Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving spent with family and/or friends!

I was very blessed to have my parents visit me for Thanksgiving this year in Chicago! They arrived on Thursday afternoon, and I was able to pick them up at Midway Airport in a ZipCar. (Note to self, ZipCars DO get booked up around the holidays. I had to take the train into downtown Chicago, pick up the car, drive back up to my apt to load the car, and then drive through downtown back to Midway!!).
After I had picked up my parents, we then drove out to Plainfield to spend Thanksgiving night with my cousin Tim, his wife Evie, and a mixture of family/friends. We had a slight detour in the cornfields, but we finally arrived, unpacked, and headed downstairs to the Newman Bar!
Evie put on quite a spread for Thanksgiving dinner - so fabulous. My small contribution was Fried Green Beans - if you want the recipe, let me know!
The evening finished with a rousing game of Catch Phrase!

On Friday, we had breakfast at the Newmans and then came back into Chicago. When we returned the ZipCar downtown, we took a little walk in the chilly Fall afternoon. We spent a little time in the Christmas Village, and then went to have lunch at the famous Billy Goat. Cheezeborger, Cheezeborger, Cheezeborger!!!

The evening was topped off with attending a show of "Jersey Boys". Mama and Papa Z celebrated their 35th wedding anniversary a couple of weeks ago. SO, as a gift, Shaun, Andrea, Colter, Christopher, Dustin and I purchased their tickets to "Jersey Boys". O what a night!!

On Saturday we went to uncommon ground for brunch complete with mimosas and a bloody mary. We then walked around the neighborhood and finally took the afternoon to relax at my apt.
That evening we went to the Lincoln Park Zoo for the Zoolights. For those that don't know, they decorate the entire zoo with Christmas lights and you can just walk through the zoo getting into the Christmas spirit! From there we continued the Anniversary celebration and went to Zed451 - a Brazilian steakhouse. It was dad's first experience with that type of dining, and he is now a fan!

Such a wonderful Holiday weekend, and I look forward to spending time with mom and dad over Christmas!

I hope you all were able to reflect on things you are thankful for in 2009!

Check out this ditty...

My friend Jay has a pretty aggressive project where he is uploading one of his songs onto myspace every week.

Some of you may know that Jay and I worked together at Musicland oh so many years ago. We became friends over car pooling and basketball. When I had my shooting accident, he wrote a song entitled "Muse" that was about me.
He's posted it on myspace and you can check it out - www.myspace.com/nakedjmusic

From my friend Janet

Janet emailed me this week with the following note and photo:

"Snapped this photo today on Broadway Street. While seeing a bicycle locked to a stop sign or parking sign or light pole is an everyday occurance, this scene took me completely by surprise."

Work, Work, Work

First off, I apologize to all the friends and family that I haven't been in touch with lately. It's sad, but the Advertising job has been taking a lot of my energy.

Then in the past 2 weeks I have been all consumed with Premier Planning Services. Rita has been working with NASP (National Association of Subrogation Professionals) for the past year and a half and our job was to coordinate their annual conference. This year we were in Colorado Springs at the Broadmoor, and it was an 8 day trip for us. This allowed us time to set up / break down for the conference and then coordinate during the 3 day conference as well.

It was so great to get back into Corporate Events again. I love this stuff! I wish I could be doing this full time. One day. :-)

A day after arriving back from Colorado, I headed out to Indianapolis to attend the annual Association of Bridal Consultants conference. It was great to connect with my colleagues from MN and WI - they are such a supportive group of Planners. The educational content of the conference was very good; however, I did feel more uncomfortable at this conference than others. The vast majority of wedding planners are married and are able to dedicate their entire time to their business. I don't feel the support from my Association as a part time wedding planner. It definitely is not by choice that I can only work part-time as a Planner.

I'm hoping that I can change some of these things as I go into 2010. Wish me luck!

Girls Weekend in Minneapolis

As most of you know, my best friend Kris is about to embark on another humanitarian effort overseas. She will be part of a Human Terrain System crew headed to Iraq in December. You can check out what she'll be up to here:

http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=8789072

As a Farewell to her, a few of us gathered in Minneapolis in October. We visited a lot of our favorite haunts and laughed until our sides hurt. There was Dawn who could not get out of the car, but still caught my arrival on video. Kris seemed to do a little jig. I tried to imitate said jig and broke my necklace. Dawn and Kris proceeded to help me pick up all of the pieces.

Here we are at The Liffy. Acting all civilized. And then we had to be crazy. Look how Lorrie and I go for the Guinness!??!

It was definitely a fabulous weekend, because nothing can replace your best girlfriends. As I write this post almost a month later, it does feel like this weekend was 5 months ago. To all my girlfriends, I send you warm wishes and happiness. Know that you're thought of often. XOXO

Cassie & Brent's Wedding

On September 12th I was blessed to attend my cousin Cassie's wedding. It was a spectacular Fall day in WI and you could just feel the love between Cassie and Brent, as well as the happiness felt by friends and family.

If I do say so myself, this was the best shot of the day.

One of the best entrances I've seen...the entire wedding party came down the hill from the Golf Club on golf carts. The ceremony was conducted by Cassie & Brent's best friend.

It was a family affair. Dani baked and frosted the cupcake dessert. Guy and Mark acted as Videographers. Did I tell you that my mom and I helped assemble flowers? This was our handiwork on Cassie's bouquet.

Congratulations to Cassie & Brent!