Hello Winter

Even though temperatures were in the 70s less than a week ago, I think I am ready for winter. Winter was always my favorite season. Now that I’m an adult (Ha, kind of…) it has lost a bit of its luster. But only a tiny bit! Snow is not as magical because I have to shovel it and drive in it, but it’s still pretty fantastic. Lets just say that I’m not dreading the first white ground covering.

Good bye Halloween, perhaps my second most favorite holiday.

I don’t remember if I bragged about these yet, but these are Vampire Cupcakes. Perfect for Halloween. Or, sigh, your crazy “Twilight” movie watching parties.

I’m not going to talk about my favorite holiday yet, because I don’t do that stuff until the day after Thanksgiving. But this year, I’m actually kind of starting early because I am going to bake tons of cookies for gifts. And eating. And that stuff has to be done in advance, especially since I will be in a show this December!

My other favorite holiday is, of course, my birthday. Which is EXACTLY ONE MONTH FROM TODAY!!!!! Wow. Kind of scary. The number is… well, young, I know. But I will officially be in my mid-twenties. And that freaks the crap out of me! Not because I’m “old” but because I feel like I should be more grown up by this age, and be more accomplished, and blah blah blah.

I’m less concerned now with presents than I was a month ago, because now my number one wish is to go on a ski trip with some friends to Indianhead Mountainin mid January. AND I am planning on getting my season rental this week! It is really more than I should spend, but I’m giving up an awesome and expensive birthday dinner for it. Maybe we’ll go out for apps and drinks at Cubanitas instead…

I just thought I’d post this on here. My wishlist is almost exclusively baking stuff, which is kind of funny. But I neeeeeeeed it!

So YES, bring it on winter!!

Christmas Decor

I love Christmas. Even though this season has been so insane this year, I’m grateful for the little moments that I get to spend just enjoying my family and the Christmas spirit. Like my tree. I really love my tree this year. It turned out better than I could have imagined.

David and I have been lucky that most of the ornaments we’ve received in the past couple years match the generic boxes of ornaments I bought last year. The tree is covered in different sizes of white lites and different shades of gold and ivory ornaments with our special ornaments thrown in. Rather than garland I used gold ribbon.

My favorite part, however, is down at the bottom of one side. My mom always gets us kids an ornament every year. This was from 2004. It’s not so classy, but I can’t help but smile when I see it:

Yes, that’s right. Patrick of Spongebob Squarepants fame.

One of the best presents of the year was probably the wireless internet that David’s brother-in-law set up for us. I don’t know how I lived without this for over a year. I am typing this from the couch in the living room. And admiring my tree.

Oh, and also, here’s a picture of the beautiful pearl ring that David got for my birthday. The picture doesn’t do it justice, but just believe me, it’s awesome.

Oh, and by the way, hi Jeremy. Don’t worry, I’ll be sure to write about Christmas dinner soon enough…

Yessss!

I got a digital camera! It is so beautiful. I love it already, and I’m sure I’ll love it even more once I finish reading all the manuals that came with it. I present, the Canon Elph SD 850:

It’s Opening Night!

Opening night…
It’s opening night!
It’s Max Bialystock’s latest show
Will it flop or will it go?
The cast is taking its final bow
Here comes the audience now
The doors are open: they’re on their way…
Let’s hear what they have to say!

That’s right! It’s opening night! I must admit I’m pretty excited. We’ve been rehearsing for almost a month now, and it’s getting pretty boring not having an audience. It’s hard to keep the high energy and just guessing what is funny when there’s no audience. That is the best part about performing.

I heard a rumor that we will have a reviewer there tonight! I’m not keeping my hopes up, though, because this isn’t really the kind of show the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel likes to watch.

In other news, I got some fabulous presents for my birthday. David gave me a beautiful pearl ring. My mom gave me perfume, shoes, and a Coach purse. My dad gave me money. It was great! I have pictures of the ring that I’m waiting to upload. I doubt they’ll do it justice, though- it is SO beautiful!

This weekend I am finally decorating for Christmas! I am so sad it had to wait this long, but when I’m only at my house for about an hour every night (plus sleep) decorating just doesn’t happen. Neither do dishes. I hope David will help me clean this weekend. That would be great.

Visit Off The Wall Theatre for show information!

I Am Disillusioned

I went to Fresh Market on my lunch break today. I was going to buy a sandwich for lunch and a loaf of bread for dinner and this weekend. I have noticed that Fresh Market pales in comparison to Whole Foods and Outpost when it comes to true natural foods. I’ve accepted that, however, because it’s close to my work.

Now I am upset, though. I spent 15 minutes trying to find a loaf of bread that DIDN’T contain any partially hydrogenated oils or high fructose corn syrup. I couldn’t. EVERY bread on their shelf contained HFCS. I was stunned. I finally found some over in the bakery that was Trans Fat and HFCS free, but COME ON! That made me angry.

 I am also angry that my December is so busy that I have only one time to go out and celebrate my birthday (ie-drink with friends). That time is tomorrow night. From 9-12. And so far no one can come. At least not right at 9. So that blows. I don’t mind going out to Sake-Tumi with David and then meeting a couple people for drinks later, but I was hoping for a big fun gathering, and now that can’t happen. It’s my own fault, but COME ON.

I am moody. Can you tell? I also had a ME ME ME breakdown last night after rehearsal. There was one girl in her underwear already. She’s cute and is in good shape. And was wearing some incredibly trashy underwear. I didn’t like it. For one, I think it will detract from the humor of the show, and secondly I was jealous that I didn’t look like that nor do I have the confidence to do that. So I whined to David for a good half hour. He listened and then told me those root causes of why I was so upset. It felt better to understand.

But I’m still frustrated. I’m so busy this weekend and I still haven’t decorated for Christmas.

Saturday:

• Get up, go to Brady St to buy some SPANX so I can suck myself in for the show.
• 3:00- Go see David in the church play that he is in.
• 4:30- Get some food together.
• 5:30- Drop him back off at the church and then go to a friend’s Christmas Party
• 8:00- Go back home and change for dinner and drinks
• 8:30- Drive back out to Whitefish Bay to pick David up
• 9:00- Dinner at Sake-Tumi and then on to drinking and dancing

Sunday

• Get up, bring down Christmas decorations and watch the Packer game
• 3:00- David has another show at the church
• 5:30- Rehearsal for Holiday Punch

Then all week we have dress rehearsals for our opening on Friday. My birthday is on Tuesday. I don’t even know if or when I’ll be able to have dinner with my parents. Fun stuff.

Whew, that felt good to get all that out. Thank you blog.

Christmas Tree Adventures

I could write a post all about my family Thanksgiving and what I’m thankful for and all that crap. But you’ve read that on 80 zillion blogs already, so what’s the point? Yeah yeah, friends and family, health and happiness, blah blah blah.

 After Thanksgiving with my mom and family and a “Festivus-Giving” with my dad (where we ate Persian food), I had my fill of family for the weekend. Or so I thought. On Sunday, my mom asked if I wanted to come get a Christmas tree with her and my sisters. She said they were going to a farm somewhere near Madison.

Okay, fine, I thought. It’ll be quality family time and will make my mom happy. She said they’d stop by to pick me up in an hour. That was at 11:00. So I hung around and played The Sims 2: Petsfor a while, and then got ready. I put on approximately 12 layers of clothing, since it was balls-ass-cold outside (yes, that’s a meteorological term). Then I waited. And waited. And got very annoyed. And played Pinball on my computer. And waited. And got the third highest score. And waited some more.

Then, an hour and a half later, I get a call from my sister Samantha saying that they will be leaving in about 10 or 15 minutes. Now it’s 12:30, and I have rehearsal at 6:30, and I will have no time to do any work around the house. Faaaantastic. I was not in a very good mood. FINALLY at 1:00 they show up to pick me up. What a great way to start the afternoon.

I assumed the tree farm was between Milwaukee and Madison. Not past Madison. In Oregon, WI. Oregon you say? That’s right. Oregon. Hann’s Tree Farm. It was pretty, though. Also, being in the car that long with my 12-year old sister so soon after the 2.5 hour car ride on Thanksgiving was just a little too much. She talks about nothing but the Jonas Brothers. And we listen to their CD the constantly. ENOUGH ALREADY!!

So by the time we get to this damn tree farm, I have just about had enough. And then it is COLD and WINDY. I might as well have been wearing a swimsuit for all my layering did for me. The thing that started to turn my mood around was the free hot cider. Mmm, that helped a lot.

We chose a tree type and started hiking through the acres of trees. You could only cut one that was tagged. But the tagged trees weren’t in any particular section. They were spread out through the whole place. Too bad, because I wanted a little baby tree.

We walked almost to the back of the section before finding a tree that was good enough to grace my mom’s living room.
  

We actually found another good one that I thought might be nice in my apartment. But I didn’t really have the money, even though these trees were reasonably priced. I spent it all on Black Friday.
But, my mom thought it was too good of a tree to just leave there, so she said she’d buy it for me! I was so happy! We’re not putting it up yet, so it’s staying at my mom’s house for now. But I can’t wait for my apartment to smell like pine, even though I’m probably kind of allergic to it.

Mmmm, pine. Good enough to eat.

 Tastes like Pine-Sol.

Overall it was a good day. But getting home at 5:45 and having to leave for rehearsal around 6:00 was not fun. But I’m happy I could spend the time with them. And I’m so excited to start decorated for Christmas!