Rockabye sweet baby James

“One day we were brought into the world, knowing love only as being what we had for our toys, family, and friends. Then, you meet someone who alters your conception of love, and you never know how you loved anything before this kind of love.”

I love all of my nieces and nephews SO much I can never adequately express it in words. But my James will always have a special place in my heart. He makes me laugh, he runs from my kisses, he is so smart and so crazy and everything wonderful there is in this world.

And today he is 8.

Happy birthday to my beautiful Turkey baby!!

Love,

Aunt Lori

I didn't need that tab key anyway...

What do you get when you add one 3 1/2 year old niece...

..to about two hours of unsupervised time with your iPhone??

You get one $150 dollar Hot Air Balloon ride purchased (unbeknownst to you until you check your account balance) on your Groupon app.

Oh, Katy Monroe... you are, as they say in spanish, "bien traviosa". I'm adding this one to the tally, girlfriend!

Love,

Aunt Lolee

The Addictive Properties of Crafting

Have you ever been peer pressured into doing something??

Drugs?

Alcohol?

Sex?

Or perhaps, much like my coworkers today, you have been pressured into crafts.

Yep. Today I pushed no less than 4 people into making m and m turkeys with me. As in "Oh, I see that you are working there, go ahead and put down the phone because I brought m and m's and pipe cleaners and you need to prioritize".

If only the druggies in high school had me working for them- people would have been getting high and decorating their book covers with glitter at the same time! A win-win. I bet they feel pretty stupid right now for never involving me in their misadventures, eh?

Happy Thanksgiving Eve!!

Lori Ann

With birds I share this lonely view

I guess no Thanksgiving week would be complete without a list of things for which I am grateful. I am going to try and veer off of the "my family and health" path, with the understanding that I am EXTREMELY grateful for all of those things.

1. I am grateful for my job. The other day I was dreading going in to work and I smacked myself upside the head and reminded myself "Lor..all you have to do is listen to people...that's your job. It's not like you've got to go and get carts in the scorching heat, cater to ungrateful customers, or give 6 people showers." (all previous jobs of mine!)

2. I am grateful for my view. I finally get why people are so obsessed with views when buying a house. I lived in a shady apartment with an equally shady view of the parking lot for 3 years. Which is why I never lifted the blinds. Now I have beautiful views and it makes me happier than I could have imagined.

3. I am grateful for my upbringing. I feel like it was God's plan for me to grow up the way I did. It helped me develop empathy and understanding, which is essential for me in life and my career.

There is a lot more I could say. I am grateful its the holidays again. It's good for me to have a time to remember to give thanks and to have fun with my family. I miss my nieces and nephews especially. More than anything, I am grateful for them.

Lori Ann

Breaking Dawn: The Much Anticipated 3:20 AM review

I saw Breaking Dawn tonight.

And somewhere between the laughable wolf conversations, Jacob taking off his shirt literally 1 minute into the film, Bella's strange wedding dress choice, Rosalie stepping up to the plate, a vision of the future Renesme, and Emmett and Charlie giving the BEST WEDDING TOASTS EVER and a million other little things- I kind of fell in love with this one.

I think it's my favorite so far.

Go see it, gremlins!!

Lori Ann Lautnor

(It just sounds right, right?)

I want to take him down to China Town

I saw this quote on my friend's awesome blog today. Amazing. I'm going to get a print and hang it in my office.

Lori Ann

p.s. Am I the only one watching "New Girl" ? I love it!!

" And the wiggly one and the bear attack and the claws and the head and the one that figure skater do and the what's for lunch and the give me that hat."

You and I have a history

I've said it many times.. I hate when people put videos on their blog. I'm always like "huh..now I've got to watch some lame video". That being said, I feel strongly enough about this video to post it on my blog.

Because it's got the best possible combination of my two favorite things.

Glee and Adele

You won't regret the 3 minute investment of your time!

Lori Ann

any snide remarks from my father about your tattoos will be ignored

the kids. Not relevant to this post, but I can't post without a picture:)

Over the last two days I have done almost nothing.

With the exception of about 2 hours of shopping (including travel time) and about 15 minutes of cleaning, I've spent the last 48 hours vegging out.

Watching Harry Potter. Taking bubble baths. Making grilled cheese. Trying to find an amazing and practically free couch on craigslist. Mixing ginger ale and cranberry juice. Playing trash talking scrabble on facebook with my same-age-as-me sister.

Probably sounds fairly similar to all of y'all's days off.

Back to the grind tomorrow...but good news...

Only a week and two days until I'm off for a nice 5 day Thanksgiving break!!

Lori Ann

My day in pictures

8 am- left my apartment and disappeared into the fog. All that was missing was the icy hand of a murdered child creeping up behind me.

8:15- off to the BEST STORE IN THE UNIVERSE. The Christmas Tree shop. Holy Hannah- it's intense how exciting this shopping experience is.

9 am- got home and realized that my new tea lite centerpiece is in the shape of a pentagram. Interesting.

11 am-7:40 pm- Providing therapy and eating these wild cherry cough drops. (which I got at the Christmas Tree Shop!) Best. Medicine. Ever.

Also, I spent a good portion of time staring out the window. Can't leave that out.

And last, but not least, my FANCY dinner. A new table and a new centerpiece called for an epic meal. I had chicken and potatoes (because that's what I make every night) but it was on my fancy plates, and I made a salad and cheese danish for dessert!

Now..all that remains is a bubble bath, hot chocolate, and watching Twilight in bed. Have to get psyched for Breaking Dawn:)

Lori Ann

Cheap is the new black

BEFORE

30 minutes of rolling the table through the dark parking lot with a number of cars slowing down to stare at me and an awkward trek into the building, up the elevator, and through the door:

AFTER!

I owe it all to my mother for teaching me the art of the Dumpster Dive.

Thanks, Ma.

Lori Ann

To dive or not to dive??

Ok,

Right now I am in the middle of a quandary.

There is this fairly nice kitchen table that someone threw out at my complex.

I don't have a table.

So... is it worth rolling the table about 4 buildings over?

(it won't fit in my car, I already tried that)

And; on a completely unrelated side note, if you put a table on top of your car without bungee cords, will it stay on??

Lori Ann

I had the best day with you

Yesterday was a perfect day.

Honestly, it was the best day I've had in a long time. It wasn't very out of the ordinary. I decided to drive home for the day. I made my parents a fancy lunch. (croissants are fancy for us!) We just talked about our lives and it made me so happy.

I went driving through the PA countryside and it was beautiful and I felt surrounded by American history. Then later I drove through the back roads with my mom and brother and my mom was pretending to be our tour guide and it was making me laugh and I felt so happy.

Then I got to make one of the few dinners that I make well (ham and potato soup) for all of my favorite people (just missing Erin and Big J). And Elly wore the Darth Vador costume I found half off at CVS. And I don't know why but it made me so happy.

Right now, in this moment, there isn't anything I would change about my life. I am very blessed.

Lori Ann

Random Thoughts: The Friday Night Edition

1. I have a raging internal debate about when to decorate for Christmas..now or after Thanksgiving? If they just made Thanksgiving decorations (classy ones..not trashy hand made turkeys!) then we wouldn’t need to have this discussion with ourselves every year.

2. There have been some surprising elements to my new job. The one that freaks me out the most is people asking me to assess them for court. Like, they need to look crazy for a judge. Let the ethical dilemmas abound!

3. I still don’t have a sofa. Or a table. Or a TV. I’m living in my apartment like a squatter. Only squatters probably have more furniture than me.

4. It’s so beautiful here right now. I’ve kinda stopped taking pictures though because pictures can’t capture the amazing feeling of fall in PA.

5. I’ve almost been at my job for 3 months. You know what that means! Benefits, baby. Which means I will be able to sign up for therapy. I can’t wait. I am doing it solely to steal other therapist’s techniques/put myself in my client’s shoes.

6. I’ve recently fallen back in love with toast. Oh toast, how could I have forgotten your delicious goodness??

7. My Spanish goes further down the drain with every passing hour. If I have Hispanic clients at 11 am, I am chattering away like a magpie..at 5 pm I am like “Hola, mi amigos..como estan?” and then smiling nervously, hoping I won’t have to talk.



8. This Thanksgiving, I am going to take a stand for all of us non pie eaters. We are going to have our just desserts!



9. I have to stop watching “soldiers returning home” on Youtube. I can’t keep crying every night!

Lori Ann