High Five for Friday - Link up, Vol. 13

Friday =

with Lauren @From My Grey Desk

Getting right to the point with my 5 favorite things from this week:

ONE. Got to meet one of my FAVORITE fellow bloggers, Nina from peace.love. & good food. We found each other by linking up with House of Rose's Stop & Smell the Roses vlog months ago. We thought it was funny because I'm from IL but now live in Charlotte...and she's from Charlotte and did live in IL...UNTIL a few weeks ago!! :) So she's back in Charlotte, and we knew we just had to meet up. We had a blast...talking about all of our favorite blogs, shopping sites, and exchanging our life stories basically. I am so sad to be leaving Charlotte soon, because I now know that I will miss out on all of Nina's fabulousness!! ;) Oh, but so we met up at a popular local restaurant, which leads me to my next pic...

TWO. One of the best restaurants in Charlotte, at least as far as I'm concerned, is Cowfish. It's a restaurant that combines sushi & burgers. Sound strange? Well, believe me, they make it work...in AMAZING ways. I love getting the bento box (as seen in the pic above), because I get to sample everything...some sushi (shrimp tempura roll above), a mini-burger (chef's choice that week), edamame (my fav!), & sweet potato fries (yum!). I'm telling you, if you make it to Charlotte, this place has to be on your list of places to eat at!!

THREE. Some of you who have been reading my blog for awhile know that I started doing Crossfit a few months ago. Those readers might also say "Um, Kristin...you're obsessed with it!" ;) I'm beginning to feel like I post about it a lot...but it really has become a daily part of my routine...and I LOVE IT! So, I'm super excited to announce that I finally completed Fran! Fran is a workout that includes 21-15-9 of thrusters (65 lbs) & pull-ups. Now, let me say it now...I had to do a modified version of Fran. I did 45 lbs. on my thrusters (just the bar) and did pull-ups with a resistance band (and believe me, they're not pretty or precise pull-ups...I still had to jump a little). BUT, I DID IT! In 6:08, AND it started raining right as I started. Ha, that's my luck, but I'm glad to get that benchmark WOD out of the way for now. The idea of the benchmark WODs are to do them from time to time to see if/how you're improving...so although I'm glad it's over (because holy cow, it was so tough - it amazes me how 6 minutes of a workout can make you feel like you've worked out for an hour), I can't wait to do it again in a few months to see how I do.

FOUR. And as if one Crossfit-inspired favorite thing wasn't enough, here's one more! :) I can't help it...I'm so excited and proud of myself for some of the things I have accomplished with Crossfit/working out. Now, the pic is definitely NOT my favorite thing...who wants to ice their shins...EVER?! But, the reason I'm icing them is because (1) I was attempting a PR at box jumps and 'biffed', hitting both shins on weights/bumpers, but (2) Right after that (that = shouted a few curse words and maybe shed some tears), I jumped 35 inches. Ahh...icing the shins was worth it! :D

FIVE. Finally...yep, I am the proud owner of this 2-Movie Collection DVD, bought at Target the other day. I couldn't resist...my sister & I LOVED watching the Sister Act movies growing up...every time they're on TV I have to stop whatever I'm doing and watch them! Anyone else like 'em?? If you didn't know already, I am a huge movie fanatic (along with my husband), and I am all about adding to my 'childhood movies' collection!! Laugh at me all you want, they make me smile!

Hope everyone has a fabulous weekend!!!

Favorite Movies as a Kid

Okay, so this is kind of a silly post, but I thought some of you out there might relate or at least get a good laugh out of how ridiculous I am!! Well, my sister and I to be exact. She lives in Seattle and I live in Charlotte...I know, right?! Could we live any further apart?? We don't get to see each other very often, but when we are together, reminiscing and taking 'trips down memory lane' is a must. And when we think back to when we were kids, we always talk about how we were movie junkies!! Our mom was always finding movies for us, that at the time, we thought were the BEST movies EVER! So fast forward about 15 years and I started buying these movies one by one...luckily you can find almost anything on DVD these days. If it's out there somewhere, I'll track it down! It may seem super silly to own all of these movies, but for us it's enjoying a piece of our childhood as we watch them. We laugh, because honestly these are not very good movies...they're cheesy, there's bad acting, and sometimes there's not even much of a plot.
But that's part of what makes them SO good!! :P

Part of me buys them for me, I mean I usually just watch them once...but occasionally, if I'm having a bad day, I indulge again. I think another reason I buy them is to have them around for when we have kids eventually - introduce them to some of the movies my sister and I used to watch.

A Far Off Place ~ A League of Their Own ~ Adventures in Babysitting ~ Double Feature: The Babysitters Club & Troop Beverly Hills ~ Big Girls Don't Cry...They Get Even ~ Buffy the Vampire Slayer ~ Bye Bye Love ~ Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead ~ Fern Gully ~ Flight of the Navigator ~ Girls Just Want to Have Fun ~ The Goonies ~ Hocus Pocus (mostly just watched at Halloween) ~ Labyrinth ~ Might Ducks I, II, & III ~ Mannequin ~ My Father the Hero ~ The Neverending Story ~ Newsies ~ Teen Witch ~ The Wizard ~ The Worst Witch



Just for Christmas: All I Want for Christmas ~ Home Alone 1 & 2 ~ Prancer ~ The Christmas Toy

There are still a few on my to-get list...

The New Adventures Pippi Longstocking ~ My Girl 1 & 2 ~ Willow ~ The Witches ~ Little Monsters ~ Mac & Me ~ The Boy Who Could Fly ~ Little Giants ~ Harry and the Hendersons

Did any of you used to watch these movies?? Can you relate? What was your favorite one?

Gifts from Mama

I just had to give a shout-out to my lovely mother who is always sending me cool & thoughtful gifts!


For our anniversary, since the 1st year Anniversary gift is paper, my mother sent me this gorgeous eco-friendly idea journal:

And the coolest part...the cover is embedded with wildflower seeds, so you can actually remove the cover when you're done and plant it! How freakin' cool is that?!

Plus, the journal is made of 100% post consumer waste paper! Their theory "If you think you write and if you should think & write you will most certainly grow!" So neat! Check them out here

AND, since my bday is coming up :) My mother added to my already-growing Friends DVD collection!

Seasons 4 & 5

My collection thus far! It's a growing...

Thanks Mom!! Isn't she the greatest?!

Anybody else gotten any cool gifts lately? Memorable anniversary gifts? Find a list of traditional wedding gifts here

New Moon Pre-Ordered? Check!

I just wanted to let everyone know that I caved and pre-ordered my copy of New Moon from Best Buy last night (thanks to the hubby's willingness to let me indulge in my obsessions)! :) I had been seeing the signs posted everywhere about all of these pre-order deals...and I was really just going to go and get it the day it comes out (March 20...in case y'all didn't know). But, it seems easier to just know that the day it comes out, I don't have to run around to multiple places (in case it's sold out at one place) or deal with the Twilight stampede of fans...I can just walk into Best Buy, pick up my copy and hurry home to have a New Moon party of my very own!!

So excited...and I hope there's a preview of Eclipse on that darn thing...we are all waiting VERY impatiently for it!

Happy (Belated) Heart Day

The hubby and I don't tend to make too big of a deal about Valentines Day...but we always like getting a chance to go out to dinner and remind each other how special the other one is! :)

I wanted to post a few pics of our Valentines Day celebration...

Roses from Cody and the heart pajamas my Mom sent me (Thanks, Mom!) :)

We exchanged small gifts...

DVD that I received (really good movie, REALLY good book)

Game that Cody received

Cody also bought us new pillows...I had been waking up a lot with neck aches and swore it was because of my pillow. So he got us these awesome pillows from Target that are one side down/one side memory foam...and let me just tell you, they are amazing!

We ended up just going out to dinner at this little Italian restaurant, Favaloro's, in Pacific Grove...great Italian food and great service! And then we went to see "Valentine's Day" at the theater...cute movie, but not as funny as I'd hoped. But hey, it was Valentine's Day, what else were we going to go see?! ;)

Back at home, after an evening of fun...we were definitely sporting the Valentine's Day colors!

Oooh...and I also received a little Valentines Day surprise from one of my fellow knitters/crocheters:

It's a bag full of goodies:

• 1 skein of Valentines-inspired yarn
• 1 pattern for crocheted Sweet Hearts
• A Valentines note pad
• Coaster
• Heart Pencil
  
• Candy (including New Moon Sweethearts)

**Thanks Jenn**

Hope everyone had a fabulous Valentine's Day as well!! <3

Look Out! It's a Giant Tower of Movies

Yeah, so no need to go the movie store to rent a movie...just ask us and we probably own it. Most of you know how much Cody and I love going to the movies, but did you know how many movies we actually own?? Actually, I don't even have an accurate count at the moment, but I know it's over 250. It's getting a little ridiculous!! I always told Cody that I wanted the DVD collection that Cameron Diaz's character has in The Holiday (I think we're getting there).

We always take advantage of Blockbuster's 4 for $20 deal or Target's $5 movies. Basically, we can pretty much always find a movie that we desperately need to own! ;) Tonight, we found out that the Hollywood Video near by is closing and they are having major deals! So, um, yeah we had to go and add to our collection.

Check out what we bought (I'm sure you can guess which ones I picked out and which ones Cody picked out):


They had so many to choose from...we could have probably bought 10 more. But I think the employees behind the counter were getting ready to cut us off. Here's hoping they never discontinue DVD players!!!

What's your favorite movie(s) of all time?