I love Christmas!

Christmas has hit our home in full force and i love it!  The house is decorated and i love to sit and look at the lights, I wish I could leave it up all year but then I probably wouldn't love it as much. 

animal videos

When I watch America's Funniest Home Videos it's the animal ones that are my favorite.  On Animal Planet they have full shows of funny videos.  Every Friday MSN posts funniest videos the week and this one was too cute to resist!  This poor cat just wants to rest but it has the patience of Job with it's Parakeet friend. 

Hysteria

Hysteria is the only word to describe the audience on the Oprah show during her "Favorite Things" episode.  It's the hardest ticket to get and people dream of being a guest on the show and taking home all the loot!  This year was no exception, being Oprah's last season she went crazy.  Part 1 was Friday and the audience got $3000 watches and a 7 day cruise to just name a couple.  Now let's be real, how many people are going to sell that watch?  I know I would.  I would be too scared to wear a $3000 watch, I would probably break it or lose it so why not get some cash for it.  Maybe that sounds bad but it's my watch now can't I do what I want with it?

Oprah tapes 2 shows a day so as this hysterical audience was leaving the building the audience for the next show were waiting in line only to find out that they just missed the Favorite Things and with their luck were probably going to be in the audience for Oprah and Gayle talking about their camping trip.  Once inside the studio they find out that there is a part 2 and they are it.  Cue the mass hysteria, tears, hugs and they don't even know what they are getting yet. 

As I predicted after part 1, the audience in part 2 all got new cars!  2012 VW Beetles that don't even come out until May.  The power of O - she can get presidents elected and get you a car that isn't even out yet. 

Why I like Taylor Swift

I have avoided getting Taylor Swift CD's in the past because I figured you had to be 16 or under to buy them.  I caved though and just got "Speak Now".  I like Taylor Swift.  Her songs are catchy and somehow she has managed to not be corrupted by the business yet and is still hanging on to her "clean" image.  It seems like mainstream teen artits now hit 16 or 17 and all of a sudden it's time to wear next to nothing on CD covers and sing trashy music.  She's on her third CD and hasn't broken yet, and she's 20 now so let's hope she's passed that stage and just keeps going the way she is.  I'm really enjoying the CD, her writing style is so catchy and from what I hear she wrote all the songs by herself.  Although this CD isn't going to help her get any dates.  It seems that anyone she has dated gets a song written about them so I don't think the guys are going to be lining up. 

Justin Bieber's Girlfriend

I saw this on youtube - this girl will get famous now.  Somewhere Taylor Swift is pretty mad that this girl totally stole her song style! 

If only they had youtube - or internet - when I loved New Kids on the Block...yeah i'm that old!

1 year

This Sunday Phil and I will celebrate our 1 year anniversary.  I can't believe it's been a year already!  When we first got married I would say "oh we've been married 3 weeks or 3 months" then time flew and here we are at our first anniversary.  We decided on no gifts this year because just went on vacation and we want to do another trip this winter so we opted out of stressing ourselves out over gifts.  I think Phil lucked out because i'm not really into jewelry (other than my engagement and wedding ring of course) so he doesn't have to worry about spending a bunch of money on that.

We started talking the other night about how much has happened in this first year.  I moved out to Wasaga Beach which was a big change for me.  I slowly but surely started to make the house more family than bachelor so we got new furniture and renovated the kitchen.  We visited Israel and Italy on our honeymoon and then just did a tour through the states to Philly, NYC, Washington and Atlantic City.  We each lost a grandparent just a few months apart.  We have learned alot about each other and alot about ourselves.  When you see yourself through someone else's eyes sometimes you see things you never saw before, or things no one else had the guts to tell you.  So I have learned alot about myself and a few things I need to work on :)

Most of all I'm married to my best friend.  I couldn't imagine life without him and I'm so blessed and thankful that God brought us together. 

NYC

My favorite city to visit has been New York.  I like the busyness and excitement - but just to visit, I couldn't imagine living there.  I had so much fun taking Phil around the city and I did pretty good at navigating us on the Subway.  I did alot of advertising for LIFE 100.3 with my hoodie in every state!

Nothing could beat the amazing view from our hotel in Atlantic City - how great to wake up to that everyday!

The Cake Boss

One of my favorite days on vacation was going to see the Cake Boss.  Let me back up first.  On one episode of the Cake Boss Buddy and the gang made a big hoggie cake for a local deli in their neighbourhood.  So we paid a visit to that deli first - Fiore's and met Mr. Fiore himself who was quite happy to have his picture taken and we got an extra piece of homemade mozarella for coming from Ontario to see him. 

Then we headed to the Cake Boss for the most amazing canolli I have ever had and I saved my red velvet cupcake for the next day - even a day old it was still awesome.  We didn't get to see Buddy, they were filming upstairs but it was still fun to be there! 

We also spent a day in DC - unfortunately Obama didn't have time to see us but we stopped by his house for a visit.  We managed to go through 5 states in one day.  We started in New Jersey, took a Ferry to Delaware for kicks and then drove through Maryland, Virginia for 5 min. and DC.  The Pentagon is apparantly technically in Virginia.



The Choppers

One of our sight seeing adventures on our trip last week was to visit the OCC Choppers in Newburgh New York.  If you have watched American Choppers on TV you know what i'm talking about.  Over the years they have moved shops a few times and went from a small shop to this!

Definately alot bigger than the old shops.  My husband of course loves the motorcyles and i just love the reality show of course.  

But the bikes are truly amazing designs.  This is the Lance Armstrong bike they made for him.

The sleigh bike apparantly shoots fire!

They probably make 70% of their income off merchandise alone these days.  Everything from mugs, t-shirts, hats, bobble head dolls etc.  You could easily drop alot of money in there if you love the show.  There is a viewing area to watch the guys building bikes - couldn't really take pictures because the glare off the windows were too much.  We didn't get to meet Paul Sr., it was a beautiful day out so he was probably fishing.

Tomorrow the Cake Boss!

It's not weird it's a God

I just got back from my vacation and many adventures to blog about this week and some fun pictures but first I have to start out with a story just as my holiday started.  A couple weeks ago I heard a woman on Focus on the Family sharing her story and promoting her book as well.  Her story grabbed my attention right away for personal reasons so I made a mental note to pick up her book next time I was at the Treasure House.  I was packing for my holiday and I packed the book I was reading "Always Looking Up" by Michael J. Fox.  I was almost done so I thought i better have another book packed, we did have a 10 hour car ride to get through.  I went down to my book shelf and as I skimmed the books there was the book by the woman I heard on Focus on the Family.  I saw the title and I took a couple steps back.  I have no explanation as to how that book got on my bookshelf.  I know I hadn't bought it yet and I hadn't asked anyone to borrow it but there it was.  I grabbed it immediately and ran upstairs to tell the story to Phil.  As I was telling him I said "isn't that weird" - he gently reminded me that it's not weird Jen it's God.  I'm not saying it magically appeared.  We get a lot of pre-release books sent to work to read and the publisher's are hoping they can send us more copies and we will give them away on the radio.  I'm sure that's how I got it but the God part is that when I would have brought it home, I didn't really know her story and at the time it didn't really apply to me.  So I probably just added it to my list of books to read.  But at that time when I went down to the bookshelf God knew I needed it right then.  I finished the book by the end of my trip and it was exactly what I needed.  Someday maybe I will share why but for now I just want to leave encouragement that God will meet you where you are.  He met me by the bookshelf and showed me that He was listening and He knows everything I have been feeling and thinking and used this book and this woman's words to bring me closer to him.