I haven’t participated in Kenlie’s weekly Friend Makin’ Mondays in a while, so I thought I’d jump back in today since it seems really fun.

Per Kenlie’s instructions:  If you’ve taken part in FMM then you know the rules. If you’re new, please take a moment to answer this week’s question on your own blog then add your link in the comments section here so we can all see your FMM questions and answers. Please invite your blog readers to add their links too so everyone has to opportunity to be seen. The idea is to connect with other awesome bloggers so take a moment to post your own FMM post and comment on a couple of other posts. Now it’s time for this week’s topic!

FMM: Short Answers

1. Mac or PC? I have both, but definitely prefer Mac.  I’ve been a Mac user since the late 80′s.
2. Do you paint your own nails? Sometimes.  I like going and getting pampered occasionally, too.
3. Beach or mountains?  Living in southern California, I’m fortunate enough to have both in fairly close proximity.  If I had to choose just one, I’d probably go with the beach.
4. What’s the title of the book you’re currently reading?  Lover Mine (book nine from the Black Dagger Brotherhood series) by J.R. Ward
5. Do you dance?  Not very often, but I enjoy it when I do.
6. CNN or Fox News?  Neither.  I usually watch MSNBC.  I <3 Rachel Maddow and would happily run away with her if it weren’t for that pesky detail of her partner, Susan.
7. Do you ride a bicycle?  No, but I own two of them.  Don’t ask.
8. Do you get a yearly flu shot?  No.
9. Best movie you’ve seen in 2012?  I haven’t been to the movie theater yet this year.  I watched The Help on DVD a couple of weeks ago and really enjoyed it.
10. Do you prefer to workout at home or at the gym?  It depends on what I’m doing for my workout.  If I’m going to walk or want to do an aerobics-type workout, then I usually just do it at home since I have a pretty large DVD selection.  I usually hit the gym if I want to spin, swim, Zumba, etc.
11. Last airport you were in?  Well, the last was technically LAX on a return flight from Dulles following a business trip to the D.C./NoVA area in December.
12. Married or single?  Single
13. iPhone or Android? iPhone
14. Do you prefer to be in pictures or taking pictures?  Definitely taking pictures.  I’m not really a fan of having my photo taken.
15. Favorite brand of sneakers?  It’s a toss-up between New Balance and Asics.  I really like Brooks, too.
16. Do you like snow?  For visiting, yes.  For putting up with an entire winter, no, which is precisely why I live in southern California.
17. Do you have/want to have kids?  I wanted kids, but couldn’t have them.
18. Summer or Winter? I actually prefer Spring and Fall over either Summer or Winter.
19. Do you know how to swim?  Yes
20. Do you prefer to shop in store or online?  With the exceptions of food & clothing, I do most of my shopping online.  I’m not really a fan of malls and it just works better with my busy schedule to shop online.

Until next time …

Write a quick comment

As bloggers are wont to do, this is my obligatory year in review post.  Rather than writing out everything about my year in paragraph form, here it is in meme form.

1. What did you do in 2011 that you’d never done before?  I went to a blogging conference (FitBloggin‘ .
2. Did you keep your New Years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year?  I don’t make New Years’ resolutions anymore.  I realized long ago that I always failed miserably at keeping them.  These days, I prefer to set smaller goals throughout the year.
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?  My friend and fellow Sisterhood writer, Heather.
4. Did anyone close to you die?  My uncle.
5. What countries did you visit?  None.
6. What would you like to have in 2012 that you lacked in 2011?  A significant other would be nice.
7. What date from 2011 will remain etched upon your memory?  September 11.  It’s difficult to believe it’s been 10 years already.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?  Earning five (5) professional certifications.
9. What was your biggest failure?  My weight loss efforts (or lack thereof).
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?  I’m currently battling a bum left knee.
11. What was the best thing you bought?  My new refrigerator!
12. Where did most of your money go?  As always, given I live in southern California, RENT!
13. What did you get really, really, really excited about?  Finally getting to meet long-time blogging friends at FitBloggin‘!
14. What song/album will always remind you of 2011?  Toss up between Party Rock Anthem and Moves Like Jagger.
15. What do you wish you’d done more of?  Staying on track with my weight loss efforts.
16. What do you wish you’d done less of?  Getting derailed from my weight loss efforts.
17. How will you be spending/did you spend Christmas?  Home alone with my kitty.
18. Who did you spend the most time on the phone with?  It would be a toss up between my friends Tracy or Nick.
19. Did you fall in love in 2011?  With a person?  No.  With my iPad 2, perhaps.
20. How many one night stands in this last year?  None.  I don’t do one night stands.
21. What was your favorite TV program?  One of my favorite new shoes is Rocket City Rednecks on NatGeo, but that’s probably because I’m a space geek.
22. What was the best book(s) you read?  Sadly, most of the books I read this year were text books.  I didn’t have much time for pleasure reading.
23. What were your favorite films of this year?  Ok, this is sad.  I can’t think of any films I saw in 2011 other than stuff off DVDs.  I *finally* got around to watching all of the Harry Potter movies.  LOVED them!
24. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?  My birthday is in February and I have no clue what I did.  I turned 47 this year.
25. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?  Having a special someone to share it with.
26. What kept you sane?  As always, my stitching hobby.
27. What political issue stirred you the most?  Toss up between the ending of the DADT policy and marriage equality.  Hopefully we’ll get there one day with the latter.
28. Who did you miss?  My Gran.  She’s been gone seven years and it still hurts knowing I can’t just pick up the phone and call her.
29. Who was the best new person you met?  My new Weight Watchers leader Jacki.  She rocks!!!
30. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2011.  Even though it still makes me extremely nervous, I’m better at public speaking than I give myself credit for being.

Until next time …

Write a quick comment

I saw this really fun meme today on Cynthia’s blog.  Since I love to travel, I thought it would be something fun to do.  A lot of the questions are about international travel.  Even though most of my travel has been domestic (I’ve been to 47 of the 50 U.S. states so far), I decided to play anyway.   As always, you can click each photo to biggify it.

A:  Age you went on your first international trip:  Ok, this is a little bit of a sad way to start, but my first international trip was in 2005 when I was 41 years old.  My friend Tracy and I went to Mazatlán, Mexico together.  Loved it!

B: Best (foreign) beer you’ve had and where:  I don’t think I’ve ever drank beer in a foreign country.  I’m not much of a beer drinker.  When I do drink it, it’s generally Guinness.  I blame it on my Irish heritage.

C: Cuisine (favorite):  This one is really difficult. I love so many ethnic cuisines — Mexican, Italian, Greek, Indian, Thai, etc.  The list could go on and on.

D: Destinations — favorite, least favorite and why:   One of my favorite destinations thus far has definitely been Hawai’i.  I went to there three years ago with my BFFs Terri and Tracy (I keep hoping if I link to her enough that she’ll start blogging again ).  It was just so gorgeous there and we had a blast!  Here’s a photo of the sunset at Waikiki Beach in Honolulu.  That’s just a raw photo without the use of filters.  It really doesn’t do it any justice either!

One of my least favorites would probably be Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.  It’s not because it’s wasn’t beautiful because it clearly s as evidenced in the sunset photo below.  The reason I didn’t care for it was due to the inundation of people selling things on the beach.  Literally every two to three minutes, another local would come by trying to sell some sort of trinket.  I realize they rely on the tourists to make money, but it was just a bit much.  It made it very difficult to have fun.  Once you got away from the beach, it was much less intrusive, thankfully.

E: Event you experienced abroad that made you say “wow”:   That would probably be on a Mexican Riviera cruise I took in 2007.  I ended up with a horrible case of Montezuma’s Revenge and missed out on a couple of days of the cruise, including our port of call and planned snorkeling excursion on a private beach at the edge of a rain forest near Puerta Vallarta.  I was stuck in the stateroom on the ship sick as a dog.  I just kept saying, “Wow, I don’t remember the last time I was this sick.”  These photos are courtesy of my traveling companion who I insisted should still go on the excursion since we’d already paid for it.  It was bad enough that we were going to lose my money for it, no need for both of us to throw away our money!

F: Favorite mode of transportation:  I adore the Pulmonia taxis in Mazatlán!  They’re so famous there that they even have a bronze statue of one on the sea wall!

G: Greatest feeling while traveling:  I just love going to new places and seeing more of the world!  I’ve only started expanding my travel outside of the continental U.S. in the past few years by visiting Mexico a few times and going to Canada twice.  I’m really anxious to expand that even more and visiting Europe and taking a Mediterranean cruise in 2014.

H: Hottest place you’ve traveled to:  Phoenix

I: Incredible service you’ve experienced and where:  There was an amazing waiter named Jorge at the condos in Mazatlán where Tracy and I stayed in 2005.  He took amazing care of us while we were there!  We went to the pool every afternoon for a couple of hours and I don’t think our drink glasses were every empty.

J: Journey that took the longest:  Hmmm, well, I guess it would be the Mexican Riviera cruise since that was 8 days.

K: Keepsake from your travels:  My pearls from Hawai’i.  We won’t discuss how much I paid for them, ‘mkay?  Thanks!

L: Let-down sight, why and where:  I can’t really think of any place I’ve traveled that has let me down.  I can generally always find something fun to do anywhere I go.

M: Moment where you fell in love with travel:  I think it was probably when I was eight years old.  I had just finished my 3rd grade school year and my family traveled to Florida to visit my great aunt.  We arrived in Pensacola just before sunrise.  My dad drove us to the beach and we watched the sun rise over the Gulf of Mexico.  It was one of the most beautiful sunrises I’d ever seen and the first time I’d seen the “ocean” (yes, I know now it’s not really the ocean, but rather an oceanic basin).  Anyway, I was hooked on travel from that point forward.

N: Nicest hotel you’ve stayed in:  Well, that’s an easy one — the Ritz-Carlton Laguna Niguel.  Several years ago when I was still married, a dear friend of mine gifted us a weekend at the Ritz in an oceanview room for my birthday.  She also provided us with gift certificates for his & her full-body massages at the spa and dinner at the hotel restaurant.  It was heavenly!

O: Obsession—what are you obsessed with taking pictures of while traveling?  Sunsets!  Here’s one I took a couple of months ago at the Grand Canyon.  There are no words to describe the beauty of the sun setting over the canyon!  Everyone should see it at least once in their life.

P: Passport stamps, how many and from where?  I’ve had a passport for several years, but I don’t actually have any stamps in it.

Q: Quirkiest attraction you’ve visited and where:   It would be a toss up between Vegas and the Grand Canyon.  I’ve tried trips to both of those attractions that were less than 24 hours each.  Yeah, don’t ask, it was crazy.

R: Recommended sight, event or experience:  As I mentioned earlier, I would definitely recommend seeing the Grand Canyon at sunset.  It’s beyond beautiful!  I would also recommend a trip to San Francisco if you’ve never been.  It’s one of my favorite cities to visit (and one of my planned trips for 2012).  Lastly, I would highly recommend taking in a hot air balloon ride!  I’d been to a couple of balloon races/festivals when I lived in Nashville, but finally went on a hot air balloon ride a couple of years ago.  It was a.maz.ing!  Here’s a picture I took of another nearby balloon as we were both floating over the southern California wineries in Temecula.

S: Splurge; something you have no problem forking over money for while traveling:  Definitely food!  I love finding local restaurants and checking out the local food scene.

T: Touristy thing you’ve done:  Oh, I’ve done lots of touristy things.  I usually do at least one touristy thing on every trip I take.  Perhaps the biggest touristy thing would be going through the tour of Jack Daniel’s Distillery in Lynchburg, Tennessee multiple times.  That’s the town where I grew up, so every time friends from college would come home with me for the weekend, that’s what they always wanted to do.  Then again, since the town was only about 360 people, that’s about the only thing there was to do.

U: Unforgettable travel memory:  During a trip to Michigan a couple of years ago, the friend I was visiting made arrangements to have some mutual friends drive up from Indiana to surprise me.  We had just arrived at a nice restaurant for dinner when someone tapped me on the shoulder to ask if the empty chair next to me was available.  When I looked up from my menu to say it was available, well, you can clearly see my surprise in the brief video below when I realized it was Betsy (another wayward blogger ) and  her wonderful husband, Mike.  It was so unexpected and such an awesome surprise.

W: Wine, best glass of wine while traveling and where?  Well, since I’ve yet to travel to France or Napa, I’ll go with the amazing Late Harvest Riesling from the Chateau Chantal on the Old Mission Peninsula in Michigan.  It’s crazy good!

X: eXcellent view and from where?:  As is evidenced in photos I’ve posted earlier in this meme, Waikiki Beach and the Grand Canyon at sunset.

Y: Years spent traveling?: I’ve no idea, but not that many probably.  Many childhood vacations were cancelled due to my dad’s job.  Once I became an adult and got married, there usually wasn’t money for travel.  It really wasn’t until I divorced just before my 40th birthday that I actually started really traveling.  Everything up to that point were mostly trips to visit friends and/or family, but not a real destination vacation.  These days I seem to be making up for lost time.  I have three trips planned already for 2012.

Z: Zealous sports fans and where?:  Cleveland Browns fans in the original Dawg Pound at the old Cleveland Stadium. OMG!  They were NUTS!

So, that’s it for me as far as my ABC’s of travel.  If you opt to play along, please leave me a comment with your post so I can check it out, too.

Until next time …

Write a quick comment

I managed to set aside a little more time this weekend for working on my Winter Band Sampler. This is such a fun stitch! I wish I had more time to work on it, but between work & school, I just don’t.  Here’s my updated progress photo of my band sampler:

Click to biggify

I joked on the Facebook group tonight that at the rate I’m currently able to stitch, it may take me until 2014 to finish my 15 projects for the 2011 Crazy UFO/WIP Challenge.   It was meant to be a joke, but there might be a certain level of truth to it as well.

I also wanted to thank my dear friend Tiffany for giving my blog the Stylish Blogger Award. We met through a website called The Sisterhood of the Shrinking Jeans that I discovered a while back through my weight loss efforts. (The editors there recently honored me so much by asking me to join them as a Contributing Writer.) Tiffany and I went on to both be members of Team Shrinking Jeans last year to raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society through Team in Training. She’s an amazing woman and I feel blessed to call her my friend!

So this award comes with a few rules, so here goes…

Rule #1: Give thanks.  Done – see above.
Rule #2: Share some things about myself.  I know some of you will know many of these already, but here we go.

1. I once appeared in a TV commercial with Johnny Cash and Richard Petty.
2. I am a baseball fan and have visited over 30 major league baseball parks.
3. I’m a college football junkie, especially when it comes to the University of Tennessee.  My running joke is that you might take the girl out of Tennessee, but you’ll never get me out of my orange leisure wear.
4. I’ve sang on both the stage of the Ryman Auditorium (former home of the Grand Old Opry) and of the Opry House (current home of the Grand Old Opry) in Nashville, TN.
5. I grew up in Lynchburg, Tennessee which is the home of Jack Daniel’s Distillery.  Throughout my childhood, the population was listed as 361 people, but the county went metropolitan in 1988 so the population is now listed at around 5700. Notable residents (past and present) include frontiersman Davy Crockett, University of Tennessee legendary coach Johnny Majors, and rock & roll legend Little Richard.
6. I worked in the country music industry in Nashville for nine years and once attended a pool party at the home of Tammy Wynette.
7. I have visited 47 of the 50 US states.  The only ones I still haven’t visited are Alaska, North Dakota, and South Dakota.
8. A few years ago, I appeared in an infomercial for Leslie Sansone‘s WalkBlaster workout series.

That’s probably  more than anyone cared to know so I’ll stop now.   Here comes the fun part.  Now I get to pass along this award to some other bloggers so we can all learn more about them, too.  Since I know most of my fellow Sisterhood ladies have already received the award, I’m going to pass this along to some stitching/crafting bloggers that I think are pretty stylish:

1. Tracy
2. Terri
3. Annette
4. Missy Ann (despite her questionable taste )
5. Michele
6. Valerie
7. Jenna

Ok, that’s it from me for now.  It’s getting close to bedtime and I still need to go sweep up the kitchen because my new dishwasher is being delivered and installed tomorrow.

Until next time ….

Write a quick comment

I grabbed this from Annette.

The only rule is:

You.
Can.
Only.
Type.
One.
Word.
No.
Explanations.

Not as easy as you might think…

1. Yourself: evolving
2. Your boyfriend/girlfriend/husband: nonexistent
3. Your hair: red
4. Your mother/stepmother: estranged
5. Your dog: none
6. Your favorite item: computer
7. Your dream last night: forgotten
8. Your favorite drink: tea
9. Your dream car: Beemer
10. The room you are in: living
12. Your fear: loneliness
13. What you want to be in 10 years: happy
14. Who you hung out with last night: nobody
15. What you’re not: thin
16. Muffin: caloric
17. One of your wish list items: books
18. Time: 23:04
19. The last thing you did: read
20. What you are wearing: nightie
21. Your favorite weather: cool
22. Your favorite book: LoTR
23. The last thing you ate: almonds
24. Your life: transitioning
25. Your mood: contemplative
26. Your best friend(S): amazing!
27. What are you thinking about right now? change
28. Your car: Toyota
29. What are you doing at the moment?: blogging
30. Your summer: busy
31. Your relationship status: unclear
32. What is on your TV?: nothing
33. What is the weather like?: chilly
34. When is the last time you laughed?: earlier

So, if you wanna play, you can either copy and paste this to your blog or you can answer in the comments at Calli’s place, where this meme originated. Either way, make sure you stop by and tell her you played.

Write a quick comment