La Petite Chic

Oh Yeah, THAT

Something I neglected to mention about our vacation to Florida is that I took my first round of Clomid right in the midst of it. Yeah, I'm crazy, right? But it just so happened that the Provera I took to jump start my cycle kicked in right before I left and, as we really want to get pregnant again sooner rather than later, I decided it was worth the potential undesirable side effects while on vacation.

And actually, it wasn't bad at all. I was really surprised because I've only heard terrible things about how Clomid makes you feel. Granted, I was only on 50mg, but the only noticeable side effects I had were night sweats (which never happens to perpetually cold me) and a little bit of weepiness. As in, songs I love were making me cry and anything that was even slightly heartwarming brought tears to my eyes. But, eh, whatever...I can handle that!  It's a small price to pay to become a mom.

Now I'm in that awful waiting period to see if it actually worked. For someone as impatient as I am, the wait is KILLING me.  I'm doing that annoying thing again where I'm over-analyzing every little twinge in my stomach and, (I'm embarrassed to admit this), I keep grabbing my boobs to see if they're even the slightest bit sore. Don't worry; I only do it in the privacy of our bedroom! 

Nothing yet, but I'll keep you all posted!

EDITED TO ADD: Can you believe it's already been a whole year since Jon and I started on this path?

Our Florida Adventure - Part Two

Orlando

Our primary reason for visiting Orlando was to go to the Epcot Food and Wine Festival.  We absolutely love going there, but haven't had the chance to go since we got married. There are unique and delicious food and drink tastings available in each country at the World Pavilion for just a few dollars each  and we enjoy just walking around and sampling here and there. They also have food demonstrations and seminars which are fun to stop into to beat the Florida heat!

Entrance to the Festival

 

Olive oil demonstration in Italy

Spirits tasting from Ireland (they had moonshine!)

The Wedding in Naples

Oh, my goodness, the whole wedding weekend was so gorgeous and romantic and most importantly, FUN!! They had a minor, okay, major, wind issue on the actual day of the wedding which threatened to blow over their chuppah and tangle all the ladies hair, but it's those unexpected things that makes a wedding memorable, isn't it?

On the beach at sundown during the rehearsal dinner
(Ignore the shiny forehead!)

Love this photo...they are always making each other laugh!

The new Mr. and Mrs
(Doesn't Amanda look gorgeous? I loved her hair and gown!)

Beautiful centerpiece and sand art

A candy bar in whimsical beach buckets!

Me with my cousin (the groom), Mike, and a groomsman
(Did I ever tell you all that he gave me a black eye when I was 6? Funny story!)

Lovely handmade favors of little shells with a pearl

I barely left the dance floor and managed to get Jon out for a few songs too!

Miniature desserts!
(Yes, that's mini creme brulee!)

My beautiful new cousin-in-law!

And last, but not least, the cake!  So pretty...and yummy!

Our Florida vacation went by so quickly, but it was well worth the over 1,300 miles of driving around the state!  Le sigh...until our next vacation!

Our Florida Adventure - Part One

In typical fashion, we packed as much as possible into our Florida anniversarymoon/road trip/wedding weekend. We are crazy and fully embrace that, but we also know that we might not be taking any vacations quite like that once a kiddo comes around so we wanted to make the most of it.

The Departure

The week actually started out on a sour note when we learned that we were bumped from our flight to Ft. Lauderdale...the flight we booked nine months ago and checked in 1½ hours early for! To say that I was pissed off would be a major understatement. However, Air Tran (yes, I'm naming names) quickly rectified the situation by offering Jon and I each two free round trip tickets to any of their destinations in the US and Caribbean. Umm, hello, 2010 cruise leaving out of Puerto Rico! Also, hello, Texas girls whom I've been wanting to visit since forever ago! 

They were able to book us on a flight into Ft. Myers leaving a ½ hour later which was not a bad compromise to make except for the fact that they overbooked that flight too and guess who got bumped again? Yes, that would be us. Then they offered us another round trip ticket, plus an upgrade to Business Class (free alcoholic beverages!) on the next flight to Ft. Lauderdale which was four hours later. We got to Florida a bit later than expected, but hey, I'll take three round trip tickets (each!). 

Key West

As you might have guessed from my tweets, I spent most of our time here drinking margaritas. When in Rome and all, you know?  I really love that town, though.  Gorgeous sunsets, friendly people and a clothing optional bar!  Yes, you read that right.  On our first night in town, Jon and I stopped into a bar called The Bull.  It has three levels, including the top level which is on the rooftop.  It was a beautiful night so we decided to head up to the third floor.  When I rounded the corner to walk into the doorway, I noticed a bare-assed naked man standing at the bar. Saggy butt, gray hair...not the sight I was expecting to see.

I turned to tug on Jon's shirt as I whispered to him, "Jon!  There's a naked man at the bar!". I never got a response from him because he was staring in complete shock at the dance floor where there was a nude dance party going on! Insane. The bouncer saw our gaping mouths so he laughed and told us it was clothing optional.  Oh, and the name of that bar?  The Garden of Eden. Appropriate, yes?

My parents joined us in Key West our last night there and we made it a point to take them there, though we didn't mention it was clothing optional. That was a hoot!  My mom had quite the same reaction I did, but my dad was pretty calm about it.  He just sat down at the bar (next to a naked man!) and ordered a drink. So hilarious!

We did a booze cruise one day (Danger Charters, thanks for the recommendation, Jess!) and had a wonderful time snorkeling, kayaking and, yes, drinking, in the beautiful and extremely warm water. We didn't see any sharks or other scary marine life, but we saw a lot of really cool birds.  Another day, Jon humored me and took me to Ernest Hemingway's house where we just about passed out from the heat, but I'm so glad we saw it. I'm a nerd for stuff like that. We also met another young couple while watching the sunset from Mallory Square one night and had a fun-filled and crazy night bar-hopping with them. We always manage to make friends while on vacation!

On that same night, we ended up in a bar where they had an old man playing guitar who could sing and play just about anything. I had him play our song, "Can't Help Falling in Love", and enjoyed a romantic slow dance with Jon.  I did a lot of dancing that night.  An old man grabbed me to dance as soon as we walked into the place, but he was totally harmless and I ended up dancing with him to several more songs throughout the night. There was a big group from Maryland in the same bar and they kept sending us shots. Miraculously, neither of us had a hangover the next morning! 

I think the thing I loved most about Key West is that everyone you meet is laid-back and happy and just there to have a good time.  It's my kind of town.  Also, amazingly enough, Jon and I both met people from our relatively small hometowns while there.  It's such a small, beautiful world!

Me in front of the Hemingway House

Kayaking

Delicious conch fritters

And Key Lime oysters

Beautiful (albeit, sweaty) sunset

 My margarita (and Jon's dirty banana) at the original Margaritaville

The Mile Marker (blurred camera from the humidity!)

Perfection
 
 

And one more sunset for good measure!

Coming next, my recap of Orlando and my cousin's wedding! 

Already Missing the Sun

I'm back from sunny Florida with lots of photos and stories to share, but of course I haven't actually downloaded any pictures from the camera yet. Hopefully I'll get around to that tonight, but until then you can check out my latest post over at Style Lush on how to make your very own homemade chicken stock. This is the perfect time of year to do so, no? Mmmm, just think of all the delicious things you can make with it!

Also, I have a random question for you all.  Do I have any DC, Maryland and/or Northern Virginia readers?  If so, please be so kind as to leave me a comment or send me an e-mail to let me know that you're local (to me).  You don't have to tell me where exactly...I just have something up my sleeve. :)

The Memory Keeper

As I've mentioned before on this blog, I'm a saver.  I save every little thing that has even the slightest bit of sentimental value, and seeing as how I'm extremely sentimental, that a lot of little things.  Thankfully, those little things are mostly paper items because, (surprise, surprise), they have meaningful words on them.

I have letters from pen pals dating all the way back to elementary school, including those written by a soldier from Mississippi that I corresponded with during Operation Desert Storm.

I have a reply from Dear Abby when my sixth grade self wrote to her complaining about my horribly mean Social Sudies teacher.  (She really was quite awful.  Back me up here, Claire!)

I have the elegant invitation from my Junior Ring Dance at Richmond and assorted Save-the-Dates from cherished friends.

There are ticket stubs from wine festivals and plane tickets from all our travels and colorful post-it love notes that Jon has left around the house for me.

Of course, as opposites tend to attract, Jon saves nothing.  He enjoys making fun of me for being attached to inanimate objects, but to that I say, "Honey, be thankful it all fits into shoeboxes!"

And sometimes, not very often, but sometimes, the fact that I'm such a saver works out in his favor.  I ripped the coupons below off the paper menus from the Montego Bay Margaritaville on the way home from our honeymoon.  That's right, the honeymoon we took three years ago.  I've held onto them the entire time, waiting patiently for our next visit to a Margaritaville for my favorite alcoholic beverage.

Turns out, we'll be stopping by the original Margaritaville at some point during our trip to Key West (T minus two days!) and we'll definitely be redeeming them for our two free margaritas.  I'd say that's a very happy ending for my treasured keepsake and Jon's thrifty wallet!

Back to the Drawing Board

As you probably guessed from the title, we didn't get the house.  Since we had such a strong offer, our realtor is pretty certain that another buyer ponied up cash which is a lot more desireable than the conventional buyer like us who would need a 30 year mortgage.  To say that we're disappointed would be a gross understatement.  However, we can't dwell on what isn't meant to be and so we're going back out tomorrow night to look at more houses.  We really want to find a home before the holidays and when you figure in the time it takes to make an offer, have your offer accepted and then finally settle on the house, that would put us into November.  Crazy, isn't it?  Just where did 2009 go? 

If you're sick of hearing me talk about house hunting (I'm sorry!), head on over to Style Lush, a new blogging venture that I'm so excited to be a part of.  I posted a fabulous recipe for Cinnamon Sugar Roasted Almonds today that I think you'll love.  They're delicious and make the perfect autumn snack!

(Also, this post was about three times longer and told a story about a house we saw this past weekend with serious mold issues (think three dimensional mold growing out from the wall), but our network decided to fail right as I hit the Publish button.  ARGH!  Trust me though, it was really gross and that house was quickly crossed off our list.)

Chopped

Photographic evidence that I'm the most indecisive person ever:

Err, yes, I decided to chop my hair off.  I love it so far, but it's only been eight hours so let's wait and see how I feel tomorrow.  The stylist did a great job though.  My hair looks much healthier and she textured and thinned it out a bit to keep it from looking like a big poof ball (which tends to happen when my hair is short).

We also went house hunting again today to give ourselves some backup options in case we don't get the foreclosed home.  We found a couple of houses that we liked, but none of them came close to our dream house.  We'll keep looking while we wait to hear back on our offer, but we're crossing our fingers that it won't even come to that.  The waiting is pure torture!

P.S.  How cute is my Lola Bean in that picture?  She's my little sassafras.

Whew

In case you were wondering, no, I didn't run off and join the circus to become a trapeze artist (although that would be admittedly cool), it's just been a hell of a week.  There's that pesky little thing called my new job taking up a huge chunk of my time, then there's the business of house hunting and everything that goes along with it, and let's not forget the throwing of a 40th anniversary party/Oktoberfest celebration for my parents and last, but certainly not least, the celebrating of Jonathan's 29th birthday which just happens to be today.  Just typing all of that out makes want to crawl into bed with a bottle of wine.

Oh, and speaking of wine, I'm on day 4 of Provera to jump start Aunt Flo whodecided to go back to her old ways of RSVPing to the damn party and then not showing up.  Gotta love her.  Also, in case you missed the connection, in my head Provera --> Period --> Ovulation --> Conception --> Pregnancy = No Wine.  Stream of consciousness, much?

Anyhow, we are getting ready to head out for Jon's birthday, but I just wanted to check in to let you know that I'm still alive.  Oh, and we did make an offer on the dream house I mentioned in my last post, but unfortunately so did four other people.  We are just waiting to hear if our offer was accepted and you know I won't waste any time in telling you if it is!  Happy Friday and happy birthday to my love, Jonathan.