Keep on Dancing Till The World Ends

I can honestly say.. I never thought I would ever see Britney Spears in concert.

A few weeks ago at Jade's Wedding Rehearsal, I had the best time seeing friends I haven't seen in years! So many college mems came rushing back, as we spent our evening celebrating Jade & Nate and reminiscing the good ol' days. At one point in the evening, my friend/old roomie, Ashley, cautiously asked me for a favor. Unsure where she was headed with it, she carefully asked me if I would possibly want to go see Britney Spears with her in a couple weeks.. Uhhh, Yeyeah! Hear me out now, I love Brit Brit, even in her trainwreck glory. I feel bad for her and am fascinated by her at the same time. I definitely don't rock out to her tunes for the lyrics or her incredible voice (right?), but I definitely think she has some pretty good beats.

So, not only did Ash have 2 tickets to see Britney (Femme Fatale tour with Nicki Minaj), but she had free tickets. I guess I could say I "grew up with Britney Spears" but would never even consider to pay to see her, since all of her shows were so expensive and I'm pretty sure my parents wouldn't have been very supportive. 13 years later.. Britney, here we come!

Ashley and I had such a fun time pumping each other up for the show.. We got together for dinner and a movie - In fact, we rented Brit's movie, Crossroads and I can't believe it, after all these years, it was my first time seeing it! We looked up where our seats were and holy cow.. Super close! Apparently the tix she had (which she got from a friend) were were 150$ each! Sheesh!

The big night finally arrived and Ashley found out she could use an extra ticket, so her friend Sarah came along too. We headed to St. Paul early for some din before heading to the show.

What a fun night out with the girls!! We danced and sang all night.. I was pretty surprised how much Britney didn't lip sync! I've heard that that's how all of her shows are, but everything was done pretty well. Definitely a night I'll never forget!

xo

Happy Little 4th!

Happy 4th of July, lovies! 

So proud of my brother for serving our country. Love you, Mitch!

[Photo - weheartit]

Soundtracks: Hellooo, Summer!

Hellooo, Summer! I can't believe summer is here and I'm actually enjoying it in Minnesota for the first time in 4+ years. Summers here are SO different from summer in South Carolina. I know everyone thinks it's freezing her every day of the year, but it actually does get pretty hot and humid. Definitely a little more bearable than SC humidity, that's for sure!

Aside from The OC Collection and hundreds of other artists and bands, my favorite summer tunes have to include these next three soundtracks. Each album is very different, but oh-so summer perfect. 

We finally saw (500) Days of Summer last summer/fall with Dan & Stacie. Oh man, I fell in love. I loved the whole attitude of an unconventional "romantic comedy" feel, plus the adorableness (is that a word?) of Zooey Deschanel & Joseph Gordon-Levitt's relationship in the movie.. The music totally made the movie with a little old-school flare with some newer indie artists. I think there was maybe 1 or 2 songs on the album I didn't exactly 'love', but it still fit the movie perfectly. It was great to see Regina Spektor on the album a couple times, as well as being introduced to Temper Trap's "Sweet Disposition" (Augh! SO good!). I was also pleasantly surprised to recognize Carla Bruni - whom I stumbled upon while planning my sister's French/Marie Antoinette-inspired bridal shower last August. 

(500) Days of Summer

Check it Out

Featuring: Regina Spektor, The Smiths, Black Lips, Doves, Hall & Oates, The Temper Trap, Carla Bruni, Feist, Simon & Garfunkel, Wolfmother, Mumm-Ra, Meaghan Smith, She & Him, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Zooey Deschanel and Kevin Michael

Yes, I know Orange County is SO 2002, but the soundtrack will always be one of my faves. A good mix of classic rock-your-face-off tunes with a total summer twist. Love it.

Orange County

Check it Out

Featuring: The Offspring, Social Distortion, Foo Fighters, Cake, Crazytown, Bad Ronald, Brian Wilson, Lit, 12 Rods, Quarashi, Pete Yorn, Creeper Lagoon and Phantom Planet

Another fantastic summer soundtrack is the album from The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. Not only is the movie a total chick-flick/daughter-mom classic, but the music chosen for the film is amazing. The album actually always reminds me of my mom.. She surprised me with lots of sweet packages my freshman year in college. One of the packages I received, she sent it to me. Even living in South Carolina, I've grown to love this soundtrack even more, because of the southern (actually Louisiana). A lot of the scenery always reminds me of Charleston. The whole album is a sweet mixture of french meets cajun meets blues.

Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

Check it Out

Featuring: Blind Uncle Gaspard, Vincent & Mr. Green, Jimmy Reed, Ann Savoy, Macy Gray, Taj Mahal, Richard & Linda Thompson, Lauryn Hill, Slim Harpo, Ray Charles, Alison Krauss, Mahalia Jackson, Tony Bennett, Bob Dylan and Bob Schneider

xo

A Father's Day Jazz Party

This post is way overdue, but I had to share what we did for my dad for Father's Day.

My dad has always been a huge jazz fanatic. Since this was the first Father's Day I could be a part of since 2006, we wanted to make it a little special. Our plan was to throw a jazz-inspired lunch party -- something simple and affordable. We created the party decor with all things I already had, which just left us to pitch in for food. The colors we chose were purples, blues, blacks and silvers. Music was a no-brainer - his favorite, Down to the Bone. I was pretty happy with our complete and very simple DIY celebration!

Crazy to have the four of us together at once!

On the menu..
My homemade, stuffed Bacon-Cheddar Hamburgers, "Mom's baked beans", Potato Salad, Fruit, Mountain Dew and Orange Pop (duh!) and Raspberry Jell-o Poke Cupcakes. Since we were still preparing the food and we weren't ready, we had to keep him occupied with our own jazzy entertainment.. oh my word! Haha

Nothing like "Down to the Bone"!

Vanessa, showing her true colors.. 

Frosting the cupcakes

 Like I said, we did things small and simple. Wrapped vases, candles and some easy little DIY stuff. To pull in the "jazz", we cut out some music notes out of black cardstock. I was pretty set on creating a sort of "piano-ish runner out of paper.. It was more "abstract" than I planned, but I thought it turned out pretty cute!

He was pretty impressed with all of our hard work!

Fringed streamers and circle garland definitely made the room feel more "jazzy" (oh, sheesh!)

Piano runner

Always chaos!

Lunch was full of memories of Daddio. Lots of laughs!

The Raspberry Jello-o Poke Cupcakes were to die for.. Vanessa made the cute toppers!

Mum & Dad

After stuffing ourselves, we jumped into an intense 8-person game of Wahoo.. What a fun day!

Wahoooo! (Looks like the girls were winning.. HA!)

xo

Umbrella Hunting, Tears of Joy and Jade's Big Day

Ohhh my word.. I can't even describe how happy and excited I am for my friend and college roomie, Jade. She's finally married.

Jade and I stood next to Mulder on her wedding day, Jade and Mulder stood next to me on my wedding day and finally it was Jade's turn to be the bride. I have to admit, with the whole "trying to move" thing, made it really hard for me to be a part of any of the excitement build up, or even bridal showers (which was the case with Mulder's too..). But -- we live here now. We LIVE here. And now I can be a part of things and not miss out anymore! 

Mulder's Wedding - 8/10/07

My Wedding - 10/25/08

With our huge move to MN and our budget, Jade and I agreed that it would be sweet for me to be a part of the wedding, but as her personal attendant. What an honor to be able to spend the entire day by her side, doing my best to make her Day the most special and memorable day ever. I have never been a personal attendant before, but I knew what the role included. I also have a whole new appreciation for my friends, Michelle and Ali, who were my personal attendants. They dealt with so many unorganized tasks I left on them -- my centerpieces, setup, everything!!! I feel like I'm a pretty organized person, but wow, I really should buy them a couple more thank you gifts! HA! 

It was really great to be included in Jade's rehearsal and groom's dinner. All of the day-before-excitement while  practicing the walk down the aisle, plus an amazing dinner. The evening was fantastic. I hadn't seen Jade or Muld since last fall and I also hadn't seen some old friends, Ashley (another college roomie) and Sarah in years. It was so fun to catch up and finally see Mulder's baby bump! Gahhh! As if the night couldn't get any better, Ash scored free tickets to Britney Spears and asked me if I wanted to go! Britney. Free. Great seats, worth 150$. How fun!

Ashley, Jade, Me & Mulder

Cliche "hand heart" on the baby bump.. Couldn't stop laughing!

Two of my dearest friends in the world --

The next day belonged to Jade and Nate. Jade texted me around 7am, sharing her fear about the rain and asking me to find 12, black, matching umbrellas for the wedding party and photos. Of course, I could do that! Anything for the bride! Besides, umbrellas couldn't be more that $3 or $4 a piece, right? Uhhhhh...

Can I just say, my husband is a saint. Since I had to be there so early and the wedding was such a long drive away, we decided to drive together and he would just stay occupied until the ceremony, while I was off with the girls. We decided to leave an hour earlier than planned, so we could track down the umbrellas. 

My first thought was Target. Good, ol' Tar-jey always seems to come through. I called to see if they could pull a bunch for me and I quickly learned that umbrellas were nowhere near $3.00 a piece, but more like $15-25.00 a piece. I thought I might throw up. Of course it's typical that during this time in our lives, with the move and all the chaos going on, our budget was pretty tight for an extra 200$, even though I knew Jade would pay me back. There was no way I was going to text/call Jade to tell her that it might be tricky for me, still unsure if she realizes how much they cost herself. Instead of freaking out, I decided to call Mulder for some ideas. She suggested the 'dollar store', and I felt like she hit the jackpot. 

I rushed off the phone to begin calling every Dollar Tree in the area, in search of 12, black umbrellas. In the meantime, Target had 12 set aside for me that matched, but they were $20.00 each. I found another Dollar Tree with "plenty more than 12", so we headed there first. Although I asked if they had them in black, the cashier kid failed to understand that tiny detail. I went in with loads of joy and relief, to find out that they had plenty alright -- Plenty in janky colors with polkas and stripes. Wahhhh!! Why?! We headed back to the other Dollar Tree where I found 2. I took them, unsure if we would continue stopping at Dollar Trees on our way, or if we would just take the chance that we could find some pretty similar somewhere else. No luck. By that time, it had been wet/rainy/humid, already annihilating my hair and makeup. Great. We checked one more Dollar Tree before giving up and just going to Target. No umbrellas had been set aside for me in customer service like they said (typical.) so I rushed to find them myself. The little liars said they were $20 a piece but they had some decent black ones for $11! I dug my little heart out to find 10 more that matched (since I already had 2 from the Dollar Tree) and there were exactly 10. Pure luck?? Not sure how that happened, because I'm far from lucky!

By the time I bought them all, we were running over an hour behind. We were in a huge rush to get to the salon.. I didn't want to miss out, plus some of the girls needed a ride back to the church. Justin waited patiently and chauffeured us around where we needed to go. 

Starting early at the salon and rushing around in the on-and-off rain, totally reminded me of my wedding day. What a complete rush of disappointment to know that the forecast for your wedding day is RAIN. I felt for her. I was able to catch a few photos of everyone getting their hair done before we ran back to the church. 

Getting beautified!

Mrs. Hubert! Well, almost.. <3

I definitely got a workout that day as a personal attendant, there's so much to do and keep smooth. I gotta say, I did a pretty good job holding my emotions together (weddings make me cry like a baby!), until 15 minutes before the ceremony, I checked on Jade's dad and he was getting choked up himself. Ohhh, I was a gonner.

Getting ready!

The ceremony was beautiful. Yes, I cried like a little baby.

Lighting the Unity Candle

Hugging the parents, even MORE emotional!

I just love this picture..

Minus Jade's sister, Mandy

It continued to rain on and off, but the photos turned out SO cute! We went to the Arboretum.. I wanna go back, it was so pretty!

Jade, being Jade

Sarah, Ash & Mulder

Jade and I had some good laughs, because I kept telling her, "I feel like a wet dog!". Finally the reception came, the food was fantastic and I was able to catch up with the guys. The rest of the night was full of dancing and laughing.. especially me laughing at Mulder's funny facial expressions and dance moves.. Oh my word, it's so good to be back. 

Me and my hunky husband

Dancing the night away..

Oh yeah, we're the ones!

xo