home for the holiday's

I hope everyone had a wonderful Holiday! This past weekend i headed home for the holiday's. and thankfully i have a pretty short trip up I-5 to the parentals place but it was still nice to be home for a few days and not have to worry about work or anything else but being with family and friends. It was a super low key Christmas and i think that made it one of the most relaxing. I got to catch up with old friends, spend time with my bestie with our traditional christmas eve celebration and spend some quality time with the fam. it was pretty much fantastic. the only low point is having to be back at work today. i don't think i've ever had to work the day after Christmas and i'm not so sure I like it. but for now i can just relive the past weekend and pretend im not stuck in the office for the next 7 hours. 

presents packed up and ready to head home. 

got to catch up with these lovely ladies. had been way to long. 

how adorable is my new JCrew leather pink clutch! i am obsessed. 

mamma's mantle 

all the animals camped out infront of the tree on Christmas Eve 

mamma and grandma opening presents! 

over all it was a wonderful holiday. im sad to see this amazing season slowly coming to an end but then i remember i have an exciting couple weekends coming up and it's all okay. 

but for now i make a frowny face at offices that are open after christmas.

but at least i have a super cute new scarf to make it better. 

Have a simply wonderful Wednesday! 

i need a party

two things. 

thing 1 - i need a party to plan

thing 2 - i want to have a christmas party

thing 3- i need a bigger house 

okay, so i guess that was 3 things. I have had a couple months off from intense party/ dinner party planning. and although i have been busy with work events things have started to calm down and i am starting to have that itch to entertain. or plan someone else's entertaining. the holiday's are in full swing and with christmas decorations and music in stores a whole month before we even hit thanksgiving, i can't help but get excited about what amazing holiday parties you could have. i would solve this whole dilemma by just planning my own holiday shin-dig but my current house does not allow for fancy cocktail and dinner parties. In these moments i still wished i lived in my old house with plenty of space for christmas parties. Sigh...so for now i just day dream about these things. it doesn't help that i came across the cutest holiday invitations at Tiny Prints. It is taking everything in me to not plan a tiny dinner party just so i have an excuse to order some of these adorable invitations. 

inspired yet? i know i am. 

Hope you have a simply wonderful monday! 

what a weekend

this weekend was full of attempts to be productive...and for the most part I was...i obviously wish i could have gotten about 20 hundred other things done but all well. The countdown for Indo is on and with less then a week to go my butt better get into gear with packing and the MASS amounts of laundry i need to do. sigh...i know it will all get done but sometimes i really wish i didn't have to work this week so i could take my time and not rush... Anyways here is what I was up to this weekend

Did some major cleaning and redecorated my piano..i kind of see my piano as all of you with a fire place mantel to decorate..haha 

very simple and natural

got a head start on my table decor for family Christmas that i hosted at my house 

Did some essential shopping form the trip. Got this fun navy bag at good old Target. It will be perfect! Nice and roomy, it zips, and will withstand a hard 3 weeks of traveling. 

Also picked up some books for all 6 of my flights. (thats just to get to our final destination)

One Day by David Nicholls 

And the Happiness Project by Gretchen Ruben. 

Finished up a couple DIY projects. My fun hand scrub and made some delicious homemade mini pumpkin breads that I packaged in of course a mason jar :) The recipe is over on Restored Style...an AMAZING blog so you should all check it out! :) 

And finally sat down to Christmas Dinner on Sunday night.. I made my holiday go to meal this year. Prosciutto and Fontina Cheese stuffed pork chops, caramelized butternut squash, and roasted brocolini  with parmesan . Talk about yummy! And we ended with a chocolate peppermint lava cake..totally forgot to snap a picture...but it was so good! 

A busy weekend. And now back to monday. Everyone else have a good weekend?

Hope you have a simply wonderful Monday.  

oh hello

hello there. sorry i went MIA this last week. Here i thought i would just skip tmonday then next thing you know it's friday!!! i've missed my little blog. but i promise to be better this week. 

it was a crraaazzzyyy weekend. Full of Christmas Cheer and parties. Here are some pics from my White Elephant Party and Dinner Party for one of the deans on campus.

 White Elephant Party. 

One of my gifts were some fireworks...haha...so I let the boys set them off :)

 And here are a couple food pics from the Dinner party last night. 

 Thanks Alissa for being my amazing photographer :) 

Hope you have a simply wonderful Monday.