Bethlehem, PA

Here are the pictures of the historic Bethlehem area I was able to explore a few weeks ago. I meant to post these a while ago, but I got derailed with the appendicitis the day after we got back from the wedding!

Nearly every front door had a Moravian Star hanging. I couldn't get enough!






Their cemetery took my right back to college, not to mention walking past Sisters' House and Brothers' House!






I'll definitely be going back, and I'll absolutely be going to the Historic Hotel Bethlehem for Sunday brunch - the most amazing brunch spread I've ever seen! Who's coming with me?

Home, for now

We're back in the weekly routine at home after a successful trip to Charleston, SC for my friend Adair's wedding. Not even the threat of hurricane force winds and rain could keep us away - though it did alter our travel plans a bit. Worked out, though, we got to spend the night with T & Lisa in NC and the hounds got to hang with Guinness, the largest lab they've ever seen.

Here are some pictures of the weekend. We hit the Charleston Riverdogs game on Saturday evening with Hillary, Abigail and Jason. Then the rest are from the wedding itself (which was at the SC Aquarium, sweet!)



Adair and her husband, Dave, dancing at their reception.


Yes, Abigail and Shannon are wearing life preservers. Yes, all three of them look uncomfortable. Blame it on the "Shark Attack."


Frank and me at the reception.

Vacation Part 2

On Thursday morning I drove further north on 17, all the way into Wilmington, NC. I met up with Cat and then we headed out to the beach for lunch and a little more sunning.

I went to Wilmington for our friend Mary's wedding, which doubled as a mini college reunion. It is so much fun to get to see everyone and to celebrate the beginning of Mary and Mike's marriage. A few of us bridesmaids (and our husbands) stayed at Cat's grandmother's house, which was not only fun and economical, but it made things easier logistically! We all had to be in most of the same places at the same times.

Friday started with the bridal luncheon in downtown Wilmington.


It was absolutely beautiful, and the food was incredible, too! What a treat to get to spend some quality time with Mary, her mom and aunts, and Mike's mom and sister during the weekend.


Mary has a super rockin' cousin named Katherine who was there, too. Katherine, or Special K as Mary calls her, made bracelets for all of the bridesmaids! It was an awesome gift from an awesome 8 year old, and most of us wore them during the wedding - at the bride's direction!


The hostesses had arranged for a charm cake and it was so much fun! I had heard of the tradition, but had never seen it in person. The charms were all pretty, and I ended up with the pelican which means I will have "a life of plenty."


After lunch us girls headed home to nap and then change for the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. The rehearsal went well, with the most confusing part being figuring out what our heights would be the following day since only one of us (not me) remembered to bring their wedding shoes. I'm sure we looked very silly trying to estimate our varied height changes!



After rehearsal we walked a block or so to the rehearsal dinner. It was on the 3rd floor of a building, overlooking downtown. And I learned something about Mike - he has a major thing for Swedish Fish! There were Swedish Fish at every table, and the cake was decorated WITH the candies, as well as decorated with a fondant rendering of a bag of the candies!


We all had fun chatting, watching a slide show, and listening to toasts. There was a lot of laughter and a few tears throughout the toasts, which is the way it should be!

Wordless Wednesday

Bachelorette, Birthday, Bar Golf, Oh My!

A visual summary of my last two weekends, and the cake in the middle!

I'm Excited About: Party and a (friend's) Baby Edition

First - this weekend I'm off to celebrate my friend Mary Eileen. She is such an awesome lady that I'm getting on a plane to NC to hang with her and some of her best friends for the weekend as we excitedly celebrate her upcoming wedding. I'm so very happy for her and thrilled to be able to count her as my friend.

We're all going to have a blast and I'm hoping that this weekend only comes in a close second to her wedding weekend in July.

Second - I get to meet a sweet little girl this weekend and I can't wait to get my hands on her! She belongs to a sweet friend of mine that I don't get to see nearly as much as I'd like. What a treat to get to celebrate two huge life changing events with two different friends in one weekend!

Off to the airport, what a great trip!

Spring has Sprung!

It is very rainy here, has been since yesterday, but it also means that spring is here! No more snow, no more bone-chilling winds, no more breath-taking temperatures! My flowers are even starting to come up. Thank goodness, I was about ready to pack up and leave.

Along with spring comes an onslaught of travel and activity, and I can't wait!

Last weekend we were in Charleston, SC for Catherine & Erik's wedding (so fun!), this weekend we're at home and I'm hoping to get some work done around the house...laundry is first up.

Over the next 8 weekends, I will be attending or hosting 7 events. I'm completely psyched for all of them! I am so lucky to have such wonderful friends to celebrate, all at different points of life. Weddings, wedding showers, baby showers, and graduations all within such a short window! There should even be a baby born in there somewhere!

Hooray for spring, and hooray for celebrating friends and family!

Fatty Got Married!

My friend Catherine married her best friend, Erik, this past weekend and it was awesome! I'm so excited for them, and so glad that they live so close to us. It was a fantastic event full of college friends, both from Salem and the Citadel.

The wedding was at Summerall Chapel at The Citadel. It was simple and beautiful, and was completed with the Summerall Guards' sword archway (including a smack on the bottom for Catherine).

The reception was in Mt. Pleasant at a beautiful club on a creek. The music was fantastic and we all danced the night away! My feet still hurt, and it was totally worth it. I snapped this picture of Cat and Erik as the photographer was ushering them out onto the dock before sunset. I was on the porch of the house, looking through a gorgeous old tree with spanish moss and tea candles hanging down. It was like a magazine shoot!


Here are two for mom; me & Frank, and me & Winters

The bridesmaids looked beautiful and carried the party through the night! The band was awesome, we really could not have asked for a better party! They even got Erik (and a few friends) to lay on their backs during "Shout!"

The band played Rocky Top - Greg is from TN...things got a little out of hand for a few minutes there, but we all enjoyed it! I hope that the floors can be buffed, Greg left half of his soles out there.

On long drive home, Frank and I stopped at Parkers in Wilson, NC for some BBQ. We got a couple teas to go.....

I didn't realize Frank had ordered the "bucket-o-tea" option.

I'm Excited About: Shoe Edition

It is Friday, and I'm going to try harder to keep up this "I'm excited about..." thing, so here goes!
I'm excited about two pair of shoes I just bought. A friend of mine is getting married in July and has decided that her bridesmaids should wear silver shoes - it came down to gold or silver. We're wearing awesome J Crew dresses in "fresh mint" which is a dainty green color. I think the silver will be nice, and convenient for me since most of my jewelry is silver/white gold/platinum!

Anyway, I started doing internet searches for silver shoes and had a hard time finding something that matched the image in my head. Then, I went to the Payless around the corner from my office and struck GOLD! or, SILVER!

I found a great pair of strappy heels that will do just the trick. They have enough points of contact on my foot that I think they'll be as comfy as strappy heels can be, they are the right amount of sheen without being sparkly mixed with the right amount of flat without being grey, and they are cuuuuuute.

The bonus here is that Payless has their Buy One Get One half off deal - and I found an adorable pair of silver flats for $9 - $4.50 after the discount, too! This means that if my cuuuuute shoes turn out to be painful, I have another cute pair of shoes to wear during the reception without being in my flippy-floppies! woo hoo!

I wish I'd thought of it

We had an awesome wedding - it was full of friends and family, the food was good, the cake was to die for, and if there was any drama I managed to miss it!

As Frank and I attend weddings we look at things differently now, always comparing it back to our own big weekend. For the most part, I wouldn't change a thing - but now and then I see something and think "I wish I'd thought of that!"

The one thing I think I could have focused more on was cherry blossoms. We were married on March 29, 2008 - the first day of the 2008 National Cherry Blossom Festival. I included some (fake) cherry blossoms on the hotel gift bags, and gave my bridal brunch hostesses cherry blossom candles as a thank you, but that is really where it ended.

Now I see cherry blossom save-the-dates and cherry blossom invitations, I could have carried cherry blossoms in my bouquet, or used them in the boutonnieres and center pieces, and most of all, I could have had this, a cherry blossom cake! (only the first one, the others are 'cake wrecks')

I am certainly not complaining about our cake - it was beautiful and delicious and everything I ever wanted it to be - but I am a sucker for cherry blossoms because of how beautiful DC is during that time of year!

I think I mostly wish I had thought to use more cherry blossoms in our wedding because it wasn't 'cool' then (yet), and now it is! We could have been ahead of the curve.

Anyway, like I said before our wedding was a rockin' good time and while I don't regret anything I can't help but occasionally think "I wish I'd thought of that!"

A New England Wedding

We traveled to Rhode Island this weekend for the Crosby/Dziok wedding, and it was a blast! We landed in the early evening, got settled in the hotel and then headed out to meet Mom & Dad Webb for dinner at Smokey Bones.

I should have taken a picture of my dinner - pulled pork on top of a halved baked potato with all the fixin's! mmmmmmmm

Then we met up with the wedding crew at McFadden's in Providence

Saturday came around, starting with the hotel breakfast around 9:30am then there was time to hang out and get ready before our shuttle left for the ceremony. The shuttle to/from the ceremony was fun, it was great to be traveling with so many friends!

The wedding was in Dave's parents' church, and it was beautiful

as was Rachel's hair - so curly and sparkly!

The reception was in southern RI, in Quonset and it was a heck of a party!

The bride and groom were having so much fun that there were only about 12 of us around to bid them farewell with the wedding bubbles when they finally left! And that is what we love about Mr. and Mrs. Dziok, they know a good party when they seen one!

Congratulations to the newlyweds! We love you!

**sneak peek of professional pics can be found here: http://www.melissamanzione.net/ **

The D word

I'm officially on a diet - blech. Tina and I decided that we both need to shed some weight and we've chosen the Crosby/Dziok wedding date as the finish line. That means I have 24 days to lose at least 8 lbs.

Honestly, it shouldn't be too difficult. Change my snack habits, eat more veggies and less empty carbs, and make use of the gym in my office building. I tried to give up diet coke but only made it for about 13 hours before the caffeine headache kicked in and I caved. Though my supportive husband was quick to point out that Diet Coke has zero calories, so I don't feel awful about it!

Yesterday was day 1 and I managed to choke down about 6 oz of V8 for breakfast (gross, never doing that again), eat an awful Health Choice lunch (disgusting), hit the gym for a solid 45 minutes midday, and then have a piece of grilled chicken over fresh lettuce and veggies for dinner (thanks, Frank!). Add in a diet coke with dinner, a handful of grape nuts for a snack, and a little bit of mint oreo custard (it was from the Dairy Godmother - don't judge me!) and that is how my first day went.

I'm staying strong so far today, drinking more water and planning to hit the gym after a lunch of leftover dinner.

My plan involves continuing to work out 3 times a week once I've lost my goal weight. I don't think that will be over kill since my work outs are restricted in length due to their occurrance over my lunch break.

I'd say my weekends will involve exercise too, but my basset doesn't really hit speeds above "stroll" all that often....

We Survived!

Frank and I had one heck of a week and weekend, and I'm happy to report that we made it through to the other side! A quick recap:

Thursday: I had to skip class due to a work commitment. My company's Board of Directors was in town for their annual meeting and we had a reception for them on the Hill. The reception was held in the LBJ room, right outside the Senate floor - the room was really nice and from what I hear, the food was awesome! We got a lot of Senators and a fair share of Representatives, along with a lot of staff. The entire event was a success, but I was happy to have it end as I had been standing in 2.5 inch heels on slate floor for about 5 hours... Then I met Frank at my office and we set off for Cary, NC. Frank was a saint and drove the entire way down. I was so tired that I was bordering on delirious and having trouble answering simple questions. We arrived at Win & Gregs' around 1am, went straight upstairs to bed and slept until 11:30 the next morning.

Friday: woke up around 11:30 and considered going back to sleep. My high school friend Adair called from the road and we set up plans to meet up in Durham for lunch and then wedding prep. We got to Durham and met up with Adair, Shannon, and Melissa & Kevin at their hotel then drove .1 miles (across the street) to a Mexican restaurant for a wonderfully predictable lunch! After a lot of the usual fare and a few pitches of margaritas we headed back to the hotel to get ready for the evening's main event.

Ta Da!

The wedding was beautiful! Abigail looked absolutely amazing and the look on Jason's face was wonderful. The music came from a string quartet off to the side and it made the sound seem to float over the pond to the ceremony site. I didn't take pictures because I forgot and I was so taken with the entire thing (sorry mom), but I'm on the email list so I'll have pictures as soon as they are ready! The reception was in a building looking over the wedding site and I LOVED the lights at dinner

It was a great wedding and I'm so happy for Abigail & Jason - I can't wait for them to move to DC next fall!

All for now, I'll fill in the rest of the weekend in another post

Travels to South Carolina

Frank, Hamilton and I went to South Carolina this past weekend for my friend Carina's wedding. She and Jeff were married in York, SC so we got to stay with my parents and brothers in Spartanburg for the weekend! While it was really fun to see my parents and brothers, I think the happiest union (other than Carina & Jeff) was between Hamilton and Barnabas.

Here are the puppies playing at my parents' church in the *mostly* fenced in back yard. Hamilton is only 9 months old and Barnabas is 4 and 1/2, so there came a time when Barnabas had had enough but H kept on going until we put him in the car to drive back to Northern Virginia.

The wedding was beautiful, a lovely ceremony at a Presbyterian Church followed by an outdoor reception just down the road. It was fun to see Carina, and Carmen and Mary Kate were there, too - all three are 'little sisters' of mine from college.

We'll close with a picture of my brothers and husband at the Greenville Drive baseball game; the look on their faces is caused by the comment Frank made, "pastrami on white!"