stir-fry and birthday candles

My husband's birthday was April 16th and I just wanted to give him a little belated blog lovin' He turned the big 2-5. I think it's a cardinal rule in everyone's house that the birthday boy or girl gets to pick where to eat for supper....I knew Ryan would pick Flat Top Grill because he never gets to eat there because he has an extremely picky eater of a wife...I did have a good meal and promised we could go back there again sometime if he wanted to....yikes, ok emily don't get too crazy...




Deric and Sara also joined us.



I was there too, I promise...

I love my husband more than words can say. I can't wait to grow old with him and spend many more birthdays together!

Oh and is it just me or does my brother-in-law resemble anyone???




I Love You Ryan!!!

surprise

And you thought you got rid of me....

I can't believe it's already April! This past weekend was my weekend off and it just so happened to be Springfest in Bloomington. So a bunch of my friends and I went downtown to the bars. We started at Pub II at noon. The weather was perfect and so our time at the Pub was spent outside. It was perfect for miss pasty over here.

After staying there for most the day we picked up some more friends and headed to Girl Friday's, where Ty and Blair were playing. It's a new salon in Bloomington. And guess who I ran into....Aunt Sheila! Small world (not really tho........we both live in Bloomington, know the unemployed architects, and probably heard about it on Facebook), but still it was fun seeing her! This was a great transition during the day.....we got to hear live music and have a couple free drinks before heading to the next bar.

What a great way to spend my day off.... SUN::FRIENDS::MUSIC::FUN

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Rewind: Friday was Elizabeth's 12th Birthday! This is starting to become a cliche, but I have to say it...She's getting so old!!! She brought all of her friends down to ice skate in Bloomington. So Ryan and I met them at the rink so we could help her celebrate.

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Fastforward: First I want to talk about DWTS, then give a little "emily 411" on my recorded shows.....

I'm SO excited that Dancing With The Stars is back! Once again I get to see creative/romantic dances, drool over beautiful gowns, and stare at Derek Hough.....life is good :)

Here's a quick recap of what I think about the stars:

Buzz Aldrin- Loved (only because he was old...danced well for his age I suppose?)

Pamela Anderson- Iffy (seems like she's drunk most the time, but this week I thought she did pretty well)

Erin Andrews- Iffy (loved last weeks performance with the blindfold, but she doesn't do much for me)

Shannen Doherty- Kinda glad she's gone

Kate Gosselin- I think she'll stay around, but needs LOTS of work....

Evan Lysacek- Growing on me....may be my fav!

Niecy Nash- She's doing way better than I expected....secretly cheering for her...

Chad Ochocinco- Loved him this week!

Jake Pavelka- Dislike....totally could do without...

Nicole Scherzinger- Just want her to stick around so I can watch her partner (which my husband told me tonight that he would win hands down if they were in a fight...sure honey..ok....)

Aiden Turner- CAN'T STAND

Project Runway: SO sad Anthony was booted, SO happy Anthony came back!, SO sad Anthony was booted again.......He totally made the show!

Amazing Race: This is a show that ever since Ryan and I have been together, we've shared a secret obsession to be contestants. There's no doubt we would argue, I would run slow, and Ryan would be doing all of the 'eating gross things' speed bumps.....but there's also no doubt we would bring home the W. This year I'm rooting for the Cowboy Brothers (especially Cord...the redhead) and the other Brothers (one's straight and one's gay). They are both in the final four...I will admit watching the couple win at the end gives you that jealous twitch, like when you were younger and the kid on the Bozo Show would win the trip to Disney after making the last bucket in BOZO's Grandprize Game. (sidenote: we would watch that show religiously every morning as a family when we were younger....and one morning the kid won and my brother Michael was juming up and down screaming WE'RE GOING TO DISNEYWORLD!!!)

:::Back to Reality:::

I'm going to try real hard to post at least once a week from now on....my New Year's Resolution hasn't been going well this year, but it's about to change!

One more thing before I leave. My old boss at Glik's, Angie, and her husband Mark are expecting their first child together! It's a boy and I believe she's due in June. Can't wait to see him...I'm sure he'll be a cutie :)

coming soon

sorry my blogging has been lacking...I really wanted to be creative and do an on-my-mind post, however, that part of my brain isn't working tonight. I promise to update soon :)

another one

so i've been out of the blog loop recently, but i have a good excuse! i love my photography website, but sometimes my edited pictures don't get displayed the best....so i was on the hunt for a new layout. it takes awhile to get used to a new editing program, so my time has been spent figuring out the new site. i like how this website looks and i think the contact page is neat because you can actually get ahold of me through the site, BUT i don't necessarily care for the url. also it takes a bit for the pictures to load because i'm sharing alot, but stick with it because once they're loaded it works great! please give me feedback...and if you know of any other free (key word) websites to try, i'm open for suggestions...

here are a few pictures from two weekends ago....we spent saturday in pontiac with our friends :)


(pictures thanks to kori)


website:
http://www.wix.com/esweitzer/emilysweitzerphotography

The Bachelor Finale

The Bachelor ended Monday night and Jake chose Vienna. So my pick from the beginning was Tenly, but I'm torn on his decision. Of course I thought Tenly was beautiful and a very nice person, but I could see the chemistry between Jake and Vienna. Throughout the season there were episodes where I really liked Jake and then one's I couldn't stand him. But I loved the last episode and he seems like a sweet guy. Not sure about Ali being the next Bachelorette, but I'll probably watch!

New Moon

Saturday evening my Aunt Debbie met my mom in Lexington to get my sisters for the night. They came to work to give me the low down on the night. They were going to get us a table at Joe's for supper and then we were headed to see New Moon (the 2nd Twilight movie). Ryan also joined us for the activities.

Before going into the movie we all clarified who we were rooting for:

JacobVSEdward

Elizabeth: Team Edward

Grace: Team Edward

Debbie: Team Jacob (booo)

Emily: Team Edward

Ryan: Didn't care

We all loved the movie. It was funny hearing all of the girls giggle when Jacob would take his shirt off. Especially the girls to the right of me *cough cough elizabeth & debbie cough* Ryan thought the shirts were off a little too much throughout the movie. We all had a great time and can't wait for the next movie to come out!

The girls stayed the night at our place, then Sunday the rest of the family came down to celebrate my birthday. It was nice to see everyone and spend time with my family. They came here first and I opened presents, then we ate supper at BWW. Sorry, I've been bad with my camera....no pictures :(

Good Times, Great Oldies

Ok, I don't want to keep you wondering any longer.....

Exciting News at Work-

So it seems like we are constantly having little contests at work to win free jewelry (which is fine by me!). When I first started there was a three month department incentive going on. If we sold $1000 worth of Lois Hill jewelry each month, then one month we would win earrings, another a bracelet and the other a necklace. Of course the only one we won I couldn't use because my ears aren't pierced.....HOWEVER, they called the other day and they had extra necklaces and since we were so close that month they gave them to us! Yay!!!

Previously I had told you about me possibly winning a Michele Watch, well I won! I'm still waiting to get it tho. They said it would take 6-8 weeks and this is week 7. *Side note: I hate it when customers come into work and want to send a watch or piece of jewelry in for repair and I tell them they will get it back in 6-8 weeks and their mad....now I kinda understand* Pictures to come....

Our last contest was for a brand called Crislu. People purchase Crislu for weddings or buy the rings for replacement wedding rings while on vacation. It's a sterling/platinum base with CZ's. Our department exceeded the goal and we all won necklaces. Then Heidi from the Von Maur center called the other day to congratulate me for being the 2nd top seller in the company! I got to pick another free piece on top of the necklace......woo hoo!!

Wedding Album Update-

It took us forever to decide on pictures for our wedding album, as there were SO many good ones! We finally forced ourselves to decide and recently received it in the mail. It's perfect! The book is 11X15 and the pages are a little thicker than paper which makes the book very heavy. We also chose a champagne color for the cover. Here are a few pictures...

Craft Projects-

A long time ago for Christmas Ryan had given me a jewelry box from K-mart, I believe, that has basically sat in the box since. Now that I'm going to be getting more jewelry I think it would be better if I stored it in something other than laying it across the dresser. It was a lovely oak (gag!), so I asked Ryan if he could paint the whole thing black and then stencil this

pattern somewhere on it. I'm so glad he helped do this. He had all the doors and glass panes out, and it was painted black before I knew it. He spent alot of time trying to get the stencil right, but it's a very complex pattern and his cutout just didn't work great. So I drew the pattern on free hand. I think together we did a great job!

(name that movie)

Photography-

So my photography business has been a little slower because of the weather, but hopefully soon it will pick up a bit. I did take pictures a week ago of a girl I work with's daughter, Bella. Last night I posted new pictures to my website. Be sure to check them out! Here are a few of my favorites.

New Hobby-
I have become a pool shark. Playing pool was just something fun to do, but recently I've been more into the strategy behind each hit and trying to improve my game. My brother in law Tyler plays the open mic night at Coconut Louie's on Monday nights and their pool tables are free all night. So we kill two birds with one stone! Also, we spent Valentine's day at Ride the Nine, which is a pool hall with around 13 tables. They have regulation tables there, which are bigger. I personally like the smaller tables because I can control my moves better, but it's still fun!

So there's my current life in a nut shell. Back to work....ugh