Big life changes have kept me away and silent

Something I’ve learned throughout my years of blogging life – I don’t do well with writing like nothing’s ever happening when something BIG is happening. I tend to bleed my heart through my writing, so I often go silent when I’m sad and don’t want to share that with the Internet, or in this case, am mandated to keep quiet about some of the biggest news of my life (for more than a month)!

The short of it – I’m moving to San Francisco. Something I’ve wanted to do and talked about since I was in my early 20s. It’s exciting to have that horizon turn into a shining beam of sunlight directly in front of me.

The long of it – I’m leaving a job, friends and a city that I’ve loved, loved, LOVED. Loved. Loved. LOVED. Who I am, my extreme happiness and what I’d like to think as success in life is attributed to Seattle and my job at Whrrl.

But, onward and upward!

I will be back with MANY more details – but, I wanted to give everyone the heads up and leave you with my favorite quote, which has had me pushing toward this day for the entirety of my 20s:

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. EXPLORE. DREAM. DISCOVER. – Mark Twain  

Currently Feeling: In LOVE with my new at-home work space. I’ll post pictures and share the transformation soon!
Currently Anticipating: Flying down to the Bay Area Wednesday to find my new apartment! *Fingers crossed* I find something good – no GRAND!
Currently Needing: To finish this monstrous task I can’t wrap my head around. Why must I be such a procrastinator?

How to Throw a Roaring Twenties Party

As one of my blog tags suggest, I am totally a theme party whore. I loooove them. I love going to them; I love throwing them.

Throughout my 20s, I’ve thrown some pretty good theme parties, including but not limited to: a silver birthday party for my silver 25th birthday party, a Dirty 30 party for my ex-boyfriend’s 30th with a boob cake and dirty mustaches, a Mustache and Sombrero birthday party (what party is complete without mustaches?!), a Sexual Chocolate party (Passion Party + chocolate fondue)… and now a Roaring 20s theme for my 29th Birthday!

Since 29 is the last year of my magnificent 20s, I decided to celebrate it with a Roaring 20s theme. I researched decorations, food, costumes and all the details. Here’s what I did, and how you can throw your own Roaring 20s Party.

Location:

I chose a private party space in Seattle called The Upstairs, which had a “speakeasy” vibe. The entrance was a nondescript door in the city, and guests had to walk upstairs to what looked like an underground bar during Prohibition… lights were strung across the ceiling, handmade art adorned all the walls and guests could dance or sit on velvet couches and chairs to chat. (If you live in Seattle, seriously have your party here! It’s owned by Cory, the brain behind Pinxto – and he is AWESOME at accommodating needs and wants to make your party special!)

Invite:

To get the guests into the Prohibition mindset, I sent an invite with an address that said the party was at “a door next to” a popular bar in Seattle, and gave them each a password to give at the door to get in (something that was often done during Prohibition for entrance into underground bars). Then I hired a door guy to ask guests what their password was at the door. (Gin Fizz!)

Decorations:

Tall vases of feathers and Cali lilies were on tables, feathers adorned bar and tabletops, and I purchased boxes of candy cigarettes to set around the party too. I also had glass candy dishes with gummy bears and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups – candies that were both invented in the 1920s, and bowls of nuts on the bar top – another popular snack food in the 20s.

Food:

My mom catered the party, and we researched popular party foods in the 20s, and dishes invented in the 20s. The menu included:

Shrimp cocktail (popular party food in the 20s)

Zucchini chips (zucchinis came to the U.S. in the 20s)

Deviled eggs (egg creams were popular in the 20s)

Waldorf Salad (served to President Coolidge in 1924 at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in NYC)

Brie cheese platter (popular party food in the 20s)

Olives (popular party snack in the 20s)

Mini Pineapple Upside Down Cakes (dessert invented in 1925 after Dole’s pineapple recipe contest)

Then I created and printed little tags with rhinestones that said the food, the year it was invented and were displayed using photo holders I bought at Michael’s Crafts for $1!

Drinks:

The bar created a custom cocktail list for me, which included:

Mint Julep (whiskey, mint, soda water)

Gin Fizz (gin, lemon, powered sugar & soda water)

French 75 (gin, lemon & Cava champagne)

Roaring Jeanna (whipped cream vodka & soda water – my fav drink!!)

Costumes:

All my guests dressed in 1920s costumes! What do these look like, you ask?! Mostly flappers in fishnets, black wigs, feather headbands and garter belts for the ladies – but also slip dresses with a low hemline, pin curls and pearls. For the boys – gangster gear or just plain suits, suspenders and fedoras.

Party Details:

I hired a photographer and set up a “photo booth” area for my guests with 1920s props such as feather boas, a fake cigar, pearl necklaces, a martini glass and a chalkboard to write fun messages on for the pics. I also created a box and a sign that said, “What Should I Do the Last Year of My 20s?” and asked guests to write their advice for me on little white cards and place them in the box. I’m going to spend this year actually trying to accomplish all the advice from my friends (another post coming on that soon!)

And now… all the photos! My favorite part of the whole shebang because it shows how AWESOME my friends are, who are the “detail” that really made my whole party:

Twenty nine looks pretty good from up here

So, yesterday was my birthday. I’m TWENTY NINE. Hard to believe I’m *this* close to kissing my sweet, sweet 20s goodbye. Everyone always says the 20s are some of the best years of your life… I don’t know any better, but I’ve certainly LOVED being a 20-something. I’m going to make this last year the best one yet!

I spent my birth day responding to a ridiculous amount of text messages, phone calls, emails and Facebook posts. If there’s one thing your birthday does for you, it makes you feel extremely loved.

Then for my birth night, I headed to a favorite local neighborhood Mexican restaurant – Laredos for enchiladas, wine and a birthday cake shot, wrapping up my evening at a couple of fun bars in my neighborhood with friends. I live in a really fun, vibrant neighborhood of Seattle that has a lot of 20-something and 30-somethings, and there’s always someone to run into or a friend behind the bar. It was the perfect way to spend my birthday.

Tomorrow I’m throwing a HUGE shindig. I’m not getting married in my 20s, so I decided, why not throw a big, decorated, catered, themed party similar to all the hooplah people put into a reception? Notice the little tag in the sidebar to the right that says “Theme Party Whore”? Yeah, that’s me. I’ll be adding a new post to that category next week with all the photos from my “Roaring 20s” theme party – complete with flappers, gangsters, feathers, candy cigarettes and prohibition cocktails at a speakeasy.

Happy Birthday to me!

Currently Feeling: Excited to stay in watching movies with my little sister tonight – we always have such a good time together. Good laughs for sure.
Currently Anticipating: My party tomorrow, of course!
Currently Loving: The XX – their album is so good!

The Worry

I recently read a friend’s old blog post where she referenced The Worry.

“The Worry is back,” she says.

“It’s the little bit of me that I don’t mind being without. It’s infiltrated the little things – like if I said goodbye the right way or if I’ll remember the way the music sounds when you are in the room.”

This is me. This is part of me – this Worry.

I’m not sure if it’s a change in chemicals, or getting older, or just part of being in my late 20s. I explained something along the lines of the above – my Worry – to someone recently and they said, “Oh yeah – I started worrying about things like that in my late 20s all the time, then it eventually went away.”

I’m hoping it’s just a phase, and this constant Worry of mine will go away. I’ve been wondering lately if it’s a bad habit I’ve formed or just a natural part of life. Worrying.

Lately I worry so much – I don’t know what to do with myself. It feels like it’s gotten worse. And it’s not basic worrying. Like I don’t worry about work, or if people will like me, or if I left my curling iron on.

I worry about death. All the time. I think about losing my parents, my real dad, my grandparents, my sister. Especially my sister. I worry about her driving five hours back to school on a two-lane road. I worry about her texting while driving and becoming someone featured in this video. I worry about something happening to her like those freak accidents you hear about kids in college like falling off a balcony while drunk. I think nearly every day how terrible it would be to lose my sister. I think about how I wouldn’t be able to get out of bed, or go to work. I go over terrifying phone calls in my mind – like what my parents would say if they called me to tell me she was in an accident.

I know this is grossly morbid – but the morbidity follows me daily… Worry, worry, morbid worry.

A co-worker of mine says it’s only magnified when you have children, which I’ve thought about too. I suppose it’s natural to feel like you love something so much, you couldn’t possibly live without them. But I’d like to think that this Worry isn’t going to be around all the time, in the back of my mind, from now until eternity.

Do YOU worry all the time to? Or am I alone in this? Is this the sign of some freak personality syndrome that I should worry about? (Worrying right now!)

Looking back and forward on my year of total happiness

Wednesday night I went to dinner with an old college roommate. We ordered two crepes, split a bottle of red wine, and discussed our upcoming New Years Eve plans. At sometime during the night I said, “2010 has been the best year of my life,” and she responded with – “Really?!”

Yes, really.

I have said more times than I can remember this year – I am SO happy right now. Happy with where I’m at with my life, happy with who’s in it (and who isn’t). Happy with my career, my apartment, my friends. If I could pick one word to sum up this year for me – it’s simply been, Happy. I could only hope 2011 lives up to the year I’ve had in 2010.

Below are just a few of the reasons that have made 2010 “my best year yet.” In no particular order, this year I…

• Made regular workouts a part of my life all year, for the first time ever. This included starting Sassy Fit boot camp, which I did for six months, and then starting my yoga practice! (Which began with a 30-day hot yoga challenge in June). Me + yoga = LOVE.
• Gave up consumerism for 30 days (as part of my 30-day yoga challenge).
• Paid of a ton of parking tickets that prevented me from buying tabs, bought new tabs to replace the previous ones that were expired for two years AND paid off my car loan. Booyah. What up responsibility.
• Took a bacon cooking class (where I learned to make a Bacon Explosion!)
• Traveled to New York, San Francisco twice and Miami (where we partied at a bar with the Jersey Shore cast. I was at a bar with Snookie in 2010. Enough said).
• Spent many fun cabin weekends with friends, including Chelan multiple times over the spring and summer, and Leavenworth for Oktoberfest.
• Booked my first trip to Hawaii!
• Co-hosted (with other Power Team members) at least a dozen Girl Power Hour networking events for women, which allowed me to meet tons of empowering, smart girls and be a leader in my community!
• Found $100 bill on the ground on Halloween night (dressed as Cruella DeVille).
• Bought an ice cream making machine and learned how to make ice cream for the first time!
• Started a “Good Friends and a Glass of Wine” dining group, where I met with four girl friends of mine once a month to try a rotating selection of some of Seattle’s most critically acclaimed and talked about restaurants. We met 10 out of the 12 months in 2010 – pretty great record, and lots of great food! We ate at Spring Hill, Root Table, Lark, Union, Mistral Kitchen, anchovies & olives, Spinasse, Osteria La Spiga and more.
• Coached a kickball team with friends.
• Took a long blog break, transferred my blog from Blogger to WordPress and redesigned my blog. Took another long blog break, redesigned my blog again. Discovered that part of my happiness IS blogging, and I feel weird when I leave it behind. Completed NaBloPoMo (without missing a single post!) to gain my blog mojo back.
• Crossed a few fun things off my Bucket List, including riding my bike to work (and walking to work most of the summer!), going to Teatro Zinzanni for the first time, meeting a blog friend in real life, planting an herb and veggie garden – and making recipes with my homegrown plants, cooking my first turkey and buying satin sheets for my bed (for ME, no one else).
• Spent a LOT, a lot, a lot of time with girl friends – made a ton of new friends (Hi loves, if you’re reading!), and became closer to my roommate and some of my best friends, who mean the world to me.
• Had my first career-related speaking gig on a panel at the Social Fresh conference in Portland, OR.
• Attended BlogHer and BlogHer Food for the first time (excellent, nerdy blogging conferences – right up my alley).
• Said goodbye to my trusty Sidekick (my friends called me Sidekick Sally for years) and bought an iPhone 4! Also was able to purchase a Kindle this year – something I’ve had on my “want” list for at least 2-3 years – and have read so many great books. I’m hoping to pull together a list of my top books of 2010, for those interested.
• Hosted a Girls Thanksgiving, and cooked my first turkey (and sweet potato pie).
• Repaired my own vacuum after it broke! lol. Pretty proud of myself for that one – I’m an independent woman!
• Moved offices from downtown to Pioneer Square.
• Threw a big, successful party – without a hitch – for work with more than 150 people in the Seattle tech community in attendance! Then received a raise a week later, and a new part time contract work for an awesome company two months after that! My career kicked major ass in 2010. I can’t believe I can say that I’m exactly where I want to be at 29, and love, love my job and industry every day. For THAT, I consider myself extremely lucky.
• Made giant steps toward a BIG life change that I’ve wanted to do, and have talked about, for years. 2011 looks like it could be my year!

As far as looking forward to 2011, I decided to not make a “New Years Resolution” for this year. Rather, I scrolled through my Bucket List and marked a number of them that I want to cross off, work on, or know I’m already on my way to completing in 2011. Some of them are a bit ridiculous, some trivial, some large – but all are realistic. It’s a hefty list this year with lots to work toward, but what is life but without high goals!

My Bucket List items I’m going to try to complete in 2011 are:

• Live in another city for at least one year
• Keep a savings account – with a balance – for more than one year 
• Swim with dolphins (Planned for Hawaii.)
• Get my teeth whitened, professionally 
• Teach myself to video edit (My job might depend on it. Kidding. But no, really.)
• Visit Bali and wear flowers around my neck 
• Take a yoga retreat (Just so happens I’m planning a yoga retreat to Bali for August 2011. Two birds. One stone.)
• Buy a Mini Cooper (Currently on wait-lists for a black one.)
• Own a license plate with my name on it (As silly as this is, figured might look all right on new Mini.)
• Take a shower by candlelight
• Give up fast food for a year (Eh – why not. Thought I’d try this, starting January 1st. This could be considered a mini resolution, I suppose.)
  
• Make a cookbook of my grandmother’s recipes before she passes 
• Go to dim sum for breakfast
• Dine in the dark at San Francisco’s Opaque restaurant
• Feel great in a T-shirt again (My tummy is my trouble area, and it’s been a long time since I could just wear jeans and a T-shirt and feel comfortable. I’d really like to change this.)
• Make a wine corkboard from bottles of wine I’ve actually drank myself (Been saving for nearly two years – almost there!)
• Go to Toastmasters and kick my anxiety with public speaking (This is a must. must.)
• Wine taste in Napa Valley

Happy  New Years everyone!

Currently Feeling: Phew exhausted! This took all night.
Currently Anticipating: Getting my hair did and all fancy for the big NYE party I have planned tomorrow with a super fun group of friends from my neighborhood. Happy NYE!
Currently Loving: A cute new consignment shop in my neighborhood that has brand new designer jeans – tags on – for $70 and less! Pshhh. I’m totally not sharing the name.

How does the word flaky make you feel

Do you think to yourself, “Eww…I’m kinda flaky” or “Gawd I hate flaky people”?

Because I think there are two types of people in this world – flaky and non-flaky. However, I’m unsure how this comes about, and I wonder if flaky people, deep down, know they’re flaky. Or does everyone say they hate flaky people, but we’re all, in our own little ways, flaky at one point or the other? Conversely, what makes someone flaky – a selfishness and lack of others’ time, overall listlessness, or a general uncaring attitude? Perhaps it’s larger, more private issues – like social anxiety or depression – maladies that cause people to want to stay in, alone, instead of being where they said they’d be. Or perhaps we’re all just overbooked, overworked, overcommitted, oversocialized…

I thought about this today during a conversation I had with someone about how hard it is to throw events these days because everyone RSVPs “Yes”, but shows up to less than 50 percent of what they RSVP to.

The conversation made me awfully grumbly – if there’s one thing I abhor in life, it’s flaky people. I work very hard to only commit to events I can actually make it to, and will run myself into the ground to show up to where I promised I’d be, even if it’s the last thing I want to do. (Which, on the flip side, probably isn’t that healthy).

But, my word is strong – if I tell you I’ll be there, unless something like throwing up, car troubles, lost keys or other life altering events happen that prevent my presence, I’ll be there.

I realized, it is very important in this life of mine to be reliable.

Because I put such weight on being reliable, it’s really hard for me to be patient with any and all of the following:

• Someone who is afraid to call and tell you they don’t want to go anymore, so they don’t answer texts and emails and kinda fall off the face of the Earth until magically, after wherever they were supposed to be is over, they “Find their phone.”
• Someone who commits to something that requires a head count, and splitting of costs, then bails out at the last minute – stiffing everyone else with their portion of the bill that they committed to.
• Someone who reschedules and cancels and reschedules and cancels, and cancels and cancels and then shows up late.
• Someone who replies “maybe” to every invite – never committing to anything (now, is that flaky or noncommittal?)
• Someone who commits to plans, which require them to be there for the other person to go, and because they back out, the other person is stuck not doing something they wanted to do.
• Someone who bails on anything that required tickets or reservations.
• Etc, etc, etc.

What are your thoughts on the what it means to be flaky? Do you put an emphasis on it?
Do you think I put too much emphasis on it? I’d love to hear your thoughts…

Sometimes you cant show all your cards or yoga in the streets

When you start to practice yoga regularly, it’s quite common to want to bust into a yoga pose while in the bathroom getting ready, waiting for your food to to cook in the microwave, in the elevator at work, or wherever the moods strikes you.

There’s something ridiculous addicting about yoga poses – the strength it requires, stretching and lengthening your body, the beauty in the shape that your limbs make while in Dancer’s Pose, Warrior III or Eagle. If you’re a yogi, you already know this. If you’re not, you probably think I’m crazy.

Crazy or not, I know there’s a time and place for everything. I usually do these poses in the mirror in the privacy of my own home, or where strangers can’t see me trying to balance and lift my leg over my head. There’s a time and place for everything, that is, until you drink a few beverages. Then apparently you think it’s smart to practice yoga on the sidewalk in the pouring down rain, a little tipsy. Tipsy does not make a good balance pose. Tipsy does make a good nose dive face plant into a wet pile of leaves in front of cute boys, scraping your knee and tearing your pantyhose.

Okay, I wasn’t really wearing pantyhose, I was wearing jeans. Thank god pantyhose aren’t really my thing cause otherwise that would have been real bad.

Life lesson: Sometimes you can’t yoga in the streets.

Shout out to my little sis’ cause the title of this post is the advice she gave me after picking me up and dusting off my dirty clothes after my face plant.

Currently Feeling: Exhausted after a full day of running around – work, hot yoga, shower then dinner with some girls I haven’t seen in months! And I used to think Mondays were low-key…
Currently Anticipating: Going to the Dream It, Launch It, Live It conference tomorrow!
Currently Reading: A crazy mix of books right now – fiction for fun, and two books for work to make me smarter or something. It’s a book juggling act!

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