Holiday gift guide

I see a lot of bloggers doing holiday gift guides of the trendiest, best presents, and I thought I would do one myself. 

This holiday gift guide comes courtesy of ThisIsWhyImBroke.Com– a website that Dan showed me. (In case you are confused, it does not link to Target.com – but that seriously is why I am broke).

I don’t know if I can even begin to summarize what this website is. So let’s just begin, shall we?

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First of all – remember this post? You too can give one to a friend for only 6 figures! Hopefully after a gift like that, they will let you borrow their boat.

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For the photographer friend. I got you this for Christmas, mom. Sorry to ruin the surprise.

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This is a gift to yourself. If you would like to freak someone out -- put this in a friend's bed while they are sleeping. It's one quarter of a man, with creepy cloth puppet fingers. 

Seriously, this terrifies me. But seeing your friend's reaction when they wake up? Merry Christmas to you!

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This gift idea is for me. I would like red. In my stocking. K thanks.

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This gift is for the hard-to-buy-for on your list. Who doesn't want glow in the dark toilet paper? "Functional and Fun" ... I'm sorry ... I can't ... you'll just have to read the rest of the description yourself.

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This is by far my favorite. It is available on Amazon. If you usually check reviews before you purchase, let me summarize:

One lady gives it five stars and said it was, "more fun than a barrel of monkeys," her kids love it, and it holds up to 440 lbs .... (I would like to know who put a 440 lb kid in this thing).

Another person gave it 2 stars because it was missing instructions. He did casually mention that “when someone unzipped the ball, the air all rushed out at once and the person inside was enveloped and smashed by the deflating plastic. While getting out, it was difficult to keep the ball from being swamped with water and sinking with the person still inside…. Also, there’s only about 5 to 7 minutes worth of oxygen when you’re in the ball.” Small details. In summary, he writes that it was a lot of fun – he just gave it two stars because he wished it came with instructions. 

And lastly, another five star review: 

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I hope your friends and family enjoy all of your presents. Merry Christmas yall!

Two Work Stories

First:

I had an 8 am meeting with the team, walked in about 5 til, saw them walking to the meeting room, and knew I would be just a minute or two behind them. When I got to the room – the team wasn’t there. I thought I was in the wrong room or wrong building – so I texted my boss to ask about the room number. A few minutes later they walked in – they had gone to get coffee.

About an hour into the meeting (it was a long one), we are watching a presentation when my boss’s phone rings. He checks his phone, looks incredibly confused, turns to me, and looks at me like I have lost my mind.

Boss: reading “‘Where are we?’ … Kelley … you are at work.”

Apparently I was not very descriptive in my text. I could have said ‘hey what room is our 8 am meeting in?’ Then when he received the text an hour later, he wouldn’t think I was crazy. Instead, he thinks I texted him, while in the meeting, asking, “Where are we?”

Second:

Background: most people at work have iPhones that they use to check email, instant message, etc. while they are not at their desks.

We were in a meeting headed up by our VP – with about 50 people in the room. It was a pretty important meeting, with a lot of information at once, so everyone is paying attention / not on their phones or laptops / etc. Our VP finishes with “Anyone have any questions?”

From the front row, Siri asks “What is your father’s name?”

The phone was sitting on the table – I have absolutely no idea what made Siri decide to speak. It got the entire room laughing as our VP replies, “Earl, Siri. My father’s name is Earl. Any other questions?”

P.S.

In my post from Greenville, I forgot to add this picture (that Grace took):

Isn't this the cutest picture of Koda? Maybe I am biased - but I find it adorable. 

Close up:

Love them both so much!

I am back tomorrow with more posts - but wanted to share that picture. 

Holy hair

My hair was getting incredibly long. I thought about donating it again -- but it is so layered, I just imagined a poor little girl with a ginger mullet (no thanks!). 

Since I couldn't decide what to do, it just kept getting longer .. and longer. Case and point:

So I just decided to chop it all off!!

Juuuuust kidding. That's an old picture. My dad is panicking right now. 

But I did take four inches off of it - which it really needed. 

SO much better! It's long, but I no longer look like a Duggar. 

Weekend in Greenville and Panthers Game

This past weekend was so much fun. The kind of weekend where someone asks "why are your eyes so puffy" on Monday morning, and you realize that you hadn't noticed how tired you were, because you were still on a high from how much fun you had. (And you also didn't notice how mean your co-workers were, until that comment.)

We went to Greenville for Saturday night. Blair organized a gift exchange (not the kind where you draw names, but the kind where you can steal) for the girls. Dan was concerned he would be bored, so he asked Brett if he could come play too. So the girls stayed in and the boys went out in Greenville. 

We drank wine.

"Blends have more fun"

We opened presents. 

We took awkward solo shots of everyone but Kelley ... wait.

We ate, drank, talked, and laughed until we cried.

I immediately regretted the ab ripper that I did earlier in the day. 

Before we knew it, it was 3 am.

Those are my kinds of nights. These girls are all within a few hours, and we don't see each other nearly often enough. And sometimes I wonder why a clean house, laundry, and errands seem more important than laughing with girlfriends until 3 am. So next time: my house. not vacuumed. amidst a pile of laundry. Blair - bring the bombshell wine.

We headed out pretty early because my Falcons were playing the Panthers in Charlotte (I don't want to talk about it) and Dan and I had plans to go to the game.

Dan wore my old Chris Chandler jersey (the QB the last time the Falcons went to the superbowl), because I thought it would be good luck. 

We paid $20 for each ticket, and had pretty good seats! Upper level, only a few rows up, on the 50 yard line. This was our view:

It would have been so much better if we had won! 11-1 and we couldn't beat Carolina! Ugh. We sat near a ton of Panthers fans, and they were giving me a hard time, but it was pretty funny. At one point, one of them said "now missy - this has all been fun and games - and we have been pretty nice to you - but if your Falcons come back and win this - we aren't going to be so nice." Haha.

The loss really is our fault. You see nachos are lucky - and we ordered them way too late in the game. I'm really sorry about that, Altanta fans. 

Dan zipped up his jacket to hide the jersey once the game was over. 

I think we will both be very tired this week, but neither of us mind one bit! We are ready for a busy rest of December, seeing family, friends, and ringing in the new year with some of our favorite people!

Oh! You hung the socks!

Dan: "Oh! You hung the socks!"
Kelley: ....stockings?


What I did:

What Dan thinks I did:

Wouldn't be Christmas without hanging the socks!