"actually good"

Achiever is one of my top five strengths on the Clifton strength finder test (along with empathy, developer, discipline, and responsibility). It inspires me to do things at work like say to myself, "oh, that bulletin board hasn't been changed in a few years, let's offer to re-do it!" Yep. I wasn't told to, but there was this display that hadn't been changed in a number of years and it just needed a make-over.

My canvas:

I spent some time on Pintrest hunting for ideas. I got the main bit of inspiration from some great vintage travel posters. The board was about international missions and had had a map on it with push-pins on it where the international students had traveled from. That element had to be retained, so I spent time hunting down maps from the different continents and then listing out the countries.

Add some 3D art with some letters, panels, burlap, and a little word art,

and voila!

My favorite part of constructing this thing was when main boss man goes, as I'm showing him a panel, "that's actually good." Thanks.

a mess.

A mess. It's what I was by the end of the day today.

It all started at birthday lunch. Birthday lunch at work is a monthly event where we gather as a staff and go to a restaurant and main boss-man buys lunch for those who had birthdays that month. We tried a new restaurant today...SO good. After lunch a few of us wandered into a new vintage/local shop while wandering (I mean, purposefully striding) back to the office. This fun little shop had fabulous dresses. As that I am a sucker for a full skirt with a pretty neckline, I made a beeline for a polka dot number. And Daynes found, well, something she's been looking for for a while.

The leopard belt was only a bonus.

Pardon my inability to look at a camera in these pictures...there were a number of cell phone photos going on, and the dress didn't quite zip all the way up the side (I'd have to loose some ribs to get it to zip) so I was focusing on not showing my side (and with happened later, that is hilarious now).

We leave the store (without a purchase) and are heading back up to work. We're walking past a glass wall of a restaurant when a wind gust happens. And I mean GUST. Gust to the extent that my dress went flying up before I had a chance to catch it. And you know how when that happens, you can think, well maybe nothing was seen? Well, the aforementioned GLASS WALL let me see me and my underwear's reflection perfectly. In addition to my colleagues reactions who were unfortunantley behind me.

Carrying on, we happen across the King of Pops cart, and we all pick a pop. It was warm, but not to warm today, but this thing melted all over me. I'm getting back to the office with this thing melting down both arms, down my face, and all over my dress. My consolation in this is that Katherine didn't fare so well with hers either. But her outfit wasn't dark navy blue...

Come to the end of the day and you have me: cruising through the office with a large band-aid still across my head, drinking water out of one of those huge hospital mugs, and my dress covered in melted popsicle. A mess.

a smattering of stories.

This morning I was late to work because I had an acne cyst go bad. Real bad. I spent about 10 minutes running though my house hunting for neosporin before I gave up the search, stuck on a band-aid, and went into work. I fly up the stairs at work and am speed walking into my office when I run into all my coworkers sitting on a bench. They see the band-aid and start laughing. Between giggles one friend goes, "did you get on a treadmill this morning?" They know me well. :) Then I was referenced to the girls on the movie Clueless who apparently covered up blemishes with band-aids. Hah. Hah. And now I'm adding that to my rent list...

Preggo Katherine (the friend in the post below) is quite pregnant and food is always a good conversation. Today at lunch she was talking about food stories with someone else in the office (who has two children). The lady was talking about how one time when she was pregnant she went to cabinet after cabinet to fridge hunting for something to eat, before finally stopping and crying in the middle of her kitchen because she didn't know what she wanted. As others were laughing at this story, I gulped. Minus the crying, I exhibited the EXACT same behavior last night (btw, there is no chance of baby here). I too went between cabinet and fridge and pantry a few times before just standing and thinking in the middle of the kitchen (again, no crying) before settling on my best-food-friend (plain) greek yogurt. Yikes.

This is my friend Julie (and her two girls),

She is amazing. Great wife & mom. Very wise. And hilarious.

Case in point...last night at church this cutie,

her son, came up to me and said, "Ms. Diana, did you make the...cookies on the table with the different colored icings?" Me, "Yeah I did, why?" S. goes, "well would you please give my mom the recipe?" Me, "Does that mean you liked them?" S., "yeah!" (and subtle look back to mom).

Best food compliment ever. And funniest, when I realized that maybe his momma put him up to it. The answer was of course, yes. You think I could say no to that?

bumps

You don't know something till you try (Mostly. Somethings you do know without having to try, such as smoking kills and eating an entire gallon of ice cream isn't worth the gym time to make it up). I am continuing to try different types of photography and I've had the chance to do some maternity photos recently! I have two friends who got married at around the same time about a year ago, and both are going to be delivering their first babies around the same time too (soon!).

Try #1, Katherine and Mike!

Katherine and I were hired around the same time at our workplace, and I'm so thankful for that! She is great! She and her husband recently purchased a home (new job, marriage, new house, baby all in a year...one of her strengths is adaptability, to say the least) and I did some photos of them at their home to send a family. They are precious!

Try #2, Ashley and Tate!

Attempt #2 at photos came with my friends Ashley and Tate, who I worked with at the UGA Wesley Foundation. We met mid-afternoon at one of my favorite places in Athens (farm!) and I had SO much fun with them. I was looking at the photos again to select photos for this post and started laughing again.

These sweet new babies definitely have some great parents!

dragging.

I like mornings. But some mornings are tougher than others. Like today. I got up to go to the gym and I was dragging. I'm stumbling across the parking lot and another woman is getting out of her car at the same time. She steps out and goes, LOUDLY, "GOOD MORNING, fellow gym rat! Hahhahhahahahah! I call everyone who goes to the gym gym-rats!"

Did I mention how it was morning? How I was dragging?

I'm fairly certain I jumped when she started with "good morning!" And, this is bad. I didn't say anything. I kinda smiled (I think. It may have been more of a grimace.) I think I forced out a "ha." And went inside. Bleh.

5 in 4 days

I have gone to (the same) Publix 5 times in 4 days. 5! In 4 days!

Publix trip #1, on Friday to get dinner items ("smallest sirloin in the meat case", bag of spinach leaves, fresh green beans, and blue cheese). Publix trip #2, on Saturday, get items for spinach and artichoke dip in a bread boat (aka a baguette). Publix trip #3, on Saturday, go with a friend to get groceries. Publix trip #4, on Sunday, get items for another spinach and artichoke dip to make for church.

As I menu planned on Sunday night, I realized that I did not have 3 ingredients for the 2 meals I plan to eat off of all week (they are not particularly complex--[1]curried chick peas and [2] roasted broccoli and sweet potatoes). I didn't have any broccoli or sweet potatoes on hand (aka, no meal #2) so I resigned myself to going on Monday after work.

At work part of my job entitles being a "gopher" as I "go for" this and "go for" that at certain times, and as I was heading out the door to run some errands I ran into one of my boss ladies who was headed out too and I volunteered to run her errands. And one of them was to Publix. Haha, fab.

Another food related story...while I was making dip #2 this weekend I was vigorously shaking salt into the bowl. I say vigorously because I use kosher salt, which takes a wee bit of force to get it out of my salt shaker. As I was with one hand shaking salt into the bowl and with the other working on pulling apart the defrosting spinach (and where my gaze was at too) I all of a sudden feel myself covered in something. Something grainy.

The cap on the bottom of the salt shaker had come loose and salt was EVERYWHERE. On the stove behind me. All over the floor. All over the counter. In the KitchenAid bowl. Down my tank-top (and in my bra as I later discovered). One feature of kosher salt is that it is large, so I was able to fish out the bulk of the excess salt from the dip (and it didn't taste salty when done, whew). Raining salt...can cross that off the kitchen-malfunction experience list.

B.H.H.

B.H.H.

I'm suffering from it. It's a condition (I did just google it to be sure it wasn't a real-life, highly unfortunate condition. It's not. The closest hit I got was "Boston Harbor Hotel"which only reinforces my B.H.H.). What is B.H.H.?

Beach. Holiday. Hangover.

I had a brief holiday at the beach last weekend and goodness it was wonderful! I don't think there is ever enough beach time in my life. The first day at the beach (Hilton Head, FYI) Nutan asked me, "would you ever get tired of living here?" I'm glad she was driving, as my head whipped around to stare at her with a dropped jaw. "Have you met me," I replied. No. I love it. I love the ocean air, the atmosphere, the heat, the water, the sand, the seafood...oh gosh.

The recap!

Friday

We left Friday (not at 4:00 a.m. as the original plan, but more around 6:something). I woke up checking the weather. We left checking the weather. Storms from Irene were forecast for Friday but clear days on Saturday and Sunday were still predicted. We had an easy back-road drive (with some of the sketchiest sites I've ever seen) and arrived to overcast skies. We checked in early onto our hotel and then raced to a restaurant (grumpiness was fast coming). We went to Salty Dog Cafe and ate our way into a walking food coma (no regrets). We wandered around for a bit and the skies got darker and darker. It'd rain, then stop. Rain, then stop. Nutan and I were visiting a few stores and one of the teen shop girls shared her weather insight with us, "it's supposed to be like this all weekend." I shared with her the forecast we'd been obsessivley checking all week and she goes, "well, locals know the real deal" or something like that. Not appreciated. Nutan and I leave the shop and then it really pours. So we decide to go shopping at the outlets. After being equipped with new make-up and new running shoes (and walking through every store [rain, remember?]) we decide it's time for our next feeding, where we proceed to overeat on hush puppies and she crab soup (my second cup of the day).

See, dark clouds:

You're missing a picture where I'm soaked through. I had gotten a horrible case of the hiccups (the screetching kind) in Marc Jacobs, so I ran to the car to get water, and while in route it began to downpour. By the time I got back to the store, it had stopped. Bleh.

Saturday

We wake up to...BRIGHT SKIES! BLUE SKIES! The day began with a beach walk/jog, breakfast, and beach time. Beach-beach-beach time. Not too much water time because of some deadly rip currents. Then dinner. And more beach time. And ice cream. And then bed. Pretty tiresome...

Sunday

Even brighter skies! And hotter! Solo beach jog, breakfast, and beach time! No more rip-current warning, so water time! And, we found a .50 kite at Wal-Mart when we bought our chairs (necessary) that actually got off the ground. Said bye to the beach. Where we were had a changing area so we got changed into travel clothes, packed up, ate-up, and headed home.

My life needs more beach! But as I was driving home on Sunday I was so missing those I love in Athens! And that made coming home more than worth it.

Yay friend!