Puke

I just barfed in my mouth a bit.

High heel shoes created with the help of Teva. Who is the target audience for this? I don't understand.

Winter Wonderland

I was awoken in the middle of the night on Friday from loud thunderstorms. You could also hear the hail falling down on our roof. It was such a stormy evening. When we woke up the next morning though, we were greeted with pretty, pretty snow- just enough to feel cozy and Christmasy without messing up our Saturday plans.


View of our house

View from our spare bedroom

Gobble Gobble!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm totally bummed to be missing the fun with my family this year, but only 22 more days until I see them. Also, they are celebrating at work with an American themed turkey lunch (which I'll eat and then promptly fall asleep during my 3pm meetings). BF and I are going to do a mini- Thanksgiving meal too with homemade apple crumble later this evening. Enjoy your day with family and friends!

FECK!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yesterday my friend R invited me to the a movie premier for the new Brad Pitt/Will Farrell movie Megaminds. Fun! I was really excited about it, and we rushed off after work to head to the Savoy on O'Connell street with my other friends S &S. We only had 15 minutes before the movie started, and we were STARVING, so popped into the Burger King next door for a quick bite to eat.

BIG MISTAKE!

We grabbed our food, sat down and ate quickly ate as to not miss the movie. As we were getting ready to go, I picked up my coat and discovered... no bag. What the heck? "Girls, where's my bag? It's not funny, hand it over."

 Turns out, I was robbed :( It's a sketchy area to begin with so I should have been more aware. I just left it on the back of my chair and no one noticed anyone coming near. Anyways, I had to file a police report and the shannigans was all just a big pain in the a@#$. The only funny thing was, I was talking to the police and told him that my purse was stolen. He asked me what was in there and I listed it out "ipod, camera, phone, etc" and he was like "all in a purse"? I had forgotten that "purse" really means "wallet" over here. ;)

So after a restless night, I came into work this morning and received a phone call from a local pub who had my bag. Amazing! They said it was chucked out on the streets, but someone brought it into their pub. So I ran over there and although my ipod, phone and camera were gone, my wallet, keys and lip gloss (all five of them!) were still there. And the biggest worry was my freaking stupid immigration card. Although I could have gotten it replaced, I was NOT looking forward to sitting in that hellish building for 8 hours.

Anyways, everything is coming up roses for me. My pal K had a spare iPod that she doesn't use anymore so generously gave that to me, and my friend M had an extra phone. Amazing! I have such lovely and supportive friends, and I've learned NEVER to let your bag leave your view...ESPECIALLY in the sketchy area of Dublin.

Filled!

Do you remember the movie, "While you were sleeping" with Sandra Bullock? She's a subway money collector and pretends she's Peter Gallagher's fiance, but while he's in a coma she falls in love with his brother. (I would too, have you SEEN Peter Gallagher's eyebrows?). Anyways, in the movie she said that one of her dreams is to fill up her passport with stamps.

I remember watching this when I was younger and saying- "Sandy, that's a great dream." I'm going to wish and hope I get to fill up my passport with glorious stamps too.

Well, guess what kids, I did it!!! :) Going to Sweden last week, put me over the edge, and I have no more blank pages or places to put stamps. So yesterday, I headed to the home country (the US embassy that is) and got more pages added to my passport. Yeah! I had renewed my passport right before I moved over to Ireland, and I can't believe I filled it up in only 2 years. Here's to more fun adventures in the upcoming years (until I fill it up again- fingers crossed!)

Walking around Stockholm

So after reveling in our boat, we decided to take a walk around the city. Why not, right? :) We spent both days just walking around and exploring, but got sooo tired because it gets dark at 3:45! Ekks! What I loved most about the city is that there are candles EVERYWHERE- in front of store doors, in windows on tables everywhere. It was lovely and gave the city a very cozy, Christmassy-feel.  Stockholm is gorgeous, and I'll let the photos do the talking.

 Making new friends

 Swedish Meatballs! (I sadly did NOT get any reindeer- I don't want to talk about it)

View of the old town streets

Along the waters

 Amazing Food Hall!

Yup. We did it- The ice bar tourist trap and to be honest, I loved every freezing cold minutes of it. ;)

Cheers with glasses made of ice

View of Stockholm from above

I'm on a mother f-ing boat!

We had the most wonderful time this weekend in Sweden. BF and I flew in to Stockholm on Friday night and checked into our BOAT which was aMAZING. We kept saying "I'm a mother f-ing boat" from the silly SNL skit all weekend. (It didn't get old once!)

BF had found an old yacht that was being masked as a hotel situated in the waters along Gramla Stan. It was built for the Woolworth's hieress, Ms. Barbara Hutton, for her 21st birthday.

Here she is! Cute, right? Look at the name of the boat (Mälardrottningen). So many letters!


BF had the smarts to upgrade to a "Deluxe" room for us which was lovely of him but it was er...very cosy and had bunk beds- let the romance begin! It was tiny, but still comfy. We didn't mind at all (besides, we're only little).



The most fascinating part of our cabin was the bathroom. It was really cool. Look at it in pictures.

Normal albeit small bathroom


Moving bathroom wall


Ta-da- Shower!


I was so impressed with the genius use of small spaces!

Food Goal

While in Sweden this weekend, my goal is to eat Reindeer. Will update and let you know if I succeed when I get back!

Cava and Tapas

I had the most amazing weekend with the funniest people in Barcelona. My stomach hurt on Sunday morning from laughing so much. We had the most perfect weather, sunny and warm (26C!). We spent the nights drinking and dancing and the days moving from cafe to cafe trying out tapas and sangria. (Amazing, no?)

The weekend involved alot of this:

Amazing Paella


Pretty decorative Ice cream


Sangria. Yum!


Which led to this:


and this:




Not only that, the Pope was in town at the same time. (What up, Pope?) AND on our flight home, I sat a row away from Damien Rice. He is SOOOOOO small- you could put him in your pocket and take him home to serenade you when your iPod malfunctions.

Happy Anniversary...

To me and my love, Ireland! :)

Well, maybe not my true love as that would really be bacon. I can't believe I've been here for two whole years already. It was actually yesterday but I was busy hanging out in Barcelona with the Pope and Damien Rice- no biggie :) It has gone by so fast!

I had a fab and amazing year of changes
- Getting engaged (woop!)
- Buying the MOST adorable house
- Getting promoted at work and becoming the boss lady
- Becoming an aunt - from too too far away :(
- Continuing my travels (India, Egypt, Jordan, Israel, Wales, Spain, Switzerland, England and next week Sweden!)

To many more happy years in Ireland!

Want

The one in the picture below is 12 feet tall!

Chances of EVER getting one- zero (12 feet or hand held size) :(

Off the rails

I'm ditching the old ball and chain this weekend for a fab girls weekend away to Barcelona.

- 20 degrees C and sunny
- 16 People
- 2 apartments
- Countless bottles of duty-free alcohol

3 days and counting.....

ROAAAAAAAAAAAR!

To die for (Though I'm VERY biased)! So sweet!

Not really sure about this get up


Totally over it now



This is much better!

Trick or Treat

Yesterday was the first time in years where BF and I were not living in an apartment so we (when I say we, I really mean just I) was SUPER excited for trick or treaters. I decorated the house with orange streamers and stocked up on candy (bags and bags of chocolates), and we waited patiently for the kids to come by. Around 6 there was a couple of groups of neighbors so I got really excited and then NOTHING! We only had about 10 groups stop in for candy. SO SAD! :(

I ended up drowning my sadness in the bags of buttons and Cadbury chocolates :)

Hope you all had a lovely Halloween!