Countdown!

• Two weeks until I am on the beaches of Mexico!

• One week until I am HOME!

Done!!

I'm done with my second quarter at FIDM!! I thought I'd never see the day! My classmates and I agree that this quarter was so much worse than our first quarter. All the lackluster was gone and we just didn't enjoy it. Hopefully our third (and final) quarter will be better!

I'm looking forward to enjoying lazy days for the next two weeks! I'll have a little bit of work mixed in, but I'm excited to be a bum again!

My Christmas Tree Experience

I bought a Christmas tree for our apartment right after Thanksgiving. I didn't realize how funny the story behind it was until I was telling my mom today.

I went to Target after work to get the tree. I was all dolled up and in my work clothes, which I didn’t think would be that big of a deal. I found the tree I wanted (for more than 50% off!!) and found a guy to help me get it down from the shelf. After he got it down, he asked me if I wanted him to carry it to customer service for me while I continued shopping. I had no shopping left to do so I put the tree in my cart and wheeled up to the checkout. The lady at checkout asked if I needed help with it. I said, “no, I was fine.” At the end of the checkout she doubled checked and asked if I wanted someone to carry the tree out to my car for me. I said, “no, I live just a few blocks away, I’m just going to carry it.” (I must have looked incompetent or something.) This tree is a 6-foot tall tree all boxed up. It wasn’t that huge of a box or that heavy.....until I tried carrying it home. So here I am (remember, all dolled up and in my nice Michael Kors work clothes) carrying a Christmas tree home on the streets of LA. It got to be pretty heavy and awkward by the time I made it home. I’m sure it was quite the sight!

Anyway, I have a pretty tree in my apartment waiting for me to get brave enough to go back to Target and get ornaments.

My Uncle Bill carves and paints Santas! I love them! (One in my mom's that I may "forget" to bring home when I go home for Christmas.)

Bar Method

My manager at work goes to a bar method workout class at a bar method studio and swears by it. I decided to look into this and the closest studio is by where I work, which is a ways away from my apartment. Instead, I decided to order the DVDs and starter kit. It’s no joke!! My goodness! It’s not as bad as Insanity, but my muscles were literally shaking!! I’m going to give this a whirl and see how it works. As absolutely terrible as it was, I loved Insanity and noticed results, so I’m hoping I love this as well!

http://www.barmethod.com/

Thanksgiving in Woodland Hills

I spent my first Thanksgiving away from home with Uncle Bill and Dana at their home in Woodland Hills. It was more than I could ask for! The first Thanksgiving away from home is always going to be hard, but this was totally great!!

On Wednesday we went to “Life of Pi.” Great movie!! I hadn’t read the book, but it’s definitely on my list now. We went out for sushi Wednesday night…I’m a fan!

On Thursday Dana cooked for a large army, I swear! It was only the three of us but we had SO MUCH food!! So much!! She prepared all of the tradition dishes and everything was absolutely wonderful. Everything!! I got sent home with some great leftovers, too! J Dana and I {literally} waddled to the new Twilight movie. I loved it! By far the best of the 4.

I’m really really really going to miss them when they move L It’s been so great being so close and being able to spend time with them!

Leftovers I got sent home with. This isn't even all of the dishes she prepared, either!

Bad Luck Streak

I've had terrible luck with shoes lately!!! I had literally worn my new MK heels 4 times and I was at work and the heel broke!! I've never ever had a heel break on a shoe before! Yesterday I was wearing my MK Aria flats with studs and a stud fell off. Not near as tragic as a broken heel, but still! I don't wear those flats anywhere but work and I've had them for no more than two weeks! Best part, though, is that since they were MK shoes I could just damage both pairs out for new pairs! :-) {{I don't want to give MK shoes a bad name...I've never had any problems with any other MK shoes nor have my co-workers. It's just that my luck has been absolutely terrible lately!!}}

My second, and much more devastating, round of bad luck also happened at work. I swear that place is out to get me! We were having a super slow day at work last Tuesday afternoon/evening so I was texting a client when another client walked in. I simply left my phone on the counter by the cash wrap (we all do it, and it was surrounded by binders we were working on so it wasn't sticking out all by itself) to help the client with jewelry in the front of the store. A few minutes later another client walked in and headed to the watches, which are in the back of the store by the cash wrap. He was around my age and by himself...my first thoughts were that he was shopping for his girlfriend. He hovered by the watches for no more than two minutes and I was just finishing up with my first client and about to head to him when he walked out and said he'd be right back (1. famous last words 2. he was on his phone so I didn't think twice). A few minutes later after both clients are gone, I go back to do whatever and notice my phone isn't where I thought I put it. I look around a little bit and finally decide to call it so I could hear it vibrate. It went straight to voicemail. My manager watched the tape and the guy who was looking at watches stole it!!! Just grabbed it and walked out!!! It was my brand new iPhone 5 that I had had for literally 3 days!! Ughhhhh!

Let's hope my luck at work turns around!!