Oh, There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays...

There really is no place like home for the holidays. We had a whirlwind of a holiday week, and I wouldn't have changed a second of it! We arrived late on Saturday, and Sunday morning I met my girlies Sara, Giuly, and Cathy for our new tradition, Splash brunch.

The food was amazing, and the dessert... mmmmm

Following brunch I headed into the city for a C/D Heidelberg dinner. The Heidelberg is an old fashioned German restaurant, and for the Christmas season it is bedecked in authentic Teutonic decorations. Going to the restaurant during Christmas is a C/D tradition, and a great tradition it is! (C/D are the initials of James' family, which is my understanding should not be broadcast on the internet).

We all had a great time! The beer and conversation were flowing, and everyone was in great spirits!

Monday night we celebrated the second day of Chanukkah. Here is the beautiful Chanukkah table set by my mom:

Guy was in charge of the latkes, and did not disappoint! They were to die for!

The food was amazing, and we all had such a great time!

On Tuesday I went down to New Jersey, and met Michellie's Mia June Kelly for the first time:

Wednesday was Christmas Eve dinner, and here is the beautiful Christmas table set by James' mom:

And Thursday was Christmas!

I received the absolute most beautiful earrings and necklace from James!

A thank you smooch for Jimmy!

I can't believe this is already my fourth Christmas with James' family!

Friday my mom and I met Katie for lunch at the Hunt Club. We both agreed that if she wasn't in Hoboken and I wasn't in Houston, but instead we were both in Connecticut, we would eat lunch at the Hunt Clube, like, ALL the time.

After lunch we went Marley and Me (very cute, total tear-jerker!) and then went to meet the rest of the girls at the Wineknot.

Cath and I wanted to grab some sushi, and so ran over to Fin (the best sushi restaurant EVER). We also clearly had one too many glasses of wine...

And that was the week! PHEW!

Lights in the Heights

Since moving to the Heights we are always hearing about "Lights in the Heights." How it's the event of the year, and it's not to be missed. Well, last night we finally got to experience "Lights in the Heights" and it absolutely lived up to the hype!

Unfortunately, my pictures do not do the scene any justice. All of the houses were impeccably decorated to the nines, and lights were strewn along all the trees lining the streets. This is the best picture I have... Lights just do not photograph well (at least not for me).

Our neighbors threw an "ugly sweater" party, but I waited until the last minute to look for an ugly sweater, and of course couldn't find one. I did, however, find this adorable red vest at Target, and the Christmas hawaiian shirt that I found for James along with the red track jacket were plenty tacky for the two of us.

Our neighbors Pat, Alex, and Ryan went all out! LOVE the Christmas spirit!

James and our neighbor Matt bearing Christmas treats.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Xmas...

As Christmas is fast approaching, the house is finally all decked out for the holiday season!

And unbelievably enough, it actually SNOWED in Houston yesterday!

Our lovely tree lights up the whole house and makes it feel oh-so-cozy

And of course, here is Audie posing nicely in front of the tree:

Okay, I lied. He wasn't posing so much as getting in my way of taking pictures of the tree, but the pic above somehow ended up looking cute. This, however, is what the rest looked like:

Sunday Dinner

This weekend was about all things Christmas, and Sunday night dinner turned out to be no exception. James prepared spicy shrimp sauteed in oil, and butternnut sqash with brown sugar. Not only was it absolutely delicous, but the shrimp dish was also the right colors!

To make the spciy shrimp, just sautee the garlic, dried arbol (or other spicy) peppers, onion, and parsley in olive oil. Add shrimp, and put over pasta. And enjoy!

Bathrom Vanity

I am now on a mission to find the perfect double vanity for our master bath. We are looking for
the perfect mix of minimalist, but with lots of room for storage.

Winter Wonderland (sneak peak)

We haven't quiet finished decorating the house, so I will wait until that is done in order to post house pics. But as a sneak peak here are some pics of our little Winter Wonderland...

Thanksgiving

Once again, I haven't updated the blog in foreva eva... But here is our Thanksgiving!

We decided that since we are in the South we need to deepfry our turkey this year. Here is the turkey doing its thing in the deepfryer:

and.... yikes! It came out looking just a tad overdone.

Here is our Sal and Audie about to sit down for dinner (well, Sal is about to sit down for dinner, Audie is about to be repeatedly told "You know you're not allowed to beg at the table!")

My attempt at an "artistic" shot of our yummy food:

This picture came out kind of fuzzy, but it shows our delicious spread of turkey (which despite the charred skin tasted awesome), stuffing, greenbean casserole, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, and cornbread pudding

Antiquing

Today, James and I were putzing around the Heights looking for home ideas. We ended up at a wonderful little antique store, and although we didn't find anything to purchase, we had a lot of fun looking at junk, I mean... treasures.

This place had a thing for old Coca-Cola memorabilia

If coca-cola doesn't do it for you, maybe a rooster, or old suit-of-armor will?

"Gimme my camera back, I'm the one taking pictures here!"

I Love Fall

I get a kick out of this picture because it shows our lovely front door all nice and decorated for fall. James gets a kick out of this picture because Audie looks like he's melting.

Closet Window

For good measure, here is a picture of the kind of window that James thinks would look good in the closet. Muntons could lead to a happy medium..

Maybe adding muntons would be a nice happy medium between our two ideas...?

Glass Blocks

As soon as we bought the house we knew we wanted to turn the dead space in our bedroom into a big walk-in closet which leads into the master bathroom. As soon as we knew that we wanted to turn the dead space into a walk-in closet, I knew that I wanted glass blocks in the closet in order to keep the area from looking too dark and dingy. At first James didn't think the area needed light, and now thinks that a picture window is the way to go. But I am holding strong to the idea that glass blocks will make people line up for want of owning this house.

The picture below shows the area in question where the walk-in closet will go. The wall to the closet will start right in the middle of the wall on the left (where the not-so-straight black line is), and the doorway will be where the dresser and TV currently are. The double windows will be gone, and the lovely GLASS BLOCKS will go just under the ceiling line, and just over the clothes pole and shelf. LOVE IT??

Here is a picture showing how nice glass blocks can be:

And another one showing how much they add to curb appeal:


They also seem amazingly easy to install: http://www.accentbuildingproducts.com/pdf/glassblocks/preassembled-basement.pdf

And at under $300 are a virtual bargain!