I know I have said it before but there is something about a good manicure in the winter that can instantly bring me back to life when I’ve got the winter blues. That’s exactly what I was hoping to achieve with these Sally Hansen Real Nail Polish Strips but apparently I shouldn’t be trying a new, fancy french manicure kit at 9 at night because, I kid you not, I could not figure it out for the life of me.

If I can find a cute pattern, nail polish strips are my go-to quick mani fix because sometimes I barely feel like I have time to let actual nail polish dry before I have to be on to the next thing, whether that’s dishes, laundry or letting the dog out. I have tried a couple Sally Hansen and Essie nail strip kits in the past so I thought, for sure, would have no problem with a french manicure version but alas, I was sorely mistaken. After staring at the packaging for a while, I gave up and reached for this Essie nail polish color, Mademoiselle, from my nail polish stash and it gave me the same results, even though I did have to wait for the dry time. Now, if only I could find a quick fix to help clear up all the dryness around my actual nails from all this lovely winter hand washing.

So we are back at it again. After taking a couple of months off from transitioning to the sippy cup, with poor baby A being sick on and off the past couple of months and me not wanting to play bad cop or deprive her of any liquids while trying to beat all the lovely stuff flu season brings with it, I am ready to take on the challenge again in the new year.

I really have been beyond lucky with Ava. She has surprised me with how well she has handled all the transitions babies encounter in their first year, after hearing so many horror stories. For example, taking a bottle, solid foods, crying it out, breast milk to formula, formula to cow’s milk, being such a good eater and her willingness to try anything, she has handled it all beautifully, overall. But letting go of the bottle hasn’t ben our strong suit. Now, I realize I am the parent and 100% to blame but part of me is sad to part ways with the bottle. I absolutely love, cherish and look forward to giving her a bottle right when she wakes up and right before she goes to bed. Some of the best snuggle time ever.

Shortly after Ava turned a year, we transitioned to cow’s milk. Once we had that under our belt, I tried to be the bad guy and go cold turkey from bottle to sippy cup but after going through about 5-7 sippy cups, none of them seemed to take. She does, however, love drinking water from her straw sippy cup but as soon as I put milk in it, thinking I would fool her, she basically gagged the second the milk hit her lips. So we’re starting slow this week, continuing to do her morning and bedtime bottle, but only offering milk in a sippy cup on her tray at meals and taking away her bottle before her afternoon naps. Let the games begin.

Here are a few sippy cups I have on reserve. I would personally chose the little pink one, if I was her. She received it as a Christmas gift from my aunt and uncle. What is cuter than a little, girly, almost vintage sippy cup with sweet, French vocabulary on it!

As football season starts to come to a close (btw, go bucks and go pack!), which I’m sure my husband would say it technically never comes to a close but nevertheless, my favorite competitive “sport” season is finally here… awards season! There are so many different award shows now that I can’t keep track of but there are three I never miss: the Golden Globes, Oscars and the Grammys. I feel like these are the creme de la creme of glamour and fashion and last night kicked off with the Golden Globes.

There are two reasons I tune in for award shows. One, is the amazing fashion and two, the hilarious hosts. Tina Fey and Amy Poehler were amazing, as usual, and I especially enjoyed the George Clooney joke about him winning the lifetime achievement award vs. his wife. However, the ladies who really knocked it out of the park, in terms of glamour, elegance and overall style were Emma Stone, Jennifer Lopez, Kate Hudson, Jennifer Aniston and Amal Clooney. They just seemed to ooze beauty in every sense of the word last night.

Not to leave the men out because I think they always look handsome and dapper in their black suit or tux but we all know how much work we ladies go through to look the way we do. That is one thing I would love to know or be on a fly on the wall for on these awards days and that is what is a celebrity’s routine, from sunup to the moment they step foot on the red carpet. I would also love to know their workout/diet regimen leading up to the event, as well as how many people (truthfully) it took to get them looking red carpet ready. Whatever these ladies above did, it definitely worked!

Maybe it’s because I have always had goal-oriented parents or maybe it’s my type A personality but I think it’s a great exercise to make new years resolutions. The past few years, ever since a co-worker told me their resolution game plan, mine have been based around those. The way it works is, you come up with resolutions for the following seven aspects of your life: marriage, financial, education, career, spiritual, physical and material. These were my resolutions/goals for 2014:

Marriage – stick to a date night (we definitely had date nights, just not consistent)
Financial – set up Ava’s will (check!)
Education/Career – take apple classes (check!)
Spiritual – regularly attend church (sadly, failed at this)
Physical – lose baby weight (almost check!)
Material – organize basement storage (not even close)

As you can see, I didn’t stick to all of my resolutions but I definitely think I got an A for effort. While I love looking at each of these areas of my life (well maybe not financial), I think I need to simplify them just a little this year, especially during these first-time mommy years when I’m consumed with keeping up with my toddler. So this is what I’m hoping to stick to in 2015:

Emotional – plan monthly date nights
Physical – attend a weekly workout class, get more SLEEP
Mental – keep up with blog, apple classes and read
Spiritual – again, try to regularly attend church
Financial – give back to alma maters, even if that means $10, $20 or $25

The other overall attitude I want to have when going into the new year is to have a ‘why not’ outlook on things so if I’m presented with a great opportunity or new experience to embrace it and say, “Yes, Why Not.” We shall see!

I hope everyone had a very happy holiday this past week. I know I did. Here are some pictures of what made my holiday so special this year. Already looking forward to next year!

Our Christmas tree skirt 

Funfetti cookies I made for a cookie exchange 

Christmas party date night

Fun little Christmas craft with Ava 

Visiting the great grandmas on Christmas Eve 

These two faces on Christmas morning

One proud mommy 

Beautiful lake sunrise

This past Thanksgiving, as a thank you, I recently received a generous gift card from my mom (aren’t moms the best!?) to my favorite nail salon, Nail Lounge at Polaris. I am pretty sure pampering is one of the best gifts you can receive, by the way. Plus, there is nothing like a good manicure in the winter to make a girl feel pretty, especially since my hands are sometimes the only thing showing in the blistering cold.

I was able to find some fun nail color inspiration around the house. The gold is from a garland ornament on our stairs and the silver is from one of my favorite tree ornaments. This particular Eiffel Tower ornament reminds me how it lights up at night and sparkles like crazy. This nail color is as close as I am going to get to that this year (haha) but if you have not seen the Eiffel Tower at night, or Paris for that matter, I highly recommend you add it to your bucket list. It is a sight to see.

While red is a very powerful color, in general, and representative of many important causes such as the American Heart Association and recently, Red Thumb Day to encourage people to not text and drive, it is also a very fun and energetic color to have in your wardrobe. It is a must have for me, especially during this time of year when I can easily parlay it into an outfit for a Buckeye game, a holiday party, Christmas mass or even looking ahead to Valentine’s Day.

I bought this red blazer from H&M a few years back and it’s provided to be the perfect red staple for me. The sparkly top/blazer combo I wore recently to a surprise birthday party right after Thanksgiving and the t-shirt/blazer combo I wore to a cookie exchange party. You may recognize the sparkly top from one of my posts below from Forever 21 and the t-shirt is from Abercrombie & Fitch. Now don’t get me wrong, if these events were with the same group of people, I probably would not have worn this blazer both times but luckily they weren’t so it was a win-win all around!

I have to admit, part of the fun of having a girl is getting to dress her and accessorize her wardrobe. Even though I can’t get her to keep a clip or headband in her hair for more than 10 seconds these days, I still continue to build her hair accessories collection regardless. It also started me thinking that I could use some new hair accessories of my own to help spruce up my look.

On one of my many trips to Kroger, I let myself browse the hair accessories section, which I don’t normally do because, much like the chip aisle, I’m always likely to leave with something if I go down that road so I typically steer clear of that aisle. Sure enough, I stumbled across these cute Goody barrettes and just had to have them. I felt pretty good about the purchase too considering I got them for the bargain price of less than $5 so I figured what the hell, why not (Christmas come early).

Here is a picture of how they came in the store with one gold, one silver and one brown. Below are a few fun ways I’ve been wearing them so far. Yes, one of the pictures I do have the gold one next to the silver one and I know, for some, this is considered a fashion crime but I like it here since it’s not too drastic of a color difference. The brown barrette picture is how the girl on the packaging is wearing it and quick bravo for anyone on the Goody marketing team because if I see a picture of how something is to be worn, I automatically think I can replicate but alas, I never am able to. I’m such an easy advertising target. 🙂

I can’t remember why I stayed away from these for so long…maybe because the name alludes to being a little girl and doesn’t equate to being a grown up but needless to say, I am back on the barrette bandwagon for now. Even better, these are perfect for those days you can’t seem to squeeze in that shower, which happens more than I care to admit.

Glamour sidebar: After taking these pics, I managed to clean one of the bathrooms before heading to bed. What’s not glam about that?!

So while my latest adventures these days may not be filled with planning vacations or trips to tropical destinations or abroad, they have kept me more local with adventures in the kitchen. I haven’t always loved spending tons of time in the kitchen, especially when take out can be so much easier and twice as fast. Not to mention, something always seems to taste better when someone else makes it. However, now that I have a sweet, little mouth to feed I love the idea of feeding her as many things homemade as possible.

I hosted Thanksgiving this past week and since baby A loved her turkey dinner, I decided to try a couple other recipes for breakfast Saturday morning. The egg muffin recipe I found on Pinterest, aka my online recipe book. Ava loves her scrambled eggs but this way I can sneak in some veggies without her knowing. I put leftover turkey, broccoli and a couple of cheeses in this one. I kind of wish I would have put leftover stuffing in them too. Super easy and delicious.

Funny story about this next recipe. I follow, and I am not afraid to admit it, Vanessa Lachey on Instragram. She’s so darn cute. Yes, she is Nick Lachey’s wife, the same Nick Lachey who was married to Jessica Simpson. Anyway, a couple of weeks ago she posted a picture of her finished product of this Pumpkin Spice Pull Apart Bread with hashtag Pilsbury so I went to their site, plugged in the recipe and voila, it popped right up. This bread is definitely going to be making an annual appearance around the holidays in our house.

After all, I truly believe food is part of what makes up a memorable childhood, at least it did for me with things like my mom’s spaghetti, birthday genoa cake and Christmas Eve fondue to name a few, so I want to make sure Ava can look back on hers and feel the exact same way.

I love the time of year Thanksgiving falls on. It really allows you to look back on the year and reflect on how much there is to be thankful for. Family, friends, health and home always come to mind and are things I definitely need to be thankful for more often than this one day a year.

I especially had to keep all this in mind when we had minor snafu yesterday morning, Thanksgiving, getting ready to host my family and had a minor flooding issue in our basement. Sure, I freaked out and thought we were going to have to relocate or cancel Thanksgiving but as luck would have it, the plumber that had worked on this issue a couple of weeks back randomly decided to work yesterday so was able to come over and fix the situation and Thanksgiving was back on by noon so he was another person I was thankful for yesterday.

Also, thankful for nephew #2 to join us next May! Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!