Surfside Beach, SC

My week long beach vacation with the in-laws starts Saturday, the second Zach gets out of class. So far the forecast doesn't look too shabby. Happy August people!

It's been an exciting summer at Cheers with Love. Lots of special birthdays, weddings, babies and bachelorette parties. With each client my design is always a little different, and here is one of the latest, and newest designs. Cheers!

Sunday Snapshots

We are one week away from a family beach vacation in South Carolina. We did some real essential shopping today. 

I also did a little late summer closet cleaning. Yes people, this is the after shot haha. I needed to cleanse the soul a little so I decided to start with the physical clutter first. 

Happy Weekend

How Will I Know?

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This past Friday Zach and I grabbed a quick dinner with our friends that just got married. Of course we had to do a wedding recap and we started talking about their AMAZING dj. This couple does not like all eyes on them, and their first dance was the best of both worlds. They started off with 90 seconds of Sam Smith covering Whitney Houston’s “How Will I Know,” and then busted out to the Whitney classic, “I Want to Dance with Somebody,” with the whole wedding joining in. I think the Sam Smith cover is just beautiful, so I had to share!

July Book of the Month - The One and Only

Texas was on my mind a lot in the beginning of July, so The One and Only by Emily Griffin was a very appropriate book to start off the month. TOaO is the story of Shea Rigsby. She has lived the majority of her 33 year old life in Walker, Texas, a college town obsessed with Walker football. Fortunately for her, she is too, but her life hasn't really progressed because of this obsession. The story starts off at the funeral of Shea's best friend's mother (she passed away after a battle from cancer). Shea's best friend's father is Coach Carr, the beloved coach of the Walker football time. The One and Only explores Shea's quest to find more in her life than Walker football, and explores her feelings to the now widowed Coach Carr. 

Emily Griffin is the queen of Chick Lit, and like most of her other books I finished this in less than a week. If you have a beach vacation left in you this summer, it is a great, juicy read. 

St. Louis

This past weekend I went to St. Louis for my yearly girls trip with my college friends. P had a baby in October, so we picked St. Louis to see her little lady. And what a delight she was! She looks just like P and was a real trooper when we took her around on Saturday. 

Our main activity was going to Grant Park on Saturday. This is a huge zoo/amusement park/beer garden situation that Anheuser Busch donated to the city of St. Louis. We started at the top of the park and hopped on a tram ride. We saw bison, long horns, deer and gazelle. In St. Louis ... who knew? The tram let us off at a traditional zoo where you could feed goats, and look animals like elephants and kangaroos. Then at the end of the zoo was a beer garden with free samples, and Budweiser Clydesdales. A little fun for the young and old(er). 

Saturday night while Amelia slept we did what we did best in college - chill out on the couch watching TV and eating - St. Louis style pizza (thin crust with provel cheese) and fried ravioli (seriously amazing dish). It was great to get caught up with girls and continue our trips with new members. 

Summer Struggles

Get out of the shower. 

Tell myself I need to dry and straighten my hair. 

Tell myself, no that's stupid and a waste of time. It will be 100% humidity today. 

Then I decide, no, I haven't done my hair in days, it's time to make an effort. 

Do my hair.

Walk outside an immediately regret the decision.

Orange, VA

Sorry it's been awhile, I have been completely wrapped up in July's book of the month! I hope you all had a great 4th of July. Zach and I spent the holiday in Orange, VA to celebrate the marriage of our friends Mara and Chris. Orange is about 30 miles from Charlottesville, VA. It is also GORGEOUS, and in the middle of Virgina wine country. 

The weekend began Friday at the Holiday Inn Express. It was the only hotel close to the venue, so the wedding had all but one room in the hotel. We were laughing that we were staying at the Holiday Inn, but it was super classy. I spent hours by the pool staring at the Shenandoah Mountains as a backdrop. It was stunning! The grooms parents threw a bbq for everyone. The day was full of pool time, sun, bbq, and American Flag apparel for days. 

The wedding was at Open Mountain winery. Of course the grounds were stunning, but so was the inside of the venue. It had cathedral ceilings with wooden beams, intricate brick work, and beautiful details. The bride and groom went to Georgetown and the DJ was the dj at their college bar. He was amazing, and we rocked out to music like the Spice Girls and Backstreet Boys the whole night. Our pregnant friend commented, "You know its a great wedding when you have an amazing time with out a single cocktail." The new married couple looked stunning, and I can not thank them enough for their hospitality. Great wedding! 

Book of the Month - May and June

I know, I know. Listen, May happened, and I just couldn't finish my book on time. However, I am back on track and ready for July! 

Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter was my May book of the month. The novel is a story of chasing dreams. Told in flashbacks between a tiny Italian coastal town in the 1960s, and Hollywood in present day, the book centers around Pasquale, a young and hopeful inn keeper, and Dee Moray, a young and confused would-be starlet. Dee is sent to Pasquale's remote coastal town by the producers of the movie Cleopatra. She is told she has stomach cancer and has to rest. Well that turns out to be a lie, and the novel tells the story of the next 40-50 years after that fateful meeting, and the different lives that Pasquale and Dee have touched because of their story. 

This is a great story, but it was not a summer page turner. Some of the chapters that focused on the side characters were a slow to get through. I wish I was spending a summer get away in Pasquale's remote Italian town though!

Zach came home one day with a real desire to read a new James Patterson. We have a ton of his books on our Kindle account, and they are always an easy read. I knew I had to get on my game to finish a book by the end of June, so I, Michael Bennett became my June book of the month. This is probably the third Michael Bennett book I have read. He is a widowed, Irish-Catholic, NYPD cop who has eight adopted children. The story takes place in the summer, with his family trying to vacation at the family lake house in the New York countryside. Unfortunately Bennett also has to deal with a truly badass Mexican drug kingpin. The book is everything you expect ... crime, steakouts, and hot female counterparts. It took about a week to read, and I enjoyed reading it.