7 Random Things

Okay,so Karen tagged me like a month ago and I never got around to it but better late than never. So here we go.....

1. I LOVE Julie Andrews- I can't think of a single bad thing about her. She's classy, good peeps. Mary Poppins was/is one of my favorite movies.

2. I am tattooed, and I want more....they are so addictive

3. I am viciously protective of those that I love, and I am endlessly loyal to them until they betray my trust. "My good opinion, once lost, is lost forever"

4. I'm a pretty private person, so it's actually kind of strange that I have a blog.

5. Marriage and babies are not really on my to do list. I'm okay with that, but most people in my life are not.

6. I accidentally started a grease fire in my kitchen when I was 12. I threw water on the fire and basically blew up the kitchen.

7. I fell down the stairs in Klaipeda one time too, but mine was not as bad as Karen and Emily's


So that's it. I tag Emery & Nicole

Beth's Wedding

So Beth's wedding was last weekend and it was perfect!. It was intimate and beautiful, and so much fun. I'm used to Mormon weddings where people invite everyone they have ever met in their their lives to the reception. And they always have DJ's or music playing. but nobody ever dances. I haven't been to that many non Mormon weddings but this was definitely my favorite thus far. We had been staying at the venetian since Thursday, and on Friday night Beth just wanted to take it easy so we had appetizers at the Grand Lux Cafe downstairs. It was Beth, myself, Donna (the other bridesmaid), and Beth's new step daughter Lynsey. We had a good trying to embarrass Beth. She is impossible to embarrass, she'll go along with anything. She's got so much moxie and she is so sassy. Our waiter, Patrick Sweety, as we like to call him played along with us and we all had a great time. We were just killing time until Royce (Donna's husband) flight got in. They are from Louisiana and they are awesome. Royce and Donna are the cutest couple I have ever seen. It is so obvious that they are MADLY in love with each other. It so funny because Donna is so the life of the party and will do anything once, and Royce is quiet and shy. But they are so perfect for each other. Anyway once Royce got in Beth decided she wanted to go to Dick's Last Resort at Excalibur. I thought it might be a bad idea because Dick's is one of those restaurants where they are purposely rude to you. They will tell you to $*!k off, or give you hard time. Beth is not the kind of girl who takes "ness" from anyone, but we all had a good time. At Dick's they make you hats for you to wear that are really crude and usually really rude, so if you're easily offended, don't look at the pictures. The Manager there is named Taco and he wears a red g-string and gives lap dances to those that are especially unlucky. We were hoping he would give Beth a lap dance but he left early on Friday. They also had a live band there which was fun. They were playing a lot of old school song. They were horrible singers, but that almost made it more fun. Plus it was the last night of the Rodeo so there were a ton of cute cowboys running around. Anyway- we didn't want to stay out too late since the next day was the big day :)

So we went back to the Venetian and went to bed. Saturday went surprising well. We didn't have any huge catastrophes. I did burn my next with my curling iron so now it looks like a have a hickey on my neck. It pissed me off so I wore my hair straight. I'll show that curling iron who's boss! We lounged around for a while, and eventually got Beth in her dress. She looked gorgeous! Ya know how sometimes when you're in the casino and you see a bride walk by and you think oh how fun. It was really fun this time because it was Beth. The ceremony was perfect. Before we started. Johnny and Beth both were so nervous, but then when Beth came down the isle and they saw each other, you could tell that it was like no one else was there except the two of them. After the ceremony was over, the fun began. Beth had given a really great play list to the DJ and we had so much fun dancing and laughing. What can I say...good food, good friends,laughing, dancing and love. Sounds like good times to me:)

Bachlorette Party!!

My very dear friend Beth is getting married and I am so happy for her. Her first husband was someone that was undeserving of her, but she has found the perfect guy for her. They are so good for each other, and they are so happy just like they deserve to be. Beth is a pretty laid back kind of gal so being a bridesmaid really hasn't been that demanding. For the bachlorette party, the first stop was Stripper 101. Only in Vegas can you find a stripper class. I unfortunately missed this part because I couldn't get away from work early. But from what they described, it was defiantly not something they will ever forget. I met up with the group at the murder mystery show at the 4 Queens downtown. The show was called Marriage Can Be Murder, so we thought it would be the perfect theme. Although now that I think about it, the show had nothing to do with marriage...hmmm. Anyway it was really fun trying to figure out who the murderer was and trying to to figure who was or wasn't a part of the show. There were 2 empty seats at our table so they sat a couple with us that "said" it was their second date. Their names were Gary & Carrie. We had just been served the salad and Gary gets up and starts firing a gun and threatening people. I should have known that they were int he show, I'm so gullible sometimes. Then while Gary is running around with this gun a cop comes in and shoots him. It was such a fun show. We got to participate int he show. The cop comes around and questions people. We got to be rowdy, and everyone had a good time. Then we went back the hotel and Beth opened her bachlorette gifts. Then it was back out on the town. I had so much fun with these girls, they were a blast.

Blue Man Baking

So last weekend Molly asked me if I would take BJ to see Blue Man Group. He has been wanting to see it for the longest time and it was going to be a surprise for him. So on Friday night I picked him up and I was planning on feeding him and then our show was at 10. Well once I picked him up he told me he wasn't hungry, which made things tricky because we had 2 hours before our show. So we decided to go ride the roller coaster at NYNY. I hadn't been on that roller coaster in forever and BJ said he was up for it. I could tell BJ was little nervous but he really wanted to go. There were two guys from Ireland sitting in the row behind us and they were screaming like little girl the entire time. It was pretty fun. Afterwards we played in the arcade for a while. BJ won a ton of prizes and stuffed animals. He even won 2 stuffed animals at one time out of one of those claw machines. Anyway when we got to our show we gave the guy our tickets to show us where to go. He looked at our tickets and asked if we brought our raincoats with us. I was confused. Then when we got down to our seats we were on the 4th row and they had little plastic ponchos for us to wear. I honestly didn't know it was that kind of show so we both put on our ponchos and hoped for the best. I was surprises how much fun the show was considering there no talking. I thought the "blue men" did a great job and luckily we didn't need our ponchos too many times. Bj is such a fun kid and I had so much fun with him. That's the thing about hanging out with a nine year old...you kind of get to be a kid too. Isn't he the cutest kid ever??

On Saturday I went to Christy's house we did our holiday baking. Last Christmas I went to visit my BF Karen in San Diego and her mom made these AMAZING cinnamon rolls. Her mom gave me the recipe and they are now a new holiday tradition. Thanks Bertha! Cinnamon rolls are a big project and we had a lot of other stuff to cook too, so we got started right away. This kind of job required an apron, and anyone who knows my cooking/baking past knows that this apron was perfect for me :) (I have no makeup on...don't judge me) However my cooking skills have greatly improved over the last couple of years. So I started on the cinnamon rolls and Christy started on the Tea Balls. We had a pretty good time cooking and we really didn't fight (which is unusual) until the end of the day, which is usually the sign that we have spent too much time together. At one point we had to make a run to the store for more supplies. It had turned cold outside and I had worn flip flops, so I asked Christy if she had shoes I could wear and I should have known not to ask because be brought me a pair of crocs. I figured since it was never going to happen again, I should probably document this. So we got all stocked up on our supplies and head back to Christy's and finished up all of our goodies. Dad even pitched in and made some awesome fudge. So I ended up taking a bunch of goodies to work on Monday, and seriously by noon is gone. Damn vultures! I guess it's actually a compliment that it disappeared so fast. But the reason I decided to do all our baking last week was because it was my only free weekend and I wasn't going to be free again until like January. Oh well. Anyway, I was hoping that the baking would help me feel more Christmas-y ...but no. THE END

Christmas....Bah Humbug

Just 18 days until Christmas....I am having a very hard time getting into the Christmas spirit this year. I'm usually that annoying person who starts listening to Christmas music on October 1st. And while I'll admit that I was listening to Christmas music in October this year as well, it has just felt different. Maybe I have been busy or distracted or whatever. Work has played a roll. We are opening Encore in 16 days. My department is one of the few that covers both properties. So not only do we have all our regular responsibilities and workloads, we have now added another property and 13 additional stores. Don't get me wrong, it is a very exciting time and I am grateful to be involved in a company that is so innovative and is the best of the best when it comes Las Vegas resorts.. I mean let's be honest. I like good old Wayne Newton as much as the next person, but Steve Wynn is the REAL Mr. Las Vegas. I'm thankful to be involved in the whole process, but I am totally burned out. I go in early and stay late everyday and I can never seem to get a grasp on my always growing list of things to do. This is the current state of my office, and it's driving me crazy. I am the type of person who loves lists and organization and order. I don't know how much longer I can work like this. And everyday it seems to get worse, I'm currently not winning this battle. I also have times when I get so frustrated that I think I am going to kill the next person that comes to me with a problem or a dumb question or a stupid excuse about why they can't do their job.

I am the type of person that when I am upset or angry or frustrated, I want to have it out right then. I do not like holding things, it makes me feel like I am going to spontaneously combust. So I think this is I haven't felt very Christmas-y. Then last week on one particularly icky day, I returned to my desk after lunch and found the new Chanel holiday bag on my desk. This happens often and it's usually stuff for an executive or stuff Mr's Wynn wants us to check out ect. However... this bag had my name on it. I actually squealed a little. I love Allure perfume! I had been working with the regional manager of Chanel to book reservations for all the Chanel people to come stay at the Wynn during our soft opening and Grand Opening. It had been a very long process to get everyone what they wanted and get them booked, but we got it done. Anyway she left the Chanel bag for me as a way of saying thank you. She also left me know sweetest card. It was so nice of her and actually really unexpected. Most of the time you barely get a thank you. Then this year we had decided we would forgo buying gifts for each other and we would adopt a family for Christmas. Someone from another department at the Wynn just adopted 4 foster children ranging from 4 to 8. We set up a little tree and called it the donation tree. We asked everyone to bring in gift cards and put them on the tree. With the economy struggling and with 4 news kids at Christmas time, we thought gift cards were the best way to go. I was put in charge of our tree and everyday as I would receive gift cards from people I would tie them to the tree. Just those few minutes each day sitting with that little fake tree made all the difference for me. I got to thinking how fortunate I was and thinking about the "reason for the season" We have already passed the tree along to the family, and I really hope that it makes a difference for them this year as they spend their first Christmas together.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!

Happy Thanksgiving. I can't believe how fast this year has gone by. This year I made dinner all by my lonesome for my family. It really wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be. The last time I cooked a turkey, I was on my mission and it was like a 30 pound turkey. The turkey came with it's neck still attached(gross) and it was so big that it wouldn't fit in our sink. My companion and I had to wash it in the shower.
So we had our little miniature family Thanksgiving. Jason and Michelle came over. We had our whole family together for 2 hours and nobody got in a fight and nobody cried....it doesn't even feel like a real holiday :) Later we went over to Molly's house for their Thanksgiving. Molly's table was beautiful!. She had place setting and all these candles. It was awesome! I love the Holidays! Here's a few pictures.

Notice the difference in Christy in these two pictures.

Count your blessings instead of your crosses;

Count your gains instead of your losses.

Count your joys instead of your woes;

Count your friends instead of your foes.

Count your smiles instead of your tears;

Count your courage instead of your fears.

Count your full years instead of your lean;

Count your kind deeds instead of your mean.

Count your health instead of your wealth;

Count on God instead of yourself.

I think sometimes in life we get so wrapped up in the things we want that we forget about all the things we already have.

50 things I'm thankful for in 2008.....

1. Family- as crazy and dysfunctional as they are, they're mine and I am fortunate to have them.

2. Good Friends- you know who you are.
3. My dogs- they are family but they deserve a number of their own
4. A secure job in a successful company during hard economic times.
5. God- even if I question a million other things, I believe in God and his love for me.
6. Rainy days
7. Listening to Josh Groban and letting it take me back to a little town called Klaipeda.
8. Finally buying my own place.
9. Gas under $2.00
10. Christmas music
11. Pedicures
12. My dad- he deserves his own number because he's my hero.
13. Chinese food from my favorite hole in the wall restaurant in Henderson.
15. Quiet times like when the power goes out and it forces you to slow down and think about life.
16. Reading and a love of books.
17. Naps
18. Gossip Girl Nights
19. Shoes
20. Freedom
21. People with open minds and open hearts
22. Music- all sorts
23. Movies- all sorts
24. Julie Andrews
25. Internet
26. My car
27. Struggles and trials that have helped me learn.
28. Percocet
29. My country
30. Laughter
31. Light fluffy snow that falls really lightly and slowly so that you feel like you're in a snow globe.
32. Dirty dishes- Thank God for dirty dishes, for they have a story to tell. While others go without, we're eating very well.
33. Lilac trees
34. Rainbows
35. Cute little chipmunks
36. Pretty sunsets
37. All my gay friends who have taught me so much about what it means to be a good person.
38. Aunt Kaye
39. My camera
40. Good health
41. Sitting by the fireplace during the winter.
42. Reese's Peanut Butter Cups
43. Health insurance
44. puppy cuddles
45. ASPCA
46. The Twilight Series
47. Valour blankets
48. Flip Flops
49. Chap stick
50. Popcorn & M&M's

May your troubles be less,

your blessings be more,

and may nothing but happiness

come through your door.

Official Property Owner

In August I decided that I wanted to buy my own place. Lucky me I found my condo on the first day. The whole process after that point was a huge pain in the butt. All the approvals and documents ect ect. The timing was horrible on my part. This was during the time that I had a lot of pain from kidney stones and I actually ended up closing on the condo the same day as my surgery. Then all the real work began. The previous owner had the ceiling, walls and baseboards painted the same color. You can't tell in these pictures, but it was the color a wedding dress turns when it's really old and rotted. It was not cute. There was a lot of work to be done. My Dad is amazing. He has helped me every step of the way, and he was there working on my condo more than I was. He has helped me with everything from picking paint colors to the really big project that I couldn't begin to understand. It feels like we have been working on the condo for forever, and we are almost done!!! We've come a long way and it's been fun, but we're both ready to be done. Sometimes I think my dad is going to kill me. Every time we're close to being done, I give him another project. He always says he will do whatever projects I want, that he just wants me to be happy, but I know he just wants to be done. The latest project I added was that I decided I wanted to paint the kitchen cabinets. And then I decided that the kitchen was kind of boring with the cabinets all white and I want a little bit of spunk and and sassiness. So I decided that I wanted to paint the insides of the cabinets a different color. This time I went on my own to pick the color. I got the color and went home and started painting. This is what I ended up with. When my dad walked in and saw what I was doing, he said "what did you do that for?" like I didn't realize I was painting in a different color. I'm sure he was thinking "Gosh I leave you a lone for an hour and you go and screw everything up!" At first I was really excited and I loved it. Then the more I looked at it, I started to second guess myself and I didn't know what I was going to do. I didn't really like it, but I didn't want to add more work for my dad. But, luckily it has stared to grow on me, and I am happy with it now. It was just too much turquoise for a minute. So anyway- we are now officially nearing the end. I have no plans to add anymore projects and hopefully I will be all moved in next weekend. I am just so excited to have something that is mine. I enjoy spending a fair amount of time by myself doing my own thing. And now I can do that all I want. No more wasting money on renting, no more roommates to be annoyed with and clean up after. It's just my own place. I'm super excited! Thanks for all your hard work Dad, you're my hero!

We Are Not Friends!

Soon I will have to post some recent pictures of myself to show how incredible pale I am. I have always been pretty fair, but in the last 2 years it has gotten really bad. I am like sickly pale. Part of it is that living in Vegas, I'm not really willing to go outside when it's a 120 degrees. Then I was on some medication that made my skin super sensitive to the sun, then I the kidney stone thing and was basically a lazy bum all the time. Then my doctor ordered some bloodwork to test my vitamin D. A normal level is around 40....my vitamin D level was 7 :( So my Dr. told me to start getting a lot more sun. So I got a tanning membership. I have only been 4 times, and I've burned twice. I started out at 6 minutes, then to 8 and I have now graduated to 10. Me and tanning beds are not on good terms....the end.

TWILIGHT!!!

I am a huge fan of the Twilight Series, so of course I have had ants in pants waiting for the twilight movie to be released. Work has been so crazy lately and Friday was super long and super stressful. I went in to work early because it was my friend Molly's birthday and I wanted to decorate her office. Molly is one of the most giving and generous people I know. For her birthday she invited a group of us to have dinner at LBS @ Red Rock and then we were going to go see twilight at the red rock theater. Molly's friend owns LBS, and they took such good care of us. The food was AMAZING!! Not only did Molly have gift bags for us, but the owner gave us a goodie box of warm cookies to take with us to the movie. Included in our goody bag were fangs to wear to the movie. (if you didn't know, twilight is vampire movie) We all had so much fun. So we headed over to the theater for Twilight. We had already bought our tickets so we thought were ready to go, but apparently people had come early to line up for seats. When we got in the theater, it was packed. We had to sit in the 4th row, but we were still excited to be there. So after all the anticipation and excitement, I have to say that I was disappointed. I thought the movie was such an obvious a low budget movie, it was too short, and the acting wasn't that great. Edward is perfect. He always knows what to say and do, and in the movie it just seemed all wrong. There were also lots of akward moments between Bella & Edward. But, even with all that, i still caught myself smiling and giggling through out the movie. I will probably still buy when it comes out, I just hope that in the sequel they do a lot more with it. Anyway- it was a super fun night. Happy Birthday Mol!!

Boo for Kidney Stones!!

I really hope that everyone who reads this has seen The Princess Bride. If you haven't, add it to your list of things to do before you die. There is a part of the movie where Princess Buttercup is having a dream that she went through with the wedding to Prince Humperdink. (Humperdink, Humperdink, Humperdink!) She is standing in the castle square and this ishy old lady publicly calls her out for marrying another while her true love lives. The old lady boos Princess Buttercup so hardcore that it wakes her up from her dream.... That is how I feel about kidney stones and health issues in general. I boo them with such distain and firey intensity that it could make me sit upright out of a dead to the world deep sleep.
Some of you may know that I have had continuous pain from chronic kidney stones for over four years. I got my first kidney stone in august of 2004. I was living in Kaunas,Lithuania and the pain made me sit straight up at about 3am. I thought I was dying, and if I wasn't dying I was thinking that death would be a better alternative. In my small reality at that time I thought that nothing could be worse than having to go to the doctor or hospital in a foreign country, so I didn't go until 3 months later. The doctors told me that they could go up there with these prong things and pull them out, or I could deal with the pain until they passed. I chose to deal but my next problem was that they never passed, they just kept growing for 4 years. 8 months ago, in my slightly larger but still quite small reality I decided that nothing could be worse than having kidney stones. So after months and months of testing, persciptions, and endless dr appts. I finally figured out why I kept getting kidney stones, and why I had been in so much pain. I started out having weeks between kidney "episodes" to the point that I was in pain everyday. And for the last 5 months I have been on Lortab or Percocet everyday. 5 months!! I know it's horrible, but I finally broke down and had surgery. October 10th was the big day. Somehow I had conviced myself that I was going to be feeling super fantasically awesome after the surgery. I was so so so wrong. I don't think I have ever been so wrong in my whole life. However, I am so so so happy to report that I am finally back to normal. During the surgery, they put in something called stent. I won't go into detail, but I am convinced that a stent is a torture device. If your doctor ever brings it up as a possibility, you should run away! I got the stent removed about 2 weeks ago (i'll spare you those details as well) and I am FINALLY back in action. I feel like a brand new woman, and I am so excited!