Christmas in Chicago!

Merry Christmas!! Tom and I had a very peaceful, relaxing Christmas day here in cold, snowy Chicago! We spent Christmas Eve watching two of my favorite Christmas movies, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and Bad Santa. Bailey even cuddled with me for a little while...I guess that was her Christmas present to me ;)

Christmas Day we enjoyed coffee and a breakfast casserole while watching the Yule Log On Demand and looking outside at the snow covered trees and street.

We didn't get each other a lot of presents this year, but the ones that we did get were useful/cost efficient and special. Tom's present from me in the foreground ;)


And of course, Bailey loved opening her presents from us and Aunt Jackie.


Here is a video of her opening her treats from Aunt Jackie.

For dinner we had a marvelous turkey complete with homemade gravy that I made from the pan drippings at Thanksgiving. We had a few sides, but kept it relatively simple. It was so delicious. I hope everyone else had a marvelous Christmas too! Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Merry Christmas Eve

Today we went for a long walk over to a nearby park and Bailey had a BLAST running the Basenji 500 in the snow!

Merry Christmas Eve!

Happy Holiday Weekend!

We had a fantastic holiday weekend! Friday after work we enjoyed a quick drink at a bar right across from where I work. It was all cozy and decorated for Christmas and a perfect way to kick off our Holiday Weekend. Saturday our friends Anne & Brian drove down from Milwaukee and our friend Kedar drove down from the northern suburbs to meet us and spend a fun day in the city.Of course all of the things we decided to do were outside and I'm not sure if it hit 20 degrees all day. We went to the Christkindlemarket in Daley Plaza. The cold weather did not seem to hinder anyone else's plans either because the place was packed!There was a variety of german food, Christmas ornaments, and of course, hot spiced wine served in a boot mug!!The wine was so hot, but after about 5 minutes the boot was too cold to put to your lips! We enjoyed some brats and stuffed bread and then made our way to the "warming tent" (which was also overcrowded) to try to warm up a bit. We had some time to kill before our next Christmasy event so we walked a few blocks to the giant Macy's for some warmth and holiday spirit (and a bathroom break). There were so many decorations and it was so cozy inside!Then we drove to the Lincoln Park Zoo to see the zoolights! They put up all these lights all over the zoo...it was so pretty! But soooo cold!! We defrosted at Lou Malnati's with some classic Chicago style deep dish pizza. Sunday Tom and I ran a few errands, watched the Eagles game (what a game!), and baked some cookies for his lab. We made Mom's No Bake Cookies, Luscious Lemon Bars, Peanut Butter Cup Cookies, and Sweet & Salty Christmas Wafers.

I wish weekends like this could last forever!

Hmmmmm, what to say....

So I really don't like to talk much about work on here, for several reasons, but I started my new job this week and I have to say I am exhausted! The first two days were general hospital orientation that is similar wherever you go, so that was pretty monotonous. Then I met a woman who gave me the biggest pile of orientation information I've ever seen in my life. I have to meet with various people (who I don't know), observe with various people (who I don't know), attend lectures with various people (who I don't know), and get people to sign off on stuff they observe me do. And I have to complete it all in 3 months and set most of it up myself.

Not that I'm complaining. I'm not, I'm just voicing that I'm feeling slightly overwhelmed at the moment. I know at the end of the 3 months I'm going to have learned SO MUCH and will be a much better clinician from it. When I'm up and running in a few months I think it's going to be really great. So don't be surprised if you don't see as many blog updates in the next few months. I'll try to be on top of it but I also want to be on top of my sanity :)

7 Weeks Flew By

Today is my last (week)day off before I start working again. I can't believe how fast the past 7 weeks have flown by! I guess when you add a Public Defense, a move across the country, looking for a job, and getting settled in a new state your time gets filled up pretty fast! In retrospect, I'm really happy that I had that much time off, I think I really needed it. I feel refreshed and reenergized and ready to start working (and making some money) again!

So aside from all of the things listed above, there were a few other things I have been able to check off my "To Do" list....some of which have been on there for quite some time! I was able to cross off 8 of my 10 goals:

1. Iron enough work clothes to last me through the rest of the year...all 3 weeks of it ;)
2. Read MOST of my magazines that have been building up
3. Organize my coupons - shouldn't be hard, since I haven't been getting them in the Sunday paper >:0
4. Change our car tags
5. Change my drivers license
6. Change our insurance
7. Finish painting our small, side coffee table for our new "sitting area" in the living room
8. Write and mail Christmas cards
9. Take huge pile of stuff in kitchen corner to Good Will
10. Take suit and cute holiday shirt to the dry cleaners
    

Also, I finally organized all of my recipes! Well, all of the recipes that I had ripped out of magazines or printed out or photocopied at some point in the past 5 years. I organized them into genre, and then put them all in page protectors (101 to be exact), and into a 3 ring binder. I am so excited that they are organized and I will be able to easily find what I'm looking for! I just have to keep it up now when I find new recipes. (Well, they are almost organized. I threw away a TON of dividers when I was cleaning stuff out when we moved, and now I am kicking myself). And remember almost 4 years ago when I ran the Disney Marathon? Well, we bought this Christmas ornament to always remember the event (as if I'd ever forget) and every year I have been meaning to get a picture off one of the hard drives, load it onto a USB drive, take it in to a store to print it out, come home, and put it in this frame. And I finally did it :) My mom gave me a "#1 Pet" oranment that is a picture frame as well, but the picture I printed of Bailey was too big to fit in the little frame. I've only had that frame for a year though, so according to my plan I still have 3 more years to print out a picture for it :)

It's December alright!

I was looking back through old posts on my blog this weekend and I came across this post, from three years ago. I can assure you that is not the case in Chicago! We got our first snow late Friday night. It was anywhere between 3-5 inches. Enough to cover everything and be beautiful and remind me of how much I missed snow! Enough to make it annoying to wipe off the car and get all slushy/dirty gross and remind me how much I didn't miss snow ;) Bailey thoroughly enjoyed it. The video below is from this morning, so she's not quite as energetic as she was yesterday when she saw it for the first time. Tom said she went CRAZY! Eating it, licking it, running in it, sliding in it, and digging in it.

Friday night Tom put together our chairs that we ordered to complete our living room. We made a little sitting area with two chairs that I found on the super cheap at Target.com and a table that I re-painted (and sanded, and primed, and painted, and polyurethaned). I love it!Saturday we got our Christmas tree, but we couldn't decorate it until Sunday because it was covered in snow and we wanted to make sure it all melted off the tree before we plugged in the lights! Bailey took this opportunity to curl up on the tree skirt thinking it was her new sitting area ;)

Namaste

So, back in September and October, before I hurt my back, I was really getting bored with my exercise routine. I pretty much stopped doing my core stabilization exercises (paid for that one big time) and I was down to running like once or twice a week....and for 20 minutes at the MOST. The gym was boring, outside was boring, the treadmill in our PT gym at the hospital was boring. I needed a change, but I just couldn't motivate myself to figure out what I needed.

Then I hurt my back and I was unable to exercise, let alone remain upright for more than an hour or so, for a while. Since the move I've started to run once a week, but not very far or long, obviously, since I have no endurance built up.

I've been saying that I wanted to try yoga for a while now, but could never make it to the classes at the gym with my work schedule. When we got our cable set up I was flipping through the channels and I found an Exercise TV channel. I think it's called FitTV. They have various exercise programs on all day, including yoga twice a day. I did one of the sessions, and then found more yoga On Demand. I've been doing it a few times a week and I really enjoy it! It's so hard, because I'm so inflexible, and I've gotten tighter as I've gotten older. Especially my postural muscles, so it's felt good to challenge my body in a way other than cardiovascularly.

Sometimes Bailey tries to do yoga with me and other times she passes out on the couch...I think the soothing voice and music puts her to sleep. I'd much rather have her sleeping on the couch than trying to participate, because it's hard to maintain Downward Facing Dog when your own dog is licking your arms and trying to walk underneath you!