Miss America Weekend Recap

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I’m back from our whirlwind Vegas weekend! My cousin Ellen looked beautiful during the Miss America pageant and while she didn’t make the top 15, we couldn’t have been more proud of her.

She had the best cheering section for sure! There were two Ohio groups located in the auditorium and we did some awesome O-H, I-O chants back and forth. Ellen said she could hear us cheering backstage, which was awesome!

 

The pageant was such a cool experience. 8,000 people packed into Planet Hollywood to see who got crowned. There were so many beautiful women, lots of sequin and teased hair. I wore a bright silver sequin dress and was not nearly the most glammed out person in the audience.

Watching the pageant live was pretty neat. It was funny to see the contestants show complete poise when on camera and then make a mad dash off the stage tearing at their clothes as soon as they knew they were off air.

The audience reaction was something you don’t get to see on TV either. During one part, they surprised the girls by letting one be “saved” by the other contestants. They had to literally go stand behind the girl they wanted to keep moving on in the competition. As soon as we went to commercial after that part, the whole audience started booing. Clearly that surprise stunt was not appreciated by the audience.

After the winner was crowned, our family met up with Ellen at the Toby Keith bar in Harrah’s for some beer and line dancing. We ended up staying out until 3am singing, dancing and having a ball.

Ellen’s year as a beauty queen has been so exciting for our family, but I think the best part is how it’s brought us all together. It’s not often you can get so many family members to convene in Las Vegas, so this weekend was very special.

Flying home on Sunday I kept thinking about how lucky I am to have such an amazing family. Everyone is so supportive, caring and FUN! I am very proud to be related to these people.

Congratulations Ellen! You’ll always be my favorite beauty queen. Thanks to the Cron family for making this weekend so memorable. You all are so great! And finally, thanks to my friend Molly for joining me this weekend. You are freaking hilarious.

Here She Comes … Miss America!

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What do you get when you combine my family, Las Vegas and the Miss America pageant??! Oh, just what is likely going to be the best weekend ever!!

That’s right, tomorrow I am off to Las Vegas to support my cousin Ellen, the beautiful Miss Ohio, at the Miss America pageant!

My whole Cron side of the family is so excited for Ellen. She’s worked so hard this year as Miss Ohio and the crown of Miss America couldn’t be bestowed upon a more deserving girl.

Ellen is already a finalist for the Quality of Life award, which recognizes her community service (she biked across Ohio to raise money for the Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals ) and for her platform, which is lightening awareness.

Unfortunately Ellen’s family has had to experience the horror lightening can bring. My cousin Christina (Ellen’s sister) was tragically struck by lightening when she was 17, working at a golf course before heading off to college. Here’s a video of Ellen explaining what happened that day:

I’m so glad Ellen is able to bring attention to lightening awareness and her sister’s story. As you can tell, Ellen is incredibly well-spoken, passionate about her platform and absolutely gorgeous! The perfect Miss America, right?

If you want to help make sure Ellen gets into the top 15 this Saturday, please click here to vote for her! The contestant with the most votes gets the “people’s choice” slot in the top 15. TODAY is the last day to vote, so please don’t delay!

I am overflowing with excited about being in Vegas with my family – they are such a hoot. And my amazingly awesome friend Molly is coming too! I already have my silver sequin dress ready to go for Saturday night and I’m asking my hairdress to “give me pageant” tomorrow at my appointment.

I hope you’ll all be watching and rooting for Miss Ohio on Saturday night! I’ll post next week with a recap of all the fun.

Go Ellen!!

Avoiding the Friendship Fizzle

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While we were in San Francisco for Christmas, the topic of friendships came up. My sister told me that she talks to 3-4 of her friends at least once a week on the phone and 1-2 friends daily.

I immediately felt a little panicked. I only talk to my closest friends about once every month… if that. Does that mean my friendships aren’t as strong as my sisters? Did moving cause me to lose touch with my closest friends?

I’ve always valued my friendships very highly. Even in fourth grade I vehemently defended a “friend” to my parents when they said the girl wasn’t the nicest to me (she made fun of my clothes almost every day at school). For whatever reason I’ve always had this fierce loyalty to anyone I let into my inner circle.

I tend to keep my close friends to a small group. The whole “best friend” notion over a gaggle of girlfriends, I guess. I like to think I do whatever I can to support these best friends and make it a priority to be there for them. But I sometimes wonder if I do enough?

And even worse I catch myself wondering … do they hold our friendship in the same esteem I do?

Luke thinks I’m a little wacky for having these thoughts. In his world – you talk to friends when you do and when you don’t no one cares.

I sort of think this stress I put myself under in regard to friendships is part of the stress all women put on themselves to keep up every facet of life to pristine condition. Excellent career, excellent home, excellent marriage and yes, excellent friendships.

But I also know that I LOVE my friends. They mean so much to who I am. They know me inside and out. Some of my most fun times have been spent with them. And if I lost them from my life, I’d be so sad.

So I guess what I need to figure out (will you help?) is how to keep friendships strong when you’re living far away? Is there any standard for calling, writing etc that I should try to follow?

 

Batman Christmas

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Merry Christmas everyone! We had a lovely holiday in San Francisco with my sister, her husband and their new baby.

Living far from most our family and working in an industry that doesn’t slow down over the holiday makes those special times when we can be with people we love during Christmas even more special.

I just couldn’t get enough of my new niece. Holding her, laughing at her little squeaks and experiencing a glimpse of what being a mom is like made this a Christmas to remember. I can’t wait until she’s older and we can start all the holiday traditions like putting cookies out for santa and seeing her eyes wide with glee when she realizes Santa came.

Anyway, here’s a quick recap on some of the best parts of our Christmas:

The Presents:
I couldn’t help but spoil little girl with some presents. First, this “baby’s first christmas” ornament I found on Etsy (this isn’t my nieces name, just an example).

Then a super cute New Year’s Eve outfit from Zara baby. They have the cutest kids clothing!

Luke got this super-cool duffle bag from J.Crew. I love the leather straps.

I got some PJ’s from Victoria’s Secret.

And new natural face lotion I’ve been eyeing.

Luke’s parent’s also got us this adorable entry way bench and storage unit for our new house!

We got totally spoiled this year.

The Food:
We had two awesome meals this weekend, but since my sister planned the menu, I don’t have recipes to share! One I did make sure to catch though was this amazing stuffed apple we had with our Ham on Sunday.


This is a Food Network recipe from the Nealys. Basically it’s a hollowed out apple filled with a mix of dried cherries, brown sugar, pecans and cinnamon. Then the apple is baked with some cider until it’s tender. It went PERFECTLY with the salty ham. I would definitely make these with pork anytime.

The Movies:
There’s nothing I enjoy more during Christmas than watching a good holiday movie on the couch after stuffing myself full. Normally it’s National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, but this year we decided to go with an oldie and watched White Christmas.

If you haven’t seen this one, it’s a classic. Bing Crosby. Supper clubs. A Ski Lodge. WWII soldiers. And some amazing singing and dancing. We couldn’t get over how small Vera Ellen’s waist was!

All in all it was a wonderful Christmas. Made even better by the lack of traffic on the way back to Tahoe.

I hope yours was filled with family, food, Christmas Carols and visits from St. Nick.