Shuffle off to Seattle...allo.

So, tomorrow afternoon my darling husband I will shove off to Boston, and on Wednesday we will head to the great city of Seattle to see this girl and one of Robbie's army buddies and his awesome wife.  I am so excited to take this trip.

Really. I cannot explain how excited I am to plan travel for a non-work-related venture. 

My job requires me to travel all around the country so for the last two years I have associated planes with the misery of Mondays...but NOT THIS TIME!  This time my husband will be by my side, watching awesome airplane TV, eating questionable yummy airplane food and, perhaps most importantly, providing me a shoulder to sleep on so my head doesn't flop forward or into the aisle or onto the shoulder of a neighboring stranger (seriously, I have come SO close to doing this several times. I wouldn't be surprised if it's actually happened). 

Then again, maybe we'll just end up like this again:

Last year on the train coming back from a Bruins game. This picture helped me understand why people think Rob and I are siblings rather than spouses.

Anyway, I decided that to maintain my own sanity I will not be bringing my laptop (eek!) and therefore will not be blogging until my return.  But when I come back, O-HO...just prepare for an awesome photo post.  I am photographing the absolute shit out of this trip and you will all get to enjoy EVERY BIT of it.

That sounds like a threat but isn't meant to be...maybe.

Threat or no, I'll see you all on Sunday or Monday! Don't forget about my wee little blog in my absence.

Poor little razor, left out of all the fun.

P.S. Before I go, I wanted to share some of today's ModCloth purchases. Those of you who know me (n other words, if you are my husband or, you know, follow me on Twitter) know that ModCloth and I have a love-hate relationship, in that I love their clothes and they seem to hate my body. I have literally returned 4 shirts or tops because they looked like burlap sacks on me. Let's hope these are slightly more successful:

I have a feeling these will NOT look like a burlap sack.

Have a great week everyone!

8 Weeks to a Better Me: Week 4/Loving Yourself

So I'm an avid reader of Danielle's blog Sometimes Sweet, and for the past four weeks she has promoted a sort of interactive blog project in which fellow bloggers discuss ways to (you guessed it) better yourself.  Along with this she posts three goals for the week that pertain to that particular topic.  I haven't participated in earlier weeks because I'm lame, but this one, Week 4: Loving Yourself really stuck with me.

When I was younger I was always pretty skeletal.  I had hips (damn, these hips) but my chest looked like a xylophone and my arms were like sticks.  I got used to everyone calling me skinny, and so, when I went off anti-depressants and became an adult and gained about 20 pounds (into much healthier weight) it was a little shocking to say the least.  I obsess over my love handles and my muffin top, and my hips, and my cellulite, and of course the spider veins that I see on my leg but that my husband just assures me is due to the translucence of my white skin.

But fact is, I know a lot of people that would kill to have some of the features I do.  And some people I know feel that they are missing certain physical aspects of their womanhood due to cancer or other illness, and my griping comes into an entirely new perspective.

I have a hard time telling myself that I'm beautiful because of the flaws, and also reminding myself how crazy my husband is about me (and my love handles). 

One of my summer goals is to start feeling better about myself, and I figure what's a better week to start that than my birthday week?  So with that, I give you:

1. Schedule another Boudoir Shoot: I won't be able to do this this week most likely, since we'll be in Seattle (eee!) but I'd like to set a date.  Call me crazy, but the first boudoir shoot I did (totally nude) bumped myself-esteem up significantly.  Seeing myself in such beautiful poses, with all that I hate about myself out there in the open, really showed me how beautiful my body was.  If you've never done this I highly recommend scheduling one with a photographer you trust - you'd be surprised how AWESOME it makes you feel.

2. Wear a Pretty Dress While Frolicking in Seattle: I've been avoiding wearing dresses around town because we aren't really a 'dressy' place here in Western Maine.  But I'm hoping in Seattle I can feel all pretty in one of the new summer dresses I bought this year.

3. Make a List. I want to make a list of all the things I don't like about myself, cross out the negatives and add positives.  I'm certain I can find something positive about everything (except maybe my feet, I hate my feet, but I will try dammit).  I want to remind myself of these positives every day.  As a part of this goal I will also not bemoan my flaws to my husband which I do semi-frequently in a shameless plea for validation.  Robbie, you're off the hook for this week and hopefully forever.  We'll see. :)

Six-Word Memoir Saturday

This is an idea I got from Tracy over at Scribble Smudge - six words to memoralize this lovely Saturday.

My six words:  

Apocalypse averted and good times had.

And for your enjoyment, I will provide six-word captions for these pictures from today:

Nemo has a fortress of shoes.

My husband is eagerly watching hockey.

Can you tell they are brothers?

"Why are you photographing me, wife?"

Strawberries and chocolate - yummy AND healthy?

My SIL is lovely and awesome.

These men always need a fan.

I sure do love caprese, dude.

Trying to escape the picture, Jessi?

Margaritas with salt are the best.

These are my favorite ballet flats.

The result of tequila and hockey.

What did you do today, friends?

Early Birthday Happiness

My husband has always been a great gift-buyer. For my 17th birthday, our first together, he bought me a locket with cutouts from this picture in it:

Along with a book signed by one of my favorite comedic writers.

If you have read our story you know that for our first Valentine's Day, my then-boyfriend of just over a month sang me a song he had written for me in front of our entire school cafeteria (probably in the same exactly location as shown in the above picture) and gave me what at the time was my favorite flower (white roses because I was wicked unique that way).

Soo, you know.

He told me last night that he was going to give me my birthday gifts early (my birthday is actually May 27. Gifts will be accepted up to and beyond that day, thank you).  I am a huge sucker for the excitement of birthday gifts and funnery so I couldn't wait until I made it home after an obscenely long travel day to see what he'd come up with.

I came home at around 1:00 a.m. to find a bouquet of beautiful wildflowers on the table:

And, of course, an AngryBirds plush toy:

In case you're wondering, yes, Rob squeezed the button on his head, which makes AngryBirds noises, and threw it at me several times.

And finally, he hacked into my ModCloth account to find out my clothing size (this has happened before with Etsy...I got this beautiful ring out of it so no biggie) and bought me a lovely pencil skirt and collared long-sleeve shirt from Nordstrom.  There's no way I'm getting in front of the camera for a photoshoot looking like I do now, so I hope this picture of a slightly similar outfit suffices:

This is not me.

And of course, lots of kisses and hugs.

Suffice it to say my birthday has already been pretty awesome and it hasn't even started yet. Oh, and my husband continues his reign of awesomeness.

Anyone have any plans for after the Rapture?  Have you made sure your pets will be safe and cared for should you be among the lucky ones that get to leave? And for those of you left over, want to meet for drinks or something?

Thursday: Things I'm Thankful For

Does anyone else love alliteration?  Of course you do.

This week was a little tough on me, starting a new project and being away from my husband and all, so I thought it was a good idea to think about what I'm thankful for this lovely Thursday morning.

1. Finally getting my favorite jacket drycleaned, and noticing that the drycleaners successfully removed two 3-year old stains.

2. The simple joy of getting to fly home after a week of work.

3. Doing well on the project so far and making my team happy and more relaxed about upcoming deadlines.

4. Allegra. Enough said.

5. The aforementioned random morning texts from my husband that say only a single word and that brighten up my day immensely.

6. Finally seeing the sun after a week of rain and dreary skies.

7. This Arrested Development Clue game, which sadly is not real, but still...someone out there was awesome enough to think about it.

8. Going to SEATTLE in less than a week!  Eeek! 



What are you thankful for on Thursday? :)

Some Letters I've Been Meaning to Write II

Dear Weather,

Please stop with the 50-degree, rainy days.  It's May. I want warm and happy and sunny and lovely.  I'm on a lovely campus this week and I'd love to frolic about.

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Dear Windshield Wipers,

I would appreciate it if you would move to the beat of the song I'm listening to both more often and for longer periods of time.

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Dear Sneezes,
 
I take far too much a rational amount of pleasure when you occur on the downbeat of a song, particularly on that downbeat between a verse and the start of a chorus.
 
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Dear Radio Station here in Rochester,
 
You have to be the most random radio station ever. I heard "Baby's Black Balloon" twice in the last few days, along with RHCP, 1990s Alanis Morrisette, and some other unidentifiable crap.  Please play consistently good songs.
 
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Dear Hotel Restaurant,
 
Drinks were delicious but I've been reacting all day from the chicken you served me.  I would ask that your chefs look into gluten-free dining for the sake of your hotel guests.
 
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Dear Myself,
 
It was really stupid of you to eat the chicken that the hotel restaurant served you, especially when the waitress implied that panko breadcrumbs might be okay and then offered you rolls (sidenote: there were no breadcrumbs on my chicken).  Let's both hope that the gluten-free menu at tonight's restaurant is reliable.
 
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Dear TBS,

Family Guy, the Office, and Seinfeld reruns are good. Conan is good.  "King of Queens" and anything by Tyler Perry is freaking stupid.  Please become cognizant of these facts and offer me programming that does not totally suck.

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Dear Robbie,
 
I hope you know how happy it makes me when I get random texts from you that say no more than "Mewf!" particularly because I know that texting on your circa-2003 flip phone is an arduous affair.  Thank you for brightening my day.
 

Love,  

Caitlin xoxo

Bits and Pieces from This Week

Today is my Sunday since I have to travel to a new project tomorrow, so I figured I’d write my write-up of our last few days now. I’m sure you’re all excited to hear about it! :-)

We’ve had a pretty busy week. Robbie finished his finals, thank god, and now is preparing for his 2-week May term course covering ground-penetrating radar (exciting, no?). We’re still anxiously awaiting his grades, particularly for physics, but otherwise the semester is finished and he couldn’t be happier to start his summer job in a few weeks. Although he’s working all with young college girls so…there’s…that.

He also got a new tattoo this week on his inner bicep (not his thigh, as this picture makes it look):



Very well done, if I do say so myself. Also, I took the matryoshka concept page to Adam and he seems really excited to move forward with it. I absolutely can’t wait to see what he comes up with, but now is the time for patience. Here is the page I brought him (I don’t have the credits for any of the individual pictures, but most were from Google Images or Flickr after searching for ‘mastryoshka tattoo’):



The phrase is "From Russia, with Love" in Russian.

On Thursday we decided to have a bar food night. Since I was diagnosed with celiac disease, easy bar food is pretty much impossible. We looked up a fried chicken recipe with gluten-free breadcrumbs mixed with parmesan cheese and spices and it was absolutely delicious! Rob even said that he wouldn’t be able to tell the difference if he didn’t know gluten-free breadcrumbs so well, which he does. We paired them with red potato fries with olive oil, garlic and parmesan (honestly, these were from a bag, but still delish!):



In other news, I’ve decided to start a new cross-stitch project. When my sister-in-law was diagnosed with breast cancer I learned to cross-stitch so that I could make this:

From Subversive Cross Stitch - check it out, awesome designs and they're easy!



After months of hard work and a meeting with a professional framer, I gave it to her for Christmas and she loved it. She proudly displays it on the wall in her hallway.

This is the new cross-stitch I’d like to make, as a reminder to myself:

Have any of you done any cross-stitching?

Finally, we took our dog, Cypress, to a field nearby to play with her two best friends, Nigel and Jago. I got some pretty awesome pictures of them all frolicking together:

Cypress (right) and Jago

Modesty always wins!

Is it just me or does Nigel (black dog) look like Frank the Bunny from "Donnie Darko" here?

Cypress and Jago, a push me-pull beast.

And two more pictures for your enjoyment:

This is one more of those "moments" where I realized how lucky I am to wake up to this face every day.

Yay it's spring!

Did you all have a good week?