I swear I didn’t send this in to post secret, but I might as well have. ugh-PET PEEVE!!! Whoever you are that sent this in: we are microwave soulmates!!!

Anyway, this week was a pretty busy one. I was supposed to have some guest bloggers but that plan fell through. Perhaps maybe this week. Some highlights of the week:

• I’ve been working diligently on a super secret project that I can’t really talk about yet. I don’t like keeping secrets, so when I get the OK to tell people, you guys will be the first to know. But needless to say, it’s been keeping me quite the busy bee.
• Tuesday one of my faves Jamie got us tickets to a special sneak preview of the Time Traveler’s Wife. We met up with Suze & Angie and patiently waited in line for about 45 minutes and had a good time just BS’ing. I also got to see fellow GG writer Desiree! Since the book is probably one of my favourites of all time, I was really worried about the movie ruining it for me. Thankfully it didn’t, but the movie didn’t evoke quite the powerful emotional response the book did. Sure I cried a little at the end, but it was nowhere near the gutwrenching sobs I experienced reading it. The more I thought about the movie, the less I liked it. Maybe it’s one of those stories that doesn’t translate well to film because I felt the movie lacked serious character development.
• Friday Chris & I went to see Paper Heart. Must’ve been movie week or something. Chris is more the romantic type than me so I tried to ignore his eye batting at me throughout the movie. It’s not overly gushy, but it IS a movie about love. It’s expected. (but that doesn’t mean I have to start melting and being all swoony!)
• Yesterday I had the pleasure of going with Chris and our friends Blagica and Michael to Velika Gospa. I’m going to post later on it in more detail, but damn can my peeps (Croatians) cook!!!
• Today was pretty much a lazy day. Chris & I were supposed to go see District 9 but didn’t get around to it yet. I would say there’s always next weekend, but it’s my other fave Jess‘ birthday and I can’t wait to celebrate with her.

So how was your week/weekend??

Giveaway Note: Winners will be announced tomorrow!! Thank you to everyone who entered, your stories were great!!

**I’d also like to thank my friends and readers for your support/advice on my breakup post. My friend ended up reading the post, so that pretty much was the end of it. I’m pretty sad about it because it’s never easy to lose a friend. I moped around for the first few days as if I had lost a boyfriend or something. But I suppose it’s for the best. So thank you all again for your words of wisdom & support.

Today I whipped up a batch of orange cupcakes with orange cream cheese icing. They’re a fun summer recipe because they’re a very fluffy cupcake and also have a sweet and slightly tangy flavor. If you’d like the recipe, I’d be more than happy to share!

creaming the butter, sugar, egg yolk, and vanilla extract together

the egg whites make the cupcakes light & fluffy

fresh out of the oven

orange cream cheese icing

who wants to lick the beaters?

Garnished with orange pieces

so yummy!!

Take that Bakerella!! (just kidding, I love you)

*I really, really love my G10.

Somewhere in Pittsburgh my mom is shedding a tear.

I guess at some point I failed to miss the life lessons she taught me about cleaning. Or maybe I just wasn’t paying attention. That’s beside the point.

The point is, I’m trying to clean my apartment because my Gap party is next week and I don’t want my friends to think I live like a slob (unless they already know this, then I don’t really care). So I get this brilliant idea to hire a maid service. (I used to have one, and it was awesome. I would go to bed one night and the house would be dirty, the maid would come while I was sleeping, and I’d wake up to a clean house. It was a very magical thing.)

Well, Chris shut that idea down. Something about strangers being in our condo blah, blah, etc. I’m pretty sure the maids wouldn’t want to steal his massive lego collection or anything. Anyway, I made an agreement with Chris that if he could clean our apartment as well as a maid service I would buy him a new Xbox 360 game.

BET ON.

So he starts cleaning, and giving me a guilt trip because I’m not participating. Whatever, I’m paying him right? I wouldn’t expect my maid to whine at me as I sit on the couch and eat my popcorn that I’m not helping her vacuum. At some point mid guilt trip, I decide to clean the stove because I have far superior cleaning skills to Chris and wouldn’t be satisfied with his work. I think I’m getting off easy because I have a self cleaning oven and start cleaning the stove top. AND it starts SMOKING. And no matter how hard I try (which probably isn’t THAT hard), I can’t get that disgusting CRUD off my stove.

It’s right about now my eyes start to BURN. BADLY.

I’m basically yelling at Chris to open the door to the balcony to get some air circulating, but he calmly informs me that he will not be opening the door because there is a squadron of spiders gathered on our balcony and he’s pretty sure they’re rallying for an invasion.

Did I mention I’m horrified of spiders?

So now we’re sitting in our apartment, eyes burning and probably slowly dying from inhaling toxic fumes. I’m pretty sure the oven and spiders had this planned out all along too. Evil bastards.

Once the oven and stovetop are clean I am NEVER using those bastards again so I never have to go through the cleaning process again.

If I don’t die from the toxic fumes overnight, I will most definitely be hiring a cleaning service. Any good reco’s in the Chicago area?

*And chris probably isn’t going to get his game now.

Holy crap.

This weekend was the most amazing, overwhelming whirlwind of a weekend I’ve had in a long time (if ever). It was my first time attending BlogHer and I had no idea what to expect. I was definitely overwhelmed and a little bit nervous. But that all disappeared pretty quickly.

I freaked out slightly on Thursday night because I couldn’t get in touch with anyone, only to find out the lack of reception people were experiencing. After finally meeting up with my friends, we got our badges and headed off to dinner. It was a great way to meet some of the other girls I didn’t know yet, and make connections with prior to the actual start of the conference.

I only ended up attending a few sessions, but from the general consensus I wasn’t missing much. I pretty much stuck with the Geek Lab sessions and 1) it was sooo hard to hear ANYTHING and 2) the sessions were either ones I had no knowledge of or way too basic. I’m a total nerd and into HTML, CSS and all that crap. But really, I would expect someone at a blogging conference to at least have a little experience with these things so I felt like my time was totally wasted on being taught how to bold or change font etc. Saturday I skipped all the sessions for two very good reasons: Paula Deen & Tim Gunn.

Allie, Jamie & I meeting Tim Gunn!!

Not gonna lie, I am not a fan of Project Runway but Allie and Jamie are. Tim Gunn was genuinely nice, although I had no real expectations since I’ve never seen him on TV. Paula Deen was absolutetly HILARIOUS. If I had a southern grandma, I’d want her to be Paula. Or if Paula happens to be looking for an adoptive granddaughter, I’m there!

The expo hall was pretty cool. There were a lot of really great booths, but I’m not sure I even stopped at every one. The lunches were surprisingly delicious. Ragu provided lunch on Friday, and it was a Mexican themed lunch Saturday. However, the lack of water was HORRIBLE. I heard it was because BlogHer was trying to go green, hence the absence of bottled water. Well, it pissed me off. I love Pepsi and all, but I am no longer a soda drinker. And I think the going green stuff is a lame excuse since they were providing bottled SODA. WHAT IS THE GODDAMN DIFFERENCE? (Clearly, a dehydrated Maggie= cranky Maggie)

The two main highlights of the weekend for me were the Nintendo Enthusiast dinner and BowlHer.  From getting all decked out, to being picked up in horse drawn carriages to dinner in the Signature Room of the Hancock building, the Nintendo dinner was fabulous from start to finish. Even the rain couldn’t ruin it. And I’m pretty sure everyone in the room was jealous at the awesomeness of our table. BowlHer was just silly and a hell of a lot of fun. We were provided with hot pink boas and got to walk the red carpet.

Photo by @rbucich

The real reason I went to BlogHer was not the parties or swag. It was about making connections. It was about building relationships with these amazing women who share their lives with me every day through their blogs

• Jamie, you are the best date ever. EVER.
• Jess, you are fucking hilarious and I love you.
• My other Chicago girls: Allie, Blagica, Suz and Angie, you’re all wonderful.
• New friends: Heidi, Beth, and Katelin, I had a blast getting to know you and I can’t wait to see you guys again.
• Jenn I wish I had seen more of you, and one of these days we better have an awesome hangout.
• My Nintendo table: Doni, you are cute as ever & need to spend more time in Chicago. Jenn, you are probably my soulmate or sister in another life. We must bake cupcakes together. And last but not least, Brandon you are a true gentleman, a good sport, and totally fun to be around.

Photo via @rbucich

Jenn, Jess and I

You wonderful people are the reason I blog. Would I do it again? Totally. I’m already looking forward to BlogHer10. Thank you all for everything.

*I didn’t take many pictures this weekend, so I’m waiting to steal some friends’ photos. Also check out @rbucich’s flickr set to see some amazing shots throughout the weekend..

Sorry bloggies for my absence this past week. I was feeling under the weather and having writer’s block-what a winning combo. Despite spending the first half of the week alternating work and sleep, I still managed to get out and do some fun stuff in the latter half of the week.

• I got to go see Harry Potter & the Half Blood Prince on Thursday. In OMNIMAX. It was pretty intense. I’ve been to shows in OMNIMAX before, but never a movie like that. As far as the movie vs the book goes, I felt like some parts of the story were rushed (like the major stuff) and there was too much focus on their relationships. But I enjoyed it. And yes, I cried at the end. I’m pretty sure I perfected the art of the silent sob too.
• Friday Brittainy and I went to see (500) Days of Summer. The story line was pretty predictable, but I liked the way it jumped around and mixed the story up. It was a really good movie to go see with your girl friends though.
• Yesterday I spent some time with an old high school friend who was in town for the weekend. I took her and her cousin to brunch at Yolk, and then did the touristy stuff at Millennium Park. Then we headed a bit north and went to Lill Studio and made some custom purses.

This upcoming week should be fun since BlogHer will finally be here! The blog cards I ordered are so adorable, I absolutely love them. I’m also super excited for the monthly book club meeting tomorrow.

So what have I missed this past week?

It’s been a while since I’ve done a Love List but I figured it was time to bring the love back.

This weekend was the the Printer’s Row Lit Fest here in Chicago and I spent quite a bit of time and money there.

Since I have books on the brain, here are some books I love:

Harry Potter Series
Fahrenheit 451
The Bell Jar
The Time Traveler’s Wife
Catcher in the Rye
Mysteries of Pittsburgh
Sex Drugs and Cocoa Puffs

If you ever came over to my apartment though, you would find that my bookshelf is pretty full. I kind of have a problem. Just this weekend I bought 5 more books when I already still have 3 to read from the last time I bought some. I know there are support groups for shopaholics but what about bookaholics?

What are your favourite books??

Today is not really a “WTF” day, it’s more of a “Holy Hell*” day. As in “Holy Hell I’m going to meet with a priest I barely know and see if he will give us permission to get married” kind of day.

Or more simply: Holy Hell I’m ACTUALLY going to get married.

And more excitingly: Now I can officially set my wedding date!

If you’d like to read more about the experience you can do so here. I’m pretty excited that now I can start updating our blog on a regular basis instead of boring you all here with wedding details.

*Okay, I lied. WTF, no one told me Scariest Places on Earth was on SciFi?! I hate you all for holding out on me.

So I’m all moved and finally settled on a theme!

The move could’ve gone a bit smoother, but I’m sure it could’ve gone worse too.

Now that it’s all over, I can go back to my regularly scheduled blogging.

So: Thoughts on the new layout/design?