Where's Abby (+ Dylan and dogs)

Here's a little tour of my place and the things I love that make it home.  We've got a picture the the Amy's Denmark trip, a super cool print from Mom, a print from my favorite artist Robin Pedrero , a cross stitch I did for Switzerland, an elephant painting I drunkenly (but gratefully) purchased at the Jax Blues Fest, random tree painting I did, and Route 66 sign I got on one of my motor home trips with Papa and Mimi. Table below that collage: special music boxes from Grandma Jeanne, Danish elephant, cork from the first wine at the new place, candles from Jenna, and a seashell from Jax Beach.  Special heart garland from Mom. It goes here perfectly! My little book nook. With another little Danish elephant peaking out behind Lola Perfect year-round home for my Danish flag ornament. Gotta have my KBH picture. Plus a candle from Amy, bridesmaid heart present from Amanda, and David Sedaris. On the candle: "Just wait unt...

I finally have all the pictures so I can share some of my favorite things from this Christmas!  First of all, just spending it with Mom, Dad, Matt and Grandparents was the best. Mom came up for t his awesome week last year but I was definitely missing everyone else! It was great having Pa and Grandma with us too, pealing pecans, sharing stories, and enjoying time together. We, of course, did multiple Christmas light looking trips, watched a Christmas movie, and typical Christmasy things. I spent time with Papa and Mimi on Christmas Eve since I had to leave early Sunday. Christmas Eve dinner couldn't have been tastier and I always love Mom's breakfast casseroles. More things to add to a Florida Christmas would be having fresh squeezed orange juice on Christmas morning from our Backyard Oranges. Listening to Dad play Christmas songs on the piano is always a favorite. We ended the morning with some football before I had to leave for work.  I was glad I "had" to work o...

I still haven't even published my Christmas post but I'm gonna go ahead and just say I got to spend today with these amazing ladies.  We got to catch up, officially start wedding planning for the Rubartaloma union, personifiy animals, make food babies, and laugh about "getting old" with our recipes and allergies conversations.  I'm beyond blessed to have these girls in my life.

       Last year I was fully enjoying a beautiful, snowy Christmas. This year I've been fully enjoying and appreciating Christmas in the Sunshine State. Some things I've been loving about this Florida Christmas...  Biking around and finding decorations like this...   Atlantic Beach's awesome lights... Luminaries in Riverside (photo credit: roomie)   Jax Beach's lifeguard chair display A trip to the Zoo with The Roomie to see the lights. The chilly air, full moon, starry sky, and hot cocoa made it quite an enjoyable night.    Sweater weather for coffee on the beach. And cuddling up for some Christmas reading by the sea.

Lately, I've been amused at instances that make me feel "old" or "grown up." These are just some of those laughable moments.  Returning my Halloween costume (or clothes, or rug) so I could eat... And then going back to get the rug later with the discount they gave me for my "next purchase." Smart shopping. Having this Christmas List... Throw in a tulip and some love birds with these boring house goods and I'm happy. Particularly this teal beauty... And whoever her love bird is.  Sending out my very own, I'm single, with no baby, and proud Christmas cards. Leaving a present for our sweet mailman. Not even getting out of the car for a party with a yard full of frat boys and chicks in slutty Santa costumes. No. Thanks. Actually finishing off all my food in the house before going grocery shopping. When 22 year old boys seem too young... There are (obvi) some adult things I still struggle with... Understanding everything that c...

This thanksgiving rocked . Even though I had to work, my friends and I made it happen. Good friends Leslie, Lindsay, Michael and Roomie joined in for a Paleo Thanksgiving Feast. Friendsgiving Highlights:  A spoon catching on fire This beautiful display thanks to Worth Wiles events. ;)  The guests. Obvi.  Sangria and mulled apple cider . Oh, and meet Roomie, Rob, blogging world! Rosemary and apple turkey  This coconut and pumpkin mousse And these paleo rolls Other things on the menu? Rosemary sweet potatoes and onions, gravy, green bean casserole, cauliflower mash, deviled eggs , blueberry crumble , and cranberry almond upside down cake . All paleo. :)  Just like last year, only this time a little closer, I facetimed with the fam during their celebrations. I was, of course, pretty bummed about missing out on Thanksgiving with them, but so grateful for the friends I did get to spend it with. Even though, I natu...

At work the other day, I found so much amusement in a Trip to Imagination Land that I took with the youngest girls in the group. They wanted to play Wii sport but I'm not a fan of this game where you win by cheating and don't even do the real motions of the sport. So I said we'd play pretend sports instead. Killer serves, fly balls, home runs, and human bowling pins crashing down and injuring bums ensued.  Way  better than the silly, just rotate your wrist and get a winning tennis shot nonsense.  This quickly turned into one of the girls going  all  in on this imagination game. It was like it just lit this excited fire in her brain. She began to scan our bodies with a wii remote to check us in for our roller coaster ride that would be followed by a merry-go-round, where our animals would rise up, grow wings and fly us around... And it would be a  24 hour  ride! Naturally I asked if we were getting fed on this ride and she informed me that, "Of cou...

So this is gonna be one random blog post. I've been pretty busy with work but still having a lot of time for fun. I don't have any major stories lately, so this is just a collection of random happenings lately.  Since moving to the beach, a bike was on my "buy as soon as possible" list. I was  determined to not settle for some shiny, new beach cruiser that everyone would have. Rusty, dented, and full of character was my goal. With this unique little 70s child, I think it was accomplished. So meet, Hendrix.  He took Chomp and I for a nice/torturous ride to the vet the other day. I thought it'd be nice to make Chomp's trip a little more exciting by taking him for his first bike ride but I'll never know if he saw it that way.  And was willing but I was not to ride to the vet again  yesterday for this troublesome cat's fancy vet food. Florida weather at it's finest took me from starting out driving to the vet, deciding I'd survive the lightest dri...

Guess what guys! I have this exciting, entertaining, funny, ridiculous story aaand... I can't share it due to this silly thing called privacy. SUCKS, huh? I'm just as bummed, or probably more bummed about it than you.  Well wait. I was gonna leave this post as a super tease and assurance I'm still living crazy stories, but maybe I'll just start writing and see how I might go about telling this one.  It started one super boring night in, when I decided to add this ridiculous app called Tinder. If ya don't know it, you basically flip through pictures of people in your area and like em or don't. If they happen to like you too, it lets you talk to each other. I told friend Leslie about it the next day and we got a kick out of how silly it is. But she signed up too and we were pretty amused. We got a couple good convos going and even more crash and burn ones... We saw how quickly you can tell if you "vibe" or not.  So, the next day, Les and...

Man this week has flown by! My second week of work went great. I got to work in the boys' cottages this week and it was not as scary as I expected from what the staff were saying. Much like my greyhound bus experience here .  It's Food Fridaaay! I just made that up but maybe Originality Advocate Demetri would be (slightly) proud of me. It is still a pic of food but maybe the recipe share helps. Hope so.   Anyway.  I've been bad at sharing some of my favorite paleo meals on here, so here's one that I've made twice already in the last couple weeks and it makes like 5 meals... For like $6! (Assuming you have the basics). So that's a lot of buffalo chicken pasta meals! It's funny because I used to hate spicy things, particularly BUFFALO things. But for some reason, of all my meals on Pinterest, this was the one I decided to execut. I'll just write it off as one of my decision making processes where I choose something completely strange or that I simply hav...

It's the first of November, people! Insert obligatory "How is it already November?!" statement here. The blessings have kept coming and am excited for the weekend. I hope everyone had a fun Halloween and good week! Here are my high fives for this week, linking up with  Lauren Elizabeth  for HF4F.  1. An awesome first week at work, building great relationships with several girls, and the  complete  joy of hearing a girl that was previously suicidal say she's "happy to be alive." I'm unbelievably excited to be doing this work and seeing the changes in these kids' lives.  2. One of the best Halloween celebrations I've had in all 24 years of life. I could make it sound even wilder than it was by writing about starting off drinking wine out of the bottle, not breaking our Irish Car Bomb Tradition at an Irish bar, and making friends with some Front Porch Sitters on my walk home... But I should also mention that it was only like half a glass of wine lef...

Oh hey, I also had one heck of a birthday last weekend. It started with house hunting with Amy in Jacksonville on Friday. We got a quick beautiful view of the beach and a tasty lunch in San Marco before heading back to Gainesville for the night.  That night, we went to a Halloween party rocking some Dispicable Me themed costumes. It was a fun night with a great crowd.  Had birthday breakfast with two of The Bests. Great start to the day.  Finding convenience out of inconvenience, my mistake that Chelsea's babyshower was on Saturday when it was Sunday just allowed for more time with Charlyn. And me forgetting my wallet in Ocala worked out due to several "it's your birthday! I got you!"s.  It was so good to see Charlyn after way too much time apart. We indulged in some  serious over stuffing of our faces at Reggae Shack. Go there. Just do it ! Right after turning down a delicious looking dessert because we were too stuffed... we finished off our fries. ...