Dowton Recaps

 Welcome back to the work week, folks.  I finally started in on the long list of Downton Abbey season 3 episodes on my DVR this weekend (and then found out that the season finale was Sunday night!).  So I'm way behind, but found these hilarious recaps of the show and thought I'd share.  They summarize the show in a Facebook feed:



Source

 That's all for today, feel like I need a nap and the day has only just begun.

My American Life

I realize that I am waaaaaaaaaaaaay late to join this party, but I have recently become addicted to listening to "This American Life" on NPR.  I love Ira Glass and all of the interesting stories on the show.  I downloaded an app on my phone so I listen to them on my headphones while I'm working out (I'm trying the Couch to 5K workout again...) or doing dishes.  I think I've listened to 5 in the past 5 days.

If you've got 12 minutes, check out Act 3 of this recent episode on deception.  It's just David Sedaris reading an excerpt from one of my favorite books ever, "Me Talk Pretty One Day."  The book is truly hilarious.  Probably time for me to re-read it again.

Speaking of this American life, here are some recent scenes from mine (at least the fun parts - you will note that there are no pictures of me at work):

Big bear photo bomb.  We all love her flower chair from Grhonda and Grandbob.

She was really working the tutu last week at our friend Amy's house.

I super love our new wreath - on sale now at Target!

My funny Valentine.

Like a Boss

A friend of mine at work ordered a few of these for her office walls - so awesome!  They are called "emergency compliments," and I think they would be great anywhere and would make cool gifts.  Check them all out here.

 

No, really.

IHWSH - Hardy Har Har

We could all use some laughs this Friday, ammmmmmiright?

Gosling.

If Dr. Suess Books Were Titled According to Their Subtexts.

Not sick at our house, knock on wood.  Source.



Downton Abbey on Instragram, ha!  Hoping to get caught up on this this weekend.



My personal motto.

Have so much fun this weekend!

Kid President

In preschool, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, and I said "the President."  It was true, I really thought that would be the best job ever.  I loved presidential trivia books and dreamt of the White House.  That seemed like a good idea all the way through high school.  My friends were always claiming cabinet positions based on what they wanted to be when they grew up ("I'll be the Secretary of Music." "I'll be the Secretary of Art.")  Sorry guys, not going to happen.  But let's continue to dream big, eh?

Just in case you haven't seen this yet, it's awesome, and a great way to start your week:

We dropped Nora off at the nanny share for the first time this morning.  She's going to be with a wonderful nanny and new friend named Nick (he's 9 months old) during the weekdays - it's going to be great (she says while crying just a little bit).  We really do feel lucky to have found some people that we know will take great care of Nora and give us peace of mind while we're at work.  Hope we can all encourage Nora to have big dreams too.

Pop

Just popping in (I just accidentally typed "pooping in" but caught myself...then decided I had to tell you anyway) to say a quick hi and rave about the latest book I read:

On Amazon

Where'd You Go, Bernadette?  It's a fun, funny, interesting and engrossing novel about an eccentric and smart family who live in Seattle and really love each other.  The book is told through a series of emails, letters, faxes, and reports, and when all pieced together help to solve the mystery of where Bernadette went.  I loved it!

Hope 2013 is treating you well...we've been having a ball with this little goose:

(Maybe) be back soon - didn't mean to take a month away from the blog, but it happened, and it happened fast.  The new year is really on a roll!

Jamming in the New Year

The first full week back in the office after that relaxing 11 day holiday break is a little bit of a bummer ... but my new sunny yellow headphones (late Christmas gift from Dac) have helped a little. They make me such a cool kid:

Urban was running 20% off headphones in store the other day ... may still be.

What makes me even cooler? Listening to Taylor Swift on my yellow headphones. Her new Red album was another Christmas gift from Dac. It's like he knows me or something. Found this awesome cover of her "I Knew You Were Trouble" track:

Hadn't heard of these guys before - some pretty cool weirdos. Liked this one a lot too:

Hope y'all are having a great 2013 so far. We painted our dining room this past weekend and the furniture is on it's way ... pictures to come soon. This is the year of getting our house together. Going to be a good one!

I Love Young House Love

On Saturday, my mom and I got to meet some of the most famous bloggers in the land: John and Sherry Petersik of Young House Love.  They were as sweet and cute as they seem online, and they signed their awesome new book for us.  I haven't had a chance to really dig in to the book yet, but I'm sure it's full of fun ideas, just like their house.  I just love reading about their sweet family having so much fun working on their house.  (I almost wrote "loving their house" - I guess their blog title has me convinced.)  Here's a pic of us all (boo to the blur) - I wore my favorite earrings (that Sherry also wears all the time), hoping she would have them on too, but she didn't wear them that day. 

Some projects from their blog that inspire me to get to work:



Paint the back of Built-ins.

Stencil a wall.

Paint my front door.

Line my dresser drawers.

Met any famous people lately?  I get really geeked out and do not act like myself when it happens, but I love it!

Snail Mail Your Email

We've professed our love for snail mail many, many times here, and it looks like there are some folks who took that love to a new level.  I just learned about an awesome project called "Snail Mail My Email."  Here's a quick description from the site:

"Snail Mail My Email is a worldwide collaborative art project where volunteers handwrite and artistically interpret strangers' emails and send these physical letters to the intended recipients, completely free of charge.

In 2011, 234 volunteers collectively sent 10,457 letters to over 70 countries, the content of which inspired 'Snail Mail My Email' - the book.

This project aims to reignite the lost art of letter writing, reminding us of the power of personal connection in a digital world."

Through Sunday, you can email your letter and the address of where you'd like it to go, and someone will send it, via snail mail, for free!  I just emailed mine to Nora, I think this project is so awesome.  If you visit the link, you can also see some examples of what has been sent, so fun.  I wish I'd thought of this!

Gee Whiz, What a Building

My office building is up for an award, so I thought it was a good excuse to brag about the fact that I work at a place called the "Gee Whiz Factory." Totally why I applied there in the first place.

Anyway, yes Trozzolo is up for an award - People's Choice award in the American Institute of Architects Kansas City Design Excellence Awards. Being up for an award is not a new thing for our company or our cool building (again, just taking this opportunity to brag), but would appreciate if you would vote for us nonetheless. :) Visit: http://www.aiakc.org/vote/ 

Speaking of work, I've been jamming out to a lot of Pandora at the office. My station rotation lately has been Mumford & Sons, The Head & the Heart, and The Lumineers. Ok, and the occasional Taylor Swift. I'm sure you've all heard The Lumineers' song "Ho Hey." It's pretty great. Another one of theirs I just heard for the first time that I love:

Will try to have a few house update pics for you soon!

The Monday List

• If you have a kid (or several kids, actually) to buy a small Christmas gift for, may I suggest this Mr. Men and Little Miss Christmas set?  You get 5 cute books (I haven't read them yet, but I think all of the Mr. Men/Little Miss books have a pretty good message), a holiday card, some cute cardboard ornaments, and some stickers in an awesome little box.  Right now it's about $9!  (It was actually only $7 when I got it last week, they must've realized what a treat this was):

To buy on Amazon

• I strained a muscle in my neck last Thursday night, to the point where I couldn't turn it to the left all weekend.  This injury occurred during an agressive game of peekaboo.
• It was 70 degrees here in DC yesterday, but last week it was pretty chilly, which resulted in this:

Hat from Boden.

• It's been exactly one year today since we found out we were having a baby...what a crazy year it's been!  I feel like a very lucky duck.
• I'm pretty excited to start listening to Christmas music in a week and a half!
• We had some friends over for dinner Saturday night and I made this awesome pear crisp from the Pioneer Woman.  I made it in four individual little dishes (so I baked them a little less than the recipe calls for) and with no pecans.  They were DELICIOUS and made a nice fall dessert:

• Do you watch Top Chef?  Henry and I love to watch it, and Top Chef Seattle started last week (one of my favorite cities!).  I didn't like the format of the first episode to decide who will be in the competition, but I guess it usually takes me a few episodes to be invested and care about the contestants.
• And last, but not least, Nora and her gang:

All of her friends are Jellycat animals - we love them!

Have a fun week!

Shave time. Shave money.

Please excuse the (bleeped) language in this, but I figure a lot of the guys I know - especially those I'm related to - will likely be interested in "shaving time" and "shaving money." This is a real thing, and a guy I know at work really does save quite a bit of money by being in the Dollar Shave Club.

I thought the ending of this, with the American flag, was appropriate for election day? 

So this past weekend, I had a blast showing my new (actually, not so new anymore) city to a great friend of mine from Dallas. Shannon and I did it all in 48 hours: First Friday in the Crossroads, the City Market, the Plaza, West Bottom antique shopping, Westport and lots and lots of great food. Plus, of course, an in depth tour of the new house. First non-family house guest - pretty big deal!

Antique shopping in West Bottoms - First Friday weekend

Happy voting! And happy, happy birthday to my mother-in-law Matsy!

Run-DAC

So this was Dac's "cotton anniversary" gift to me, that I am just now sharing more than a month late. My Uncle Phil gave Dac the nickname "Run-DAC" (like Run-DMC) the very first time he met him. This wasn't a new one to Dac - I think he may have even tried to give himself this nickname in high school - but he was still impressed by the nickname expert of our family. So he had shirts made from the Run-DMC logo that of course say "Run-DAC" and "Mrs-DAC." Pretty awesome.

We saved them until moving day, to get pictures in front of our house. Worth the wait.

We got quite the impressive amount of trick-or-treaters last night. I way underestimated the amount of candy we would need, and we had to turn the light off after an hour. Our favorite was a larger girl with cleavage (gross) who belched instead of saying trick-or-treat (even grosser). Dac's response was to say, "pleasant."

Happy November, y'all!

#1 Dad

Saw this on Look Linger Love last week:

This Dad (Dave Engledow) has created some awesome (and hilarious) images with his daughter and Photoshop.  "World's Best Father" indeed!