New Year’s Survey: AK

January 1, 2010 by

1. What did you do in 2009 that you’d never done before? This year was a whirlwind of good and bad.  Things I’ve never done:  Learned that our baby loves to sleep to white noise!  SUCCESS!  I telecommuted for my job and mommy’d at the same time.  I became unemployed.  I started a business with my husband.  I started this blog with my friends!  I learned to go with the flow more.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I didn’t make any last year, probably due to the fact that I was in a daze from no sleep because I had a 3 month old at the time.  I am making resolutions this year!  I want to go into this new year, new decade with a plan and hope and faith!

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? Yes, one of my good friends gave birth to a bouncing baby girl in October!

4. Did anyone close to you die? No.

5. What countries did you visit? None, no trips this year…boooooo! Oh how I miss you Mexico!

6. What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009? A vacation!

7. What dates from 2009 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? October 2:  My baby’s first birthday!!

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? I would definitely say starting a business with my husband.  I think its been a long time dream of ours but I guess sometimes it takes a push to move in that direction.  I would also say getting all my tipsy girls together and starting this blog–its been a blast!

9. What was your biggest failure? This is probably a really bad question to ask me because I could dwell on this for days.  I mean hindsight is 20/20 right?  But you make the decisions you make based on the information you have at the time…  So I guess having said all that I’ll just say my biggest failure and probably my biggest failure in years past and most likely in years to come is just worrying too much.  Worry and Stress can just stop you in your tracks.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? I guess I was sick more this year than I’ve been in a while.  I’d attribute it to stress.

11. What was the best thing you bought? For Father’s Day I had a chef come to our house and teach my husband how to cook an authentic French meal.  He was completely surprised, thrilled and blown away.  Totally worth it!

12. Whose behavior merited celebration? My son’s!  When we went somewhere in public expecting a complete meltdown he came through with the best behavior ever!  He constantly surprised us this year!

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? No comment.

14. Where did most of your money go? Thankfully our savings account, I mean beside the typical bills and fun purchases.

15. What did you get really excited about? When I ask my bouncing baby boy if I could have a kiss and him giving me one.  You can’t believe how much I love that!!

16. What song will always remind you of 2009? Usually I can remember a year by a song that was played over and over and over again…like 1993 What’s Up by 4 Non Blondes. hahaha  Anyway, I’d say this year  is probably Just Dance or Poker Face by Lady Gaga….I mean who on this Earth didn’t hear either of those songs this year??  I also agree with Sarah on Love Story by Taylor Swift.  OH WAIT, how could I possibly forget PARTY IN THE USA by Miley Cyrus!  So damnation, I don’t know–all of those remind me of 2009.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you: a)happier or sadder? b) thinner or fatter? c)richer or poorer? a) happier b) thinner for sure (I was preggers in 2008) c) Is this a financial question?  or a personal growth question?  I need some clarification 🙂

18. What do you wish you’d done more of? Worked out more.  Don’t get me wrong, I regularly worked out but I would love to get into a routine of working out at least 4 days a week.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of? Worry/Stress

20. How did you spend Christmas? Christmas Eve Eve was Mexican food with my husband’s dad.  Christmas Eve was Paella with my husband’s mom.  Christmas Day was with my family.  We always have a Sausage Egg Casserole and Apricot Bread for breakfast and Turkey dinner for dinner.  We played washers this year and I got my butt served on a platter…I think we should bring back lasso golf next year.

21. Did you fall in love in 2009? I guess this is pretty cliche but I fell more and more in love with my little family.  Watching our baby boy grow this year has been amazing!  And watching my husband as a dad has been sweeter than I ever thought.

22. What was your favorite TV program? I would say hands down this was the best season of Lost since Season 1 but Glee came in a close second.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year? nope

24. What was the best book you read? Lots of “get baby to sleep” books were read at the beginning of 2009 but I did finally start Twilight at the end of 2009 and though I’m not done with it yet, I’d say its pretty durn good.

25. What was your greatest musical discovery? It’s probably a tie between Lee Ann Womack’s Call Me Crazy or Miranda Lambert’s Revolution–both fantastic albums.

26. What did you want and get? A baby that sleeps through the night!

27. What did you want and not get? a Skybar Wine System hahahaha yeah right like I’d get that…I haven’t a clue where I’d put that in my house.  It is pretty amazing though. Just the idea of it…

28. What was your favorite film of this year? I know I said in a previous post that I didn’t get to as many movies as I normally do, but I would say I have a 3-way tie for favorite film this year:  The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Gran Torino, Slumdog Millionaire

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? This year I turned 34.  That seems so so super old.  I feel sorta like jonniker about 34…I wanna stay 32–that seems a good number.  But I did have a super fun time on my birthday which as of the last few years has been a dual birthday celebration with Court, my other tipsy girl.  In 2009 we partied it up with some Benihana and Karoake.  Dude, SO. MUCH. FUN.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? You know…no regrets, what ifs, no woulda shoulda couldas.  I’m a firm believer that everything happens for a reason so I think the year was exactly as it should have been.

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2009? cardigans BABY!

32. What kept you sane? My wonderful hubby who is so good at listening to me rant and rave and whine and tell the same story over and over and over again or start a story and never finish it and everything else and still loves me just the same.  My friends run a close 2nd..specifically girl’s night 🙂

33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Fancy?  I’ll just say Ellen DeGeneres made my kid dance a lot this year which made me smile a ton and she made me laugh a lot midday when I was about to go insane from said kid who was teetering on pre-naptime hysteria.

34. What political issue stirred you the most? I’m with Sarah in that I don’t really like to talk politics.  I’ll stay out of this one.

35. Who did you miss? I guess I’d just say my friends…I didn’t see everybody as much as I would have liked this year.  Oh parenthood….

36. Who was the best new person you met? I would definitely say our nanny/babysitter.  She has saved our sanity many times this year.  Thank you!! You are the bomb!!

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2009. God never gives you more than you can handle.  I learned this about 6 years ago but I guess He thought I needed reminding.

38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year. I could post this whole song but this section gives you the gist:

And today you know that’s good enough for me

Breathing in and out’s a blessing, can’t you see?

Today is the first day of the rest of my life

And I’m alive and well, God, I’m alive and well

–I’m Alive/Willie Nelson

Filed Under: ak, tipsy

New Year’s Resolutions: AK Edition

December 31, 2009 by

I never make New Year’s Resolutions. Ever.  But I thought, you know, we are going into this year a little different than any year before and I thought, why not.  I think it’ll be fun to look back and see if I could pull any of this off in a year.  So here goes:

ak-resolutions

  1. Try and take a walk with the kiddo every day if weather allows.
  2. Learn to sew, like for real with my new Christmas gift.  My ultimate goal:  a baby clothes memory quilt.
  3. Implement some sort of regularly occurring date night that went to shit when we had our bouncing baby boy.
  4. Get back into going to more movies SOMEHOW, SOMEWAY!  My mom and I used to go to a movie every Sunday pre-bebe and pre-2009.  I need my theater watching experience por favor.
  5. Organize!  Organize the junk drawer in the kitchen, organize the closets in the extra bedroom and finally organize my closet (trying on clothes and seeing what actually fits and doesn’t). (and just FYI that’s not my closet, you don’t want to see it)
  6. Read more and when I say more, like maybe a whole book.  Magazines don’t count.  Google Reader doesn’t count.  I may even go so far as to go for 10 books in 2010.
Filed Under: ak, books, exercise, movies, resolutions Tagged With: , , ,

Year In Review: Music

December 30, 2009 by

I’m an avid iTunes-er (I just made up a word, oh yes I did).  So I thought I’d take a walk down memory lane from the year 2009 and share with you what I feel have been my-top-listened-to songs via the iPod.  Yes it will be heavily COUNTRY–cut me some slack..I live in Texas, I grew up with parents that listened to country, and I’m a sucker for a story telling song. I also like me some pop every now and then because like I’ve said in other posts, we like to dance around here.  Do we dance well? No.

  1. Lee Ann Womack, Solitary Thinkin’-I love a blues-y Lee Ann Womack and my son smiles when this song comes on.
  2. Lady Antebellum, Need You Now-This song just got stuck in my head when I heard it, that’s when I know I need to buy it.
  3. Kelly Clarkson, My Life Would Suck Without You-This one’s for you J.Wo!
  4. Miranda Lambert, The House that Built Me-LOVE her voice in this song, LOVE the story.  Miranda kills it on this one.
  5. Lady Gaga, Just Dance-This is thanks to The Ellen DeGeneres Show, can’t stop jamming.
  6. Willie Nelson, I’m Alive-I know Kenny Chesney has his own version of this but I think it changes meaning when Willie sings it.  Gotta love Willie Nelson.
  7. Kenny Chesney, Way Down Here-Sad and hopeful song, I’ve listened to it a million times.
  8. Dierks Bentley, Pray-I love me a slow Dierks Bentley song.  Really great song.
  9. Taylor Swift, Love Story-Man-o-man I wasn’t really a Taylor Swift fan and then I heard this about eleventy billion times and I started liking it and then next thing you know I bought the son of a gun.
  10. Miley Cyrus, Party in the U.S.A.-my son dances to this, alot.  So does his mama.  So does Der.
Filed Under: ak, music Tagged With: ,

Year In Review: How We Survived a Full Year of Baby

December 29, 2009 by

These items have helped my husband and I survive this year.  So I guess this is a Year in Review/Survival Guide.  These items have helped us through months 3 through 14 of bouncing baby boy.  I know all kiddos are different but maybe one of these items may help you make it out alive.

  1. Dex Baby Sound Sleeper, Amazon-Womb setting on mid volume anytime, anywhere combined with #7 will induce slumber like no other combo.  It may or may not induce slumber minus #7 in mama & dad, just saying.
  2. Sophie the Giraffe Teether, Amazon-This little dude is called George in our casa.  George is excellent for all things teething.  As our little one has gotten older different parts of George work better–currently he’s working on George’s leg.
  3. Itzbeen Baby Care Timer, Amazon-Months 1-3 this was the BOMB for tracking feedings and sleeping and everything.  Months 4 and beyond we’ve mainly used this gem for tracking any sort of medicine or Tylenol when he’s teething.
  4. Night Night Baby Sleeper, Hanna Andersson-These PJs are awesome.
  5. Animal Ears Hat, The June Bride Etsy Shop-I’ve posted on these before.  We currently have a navy, orange, turquoise, and brown we have been rotating this winter.  They are super cute, stay on and my little munchin doesn’t rip them off his head.
  6. Bright Starts Around We Go Activity Center, Amazon-This thing is sort of an exersaucer-ish type of thing except the baby can actually move from one activity to another.  The seat can come off and can be used as an activity table.  At 14 months we are still going strong with the piano part of this thing sans the seat–what can I say, we like to dance around here.
  7. Soothie Pacifier, Amazon-This was the only pacifier my son would take.  And I think my husband and I high fived each other for days when in the middle of the night we’d watch our son on the video monitor find it on his own and put himself back to sleep.
  8. Baby Bjorn Babysitter Balance, Amazon-We used a different bouncer very early on, but this one has been great from about 5 months til present.  I think we are getting to our weight limit on it, but we still use this in the mornings when preparing breakfast and needed to keep the speed demon in place.  He still hasn’t figured out how to get out of it, he just happily bounces!
  9. Nuby Sippy Cups, Amazon-THE sippy cup.  We have searched high and low for a sippy cup that my son will drink out of and this seems to be the big winner!
  10. Nesting Blocks, Amazon-I ordered some nesting blocks like this before the little bebe was born.  BEST. PURCHASE. EVER.  Our little dude still loves to play with these and he never tires of them.

Oh and if all other toys FAIL?  Give em one of these…talk about endless fun, endless fascination.  I don’t get it.

year in review-baby part 2

Filed Under: ak, baby gear Tagged With: , ,

BAM! Gifted*

December 28, 2009 by

I thought I would share with all of you some of the presents my little family procured on Jesus’ Birthday.  I’ll let you guess who got what.  We are all absolutely in love with our presents but only one of us (my son, Jack) goes and kisses their present (the monkey) multiple times a day.

  1. Little Tykes Smart Trike, Amazon
  2. Silly Monkey, My Pillow Pets
  3. Rick Bayless’ Mexican Everyday, Amazon
  4. Apple Gift Card, Apple.com
  5. Brother Sewing Machine, Amazon

What did yall get?

*That’s a little modified “The Office” humor for my husband because I like to make him laugh

Filed Under: ak, books, boys, gadgets, holiday Tagged With: , ,

Slap One of These On Your Wrists for NYE (Not Handcuffs)

December 28, 2009 by

Snazz up your NYE outfit with one of these numbers.  I mean if you are gonna go for EXCESS, by all means.  NYE is the day to wear something you don’t normally wear and feel fabulous in it.  So if you normally wear subdued jewelry then go for extravagant!!

  1. After-the-Rain Bracelet, Anthropologie
  2. Natasha Accessories Crystal Coil Bracelet, Dillards
  3. Natasha Accessories Silk-Bow Bangle Bracelet, Dillards
  4. Expandable Jewel Bracelet, Forever 21
  5. Serling Collection 3-Strand Coral Bracelet, Dillards
  6. Pave Ball Stretch Bracelet, Ann Taylor
  7. Hollywood Intuition Frost Bracelet-Rhinestone/Gold, Target
Filed Under: ak, jewelry Tagged With: , , , ,

Season’s Greetings, Love Tipsy Society

December 25, 2009 by

A Very Merry Christmas from the Tipsy Girls and their men 🙂  Photos taken at our 1st Annual Wine/Beer Tasting/Competition Christmas Party.

ak-merry christmas men

(We told the guys not to look too excited)

Filed Under: holiday, tipsy

It’s a Christmas Floral Extravaganza!

December 24, 2009 by

Do you guys set your table for Christmas dinner all nice and fancy?  Do you have a centerpiece of some sort?  I love all these selections and if you are crafty you could do them yourself for sure.  My absolute fav and would totally try is the carnation snowman.  Merry Christmas Ya’ll!

  1. Holiday Bliss Bouquet, FTD
  2. Carnation Snowman, Style Me Pretty
  3. Rosehip Arrangement, Martha Stewart
  4. Martha Stewart Holiday Party Bouquet, 1800Flowers.com
  5. Martha Stewart White Rose and Berry Bouquet, 1800Flowers.com
  6. Candy and Red Tulip Bouquet, Martha Stewart
Filed Under: ak, flowers, holiday Tagged With: , , ,

My Top 10 Christmas Songs Currently in Rotation

December 23, 2009 by

  1. Please Come Home for Christmas, Harry Connick, Jr.
  2. A Baby Changes Everything, Faith Hill
  3. Christmas Must Be Something More, Taylor Swift
  4. Grown-Up Christmas List, Michael Buble
  5. O’ Come All Ye Faithful, Luther Vandross
  6. The Season for Romance, Lee Ann Womack
  7. Merry Christmas Strait to You, George Strait
  8. Christmastime Is Here, Vince Guaraldi Trio (Charlie Brown Christmas)
  9. The Chipmunk Song (Christmas Don’t Be Late), The Chipmunks
  10. My Only Wish (This Year), Britney Spears
Filed Under: ak, holiday Tagged With:

My Favorite Gift Guides This Year!

December 21, 2009 by

For those stragglers out there still stumped by someone on their list or because you are a MAY-JA procrastinator here are my favorite gift guides out there.  Of course aside from mine and Der’s and Sarah’s and Courtney’s and Courtney’s son’s and my husband’s advice for wannabe chefs, geeks and golfers (not Tiger).

Filed Under: ak, gifts, holiday Tagged With: