Fat and Happy

After a recent trip to the vet I have learned that Yoda is bordering obesity. Wow!!! He does seem a little heavy when I pick him up, but I didn't think it was that bad. Well I looked back on some photos and footage and found this video.

Yoda's schedule: eat, sleep, eat, sleep, clean himself, eat, eat some more, sleep, zzzzzzz

Guess that explains it

Cheers to Joe on his 25th birthday!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! Can you believe the baby of the Stier's is this old?!! Wow!!. Have a good one Jody and be careful. We love you!!!!

gotta love this pic with the big knot on his forehead

I've been hiding and.......

I know I have so many posts to add. A lot has happened in the last few months and I have been suuuuuper busy. So there, that is my excuse. I plan to sit down one day and blog until I have everything up from March to July. But for now, I just need to share these pics in the easiest way possible, so here they are.

Rob and I had some photos taken in the good ole NYC (our city of love).

July 4th- 2nd annual lake party!!!!

We have decided to start our own family traditions. Party at Mel's lake house in Prosperity. Being out there is so peaceful, having coffee on the porch in the morning (sorry no pics of that). Anyway, last year Mel and Pat called some people to come out and it turned out to be such a fun time that we did it again this year and SUCCESS!!! We had such a wonderful crew. I said to Rob, "is it me or do I just have really cool, fun friends" he agreed. Well below are some pics from the weekend. Thank you to everyone for making our 4th super memorable. And a special thank you to Pat and Mel for hosting this wild crowd!!!

Happy Birthday USA!

The Ladies

brother don't shake hands, brothers got to hug!

Some other shout outs!!!

Jesse for maintaining the boats, jetskis, etc. all the fun things people to participate in, but never want to do the work for.

Max for his festive attire and almost making it thru the night

Beau for being a soldier (I think he was the oldest one there)

Maggs, oh Maggs for being your pirdy, dainty self. Even when you are tired you pose beautifully

Uhhh, did he say something embarrassing?

EHHHHHH!!!!

The Pinks

The Greens

The Pinks and Greens

the devoted men. wait where is Rob? oh he's taking this pic. that a boy!

July 4th continued..... home sweet home

You visit the Stier house, you inherit a child. After the weekend out at the lake, Rob, Alyssa and I headed to my parents house to see my sister and my nieces and nephew.

Juju, Alyssa, Ella Joy and Rob get some quality time in

being fed by whoever will feed you

Noah is almost 9!!

EJ loves Rob and prefers her undies to a swimsuit

Juju and Jenny staying cool under the umbrella

just relaxing

and hanging out

playing with Papa Jon's ipad

the little ballerina!

Only in New York................

can you see a sophisticated, middle aged lady on the subway beat a man over the head with her wet umbrella because she is mad he squeezed onto the train

or

can you see naked men trolling around their apartments at odd hours of the day from you desk

or

pick up a bottle of wine, eat chinese, buy a lottery ticket, a new pair of sunglasses, get a mani/pedi and finish off with a beer from an irish pub all on one block, phewww

It's a recession, Yoda has a job too...........

I debated on whether to post this or not because it's nasty, but it's a true story in my life and ya know sometimes the truth is nasty.

On Monday morning I awoke to a contently playing Yoda at 6:30, a nice change from him bothering me to feed him at 5:00 or 6:00. Well, I turned on the light to find a dead mouse being flung around my apartment, eeeewwwwww!!! I calmy discarded it in the hallway trash while congratulating lil' Yoda. He did his job well. I was just as much proud as I was disgusted.

When they gutted my place a huge crack was left between the floor and wall, so I think the the sucker got in from there. Maintenance is coming to fix the crack and the exterminator is returning asap. Until then it's all Yoda...................

Mardi Gras, King Cake- I Got the BABY!!!

I was in the kitchen at work and there was this yummy cake sitting there and I thought ouuuuu afternoon snack. Whoever was in there with me was saying its a King Cake, if you get the baby, blah, blah, blah, I stopped listening and starting cutting, mmmmmm. Low and behold I flipped over my piece and there was the baby!!!!! I won!!! Not really, but I was super excited. I decided the baby had be shown off, so he got to ride the mic on my speaker box.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_cake

Talking to your animals cont...

I felt the need to add photos, so you could get an idea of the subjects from the last post. I think the story made Steff sound like an old, crazy lady that has only animals as friends, but as you will see she's cute, young, party girl with lots of friends and lots of booze!!!! (Also, Jenny these are good pets for kids, you only feed them like every 1 or 2 weeks. They are super low maintenance.)

Steff

Edward and Bella (Edward is the pale one)

Talking to your animals

From the moment I get home at night until the time I leave in the morning I talk to Yoda. Having him around really makes it feel as if there is another person present. I refer to doing things as "we" when I talk to friends and family. "We are watching tv, we are eating dinner." I honestly think I would lose my mind (and be sad, lonely, lazy, etc) if he wasn't here. When I take baths he lays beside the tub, when I eat dinner he tries to steal my food and when I am on the phone he is usually doing something bad to get my attention. He keeps me on my toes and keeps me company. On that note, I have a very funny story about someone talking to their pets, but when other people could actually hear them (there's a difference).

My coworker, Steff, has two tiny pet frogs (Bella and Edward) she keeps at her desk. The other day I heard her say, "are you hungry?" she paused for a second, then said "but I fed you yesterday." (key word there "but") that means the frogs answered her. I was like Stef, I talk to Yoda, but you just asked those frogs a question and you think they answered you AND you just responded. We all starting laughing.

Yoda testing Rob

I'm 27 now, so before I turn 28.......

I had an amazing day today, so thank you everyone for your wonderful birthday wishes. Friends and family are truly all you need to be happy.

I also thought I'd share some plans for this upcoming year.

I am definitely not obsessed with staying young and worrying about getting older. I actually feel happier the older and wiser I get. However, I did read an article in the New York Post titled, "If You Are Not 28, Don't Read This", but of course I read it anyway. It basically talks about how it becomes more difficult to learn and absorb material as you age, particularly at 28. So...................... I have been wanting to learn to speak Spanish fluently since as long as I could remember. I even majored in it for a couple years and promised myself to move to another country and complete my learnin' at some point. That has yet to happen, but maybe one day (Barcelona, Rob?).

Additionally, I have been dying to learn to play the guitar (specifically the ukulele, since it would be more fitting with my size, but we'll start with the standard guitar). If you can play then someone will sing along. I love how just one instrument and one voice can completely fill a room with music. I want to do that!!

Just so you know, no one has been holding me back. I have been lazy, but now the pressure is on! (Hopefully next year I'm posting my melodies and writing in Spanish)

Let's go with my lessons!

Over and over and over again

Have you ever felt crazy for listening to the same song a million times? Well that was me this past week. Two Fridays ago I watched the Hope for Haiti telethon and was quickly drawn in by the touching stories and the unbelievable music. This is a video from youtube of just one of my many favorites from that night. I ended up downloading the album off itunes and have been listening nonstop. I highly recommend getting it and the money goes to helping the victims. Check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fI_nKWeDnk0

Wine and Dinner and Friends, OH MY!

Friday with the girls
Tonight I met with Jevne, Sylva and Katie for some much needed catch up time. Of course included in that was some heavy wine drinking. We planned for one glass which turned into 3 or 4 rounds and an one annoyed waitress (and maybe an annoyed husband who was not met at dinner because his wife was getting tipsy with us, oops).
Well we had a blast doing the norm, telling stories, gossiping and at times almost falling out of chairs in laughter. It was great!!! So good to see you guys.

Thursday with the Irmo peeps
On Thursday Nick (Glover) came over for a delicious spaghetti dinner I prepared. Alyssa our other neighbor (and my old roommate) was supposed to come, but became too intoxicated at the one and only Southern Hospitality. So we dined and drank and had great conversation while Yoda ran back and forth in my tiny studio, occasionally trying to steal a bite from the table. We are now making it a weekly tradition to cook dinner together at Nick's apt on Sundays. So far we have four participants and hoping to build the crowd. Here's to Sunday Funday.

The Best Medicine

Based on my previous post you can tell I have been little unhappy and a lot annoyed. To add to that, it was a busy work week and I was beginning to feel a bit under the weather. I had a minor headache and a stuffy nose from Wednesday to Monday. I tried my best to go to bed early during the week (which didn't happen) in efforts to revive my immune system. Over the weekend I said, "I'll stay in, drink Vitamin Water, take Echinacea and rest, rest, rest." And rest is what I did, excluding a bar mitzvah, NYC style on Saturday night (It was a late night, but not a drunken one, people). On Sunday I still felt yucky, but did get out of my apartment long enough to do some grocery shopping. It was sort of a lonely weekend since I opted not to answer my phone because any noise in my ear made my head hurt worse, but I thought whatever it takes to feel normal again. Then Monday came and I was still in a slump. You should have seen me when I walked in the door at 7:30, looked like I got punched in both eyes. Thankfully after about 1/2 hour I looked a little more presentable. I thought possibly it's allergies. I got home and went for the Claritin, the box was filled with tylenol (ugh), so I decided to tough it out. In attempt to distract myself from my 6th day of feeling like blahhhh, I made some phone calls. I was on the phone for a while just catching up, listening, laughing and discussing future aspirations. I got off the phone and amazingly I felt better. My head no longer hurt and I was filled with energy and happiness. So the doctor may say "an apple a day", but I say a good chat and some laughs with friends, family or whoever can sometimes be the best medicine. So thank you Haley, Mel B, Ryan and Rob for the fun and healing conversations from last night.

TODAY I WAS BACK TO ME!

Frustrations

So I ordered a new computer almost a month ago and was suuuuuuuuuuuuper excited to get it and hook it all up. Well...........things did not turn out as I thought they would. I am missing a part or something was installed wrong, so I am unable to use it. Additionally, I have two extra monitors that need to be returned and I cannot get Dell (btw- I will never order from them again) to send me return labels. At this point, I am out $400 for the monitors that need to be returned and I have a computer that does not work properly. I have fought and fought with them and no one will help. I have absolutely had it! Wheww! I get fired up just typing. Poor keyboard.

Anyway, the reason I am writing this is to help remind myself that it is alright and not that big a deal. While it may be the focus of a lot of my attention and currently the root of ALL my anger, I need to be very thankful for my life. I need to appreciate that fortunately it's a luxury that I am living without and not a necessity. So, while I like to complain and get carried away about these so called "huge issues", I should really step back and ask myself, "Am I alive?, Do I have what I need to survive?" If I can answer yes then, Everything Will Be Fine.

So, a reminder for myself and a lesson to share with others. Hope this helpful in your times of stress, anger, frustration, sadness or whatever it is that just gets to you.

Well cheers off to you and a lovely weekend. I hope to have the new computer up and running and new pics on the blog.

Weekend Shenanigans

So for New Year's and New Year's weekend Rob and I did a whole lot of nothing. It was great! It was a super cold and semi snowy weekend, so staying in was key. We managed to eat too much and watch a lot of movies.

When the ball dropped we were on the phone with none other then Pat and Melissa (who were doing absolutely nothing on New Year's eve as well). Aren't they funny?!!!!

Some other weekend activities.............

YAHTZEE!! (on the first roll!) Rob made the mistake of telling me he didn't play many board games as a child, so I went out and bought a bunch and we played all weekend! What fun!!!!

wine of course

lots of reorganizing

and spending time with lil' Yoda who managed to curl up in such a tiny ball that at a glance it was difficult to tell head from tail (I think someone was trying to stay warm from

bitter cold outside)