Home for the Holidays

There is nothing more special than the holiday season with family.  

Here's a jumbled look at the end of December.

(The IT Department at work serenaded us with holiday jingles for 2 hours during lunch.  

What great guys:))

(I made and canned 36 pints of salsa for Christmas presents.  All from scratch.  

I hope Martha is proud!)

(After a 12 hour midnight drive down to Arkansas I greeted by my lovely parents, a comfy bed, yummy mexican food, and the best home cook meal I had had in awhile.  

Wild rice with roasted duck and cheesy kale casserole, all made by my wonderful cook of a father!)

(Visiting the Haines Family in Mt. Ida for gift exchange!)

   

(My mother's awesome Christmas decorations, I love our house at Christmas.)

(Me and my lovely seester going trendy with our Oxblood pedicures.)

If any of yall are familiar with my family, you know that we have no such thing as a "traditional Christmas Eve dinner".  In recent years we've had Cajun Christmas with crawfish etoufee and blackened catfish, Surf n' Turf with generous steaks, crab legs, and crab cakes, and Italian.  This year we went with a South of the Border theme and had fajitas. 

(My contribution: Guacamole.  Secret ingredient: Cream Cheese.

Recipe curtsey of the Haines Family.)

(I headed to Arkansas for the Holiday's expecting a warm winter; well, warm compared to my new Wisconsin standards anyways.  This is what met our doorstep on Christmas.  Not to mention a pretty much state wide power outage. Nothing like playing pioneer on Christmas!)

(When it's freezing cold at night and everyone else has their honey bunny to snuggle with except you, you adjust.  I invited Scout to sleep with me, thinking he would keep me warm.  He wasn't the best bed partner but as my dad said "you can't blame him, it was his first time!" 

Oh. Dad.)

(Despite the crummy weather we got to mark a huge task of the wedding agenda for my sister.  

She said yes to the dress!

She found her wedding dress at the same dress shop in 

Brinkley, AR that my mother found her dress at 35 years earlier.)

(Not only is my father a great cook, but my sister is too!)

(So obviously my family is obsessed with food.  Which is totally okay with me.  In addition to 6 new cookbooks I also got a KITCHEN AID STAND MIXER!  If you can't tell I'm really excited:))

(One of the longstanding traditions of family get togethers on my mother's side is to play Michigan Rummy.  It's one of my most favorite things to do when we all get together!)

(I miss all the odd interesting things that go on at my house.  

My dad's mussel collection; A Pig's Toe, Deer Toe, and Cow's Toe.  We're not nerdy or anything.)

(Celebrating my Papaw's 80th birthday!!!)

(Me and my dad made a honey baked ham!)

(Scout being a good bird dog and watching the sky for ducks!)

(My new Tory Burch lunch box!  I feel so fetch:))

(If yall didn't know, I have the best boyfriend ever.)

(Further proof that Wes is the best boyfriend ever.)

More pictures and posts later!

Until next time...

Party Down in H-Town

There's nothing I love more than visiting friends.  I'm lucky enough to have some great ones that will drive 2+ hours to see me for a couple of days before a work conference.  Love em to death!

After leaving a brisk 40 degree Milwaukee, I landed in a balmy 84 degree Houston, TX on Friday night.  Haley was nice enough to let us all crash in her town home and we rallied the troops for a late dinner.  (Naturally my first stop in Texas would be for queso.)  I told Haley it would be great to go somewhere "kind of quiet, where we could all talk and catch up."  

Little did we know what we were getting ourselves into...

(The gang's all here!  My favorite people in Texas!!)

(Kathryn, myself, and Brooke at dinner.  Notice how dark it is in the background?  Yeah, that's because it happened to be salsa night at Gloria's and all the lights were out with laser strobe lights on.  So much for a quiet dinner:))

(After dinner we headed a couple of blocks down to Celtic Garden in Midtown.

 Love hanging out with my guuurls.)

After a long night out, we headed to Tacos A Go-Go for some much needed breakfast.  

It's amazing how much you can laugh when you're with true friends.  

I literally don't think I stopped laughing the entire day.

(Saturday night we headed to Lights in the Heights for a good dose of Christmas lights and carolers.)

(Sunday morning we had the most amazing brunch at Benjy's.  

Nothing like crab cake eggs benedict!)

(Actually, there's nothing like a refreshing blood orange mimosa.  Those things were so good!)

(The rest of the week in Houston I spent at a Values and Practices workshop for Cooper Eaton.  The acquisition went through about three weeks ago so we're still in the transition stages of finding everything out.  We had a power outage at the Tech Center one morning so they passed out some unreleased products.  Someone's getting a Mighty Light for Christmas!)

(Wes and I took a late flight on Friday to get back into Milwaukee in time for the Young Professional's Holiday Gala at the MAC.  It was quite the swanky event and I loved getting to catch up with my MKE friends who I hadn't seen in ever and a half.)

(That's Wes.  The love of my life.  In Santa suspenders and a candy cane bow tie.  Gotta love him.)

(Saturday night Wes and I headed to Natalie and Meg's Tacky Sweater Party.)

(This picture perfectly captures Sarah's awesome earrings.  They were christmas lights that flashed.  Totally awesome.)

(My sister couldn't put up a real tree this year so she attached this little cutie to the wall.  

That is some Christmas Spirit!)

(Tonight we had breakfast for dinner.  I decided to make some bisquick biscuits and jazzed them up with a little heart shaped cookie cutter instead of the traditional circle.  

Don't they look twice as good shaped like a heart?!)

In 5 days my family is reunited!! I'm so excited!!

Family Visit Round Two

My Aunt Beverly and Uncle Kenny, and their two good friends Pete and Connie came up this past Thursday for the Packers vs. Vikings game.  Pete is a big time Packers fan so I had to bust out all the stops!

(First stop of the night, The Milwaukee Brat House.  This cheesy monster was mighty good!

There's nothing more Milwaukee-ian than brats and beer!)

(The next day the gang went to tour the Harley Museum while I was at training.  I met them up at lunch time in the Motor Bar for some of their delicious macaroni and cheese.)

(Saturday morning we headed to the Lakefront Brewery bright and early at 10:30am for our tour!)

(Me and Beverly; up and drinking bright and early!)

(The gang in front of the Lakefront Brewery Mug!)

(Beverly and Pete were selected to be the Laverne and Shirley of our tour group!)

Sunday morning we got up bright and early to start our trek to Green Bay.  

There's nothing like tailgating before noon!

(Here's Pete the Green Bay Wigwom.  He said in the car on the way up to Green Bay

"I haven't been this excited since I saw a girl naked for the first time, and that's when I was 12.  

I was nervous I was excited, I didn't know what the hell to do."

Definitely the funniest quote of the weekend.)

(Pete, myself, and UK at Kroll's West in Green Bay.  

Waiting in line to get our cheese curds, brats, and beer!)

(Some avid Packers fans and their awesome cheese hats!)

(Uncle Kenny and I at Kroll's West!)

(Our sweet ride up to the game...

Not.

Nothing classier than a Ford F350 stretch truck limo thing.)

(Game time!)

(Love them!! So glad that got to visit!!!)

And now, the best picture of the weekend...

(If any of you know my Uncle Kenny, you know that this picture is amazingly awesome. 

It also further proves my thoughts that I can get him to anything for me, even hold my pom poms.)