Wednesday, October 31, 2007 - Ereka

Monday, October 29, 2007 - Bill

Hi Everyone,

I am writing to you from Los Angeles- I flew out here after the show on Friday to spend the weekend with Giuliana.   We are taking Giuliana’s assistant Matthew out to dinner for his birthday tonight.  Some of you may have seen him on the show last week with Giuliana.  He did so much work planning and executing every detail of our wedding, I really owe him.  So I guess I am starting to pay him back tonight- “Eat up Matthew!”

We have been doing a lot of segments on cancer prevention this month and I am a firm believer in preventative maintenance.  I know a mammogram or colonoscopy is not first on everyone’s to-do list but I have seen amazing treatments and cures for certain cancers that are detected early.  I don’t ever want to see anybody have to go through what my family and I went through when my dad was sick with kidney cancer. 

On another note, if any of you watched the show on Friday the thought may have crossed your mind that I should be one of the next contestants on Dancing With the Stars.  Well, after watching the footage the answer is…… “NO WAY.” Man oh man, I should not have even tried to do those Latin moves.  I know you can get a great workout from dancing, and many people have lost a lot of weight dancing.  As for me, well, I am sticking to running and weights. 

Hope you all have a great Halloween week. 

Bill

Thursday, October 25, 2007 - Ereka

Hello Again!

What a weekend. I woke up bright and early on Monday morning (4am) to get to New York just in time to drive down to Atlantic City for my friend Laina’s bachelorette party with four of my closest friends. Despite the fact that my dancing feet ran out of gas around 12am (I was literally in bed by 12:30), the all girl weekend was worth the trip! I laughed the entire weekend.

So Halloween is right around the corner and it’s one of my favorite holidays…my favorite being Thanksgiving. Every year my husband leaves it to me to hunt down our costumes, but this year it should be pretty easy because we’ve decided to disguise ourselves as David and Victoria Beckham. The hardest part will be holding her signature pout for an entire night.

As for our show costumes….well, that will have to be a surprise! I can tell you that we’ve settled on some pretty great ones.

How did you like our discussion with Sarah Ferguson? Each time I see her she seems to be taking on more and more worthwhile global issues. The concept of being a global mother is brilliant and incredibly selfless. I do wish she would get a hold of Britney as she suggested. I think we all want to see Britney recover.

So cancer awareness month is coming to an end, but hopefully we will continue to shine some light on this issue as well as other health issues facing women today. My mother is currently a high-risk breast cancer patient and is due for a check up this month. I say a little prayer everyday. I also think it’s very brave of Kim to give us a behind the scene look at her heart exam. We are scheduled to take the cameras on my first mammogram later this month.

I’ll be back same time next week!

Ereka

Monday, October 22, 2007 - Kim

Ooohhh, what a week I’ve had since the last time I’ve gotten my blog on!  Where should I begin?  How about with some fava beans and a nice Chianti.  You know what I’m talking about: TONY HOPKINS! And yes, Sir Anthony Hopkins insisted that we call him “Tony”.  Oh how lovely, sweet, funny and delightful he was.  The rest of Hollywood could take a lesson from him in charm and grace.  He exceeded my expectations.  He’s awesome!

Then, there was John Mahoney.  (You know, the dad from Frasier.)  And he was equally as delightful and super sweet.  I had met him before when I did a couple of episodes of Frasier.  He remembered me and gave me the biggest hug.  How nice to see him again and how surprised I was to learn that he’s actually from England.  It’s usually very nice when you learn a celebrity’s personal history. 

Then there’s my old pal, Bill Bellamy. Yes, I know he’s funny.  But, oooweeee that’s a good lookin’ man.  I’ve known Bill for years and his best quality is that he has stayed the same for all those years.  Very grounded, polite, and just darling.  And yes, super fine!

So, I gotta tell you how excited I am that my car arrived from L.A..  Everyone says that Chicago is a walking city, but there’s places I need to go that I ain’t got time to walk to.  And let’s face it, shopping is so much easier with a car.  Target, Walmart, Crate&Barrel, CB2, Pottery Barn, Pier1, Macy’s, Saks, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Bloomingdales, Bed Bath and Beyond, Trader Joes, Whole Foods, etc, here I come!

Monday, October 22, 2006 - Bill

Have I told you lately how much I love my job. How many people get to start off their week talking with Anthony Hopkins?  Well, that is exactly what I did on Monday.  It was such an honor to meet him and I was so impressed by how talented he is.  I feel like I need to get a hobby or take music lessons, or start woodworking.

Then later in the week, I was just as honored to sit down and talk with John Mahoney, another talented guy.  You would think after Frazier he would have decided to retire but he just keeps on working getting involved with new and different projects -- did I mention I need to get a hobby?

On Saturday I hosted the Men’s Health Urbanathlon. Giuliana came into town and we did the race together.  This is such a unique race - it is ten miles in all but interspersed are obstacle courses, taxi cab hurtles, and running up and down the stars at Soldier Field (Walter Payton style).  It was a beautiful day and all for a good cause.  The proceeds from the event went to the Challenged Athletes Foundation.

I was out in the suburbs this weekend and saw all of the Halloween decorations up and starting thinking about what Giuliana and I should be for Halloween.  I am a fan of the funny costumes but I also appreciate the ones that make you think.  Last year I saw a couple and the girl was dressed with an army fatigue coat and the guy had on the army fatigue pants.  Can you guess what they were?  An upper and lower GI.  Get it?

Monday, October 15, 2007 - Bill

Hi Everyone,

We had another great week.  I especially enjoyed spending some time talking with the Doctors. They have such an inspiring story to tell which will motivate so many people to set and achieve goals for themselves.  On Thursday night I went out to Yorkville, Illinois to give a speech and one of the topics I talked about was the importance of setting goals.  That is one of the things that really helped me out along the way.

On Monday, my nephews came on the show for “kids day”.  They were the two boys who participated in the kids’ boot camp with Nikki and me.  I love to exercise, it is something Giuliana and I like to do together and when we have kids they will be full members of the Rancic boot camp.

I got to ride on my first float in the Columbus Day Parade in Chicago this past weekend.  Kim, Ereka, and I had a lot of fun on the NBC float. So much work goes into making these floats it is unbelievable. I remember there was a project on the Apprentice where the teams had to build a float boy….they really had their work cut out for them.

Giuliana, my mom, sisters and I went to the Chicago Firehouse restaurant on Saturday night to celebrate my sister Karen’s birthday.  After the party Giuliana and I went to another restaurant to surprise (check up on) on my 16 year old niece and her friends after their Homecoming Dance. I was fully prepared to interrogate her date – Giuliana had to hold me back.

Friday, October 12, 2007 - Kim

Hey what you guys!  I LOVE my job!  Well, actually, I do love my job, but I’m really loving it this week because I got to go to St. Lucia for the weekend.  Yes, the tropical, simply beautiful island of St. Lucia.  No, I wasn’t taking a short weekend vacation.  I went there to shoot a segment with a relationship coach named Peta Haskell.  She gives a seminar there twice a year for women looking to learn how to have good relationships.  I learned that the key to a good relationship is to first have a good relationship with yourself. And to think, I had to fly 7 hours each direction, get sunburned, get bitten by tropical bugs, and to sweat until I was dehydrated to find that out.

No, really, it was good information.  We jump through so many hoops trying to find love when in truth, if you tap into the love that is already inside of you, and share that with the world, more love will come to you.  Sounds like mumbo jumbo, but I swear it works.

Sorry this is a short one, but I have an exciting weekend ahead of me, and can’t wait to get it started!

Wednesday, October 11, 2007 - Ereka

Hello again!

Fall has finally arrived! My husband and I caught a glimpse of the changing leaves this weekend while in upstate New York celebrating my dear friends Shannon and Seamus’s wedding. The wedding was held at their beautifully restored historical home and it was so nice to see all of my closest friends. I woke up Monday morning at 3am to catch a flight back to Chicago but unfortunately it was delayed nearly 2 hours and I arrived only one hour before air time!

What a week so far. Our celebrities continue to teach us everything from how to make the perfect guacamole to how to detect the signs of uterine cancer. Rick Bayless is one of my favorite chefs from Chicago. I was amazed to see how mature and skilled his daughter is in the kitchen…it’s hard to believe she’s only 16!

Fran Drescher truly impressed me. She was a victim of rape, survived uterine cancer and continues to use her life experiences and courage to educate and inspire people. On and off camera she was charming, kind and hysterically funny. It frightens me to think that Fran was so proactive in attempting to diagnosis her symptoms and it still took 8 doctor visits to figure out it was uterine cancer. I plan on doing more research on the alkaline/acid diet she referred to at the end of her segment.

This weekend will be a busy one, some of my co-hosts and I will be attending both the Chicago Focus Fashion Show and riding the NBC float in the Columbus Day Parade!

In addition my co-host and I are brainstorming on Halloween costumes so feel free to email us your suggestions. Halloween is one of my favorite holidays of the year and this will be my first in Chicago!

Monday, October 8, 2007 - Bill

This week really flew by for me. Giuliana and her assistant Matthew flew back to Los Angeles on Tuesday morning- I was up with her at 4:30 a.m. and I am not a morning person- oh, the sacrifices of marriage. I am really starting to fall into a routine. After the show we have a meeting then I am usually off to work out (mostly the desserts from the night before). Remember the “soft addiction” episode? Well I am on the first step to a full recovery, which is admitting I have a problem.

In the afternoons I take care of the other businesses that I am involved in and then I start preparing for the next day’s show.  I have really enjoyed meeting so many of the guests and researching topics. Some of these topics I never ever imagined I would be talking about- especially on national t.v.

I had to go out to my sister’s house (she is also my manager) on Wednesday to sign 350 books for a speaking event I am doing this week out in Yorkville, IL. Her three boys set up an assembly line and we operated like a well-oiled machine. I don’t know where they got the idea that they were going to get paid….. I never mentioned it to them.

So I was not kidding when I told the story about Rocco cooking dinner at my house a couple of years ago. He used every single knife, pan, bowl, and spoon that I owned. The dinner was delicious, but the cleanup was a nightmare. He is an amazing chef and has become a good friend of mine.

Lesson Learned this Week: When cooking alongside a celebrity chef a.k.a. Rocco DiSpirito, let him take the lead in the kitchen!

Friday, October 4, 2007 - Kim

This was a crazy week.  My beloved cell phone died on me, and I call it my beloved cell phone because in it is stored all my phone numbers.  No, my numbers are not backed up any other place in the world.  I stopped keeping a phone book a long time ago. Stupid right? I just have the numbers stored in there. So imagine my horror and the feeling of disconnection I felt, particularly to all my L.A. friends.  Because of the work schedule, I was left without my phone for a day and a half.  Finally, I went to the store and paid a grip (a whole lot of money) for a new phone.  They were able to salvage all my numbers and info.  So I guess it was worth all the money.  But the best part was that one of the guys who worked there very sleekly kept asking me to marry him.  I later found out he was 30 years old.  Super cute, but too young for me!

My Chicago apartment is shaping up nicely.  Charcoal gray sofa, chair and ottoman all from CB2 with acrylic coffee table and end tables, beautiful lamps and my zebra rug from Ebay arrived.  ROARRRRR!  My vision of having a gray, white, black and silver apartment is being realized.  All I need to do is rip down those bloody awful mini blinds, hang some silk curtains, and Kim’s bachelorette pad will be ready for action! Oh yeah, and I gotta finish unpacking all my boxes.

I think the show is going great this week.  I think the three of us are clicking nicely.  It was fun having Harvey Walden on the show, even though I gained back all the weight I lost on Celebrity Fit Club.  Oh well, I can always start my diet tomorrow.  Again. 

Oh yeah.  Ereka and I went to a great party this week. Lucky Magazine is making their November issue all about Chicago and had a party to celebrate all the boutiques that were in the magazine.  The women at this event were so chic and so fabulous and so sweet and I really noticed the difference between a Chicago party and a L.A. party is that the age range was vast.  There were beautiful young women and beautiful older women too.  I’m sorry but in L.A., old folks and young folks don’t usually hang out together unless it’s an old, rich geyser with his young, buxom girlfriend. And trust me honey, he bought the buxom.

Well, that’s it for now.  I’ll talk to you guys next week.  Keep watching the show.

Friday, October 4, 2007 - Julie Watson

Hi Everyone!

It’s been a great week on the show, but I have to say the highlight for me was our segment with Lucky Magazine’s Editor at Large Gigi Guerra. She was so wonderful- it was a great treat for me to meet her! To give you an idea of how relaxed and fun she is, she was looking to add a bit of sparkle to her great deep green top, and hadn’t brought anything with her…so, last minute, she borrowed one of Ereka’s necklaces. No “high fashion” drama- it was just like 2 friends sharing clothes! It was great. On Wednesday night I went to Lucky’s event promoting the release of the November issue, which includes a fantastic “Shopping Report” on the best shopping in Chicago. It was a fun night- I even ran in to Kim and Ereka! There was a guy there wearing a Fedora, a “man blouse” and high waist pants- Kim LOOOVED it- though I giggled to her that he was a bit too “All That Jazz” for my liking. But, you gotta love anyone who takes a fashion risk, though- so hats off (no pun intended!) to him!

Tuesday's show, we outfitted the hosts in looks from Scoop (www.scoopnyc.com). They all looked fantastic! It’s always fun for me when a client, or in this case a host, is hesitant about something, but they trust me enough to “go for it”. This was the case with Kim’s beautiful long grey with brown suede trim Tory Burch Cardigan. At first she wasn’t feeling it, but by the end of the show and umpteen “oh my god, you look amazing in that” comments she was loving it- and was even contemplating buying it! And yes Kim- you DID look amazing! But, I have to say, Bill wins the prize for “look of the week”! He and I agreed- Tuesday was his best outfit yet: dark rinse slim Prada Jeans, an amazing Martin Margiela burgandy shaker knit cardigan and a bright Dsquared2 stripe shirt. And, the piece d’resistance? The kicks! Pumas with gold accents- nothing better! It was such a chic, clean but urban look for him. I tried to get him to bust out a little hip-hop back stage…but he only teased us with a few choice moves. I’ll take it- it was hysterical.

When were chatting about how much we liked the outfit, Bill made a comment that I hear often but it always resonates with me: when you FEEL great in your clothes, it changes everything- your mood, your confidence, your poise, your demeanor- everything! He’s right- when you love what you’re wearing it absolutely shows. That’s a great fashion lesson for all of us- it doesn’t mater where it’s from or how much it costs- what REALLY matters is how your clothes make you feel. When you feel great in what you’re wearing, your positive energy is contagious!

Until next Friday, have a fun FASHION-FILLED week!
Best, Julie

www.juliewatsonstyle.com
Email:info@juliewatsonstyle.com

Wednesday, October 3, 2007 - Ereka

Hello again!

What beautiful weather we had this weekend here in Chicago and it was so nice to have my parents in town to enjoy it with! Luigi and Maria are so proud and they have rallied an army of Italians back in New Yorker who religiously watch In The Loop.

Having them here gave my husband and I an excuse to indulge in local food and behave like true tourists. We went to a Rick Bayless restaurant, ate Garrett’s popcorn, took a tour on the Wendella, shopped Michigan Avenue and had a drink on the 96 floor of the John Hancock building. Come Sunday I was completely wiped out, but it was worth it…I miss them already.

So what do you all think of the Bally’s Hip Hop work out? Bill dances just like my husband! I can’t believe that one hour of Hip Hop can burn up-to 600 calories. Fantastic.

Cooking with Dale and sharpening my knife skills with Hung were the highlights of my work week. Lesson of the week: never say a disparaging word about a man who can dice an onion in under 10 seconds. Hung was such a great sport and actually very sweet. My husband and I are obsessed with Bravo’s Top Chef and while I think the best chef won, I was rooting for Casey to go all the way.

Other than that I had a fun trip to Shedd Aquarium where I smooched a sea lion named Tyler and played pattycake with a dolphin named Pichette…all in a days work! More on my trip to the aquarium next week.

Monday October 1, 2007 - Bill

Hi Everyone,

I hope you all are enjoying the show as much as I am. Last week my mom came to the show and brought 13 of her friends. I think I had at least three of them as teachers at St. Michael’s School. They had a lot of fun and made plans to return to the show next week.

Wednesday I went to Philly and had a blast cooking those Philly cheese steaks. I don’t even want to know how many fat grams are in that cheese wiz I caked on to the bun. I have to tell you, I am learning so much while working on the show and not only about cooking. The segment on wedding gifts was such an eye opener for me. I always thought you either gave money or something off of the registry but there were so many cool gifts- like the movie rental subscription, and popcorn. That beats a place setting any day of the week!

Giuliana was in town last week and came on the show. I didn’t give her much notice that she would be joining us on the couch at the end of the show. Actually, I didn’t give her any notice-- good thing she is such a trooper.

Weekly Lesson Learned: Take a couple of Tums before downing multiple Philly cheese steak sandwiches for breakfast.