Get your driving shoes on!!!

Mike ordered custom Nike shoes, and they arrived today. We had so much fun creating these Nike ID's. They are the newest thing out there. Oh. The perks of having a Nike wholesale account and a rep that is good to Mike. He is in love with "his girls" so much that he decided they needed to be a part of his new shoes. Cheesy? Maybe, but oh so precious that he loves our pooches like he does.

He can now take them with him wherever he goes.
When he wants to get the girls all riled up to go on a car ride, he always asks them if they have their driving shoes on. They know what that means, and they go berserk. They live for car rides. So...
Ali with her personalized driving shoe on.
Ashleigh with her personalized driving shoe on.

If that didn't make you smile, there is something wrong with you!!

Fairy Godmother!!

I'm just pleased as punch!!! I am going to be beautiful baby Chloe's Godmother!!! I promise to love you and spoil you and be there for you and lead you down the right path (I won't tell you stories of the trouble that your Mommy and I got into until you're older). I love you, baby girl!!!

Dinner for Friends

Tonight we took dinner to some dear friends of ours. You might remember that I blogged about them on December 30th, 2007. They are an incredible family that needs all the prayers that they can get. This father of 5 girls, and husband to an amazing woman was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer on our 2nd anniversary (December 10th, 2007). He went through a period where he was doing much better, but he is going through another tough time right now. Please keep them in your prayers and check out their blog to read their complete story at www.caringbridge.org/visit/stevecaswell. It doesn't matter what he is going through- he is still an unbelieveable inspiration!!

My name is Leigh Ann and I am a Hotel Snob!!!

Over the years I have become a hotel snob. After working for Delta and having my very nice rooms in excellent locations paid for, it is so hard to go back. It is the same with the free flight benefits that I had for 11 years. It KILLS me to have to pay for tickets now. Anyway, my new job has recently paid for me to stay at the Westin in downtown Atlanta and the Marriott in Dallas. Both very nice hotels with wonderful amenities and comfy cozy beds with tons of pillows and down comforters. There's a reason that they call the Westin beds "Heavenly Beds". Although, I must say that the bed at the Marriott was even better!!!

As you can see, nice Westin bed.

Fabulous view of the city from the 45th floor.
What I could afford in Atlanta this weekend when I had to pay for my own room...
...check out that disgusting comforter. Yuck!!!! What is up with those pillows??? They look like they should be on a toddler bed. I wore flip-flops every step that I took in that room. The 80's artwork was even ugly back then. I guess you get what you pay for, but I must say that it is just so hard to go back to skanky, cheap hotels after you have been spoiled with top notch hotels. What's a girl gonna do, though, when she's on a hotel budget that comes out of her own pocket? Farewell heavenly beds, down comforters, an abundance of big fluffy pillows, nice amenities, fabulous views and great locations. I will miss you!!!!!

OneCoast University

I have spent the past few days attending OneCoast University in Dallas. This is a training program for my job. I learned SO much, but it was intense!!! Twelve hours a day in class and then we had a 2 1/2 hour long essay test on the last day.

Here are some of my instructors.

This was my roomie Debbie. Wow!!!! I look tired!!!! Oh yeah, I was!!!!
Here's some of my classmates. There were 35 of us- 33 women and 2 men.
Here I am with the CEO Ted Teele (that man is a marketing genius) and my mentor Nora Campbell. They both taught some of the classes.
Here's some of the stuff that we received. The big binder was our OneCoast textbook for the week. They gave us surcies like notecards, notepads, a big bag of snacks when we checked in and the bear was waiting in our room for us one night after dinner. Marketing your retail store is only one of the books that we will be receiving. Every year our company sends a book to our top 1,000 customers and all of the 400 employees. That was last year's book, and we will get this year's book in the mail. I thought that was kinda cool that they want to educate the customers as well as us. We had a little graduation ceremony where we received our certificate and a framed pic with the CEO and our mentor.
I just know that everything I learned at OneCoast University is going to be a great foundation for my new job, and I am so fortunate to have been hired for this position. There were some really bright people in my class, and OneCoast is a fabulous company. Thank you God for answering my prayers!!

Vacation

As promised, here's a peek into our vacation. Hubs and I haven't taken a vaca by ourselves since our honeymoon almost 3 years ago. This was a much needed break since we are both getting ready to be super busy with work. We started the trip with golf for Mike, and a 7 1/2 hour conference call for me. Yes. You read that right. Long day, but that night we were able to go to Shannon and Brandon's house (friends who live right by where we stayed) to watch the Gamecocks play their season opener and have dinner. The next day was "our alone day".

We ate lunch at the beach club.

We were viewing the beach from lunch and wasn't sure if the weather was going to hold out, but...
...it turned out great and we did some reading on the beach.
We had an incredibly romantic dinner that night. If you go to Pawleys Island, you must try a Pawleys institution called Frank's. Unbeliveable!!!
After our alone day, we pretty much spent the rest of the weekend with Shannon, Brandon and their little boy Hunter.
We invited all of them to the beach where we were staying. Hunter loves the beach!!
Next year we will have a new addition to play with. Elizabeth will arrive within the next month. I loved this pic of Shannon and Hunter. Shannon stripped him down to take off his swim diaper before we left the beach. He loved being naked and ran around the beach showing off. I doubt if he'll be very happy about this pic in a few years.
Of course I had to bring some surcies for baby Elizabeth.
Hunter loves to dance, and has amazing rhythm. We ate outside at a restaurant on the water that had a band. He was entertaining the whole crowd. He was "raising the roof" and doing other fun dance moves. He even had several women dance with him, myself included. It was too cute!!
He has a new love- ice cream!! I don't blame him!!
The next day we went out on their boat. The girls love a boat ride!! To the left is a tiny island that only has goats on it.
We docked the boat on a beach, had a picnic lunch and spent the rest of the day like this.
Hunter liked sitting in my float.
This was the first time that they brought the gate for him. I think they wished that they had done this all summer. Otherwise that boy is on the move!!
He finally crashed out for a nap on top of his Mommy.
After swimming, the girls got back on the boat and crashed out too.

They are happiest when the boat is moving.
Along the way we spotted a couple of houses that I wouldn't mind living in.

I would take this boat too!!

The only thing that we forgot to do was take our annual pic with Shannon and Brandon. I guess we'll have to look back on Summer 2006...
...and summer 2007.
Unfortunately, the vaca had to end. On our way home we stopped at Burger King. It was too dark to get a good pic, but this was so blog-worthy. There were at least 20 cats camped out in the parking lot at BK. I guess they were waiting on dumpster time??
The girls were so wiped out after their time at the beach. They passed out as soon as they got in the car and didn't bother to lift their heads all the way home. The end. Unfortunately. When I go to the beach I never want it to end!!

When you are on the go...

Good morning!! I am getting ready to go see a customer and in a hurry, so this will be a quick post. I am over at Chic Critique (www.chic-critique.com) today talking about a new product that I found for the mineral make-up lover for those days when you are on the go. It is a fabulous compact with your all-in-one concealer, foundation, finishing powder, sponge and mirror. Check out Pur Minerals if you want a good coverage, light, on-the-go mineral make-up. I found mine at Ulta on a BOGO special. I think the first one was $24.99, second one free. Can't beat it!! I'm in a hurry today, so I guess I'll go put some on now. As always, feel free to leave me a comment over there. You know, I want to be popular and all:)

Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous

My hubs and I finally had a chance to take a much needed vacation. We are so blessed to have some generous friends who let us stay in their beach house for a few days. We appreciate it soooo much since we were on a limited vacation budget. They told us that they would be happy to let us stay in their duplex. I must say that this wasn't like your average duplex...

The back of the duplex
The side of the duplex that we stayed in
The screened in porch (Ali wanted to be in the picture)
The view from the back deck and screened in porch
The entryway (beautiful paintings from the Cayman Islands)
Cool fish hook for their hats and our puppies' polka dot leashes
The view from the dining room into the hallway and foyer
The view from the foyer into the hallway and beyond that the family room

(Sorry for the bad lighting)
The hallway
View from dining room into family room
Dining room
Wet bar
View of kitchen from dining room
View of kitchen from the entrance to the laundry room
The family room
Guest bedroom
Another guest bedroom
Cool tortoise wall hanging
We loved this painting. This is Mike's dream view from his dream dock connected to his dream home on the marsh/water.
Master bedroom where we stayed
The TV that we enjoyed from our comfy-cozy king sized bed. French doors on right led to the screened in porch.
Door leads to the master bath
Stay tuned to see what we did on this fabulous beach vacation.