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Seasons Greetings

GGMT , Holidays , Personal • Dec 5, 2016

seasonsgreetingsTis’ the season! Holiday decorations, pine scented candles, christmas lights, decorated trees, hot chocolate and so much more! There are so many great things to love about the holiday season. It’s my favorite time of the year for so many great reasons.

The last few years have been very different since my mom passed. She left me with so many beautiful memories that I have plenty to look back on and be grateful for. My mom was the type of parent that could hardly wait for Christmas to begin opening presents. Lets be real, she also didn’t want me waking her up early so many times we did our presents on Christmas Even instead of waiting until Christmas morning. Each year I make sure that my partner opens one gift on Christmas eve regardless of how small it may be. I’ve never told him this but it’s one of those little things that keeps the memory alive.

Each year we put up two Christmas trees. His and His if you will, lol. I like a tree with multi-colored lights and glittery ornaments. Brian on the other hand prefers white lights and a tree full of ornaments both from his childhood and from his travels. Both trees are stunning and it’s disappointing each year when they have to come down.

There is also a massive Christmas village that Brian puts up each year. Probably 50-ish houses and all of the people to match. It’s a Department 56 village so it has all of trimmings to really make it come alive. A few novelty houses as well such as Play-Doh and Lego. Takes a few hours to put it up and a few more to take it down.

I hope that everyone takes the time to truly enjoy this holiday season. I would love to hear some of your traditions!

Christmas 2014 Is Coming!

Holidays , Personal , Project Life • Nov 22, 2014

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Seems crazy to even say that Christmas is roughly a month away. A MONTH! I am not at all prepared. I’m trying though so hopefully that at least counts for something. One thing that I really wanted us to do this year was make our own christmas cards. I spent a couple months slowly gathering supplies to create the cards and even signed us up for a class at Studio Calico. I wanted us to be ready.

Well, the class was a bust. Nothing against Studio Calico but i just didn’t feel like I had the tools to be making the cards that they were showing us how to make. I have A TON of craft stuff due to my Project Life obsession but I don’t have a lot of the more expensive tools such as a die cutter. I felt like a lot of those tutorials really focused on having a die cutter so that was of course of no use to me.

A lot of cards turned out beautiful. Their are a lot of really neat crafting supplies that come out during the holidays. My favorite line by far for every holiday is Martha Stewart. I just think that all of her crafting material is top notch. It tends to be a bit on the pricey side but their is always a sale and every craft store tends to constantly have some sort of coupon available (except for Pat Catans so I tend to avoid them :/).

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I went to Michaels and Pat Catans yesterday. Pat Catans sent me a 15% off coupon and their holiday merchandise was 40% off for a total of 55% off my holiday purchase. As much as I avoid going to Catan’s due to the sending out coupons-once-per-year policy they always have all of the Martha Stewart products. Above is about half of what I actually bought (but the only Martha products).  I only spent around $17 total and got a ton of stickers. I’m good on just about everything else but I tend to use a ton of stickers so it was worth the small hall in the end.

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I mean.. honestly.. how amazing are the stars above?! I just couldn’t pass that up. During Valentines Day one thing I really enjoyed using where some postage stamp-style stickers she released. I saw them (below) for Christmas and I could not pass them up. We have a couple of more Christmas cards to make and I can think of a million ways to use them. You get A TON in each package so i’ll have enough left over to use them in my Project Life book. The stickers (above) are also a bit raised so you get that three dimensional look to the photos in Project Life. A bit more appeasing to the eye!

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One other thing i’m working on is a December Daily book for this year. I haven’t really put anything together because i’m debating on how I want to make it work. Their are so many options but I struggle because I feel like we don’t always have enough to document on a regular basis. For example – I know that a lot of people due two pages in their Project Life book for each week. I generally tend to leads toward one unless something significant is happening. Aside from work their isn’t too much that goes on every week of the year. I don’t have kids so their just isn’t anything to document.

Speaking of work, the holiday events are all starting! I LOVE IT! So many great things that go on from parties, cookie baking, and of course just the overall end of year celebration (i work in finance, you must celebrate the year-end). I work as an administrative assistant so I get to assist with a lot of the planning. Looking forward to every last bit of it!

We got a good dropping of snow this week! Enough to cover everything but still keep the roads clear. I don’t remember all to much snow coming in November in past years. I saw on the weather forecast that the majority of the snow will melt before Thanksgiving and then being to snow again on Thanksgiving DayGreat… just what we want for Black Friday shopping! Madness, crazy people, and snow covered roads, what a great combination.

Anybody have any exciting plans for the upcoming Thanksgiving Holiday? Do you do Black Friday shopping?

Downsizing – Good or Bad?

Business • Sep 26, 2013

The business of banking banking is (and i’m sure has always been) a challenge. It is an ever-evolving industry. My grandparents can remember the days when the ATM did not exist. My grandpa loved to tell stories about waiting in line, HIGH rates of return, and of course walking 3 miles in the snow to get to the bank. On top of all this I can only imagine behind the scenes what it was like without our beloved computers!

The industry as a whole is really moving towards electronic touch, high efficiency, and well… less people. The bank will forever need people to sell products but I think that they are beginning to forget about needing people to service these accounts that are being sold. A few years back Bank of America installed in Times Square state-of-the-art teller machines that look and interact like a human being, but .. well .. it’s a computer!

It’s almost like Siri becoming your new teller! It’s crazy and at 23 years old still a challenge to get a solid grasp upon. At 26 I think that most people assume that I do all of my banking online. A portion of that is true, I do check my balance online as well as on a mobile app provided by my bank, but other than that I like the old fashion way. I balance a checkbook to the penny and pay all of my bills by check!

Even though technology is meant to make our lives easier I do think at times that it’s making it harder for some. As we go to machines to handle the daily work at the bank where does that leave our tellers? Why hire bodies when a machine can do the same work (or so most industries are saying). I am all about turning off a light when i’m not in a room or even buying off-brand groceries to save a few dollars but knowing that hundreds, thousands, perhaps even hundreds of thousands of people may lose their jobs simply because I find it convenient to deposit my paycheck via my cellphone just doesn’t sit well with me.