, reminiscing, shopping, and wonderful company...in Maryland!)

Brian and I both had wonderful weekends in two different states hanging with [some of] the people that mean the absolute world to us.  It was a much needed and nice break away from the every day stresses in Ohio, and I know it meant so much to our family to be there to wish them a wonderful journey to Canada.  The countdown is on; Thursday is the official moving day!  The next time we see my family we may be visiting them in the True North Strong and Free!

Contending With Laundry

Jack has got some competition vying for the most coveted spot on the couch tonight:

Eaten Alive

I swear if I don't have malaria, west nile virus, or yellow fever by the end of the summer, it will be a miracle.  Every time I go outside mosquitoes are on me like white on rice, and I am not kidding.  Within seconds of being outside, I am itching a new red welt.  Any skin that I have left exposed including face, hands, ankles, ears, neck, etc. is fair game according to those little buggers. And if I even think about going outside, a previous mosquito bite will inevitably start itching. 

From what I understand, this year is extremely heavy with mosquitoes because of all the rain that we had in the spring, however, we don't have ideal breeding grounds for mosquitoes in our yard and we certainly don't promote mosquito reproduction. We have citronella candles and bug spray; neither seem to provide any bit of protection. The new generation of mosquitoes is ruthless. Ruthless.

Our mosquito dilemma has literally has gotten to the point where I start to wonder what life would be like if the mosquitoes became extinct 65 million years ago instead of the dinosaurs, but then I snap out of it because we all know that would just pose another set of...dilemmas...  At this point, I can deal with a small, itchy red welt on my leg from a mosquito being hungry as opposed to not having a leg at all because a tyrannosaurus rex decided he or she was hungry.

For now, I will count my blessings that we aren't living amongst hungry, non-contained (read: wild) dinosaurs, but these bug bites have seriously got to go!

Cafe Tu Tu Tango & One Year of Marital Bliss

We celebrated our first anniversary this weekend in Orlando, Florida!  Initially, we were going to stay in town to celebrate but everything just kind of fell into place for Orlando, so we decided to hightail it outta Columbus and head south! 

It was a wonderful way to celebrate our first year of marriage together!  We flew to Orlando on Thursday night and got settled into the resort we were staying in.  Then, we went to Disney on Friday and hopped from Epcot to the Magic Kingdom and on to Hollywood Studios.  Brian hadn't been to Disney in...forever (aka 1985, or something like that)... and I hadn't been since 2003 or so, so it was a nice visit to the most magical place on Earth!  It brought back a ton of memories!  Some things never change!

On Saturday, our actual anniversary day, we went to Typhoon Lagoon, one of Disney's Water Parks, and tried as best as we could to keep cool.  We learned on Friday that the temperatures are quite a bit warmer in Florida than our home sweet home some 950 miles north, north west, and since Saturday was another extremely hot day, it was a fantastic day to be a water park!

After our umpteenth lounge along the lazy river, we headed back to the resort to find a local place for our anniversary dinner.  We decided on the highly recommended Cafe Tu Tu Tango, which was fabulous!  We enjoyed our wonderful, delicious dinner, and reminisced on what we were doing exactly one year ago!  We still are amazed at how it has already been a year!  We capped the night off with a showing of our tribute wedding video and a delicious taste of our wedding cupcakes!  (Made fresh by our wonderful wedding cupcaker - Alice!)

On Sunday we relaxed poolside and got ready to head back to Ohio.  It was a wonderful one year anniversary and quick getaway!  Orlando ended up being a great place to hang, have fun, relax, and enjoy being married for one whole year!  Enjoy the photos below!

Happy First Anniversary, Bri!  Here's to many more! ♥

One Too Many Scary Movies

When I was 15, I watched the movie Scream.  Shortly thereafter, I awoke one lazy summer morning and headed downstairs.  Our cat, Bayne, bolted up the steps right as I was going down.  I chalked that up to him getting a wild hair up his rear.  Sometimes you really never know with cats.  No less than 2 minutes later, I found out why Bayne had run off so quickly.

I was seven feet from our garage and basement door.  They were right next to each other in my parent's house.  Out of nowhere I hear this, 'BANG! BANG! BANG!' on the garage door.  I grabbed the cordless phone, which I may have already had in my hand at that point, and ran upstairs to my room, closed the door, ran into my windowless, 'no potential of escaping if I needed to' closet, closed that door, and called the police.  (I, clearly, would not have survived if I was in a scary movie.)

I swore someone was trying to break in.

The officer kept me on the phone and made me describe the situation and what was going on while a deputy in a cop car was on his way.  I explained it 84 times, it felt like, when finally an officer showed up.  The dispatcher on the phone said, 'Ma'am, do you have a brother?'

I said, 'Yes. He is in his room sleeping.'  (Why it didn't dawn on me to run in there and wake him up is beyond me.)

The dispatcher replied with, 'It appears that he is locked out of your house and is trying to get in.'

'What?!' I exclaimed.  Shocked, because I honestly did think he was in his room sleeping, and then confused because he had the code to the garage and there was a hidden door key in there, AND because I was home so if he had knocked normally, I could've easily let him in.

I walked downstairs.  It turns out that it was my brother.  Banging on the garage door with a metal baseball bat.  (Imagine hearing that and not knowing what it was.  That is exactly why I called the Po-Po.)

I let him in, got off the phone with the dispatcher, apologized to the officer, and called my Mom crying because my brother had just scared the living daylights out of me.  That was the last time I decided I would be watching scary movies.  I didn't need any more help imagining what was on the other side of things.

What does this have to do with anything, you ask?  Well, last night I went for a run.  I was probably 4 minutes into my run, when I saw a maniac lady (she seriously did NOT look happy) back out of her driveway in a mini van, back directly into a parallel parked car on the streets, and then completely drive off, as if nothing happened.  I didn't know what to do.  I looked around but no one was outside and no one was calling for me and/or the suspect in the hit and run.  So I kept on running, but for the rest of my run I kept envisioning the loony lady driving up next to me in the mini van with her accomplices and "getting me" since I, essentially, was the sole witness. 

THEN, 5 minutes after that, I saw a book and a juice bottle laying in the grass on the side of the sidewalk.  As I ran past, I saw that it was Charlotte's Web, but before I started reminiscing about childhood, I was scanning the area for a little someone whose book and juice bottle that may have belonged to.  No one was around.  And then I started envisioning someone sitting on the edge of the sidewalk, reading about Wilbur and Charlotte's adventures, when an unmarked car pulls up next to them and...  I'll stop.  I don't know what happened, but my mind wanders far enough away from me that I don't need to know what happened.  Everything was probably fine.  I just happened to run by at a weird time.

I made it home safely without any drive-bys or kidnappers hunting me down because I was a witness.  But these are both clear examples of why, fourteen years ago, I took the 'scary movie' genre off of my viewing list.  Sometimes I don't even like seeing the previews to new movies coming out.  I know it is sad.  Sad, but true.  I am a scaredy cat, and I don't need movies to assist in my cowardice. 

Sometimes life is scary enough!

Happy August!

Last night, we headed to the Ohio State Fair for a little Monday night adventure.  We are shocked that it is already August!  Can it be?!  At this time one year ago, we were tying up all the loose ends and getting ready to walk down the aisle.  Now, we aren't necessarily tying up any loose ends, but we did walk down [the fair] aisles!  We saw every deep-fried food you could think of, plus games galore, rides, haunted houses, scary fair workers, cotton candy, funnel cakes, and even Mr. Lincoln himself.  It was quite an adventure.  Time really does fly when you're having fun!