Today, Eric's company and I surprised Eric with a shower! A few weeks ago, Melissa, one of Eric's co-workers, sent me a message through myspace about a surprise shower for Eric and asked me to try to come and be part of the surprise!
Let me give some background info about Eric. First, he hates to be the center of attention. Second, he hates surprises. So being part of this scheme was a bit risky, especially happening before our wedding.
I arrived at MYNAH at 11:30 and the kitchen/eating area was decorated and set up. There was a burrito bar with tortillas, chicken, beef, chips, sour cream, salsa, lettuce, etc. Everything you needed to satisfy your Mexican taste! They gave me beautiful roses! We also got so many gifts and cake! Here are the pictures!
Surprise Eric! Whew, glad I no longer have to keep this surprise in!
Posing with all the presents, cake, balloons, roses!
This cake was beautiful! I loved the design and it was tasty!
One of the MANY awesome gifts. Actually, the guys passed this around to look at the box. Apparently, Eric charged it at work and vacuumed with it and four guys crowded around. Yes, they crowded around a vacuum. Ladies, if you want your man to vacuum, get a Dyson.
I came in with this gag gift for Eric. I'm not sure how I pulled this off while I've been terribly busy at work, but I just have to say, thank goodness they had them at Walgreens when I went in! If you know Eric, this is his FAVORITE chips of all time that was not available in St. Louis until recently and now Eric can have them!
Thank you MYNAH for throwing us a wonderful shower! We truly appreciate all the time and effort that was put into this. We are truly blessed!
For some reason, I have a hard time spelling Cincinnati. I can't remember if it's one n when and one or two t's? However, I am back from my trip!
Here are some funny stories and reviews:
When I got to Lambert Airport, I thought I was suppose to be at Gate C17. I sat there wondering why the plane was so small and why 15 minutes before takeoff they still hadn't boarded any passengers. I looked at my boarding pass it was suppose to be Gate C18, I quickly turned around (since I was facing the glass window) and was the last person on my flight to Chicago. This is what I call my Asian blonde moment.
I also got to meet up with Rich Sanker! We had some drinks and talked about his possible job prospects. Good to see him! Funny how we both live in St. Louis, but hadn't seen each other in 5 weeks, but since our hotels were less than a block away it was easy to meet up! I also had dinner with my boss and talked got to know her a little more, which was nice.
I got a new mentor now that Rich is gone, I have someone to get advice from! WOOT!
I met some really nice and amazing people. I even participated in a real medical school interview and did terrible. I wasn't prepped and it was totally intimidating! There's a new model of interview styles where you have 2 minutes to read a scenario, 8 minutes to answer questions about it, then you move on and do it for a total of 8 times. I was sweating after doing two!
Coming home today was a pain since it rained. I was put on standby to get to Chicago, but once I got there I had a two hour layover since my original flight back to St. Louis was delayed. It sucked that it took me almost 5 hours to get home! Boy was I glad to be back. Not sure if I'm ready to go back to work tomorrow!
Okay, restaurant/cafe/ice cream shop reviews. Since we are allotted so many dollars a day, I took advantage of using it! Here are some reviews:
Bruegger's Bagels: I give it a 3 out of 5 stars. I had the Denver bagel I think and it was just not as good as St. Louis Bread Co. My standards are high when it comes to breakfast sandwiches. I liked the peppers, but I could tell it wasn't made with love.
Graeter's Ice Cream & Bakery: I had a coconut chocolate chip ice cream on a sugar cone. With the weather in the 70s how could one not get ice cream, sit in the Fountain Square and watch the Cincinnati vs. Houston baseball game, or have a 2 hour conversation with your boss? The flavor was good, but nothing that specatular about it. I was disappointed they were out of waffle cones. How can you be out of waffle cones? This is pre-summer time! 3 out of 5 stars.
Via Vite: I actually ate here twice. The first time, I was SO hungry because I had just gotten in and I had 2 hours before the first meeting. So I had no idea about the place and looked at their menu, realized it was Italian and had a seat. The place looks great, the price is moderate, and the food was good...the first time I went. The second time I went was with my boss and we ordered the special they had that evening. She made it sound delicious and when it came I was disappointed with the pasta since it tasty very grainy, the sausage was meatball-like, not sliced like I imaged it would be. The ambiance was definetly nice, but it's the taste that matters to me. I give it 2 1/2 out of 5 stars.
Rock Bottom Restaurant and Brewery: I went here the first night I got in since we had the option to sign up and go to a restaurant with new people. I lucked out and got to meet the Dean of Admissions of Creighton University. The guy is SO nice and I learned a lot from him. Okay, onto the food. I had steak which I think should be good at any brewery restaurant. Unfortunately, it was a tad dry, but the white cheddar mash potatoes were delicious, the green beans were juicy so it made up for the steak (sort of). I give the restaurant 4 out of 5 stars.
McCormick & Schmick's Seafood: One night I wanted to get Thai since I knew it was the only time I could since Eric wasn't around. Unfortunately for me they were no where in sight. So I caved and went here. My gosh it was so expensive so I just ordered the fish and chips. The fish was lightly battered and delicious! I give this place 4 1/2 out of 5 stars. You really have to like seafood for this place.
At the airport today I ate at Wolfgang Puck Express. Delicious. I had a pasta dish that was a little too rich, but had a side of vegetables. I think Giada made those because it was so good! What I didn't get was that I got a glass for my drink, ceramic plate, but plastic knives, fork, and spoon? I give it 4 1/2 out of 5 stars.
Here are some pictures from my trip!
Apparently, this is a famous fountain. So I took a picture of it. It's located in the middle of the square and you can see lots of tourists taking pictures of it.
One of the pre-med students told me to eat here. When I looked online, I realized they were known for chili. Traveling and eating chili? I don't think so, plus I'm not a fan of chili. So I took a picture of it instead. It's also located in the square. They say that it's "meat paste!"
I love how there was a screen in the city. Downtown Cincinnati made me think that it was a tiny New York. I wish we had this in St. Louis!
The screen at night. I love the bright lights!
Oh and on my way to the hotel, the driver showed me this: Ascent. Beautiful!
So, there are seven weeks left!!! Time is sure flying by! This past Friday, I went in for my final dress fitting and it went great! I still need to tone my arms and make sure I lose some more weight. It's definitely tight! Before my final dress fitting I went and got my hair done. Next to my parent's restaurant is a hair salon and the girl there did an awesome job on my hair. I was VERY please with my hair! Yah! However, that night it took me and Eric about half an hour to take out all the bobby pins..there were about 115 of them!
Here's a picture of Eric using our panini grill this his cousin, Vanessa, gave us. Eric has used it two or three times. Along with the sandwich Eric is using up his last few bags of Flaming Hot Frito's. We found them here in St. Louis at our local Walgreens, unfortunately, they no longer carry them. Maybe when I'm in Cincinatti next week I can get some for him! :-)
The RSVPs are starting to come in, if you haven't sent yours in, please do! We would like to get an accurate count and calling or e-mailing you would give me and Eric less stress. :0) We are starting to hang them up on our wall. If we get enough good ones we may display them at our wedding.
Here's another option to our centerpieces using the spaghetti jar but with tissue paper to disguise the jar. What do you think? Yesterday, Eric and I went to look at some vases so maybe once we decorate with those you can give us your opinion. I do think this looks better than the one from a couple weeks ago. Thanks to Jessica for recommending this style!
Wow, I never realized how much work goes into a Couple's Shower! Eric's family (aunts and grandmother) threw us one on Sunday. We are so grateful for their hard work and time in putting it together. The place was great, the people were wonderful, and we were showered with a lot of gifts!
We posted many pictures! We got our own cake because we really wanted to use The Cakery for our couple's shower since it was way too expensive to have it for our wedding cake. I was disappointed with the design (yes, this is where my mother will say that it's too hard to earn my business). I think it's part of me being somewhat of a perfectionist, but I say if I'm spending over $50 for a cake it better not only taste good but look good. Okay, it looked good but I guess not perfect! What can I say? Everyone kept asking where it was from..hmm chocolate cake with vanilla butter cream. Who wouldn't drool?
Eric came late and I felt so embarrassed. My mother bought a couch and needed Eric and Dave to get it and move it by Sunday since if we didn't get it by then it would be back out on the floor. The problem was that Sunday morning we took advantage of the weather and got our engagement pictures in. We went to the Missouri Botanical Gardens at 10:30 thinking we would be out by 11:30, but wasn't out until almost 12:15. Eric and I rushed back to the apartment to change, grab drinks and get to my parent's house to grab the receipt. By the time that happened we went to the place to pick it up and at 1:30 the couch was still getting brought up and Dave hadn't arrived yet (he's the one with the truck) so I left to attend the shower.
Arriving without Eric was probably the biggest mistake. Making my rounds each set of people kept asking me "where's Eric?" Not wanting to go into a long story I kept saying, "he's on his way he got caught up in something."
Finally Eric arrived, everyone clapped, and we opened gifts and had cake. Eric's grandma (pictured below) and my mom admitted to having two pieces of cake. My mom said to her, "we're the smart ones!"
Below is a picture of Ben who agreed (very eagerly as well) to be our ring bearer in the wedding. Eric and I are thrilled and honored that he is part of our wedding party!
You can see from the pictures we received a lot of gifts and our apartment is now even more filled with gifts that we both want and need! Thank you everyone for helping us make this a memorable day!!
