Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!! J and I arrived yesterday back in St. Paul and we are staying at my mom's house for the weekend. My mom, J and I got up at 6 this morning and headed on over to do Meals on Wheels and had so much fun! We had a wonderful time dropping off the meals and trying to navigate our way around the city.

We are going to my aunt's house on my mom's side for an early dinner today and making it over to my dad's house for a late dinner this afternoon. So I'm sure I will be right on track with the national average of an additional 600 calories today.

I'm sorry I've been a lame blogger lately I feel like there is just not enough time in my day to get everything finished! I promise after next week passes and things begin to settle down for a bit I will be back on track.

We are of course getting up early tomorrow to get some of the great black friday deals and then heading to the outlet mall outside of the city. So I will be sure to post some of the great deals and presents that we find on Saturday when we head back to Chicago.

I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Share Your Soles - Shoe Drive

I just read about The Share Your Soles Foundation that is headquartered here in Chicago. This is an organization that collects new or gently used shoes and ships them to underprivileged people all around the world. The organization was started back in 1999 after founder, Mona Purdy, visited Guatemala and saw that the children there were painting their feet with tar so they could participate in races that were held at town festivals. She ran into an American surgeon who makes trips to several different towns in Guatemala throughout the year who said, "If these children had shoes to wear, there would be a lot less need for me to regularly travel to the region to perform amputations of infected limbs."

Mona now has 120 drop off locations in 10 states across the United States. I looked at the locations and there are several stores that are close to my home - so I have decided to start a shoe drive for the holidays.

If you have a pair of shoes that you bought and never wore or shoes that you have worn in the past and no longer use; please send them to me and I will wash and send them off to one of the drop-off locations. If you do not have any shoes to donate you can also go to Share Your Soles website and take a look at their warehouse wish list to see if you have any of the items listed to donate to the shipping center.

Send me an email if you are interested in shipping shoes to the organization.

Crazy Eights

I found this survey on No Worries WYNN in Love. So to kill some time and feed my boredom here we go:

8 TV Shows I Love to Watch:
1. Grey's Anatomy
2. Private Practice
3. Entourage
4. Friends
5. CSI
6. Oprah
7. What Not to Wear
8. Extreme Make Over Home Edition

8 Favorite Restaurants:
1. Brazzaz
2. Fogo de Chao
3. Big Bowl
4. Brasserie Jo
5. Giordano's
6. Quartinos
7. Twin Cities Grill
8. Ralph Lauren Grille

8 Things that Happened Today:
1. Work
2. Fought with Santa
3. Laundry
4. Emails
5. Food tasting with a perspective caterer
6. Talked to my dad
7. J got a promotion
8. Ate a hot dog

8 Things I Look Forward To:
1. Graduating college
2. Moving back to Mn
3. Visiting my family
4. Shopping
5. Payday
6. Date night with J
7. Blogging
8. Going on vacation

8 Things on My Wish List:
1. Kate Spade handbag
2. Versace perfume
3. OPI nail polish
4. mani/pedi
5. Cole Haan loafers
6. Pearl bracelet and earrings
7. 180's
8. A housekeeper

There goes 15 minutes I'll never see again.

Michigan Avenue Lights Festival

I am laying in bed right now on a Friday evening at 9:30, in my bathrobe, catching up on all of your posts because tomorrow I have to be downtown to begin set-up for The Michigan Avenue Lights Festival at 7:30am. The Lights Festival is a large parade that happens every year to signify that the winter season has begun and it's also when all the lights on Michigan Avenue go on for the first time.

My company has purchased a large sponsorship for the parade and we are hosting Santa Claus on our float; so I have been nominated, along with a few of my other colleagues, to set-up our booth, get the jumbo tron assembled and one of my special responsibilities is to watch over Santa all day. Now this may not sound like such a difficult task but just to give you an idea of how high-maintenance this man is: this morning Chuck (Santa) called me to ask what time I would be at his hotel tomorrow morning with a limo to pick him up to walk one block to the booth! I explained to Chuck that it was only a block from his changing room to our booth and I didn't think a ride was necessary, he followed up by saying, "Now, Nicole once I put on that suit I tend to get very sweaty and children are going to want to rush at me and I am worried I will fall over. So I will need someone to escort me once I am in the suit for the entirety of the day."

I just about fell off my chair! I thought you have got to be kidding me Chuck!! I am not going to have a limo come and get you for one block! So as a compromise I am now picking him up at the "North Pole" suite (real clever I know) from the Swiss Hotel at 10:30am and escorting him in a cab to our booth until the parade starts around 530pm.

I am hoping that the weather will cooperate because as of right now the high is only going to be 37 degrees with a real feel of only 30!! I can only imagine what my feet are going to be feeling after 12 hours outside!

I'll give you an update on Sunday if I am not in the hospital.

Holiday Gift Swap

I am participating in a holiday gift swap over at Grove Gals and I have been partnered up with Eloise at Weasel's Journey!! I am so excited to be part of my first blogger swap. The rules of the exchange are as follows:

1. The budget is $25 and you must send at least 3 items. Items can be new, homemade, etc.

2. All packages must be shipped by Dec 1st with delivery confirmation/tracking. It is no fun to go to the trouble of putting a package together and mailing it only to get nothing in return.

3. Please contact your swap partner via the blog or email address posted below.

4. Items can be ornaments, ribbons, decorations, stationery, paper, wrapping supplies, cookie cutters...you get the idea

5. You MUST include a recipe of a holiday cookie that you love.

I found two of the three items that I am going to include in the package at my new favorite store Genevieve Lethu. It is a store based out of France and it has really unique gift ideas for fairly reasonable prices (some of the stuff is outrageously priced, but you can definitely find great gifts for under $20.) They have ornaments, stationary, place settings, monogrammed napkins and everything you could ever need for a dinner party. I wish I could show you all what I purchased for the exchange, but I don't want to ruin the surprise for Eloise! I will be sure to post them after the Thanksgiving holiday because I am hoping to get her gift out this weekend!!

A Quick Note To My New Neighbors

Dear Horny New Neighbors in Apartment 410,

I know you are excited to have moved into a new apartment, but I have to draw the line somewhere. Like clockwork for two weeks straight, every night between the hours of 9:30pm and 11pm, you have been in direct violation of rule number 13 of the building's handbook: "Do not have sex so loud that noise of the bed squeaking echoes into the surrounding units, sounding like millions of children jumping up and down on a broken mattress!!!" Please ensure that the necessary adjustments are made(whether it be self-gratification, abstinence during the work week, or getting a sleep number mattress-I don't care which one) just be sure to rectify the issue as soon as possible.

Thank you,
Sleepless and Irritated Resident

New Favorite Perfume

I stopped by Macy's after work while I was waiting for the bus to go home and found a new perfume that needs to go on my Christmas list! Versace Signature!! If anyone has any discounts for Sephora please let me know!!! I think it retails around $70 so I will definitely need a coup. Right now I wear Badgley Mischka's Signature scent - which I love but I have been wearing it for just over a year and need something new.

T - 26 Minutes Until FREEDOM

It has been such a long and stressful day at work today that I cannot even think about another event or wedding reception, I don't want to get another phone call about our holiday program and if I see another advertising edit come across my desk I am going to throw up.

Today started out well with my bus being on time and getting into work a few minutes early. When I got into the office I saw that another girl brought in pastries for an early morning snack and I didn't even have one single voice mail sitting on my phone when I arrived - which is UNHEARD of most days!! Then around 11am things went down hill rapidly. My phone and email inbox were overflowing and all of the holiday events that I have coming up were all asking for ten different things at once. So I raced through my day and got everyone what they needed to keep them quiet for at least 24 hours.

And now it's now 4:40pm and I have decided that for me today is over - I didn't get to my 'normal' workload and still have 8 organized piles of work on my desk from Friday that I wanted to complete yesterday and still haven't gotten to. But I feel that I have been as productive as I could be running on doughnuts and coffee and I have had it for today. I am going to hop on the bus and head home, get into my sweats, eat dinner in bed and watch some Friends re-runs and catch up on all my favorite reads!

Another GREAT Giveaway!!

The Mrs. over at Leaving and Loving on a Jet Plane is giving away a set of Marie Antoinette Coup Stemware from Pottery Barn in honor of her 200th post!! You can go enter here for a chance to win next Sunday when she draws the lucky winner!! The Mrs. blogs about everything from her pilot husband to life as a newlywed and even shares the great deals she finds on clothes and pottery barn classics! Definitely get on over and check her out!

Another Weekend Come and Gone...

J and I went out for 'date night' on Saturday evening to Buffalo Wild Wings in Lincoln Park (I know what you're thinking - date night at Buffalo Wild Wings?! Does she live in a barn?!) But in my defense it was really last minute that we decided to go out and I was craving hot wings. So we went down to the filthy bar and had a terrible frozen iceberg salad with really DELICIOUS wings and then headed downtown for dessert. I was hoping to see some of the lights up for Christmas on Michigan Avenue, but no such luck. Only millions of people crowding the streets trying to get in some early Christmas shopping at a sales tax rate of %11 in the downtown area! We ended up at Devon Seafood Grill for a Ghiradelli Warm Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Ice Cream!! By far the best dessert I've had in a while. Definitely worth the crummy salad and the obnoxious college football fans at BW3's!!

The rest of the weekend went by fairly quick without anything too exciting to report. Snow started falling this afternoon and J has finally let us turn the heat on in the apartment!! Thank God!!!

My Live Signature.com

Anyone know how to get the box that is around the signature to go away?? It's driving me crazy!

I'm A Grown-Up Now

Every year our family gets together Christmas day and we do three separate themed gift exchanges. Now, in theory the theme changes each year, but inevitably the uncles will all exchange gifts related to either tools or hunting, the aunts do a candle or spa theme and then the cousins end up doing a college theme or 'day at the movies'. Yesterday I got an email from a few of my aunts back in MN who are planning the Christmas festivities and have been told that myself and a few of the other "older" cousins will be promoted to the adult gift exchange at Christmas this year. So I am now looking for a gift that is $25 or less that fits into a Spa/Pamper Yourself type theme. Any unique gift ideas???

White House Black Market

Thought I would pass this along to everyone. White House Black Market is celebrating their friends and family 25% off EVERYTHING in the store!!! When you are at the checkout just mention the Friends and Family discount to receive the offer! If you are ordering online enter in the promotion code: 8748. Sale only lasts through the 16th of November so be sure to get in this weekend!

Seeking All Stock Market Guru Advice

I haven't the faintest idea what is going on in the stock market lately except that stocks are continuing to drop in value. I see the bright red decline every morning on the elevator screens as I go up to my office and shake my head along with the other five people in the elevator just to fit in for the first ten seconds of my day. Now I currently do not have any money in the stock market but was sparked by an article I read the other day about it being an OK time to buy stocks cheap as he market has pretty much hit the bottom. Any thoughts on if I should buy stocks now (if so any suggestions) or wait until the economy settles down?

My First Blog Award

I received my first blogger award since joining the blogging world a few months ago from Elizabeth over at no worries WYNN in love. Elizabeth's blog is great and she always has something interesting or funny to say! If you haven't been over to her site you should go check it out today!

The qualifications to receive the award are:

A. Display a cheerful attitude

B. Love one another

C. Make mistakes

D. Learn from others

E. Be a positive contributor to the blog world

F. Love life

G. Love kids

The Rules:

1. Must link it back to the creator

2. Post the rules

3. Choose 5 people to give it to

4. Recipients must fill the characteristics above

5. Create a post to share this

6. You must thank the winner

I would like to pass this award on to the following five people:
Monograms and Manicures
GIRL FROM THE LAND of 10KL
Adventures of a Southern Newlywed

tying the knot
Amelia Bedelia

Thanks again Elizabeth!!

Winter is Here

Winter is officially here in Chicago, I don't think the temperature even reached 32 degrees today!! So I decided to take in my favorite drink of the holiday season while I was at Target yesterday and was able to enjoy it in bed all afternoon while watching reruns of Friends from ten years ago!! It was a perfect touch to a lazy Sunday afternoon after having to go into the office last night on a Saturday.

Mom's Birthday!!

It was my mom's birthday this past Friday and I am so excited about the gift I got her. Hopsy posted about a company called J Bee Designs a few weeks back and I had been waiting for the perfect occasion to purchase one of Jennie's hand painted creations!! Jennie was so easy to work with and I was able to completely customize my entire order all in one day and have it arrive in less than four days! She has so many different designs on her site and they are all so unique. I decided to go with four wine glasses all monogrammed with my mom's initials and instead of having the entire glass painted I opted for the fun designs only on the base of the glass. Each glass comes with a personalized signature from Jennie and a cute little bumble bee too. I had such a wonderful experience with J Bee Designs that I can't wait to place another order for myself.

Giveaways!!!

Thanks to Elizabeth I found out about a great giveaway that Wearing Mascara is giving away for her 100th post. I have been to wearing mascara's blog several times and she always has such fun stuff to share on her blog!! She is giving away a this make up set from Sephora along with my favorite lip gloss!! So if you want to enter to win the Sephora set head on over and check out her blog!!

TCF Is Robbing My Checking Account

I went to the bank a few days ago in a rush to deposit my check and run a few other errands. I went into the Jewel Osco TCF location - which I hate because I knew it was going to be at least an hour before I actually got a chance to speak to a person, but that's for another post. I ran in and I got up to the teller, deposited my check and as he was giving me my cash back he says, "Do you know you are being charged 7 dollars every time you take money out of a non-TCF location? And if it is a TCF ATM you are still being charged $4.00 to get your money?"

I must have given him a look of pure disgust because he immediately began to explain to me that TCF has been charging my account because it is based in MN and not in IL. He said that I need to change my acct number to an IL account number in order for the ATM to stop charging me a mandatory out of state ATM fee!!! For the record I have had this account for at least 20 years and have been living in Chicago now for the past four years. I USE ATMS ALL THE TIME!!

I was so irritated and confused that I took my money and left without ever saying a word to the poor man who was clearly just trying to save me a few bucks. Unfortunately at the time I was picturing him personally to be the man who was stealing $4 from me every day for the past 4 years!!

I can't even begin to imagine how much money I have 'lost' to my own bank just to take out cash for the past few years. I don't even want to think about it. I'm switching to Wells Fargo that's it.

Election Day is HERE!

Election day is here and it's time to get out and vote!! I'm not a die hard politician by any means, but I do feel that it is my responsibility to get out and vote for the next president. Most days I'm just a bandwagon fan of politics and today I feel that it is only appropriate to pass on the message that everyone needs to get out and cast their vote. And of course I enjoy all the hoopla that is created around election day. I am wearing my new blue blazer to be political and support the elections today!!

One last thing that I almost forgot to remind everyone about is some of the cool incentives companies are offering to get you to go out and cast your vote. In case having a say in who will make all the decisions on behalf of the United States for the next four years is not enough incentive. (Listen to me - acting like I know something about the electoral process and the white house agenda.)

Take a look at some of the goodies you can cash in on if you show that you voted today!

Starbucks is giving away a tall coffee of your choice.

Ben & Jerry's is giving away free cones.

Krispy Kreme is giving away free cookies!

Happy Voting!!!

Halloween!!

J and I decided last minute to go out to a Halloween party last night with a bunch of our friends from Loyola. I originally was going to be a Rubik's Cube and J was going to be a Stop Light. ( I say that lightly as J never really wanted to go as a stop light but went along with it for a few days until a better idea came along)

I didn't want to spend any money on our costumes this year so I searched online for a bunch of different couples Halloween costumes. These sites had everything from Sonny and Cher to Ketchup and Mustard. I finally decided on dressing up as a pair of dice.

J stopped over after work to my office and we took two boxes and covered them in white printer paper. I then printed off a bunch of large dots and pasted them all over the boxes. We punched a few holes in for the strings and Voila! we were all set to go! I know it sounds like it probably should have taken us twenty minutes to create these costumes, but I am ashamed to say that these costumes took us almost two hours to finally finish.

We headed over to Wrigleyville around 10:00 and I have never seen so many people crowding the streets in full costume. I saw everything from Superwoman to the Jolly Green Giant to Fred Flinstone and even a few Mike Ditka's along the way.

We had a great time and wonderful weather for Halloween! I didn't even have to wear a jacket - which if you have ever experienced Halloween in MN you know that there is rarely a costume walking down the street that doesn't somehow incorporate a full snow suit and boots.