Sugar High

We have gotten so many emails from clients asking for help with favors that we knew we had to find a solution.  The Grove is a big fan of food favors and since I am not a fan of cake (it's a texture thing!) cookies are my go to.

As of this weekend you will be able to not just order your favor tags and stickers from the Grove, but also your cookie favors too!  We have contracted with out favorite baker and will now be selling cookie favors, made to order, on our site by the dozen.

I love the idea of these Lemon Cookies for a summer bbq!

And how perfect are these Shirt Cookies for Father's Day?

Drop Off Day

Mini K has literally been counting down the days until she was old enough to go to sleep away camp for two years.  Well today is the day.  We dropped her off this morning with a big smile on her face and she told me not to cry...which made me laugh!  Baby C told her no fair sissy and pointed to the pool.

The time has flown by and I am so proud of how she literally embraces situations without fear.  She met her pen pal Charlotte and it was like they had been friends forever.

So Mini K, her duffle full of monograms and her clip on fan with neon lights are all checked in to camp until Friday morning and Baby C is wondering what is going on!

Saturday Steals

Well clearly I missed the Friday Five this week, so I am creating my own Saturday Steals.  I firmly believe that two things can make a working woman or working mom's life easier:  self gifting and stowaway gifts.  Let's be honest, we all have days where a little something for ourselves can lift us up, right?  Now some of you may wonder what a stowaway gift is.  This is a phrase my grandmother used.  It is NOT re-gifting.  A stowaway is purchasing multiples of a couple of items and keeping them on hand for when you need a last minute housewarming or hostess gift and do not have time to order something personalized.  NOTE:  I blame my grandmother for my monogram obsession as she taught me, but I digress.

Let me just say that for all of the finds below, you can use code MEMORIAL20 to save an extra 20% off the already discounted prices, I say apply the savings to your self gifting budget.

Candles
I love to give a candle, BUT  I never give a candle in a box.  I always put the box in a cello bag and tie it with a big bow.  There is something about cello, tissue and grosgrain ribbon that changes an item into a present.  My mother recently introduced me to Snooty Roots candles and I am HOOKED!  They market themselves as a kitchen candle because they eliminate all odors, but ladies if you have a boyfriend, husband or son that plays hockey, light one of these around a hockey equipment bag and in 20 minutes you will be shocked...for the better!  The candles retail for $40, but you can buy a voucher worth $80 (2 candles) for $36 and it's even cheaper when you use one of the 2 discount codes above.  You can find the deal HERE.

Jewelry & Handbags
Hello, what's not to love?  A friend gave me a Gorjana neon pouch for my birthday to hold my change and I LOVE it.  The bright color means I don't lose it in the bottom of my bag.  I hadn't heard of this line before, but they have some great jewelry and their leather is top quality.

I purchased this cross bracelet for my niece who just made her first communion in sterling silver and am going to take advantage of the deal I am about to share to order some pouches to have on hand for gifts.

You can purchase an $80 gift certificate to Gorjana for $40 and again if you use one of the codes above, you will save an extra 20 or 30%.  You can purchase the deal HERE.

No surprise to any of you, but I LOVE a polo shirt, with a popped collar of course!  I also confess that when Mini K or Baby C has on a polo shirt, I always make sure their collars are up.  Now that I have discovered the Chirp Shop I feel like I am justified.  I mean how stinkin cute are these minnie-polo shirt onesies with the fabric on the collar?

 
You can get a gift certificate worth $25 for $12 before you use one of the discounts above.  So think ahead to Christmas or upcoming baby showers or birthday parties!  You can find the deal HERE.

I hope you can take advantage of these, but I need to finish getting Mini K ready for camp!

Side Tracked and Sparkles

Today was the day everything would get done and I would actually watch Thursday night tv on Thursday night.  Oh those smug mommy thoughts always have a way of hitting me in the face, with a chair!

Mini K got sick at school and has asked us no less than 200 times if she can still go to camp on Monday.  The answer is yes considering I think the bug is already out of her system.  But my day ended up consisting of conference calls and emails in between saltine cracker and ginger ale buffets.

I have meetings tomorrow morning, but the afternoon is reserved for CAMP PACKING.  I still cannot believe she is going to sleep away camp, but am so proud of how she tackles each experience with pure joy.

I did finalize the final logo for my new firm tonight along with all of my tax forms and filing papers.  July 1st will be here before I know it and I cannot believe a dream will soon become a reality.  I somehow ended up on you tube tonight and watched one of my favorites, Steve Jobs's 2005 commencement address at Stanford.  That speech gets me every time!

My big must do tast for next week will make all of you laugh as it involves Christmas...yes you read correctly.  See above for my mention of how fast time flies!  Memorial Day weekend for me is when I start thinking of Christmas cards, and gifts to buy and cookies we must bake!  Now that 2 of our nieces are tweens and have pierced ears, I already know what to get them!  BLING.

What's better than BLING?  How about BLING that is on sale?  The annual bling sale at JoJo's starts tomorrow and I will be crossing of 2 people on our gift list.  I am thinking BIG blings for the oldest and the mini blings for the youngest.  I put all three pairs in their little tins in a paper ice cream container from Garnish and fill it with their favorite candy and tie it with a big GIANT bow.

I also need to sneak off to the framer's to get Mr. G's father's day gift framed!  I am in serious denial it is almost June...well other than June means I can finally stop wearing this walking cast!!!!!!!!!

It's ginger ale refill time again so I am off to snuggle with my peanut before she realizes that she is too cool to watch tv with her momma!

Recap

I am back from NYC and finally catching up on emails, my stack of catalogs and my to do list!  Baby C's thank you notes will be done tomorrow...beyond late for me, but oh well.

His party was so much fun.  Mr. G gave me a hard time about making a beer punch instead of just buying a ton of beer, but the beer punch was a BIG hit!  In case you want to try it:

For every 6 pack of Corona Light, add a half cup of Vodka and a can of frozen pink lemonade and some sliced limes.  I do not like beer and trust me, this punch tastes dangerously good!

Everyone has something that they MUST have at a party...for me it's a theme and a cake.  I tried a new baker this year and she was AMAZING.  The cake tasted great and was perfect for our crab shack theme!

With the party and NYC behind me, it is all about getting Mini K ready for camp!  It will be her first time at sleep away camp and she is counting down the days until she is a big girl on her own for 4 nights!  I confess that when the parents handbook came and said we needed to label everything, I immediately thought I had to find a loophole.  I mean this is Washington, D.C., there is a loophole for everything and I despise those iron on clothing labels.  So I channeled my inner Southern Belle and monogrammed...EVERYTHING but her socks and underwear and I am NOT joking:

Washcloths...all 4 of them are monogrammed
Swimsuits, check!
Her flashlight, yep it's monogrammed
Sunglasses...PLEASE!
Her shorts, EVERY LAST PAIR
The duffel to put it all in...DUH

I don't think Mr. G is thrilled that I have pretty much turned our formal living room into a packing staging area, but I don't plan on any formal entertaining until we survive camp!

I have less than 2 weeks left in this surgical boot and I am counting down the days.  I have developed a HATE HATE relationship with the stationary bike...I hate it, yet I go back to it for an hour a day.  Let's face it, it's not like I have a lot of options and not exercising would make need to go into hiding.

That is pretty much the Grove in a nutshell and my guess is that I have bored you to tears!  I am off to finish our end of the year teacher gifts for Mini K and farewell gifts for the teacher's in Baby C's toddler room as he is moving up to the junior room in June!  It seems surreal that we will be touring D.C. preschools for him this fall!  We are almost to 500 fans on Facebook and I can't wait to giveaway one of our monogrammed carryalls!  If you haven't liked our page, would you, pretty please, give us a wink HERE.

Night!

Empire State of Mind

I am off tomorrow to NYC for what will be a whirlwind of events and a weekend of walking in this lovely cast.  I keep looking at my suitcase and laughing, because I only had to pack right shoes!  It's amazing how much space you save with only one shoe.

You know that phrase that goes..."do something every day that scares you?"  Well today I did just that, but instead of scaring me I feel like I have lost 50lbs and gone to a spa for a month long massage.  I QUIT MY JOB!!!!!!!!!!

This post is NOT meant to start the mommy wars so if you are looking for a fight please look elsewhere.  I am not going to be a stay at home mom.  Instead, I can cross something BIG off of my bucket list.  I left a big firm with fancy marble floors and mountains of meeting requests for "office socials" to start my own firm.  The BEST part, ALL of my clients are not only going with me, but they have been my biggest supporters.  I feel truly blessed to be able to work for such amazing clients!  I have told maybe 10 people and have had no less than 5 people call me about doing work them.  I have spent the last year wondering why I felt so alone at work and wondering if I had made the wrong decision somewhere along the way.  I have always LOVED my clients, even on their crankiest days, so I knew it wasn't them.

I handed in my letter today and was asked if I had given it thought or if I was just mad.  That question, I know, would never have been uttered to a man, but I had an answer...I had been thinking about it for months!  If I had any doubts, which I didn't, they were erased as soon as I was asked that question.

This post for me is my therapy today.  Today I learned:

crossing a big item off your bucket list feels amazing

that sometimes you have more support if you walk away from what brings you down

that following through on a goal you set for yourself feels better than I thought it would

But most of all, today I did something that my children can be proud of...I don't ever want Mini K to be asked if she is capable of making a decision at 37 or having a tantrum.  I want her to know her own worth and it starts with her seeing her mother model that behavior.

My last official day is June 30th and while my clients will still be my clients on July 1st, I can't wait for that day to come!

So for all of you that have known I have been stressed, or not myself or just not plain happy, now you know!  I cannot thank you enough for your kind comments and emails!!!!  If you see a girl with a cast on her left leg and a smile as big as Texas on her face this weekend in NYC, please come say HI!

I won't be back on here until Monday, but I promise to keep you up to date on twitter!

Rainy Day Money Savings!

We celebrated Baby's c's second birthday this weekend and I promise a full recap tomorrow!  It is a dreary, rainy Monday and not at all what I needed to kick off this busy week.  I have a fresh to do list, a cup of coffee and the light of a girls weekend in NYC to get me through the week!

I have deleted no less than 1200 emails this morning and planned a couple of Christmas in July events...it will be here before you know it!  While I was sorting through emails, I found a couple of happies that will help me tackle my list and save me some money for said NYC girls weekend in the process so I thought of would share:

Today is the LAST DAY to purchase your celebrity favorite $100 Naomi Gray jewelry gift certificate for $40!  Remember to enter in code MOMSDAY20 to save 20% off of the $50 purchase price.  You can use your electronic gift certificate immediately and the $100 can get you the sterling silver or gold plated birthstone ring necklace with two charms!  You can purchase your certificate HERE!

You have all heard me rave about ebates, well here I go AGAIN!  Ebates is 13 today and I could kick myself for not joining sooner, and they are celebrating with 13% cash back from a lot of stores, and in some cases 39% cash back!

If you aren't a member you can join HERE.

Nordstrom
Mr G and I don't want to part with our Rainbows, but they have most certainly seen better days.  They rarely, if ever, go on sale, but I ordered us new pairs from Nordstroms today, because I could use my Nordstrom notes and get 13% cash back so combined they cost me less than $20 for 2 pairs!  So check out your Nordstrom's list and click on over, because 13% cash back is $13 for every $100 you spend, throw in their everyday free shipping and you come out great!

Last Call
Even though Neiman Marcus isn't on Ebates, Last Call is and they have a 30% off sale on all women's jewelry, shoes and handbags.  I am loving this mint green Lauren Merkin clutch.  It's already marked down on Last Call, plus an extra 30%, plus 13% cash back via Ebates and it is almost 80% off!

Magazines
Despite my ipad, I still love to turn the actual pages of a magazine.  Magazines.com is offering 39% cash back on all purchases to celebrate Ebates 13th birthday.  My goddaughter is turning 13 this year!  I have no idea where the time has gone!  I just ordered her 20 issues of Teen Vogue for $10, plus I get 39% cash back on that!  It will cost me $6.10!

If you are an Instyle junkie like me, you can get 26 issues for $26, plus your 39% cash back!  That is 26 issues for $15.86!