321delish

Hello, 2013!

I guess I’m a few days late on the whole “Happy New Year” thing, but the past week and a half has been quite a flurry of activity!

It started out with a trip home to New Jersey to spend Christmas with my family. It was really relaxing and I had a great time hanging out with friends and family.

When I got back to Tampa, I picked up Bill at the train station and we had a quiet night in, because the next day was moving day!

(photo courtesy of Meghann)

Thanks to my AMAZING group of friends, I was moved out of my old apartment and moved in to my new apartment in only a few hours. 🙂 I love these guys!

Bill and I spent the rest of our Saturday unpacking boxes, installing shelves, and making my space “me.”

I plan to do a walk through of the apartment via vlog in the coming weeks, but I’ve only been moved in a few days, and it really feels like home already 🙂

On Sunday, we hit up Ikea for a desk, some shelving, and a bit of home decor. We got home just in time to head back out; Bill and I had plans to part ways for a few hours to celebrate the upcoming marriage of our friends Felipe and Jess!

Let me rewind a second- the Friday before Christmas I got a group text from Jess with a picture of a gorgeous ring. Felipe had asked her to be his bride, and of course she said yes! The next day, we got another text, asking if we had plans for New Year’s Eve, because they were planning a small, intimate wedding ceremony for that night! Of course I’d be there!

So, the day before the wedding the guys hung out and did “manly” things, while the girls got mani-pedis and went out to dinner.

Mary, Jess, Courtney

I left the gals around 9 or so and headed back to the apartment, where Bill was already back at work. Remember those shelves we had purchased earlier in the day? Bill had a grand plan for them.

Yes, that would be a kitty jungle gym. Bill covered the shelves with fleece and strategically placed them on the wall so that the cats could play up high. Iggy and Lulu have been playing on them every day!

::insert crazy cat lady jokes here::

On Monday, we put up the final kitty shelf before heading over to Mary and Marcus’s house for a birthday brunch! Marcus is a NYE baby, and celebrated the big 2-6 this year. We had an amazing spread of food and shared some laughs with the birthday boy.

After brunch, Bill and I did the last bit of work on the apartment so all that was left to do was some organization I could do on my own. A little before 5, I took him back to the train station so he could head back to Orlando 😦  (He had an uber-early flight to catch on New Year’s Day)

I zipped (safely) back to my apartment to change; I had a wedding to attend! Courtney picked me up and we headed to the church for the 6:30 ceremony.

(photo courtesy of Meghann)

A friend of mine once said “Big wedding are about the party; small weddings are about the couple.” Jess and Felipe’s wedding was exactly that-it was about them and the promises they were making to each other. There were none of the bells and whistles of a “traditional” wedding and the only people attending were family and close friends. I thought it was incredibly special and intimate. It was beautiful.

After the ceremony, we headed out to celebrate the newlyweds with a delicious dinner at Lauro’s, before heading over to a family friend’s house to ring in the new year!

(again, Meghann’s photo 🙂 )

One thing that really smacked me in the face in the middle of all this crazy activity is how truly blessed I am to have such a wonderful group of friends in Tampa. From the moving, to the birthday brunch, to the wedding, to ringing in the new year- I was surrounded by the people who make me laugh, who I love to be around, who I can count on for just about anything. It’s hard to believe that this time last year, I hadn’t met any of them! But now, I call them my closest friends, my family. I love you guys!

Here’s to many more fun times with the gang in 2013!

Question of the day: How was your New Years?