gaga for lady gaga

who doesn't love this lady's music? now, the wardrobe and makeup choices are somewhat....questionable, to say the least. i don't pretend to understand - i guess i'll just conclude that it adds to her "mystique". i do love her music, though - particularly the song "bad romance". alot of her songs remind me of madonna in the 1980s.

who knows, a year from now i might go back and read my blog posts and think, wow, what happened to lady gaga, such a flash in the pan. for some reason, though, i think she has some staying power. even barbie is immortalizing her (did you see these pictures on the today show??):








that's cute, babs, but i personally prefer you like this.

hanging with the girls

have you seen the trailer for sex and the city 2?? i think this looks great! i know the first movie got mixed reviews....i personally loved it though i agree that the middle of the movie seemed to drag on a bit and it was a little more serious than i had anticipated. the sequel, though, looks to be alot more lighthearted - just the girls hanging out and going on an extended road trip. can't wait for may!

first hair trim

when i was pregnant, i often daydreamed about what my little girl would look like. a lot of her features were a toss up, but i knew she would have a head full of thick hair since both her daddy and i have alot of hair (his straight, mine wavy - and not in a tousled, beach wave kind of way but in a frizzy, bad perm straight out of the 80's kind of way).

as i predicted, alexandra does have a head full of hair that has grown leaps and bounds over the past few months as you can tell here. while her hair is beautiful, her long bangs were starting to get in the way of everything, particularly food. a shaggy underlayer has also grown in the back, forming a bit of a mullet - you know, the hairstyle known as "business in the front, party in the back" or the "kentucky waterfall" made famous by billy ray cyrus (i can get away with calling it that since of course i am from kentucky).

so we made arrangements for alexandra to have her first hair "trim". all i hoped for going into it was that the ends would get cleaned up and that she wouldn't scream in protest. i armed myself with elmo books and a favorite baby doll in the hopes of keeping her distracted. i contemplated taking her to one of those kiddie places, but i know enough people who have regretted doing this that i quickly decided to go with ryan's hairstylist, angela, who could fit us in.


i'm proud to say that she handled it surprisingly well! as you can see, mommy had to sit in the chair and hold her, and we both wore drapes. i did everything i could to try to distract her from the task at hand:


she was fine for the initial bang trim, but got pretty antsy by the time angela made it around to the back. she twisted around in my lap and clung to my neck - any time angela would get a good grasp on the back of alexandra's hair, she would make a sudden movement and the scissors missed.


bottom line? she had a nice little bang trim and she now has an unobstructed view - plus I am happy to report that food, snot, etc. doesn't seem to be getting caught up in her hair so easily! unfortunately, while angela was able to trim a little bit of alexandra's hair in the back, it is still a pseudo-mullet.


of course, on my baby, it's a beautiful pseudo-mullet!

big blue nation

this afternoon our beloved university of kentucky wildcats will take on the georgia bulldogs at rupp arena. while it is cold as ice outside, i'm sure rupp will be on fire. as usual, the big blue nation will expect a big showing from this guy:


(for those of you not in the know, that's john wall - kentucky's freshman phenom. we probably will only have him this year before he is lost to the pros, but i'm sure kentucky fans are content to have him for any period of time).

oh yeah, and she is supposed to be there too...

fashionable (but practical) feet

yesterday when alexandra and i wandered out into our backyard to investigate the snow, i had no other option but to clomp around in a pair of my husband's boots. while they served their purpose by keeping my feet warm, they didn't do much for my outfit (well, i was wearing colorful pajama pants at the time, too, so they certainly didn't help either). now, we don't get enough snow in the south for me to justify the purchase of some cute snow boots, but if i lived in an area that got alot of snow (or rain, like the northwest), i would definitely have to purchase these silver wellies. aren't they cute? they can be found here. oh, and the green pair (my favorite color) are pretty fantastic as well.

baby it's cold outside

louisville got hit with about 4 inches of snow today - to any of you northern readers, that probably is just another thursday to you. however, if you live south of the ohio river, word of a 4 inch "snow storm" hits the airwaves with warnings on broadcast news hitting days in advance. people lose all their cool and flock to kroger in **droves**, buying up all of the bread and milk (this has never made sense to me - if you thought you were going to be snowed in, wouldn't you go for all the good stuff like frozen pizzas and diet coke???). and no one, i repeat, no one can drive worth a damn once the snow hits - it's like the roadways are covered with 16 year-old drivers with a fresh new driver's license burning a hole in their pocket.

i digress....

one nice thing about the snow is watching it through the eyes of a toddler. alexandra was really too young last winter to remember any snow (i don't think we got much in ky last year anyway, just a very bad ice storm). i picked her up early today from daycare and she looked at the snow very curiously as we walked to the car. once we were at home, she walked up to the back door leading to our deck and said, "side? side?" (toddler-speak meaning "outside").



she was really interested when we got out there in the white stuff, and really enjoyed watching the two little girls next door play with our lab, pearl, throwing snowballs for her to catch in mid-air.


i don't know who had more fun, the girls, Alexandra or the dog!

what a difference a year makes

i follow quite a few different blogs, and most of them have included a retrospective post this past week, reflecting on the events that transpired in their lives in 2009. since alexandra was born, i feel like my memory is shot so i have a hard time putting into words all of the events that have shaped the everyday life of our little family over the past 12 months....12 months, it seems to have gone by so quickly. the best way for me to reflect on 2009 and its impact is to look back at pictures. truly, i am hit by what a difference a year makes when i look at pictures of my sweet little baby maturing into an active, beautiful toddler.

december 2008:


january 2009:


february 2009:


march 2009:


april 2009:


may 2009:


june 2009:


july 2009:


august 2009:


september 2009:


october 2009:


november 2009 (sorry, had to include 2 as i couldn't pick my favorite image for the month!):



december 2009:


we can hardly wait to see what transpires in 2010!

app-tastic

just one of the thousand reasons i adore my new job? the firm purchased for all attorneys the new iPhone 3G! i've only had this thing for a couple of weeks but i am in loooove. i don't think i could go back to a blackberry even if i tried. i'm still trying to figure out all the different bells & whistles, and would greatly appreciate any recommendations you all may have on worthwhile apps to download. suggestions??

christmas extravaganza

the holidays blew right on by at a furious pace this year - some complain that the holidays drag on, but for me it's different. i took down the decorations this past weekend and felt deja vu like i had just put them up yesterday. i think that's what happens when you have a kiddo - time flies at an exponential pace, no matter how much you try to slow it down.

we had at least 5 or so holiday parties this year, including alexandra's daycare party. it's a marathon, people, not a sprint!!! here's a picture of the 3 partners of my new firm at our first firm function - they are as beautiful and fun in person as they appear in this picture.



here's ashley and i toasting the success of our new firm ... yeah, i know, we're dorks.



we had our second annual cookie exchange (aka "excuse to stuff our mouths with chocolate, drink wine, and pick apart the latest issue of us weekly" party). i love these action shots:



my friend casey noted that i am always behind the camera and never in any pictures so she grabbed this one of me. this one cracks me up (notwithstanding that i did not realize how unflattering this top is, ugh!) because (a) the holiday apron - enough said!, and (b) the fact that i am cheerfully posing with a glass of red wine, which is not my drink of choice (i'm a white wine girl, specifically riesling).


the actual holidays were very fun but very tiring with lots of travel. we got to see almost all of our family, with the exception of my sister who was on call at the hospital in boston for what i think is the 2nd or 3rd christmas in a row.

we spent christmas eve at my parents' house (aka mimi and poppy) in harrodsburg:


i wish i got a better picture of alexandra's hairclip - it's monogrammed (you know us southern girls, we LOVE ourselves anything with a monogram) with her initials. i'm starting to develop a **wee** obsession with her hair accessories....not good.

alexandra loved her mimi and poppy's cats - check out that beautiful grin!


we returned to louisville that night so we could enjoy christmas morning in our own home. we woke up alexandra that morning so she could open up some of her presents. notice i said "some" - she was awfully good this year so she had lots of presents and we did not have enough time to open them before we had to get back on the road. as she is still under 2, alexandra is still getting the hang for this opening presents thing - by next christmas, i'm sure she will be a pro.



though we got her a bunch of gifts, they were mostly small - we didn't go overboard because we knew she would get a ton of stuff from family and friends. our "big" purchase this year was the elmo encore live, which you can see in the next couple of pictures. oh....my....word - we have several elmos in our house but none quite this fancy. he sings...he dances...he tells jokes....this little monster does it all. thankfully, alexandra has not been obsessed with this latest and greatest version of elmo so ryan and i have not grown tired of him...yet.



i was so happy she loved the little xylophone we got for her - she's in a music class at daycare and just loves to dance. she also got a little guitar and piano from her grandparents - we could have our own little family rock band.


the bows and packaging still held some appeal for her this year - here she is getting tangled up in the ribbon from the sweet monogrammed pottery barn jewelry box her daddy gave her.


we tried so hard to get a picture of her smiling but truth be told, i think she was a little overwhelmed by all the gifts and commotion.


after opening gifts, we finished packing up the car and hit the road for western ky to visit ryan's family in paducah. we settled in for the 3 1/2 hour drive - i tried to arrange our trip around alexandra's nap so she would sleep during the last half of the trip. well, my sweet child had other plans - she NEVER slept!! i was preparing myself for the major toddler meltdown which i thought would inevitably follow, but she did pretty well all things considered. she did go down to sleep early that night and slept 15 hours straight, so i'd say she more than made up for her nap!

here's a picture i took at his grandmother's house, and it is probably one of my favorite pictures ever taken of my little girl (despite the terrible lighting and the flash which i had to use). it's selfish, but i think one of the main reasons i love this picture so much is because she looks so much like me! (after hearing she looks just like her father oh, i don't know, one million times, it's nice to see she bears some resemblance to her mommy, too!)


there was more gift opening that afternoon and elmo and friends continued to show their influence.


the next day, we got ready for christmas round #3 with ryan's mom and stepdad in southern illinois. here's alexandra playing us some tunes on her new sesame street piano (i heart this little dress she is wearing - my child is so better dressed than me, it is pathetic).



we had a great time with ryan's mom's side of the family, but i think my little one was done. the past three days of celebrating, traveling and odd sleeping hours finally hit her like a brick wall and she was d-o-n-e, done...as evidenced by her expression in this picture!


the next day we hit the dusty trail for louisville, with full bellies, happy hearts and a suv loaded to capacity with lots of new toys.

here's hoping all of you had a wonderful holiday season!

not quite sure this is what they had in mind....

i really enjoy checking the feedjit live traffic feed (you'll find it on the right side of the page) to see what parts of the globe have been reached by my silly thoughts. a check a few moments ago indicated that southern comfort had visitors from north carolina, south carolina, arizona, virginia, new york, tennesse, indiana, oklahoma, wisconsin, new hampshire, and even germany. some of these folks link to my blog directly, and some end up here on an internet search.

what i find so amusing are the search terms people are entering on google or yahoo that end up leading them to this blog. the funniest one had to be the one i just saw tonight - a lucky individual in florida stumbled upon my blog by entering the search term "southern comfort/porn". (trust me, they only linked in by the first 2 terms - i'm not sure the word porn has ever shown up on this blog). something tells me that my little old blog is NOT what they had in mind!!