Holiday Road

Chris and I are leaving Statesboro tonight for his parents' house in North Georgia.

Here's hoping you have safe journeys on the "holiday road" this weekend.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays.

xoxo

Happy 4th!

Happy Independence Day! While you're watching your fireworks and eating your hotdogs this weekend, don't forget to take a moment to think back a couple hundred years to what today's all about.

Happy Birthday, America! You pretty much rock!

(all photos via we heart it)

xoxo

A Day Late

Why am I always a day late with things like this? Oh well, better late than never.

Happy Father's Day!


Don't worry, I did actually tell my Dad yesterday... I'm not that behind.

Happy Easter!

Chirp, chirp!
xoxo

Banana Hearts

This is the breakfast I made for Chris for Valentine's day. Pecan waffles with heart-shaped bananas and strawberries with syrup, scrambled eggs, sausage from a local market and mimosas to top it all off. We ate while we listened to sweet music coming from the record player and the cat meowing at us. It was absolutely perfect.

Sweethearts on Parade: A Playlist

Music for Valentine's Day.... Enjoy.

(Ten points to anybody that can name where the picture is from.)

Happy Groundhog Day!

Or as my Dad calls it, TerraSwine Day.

And according to CNN and Punxsutawney Phil, there will be six more weeks of winter. Here in Statesboro, that's just "slightly chilly" weather as we don't actually get seasons here.

A Very Merry Christmas

We had a very merry Christmas here in Jasper. We stayed in pajamas all day long, watched Christmas movies, ate lots of good food, played with our new presents (and the kitty), and were lazy pretty much the whole time.

I hope your Christmas was equally as wonderful. Happy Holidays.

Gobble Gobble

Thanksgiving break was great. We spent the first half of the week painting our kitchen and the second half of the week hanging out with family. We decided to spend this Turkey Day with Chris' family, since we spent it with mine last year. We spent three nights at his parents' house in Jasper, then went to Atlanta to help Emily (our sister) cover some pillows for her new apartment.

There was good food, good company, and lots of both. There may have been a few games of Mexican Train, too.

I'll try to take some pictures of the apartment soon. We put up all our Christmas decorations when we got back, so our place looks quite festive.

I'm also working on a December playlist that will (hopefully) rock your socks off.

Until then... have a lovely Thursday.

Thankful

This year, I'm thankful for:

1. A husband that I love and who loves me unconditionally in return... even when I'm 12 kinds of crazy.
2. Our small, but happy home... broken washing machine and all.
3. My family, who bent over backwards to help us make our wedding the most special day of our lives.
4. My new family, who have welcomed me so warmly that I feel like they've always been part of my life.
5. Friends that can make me laugh even in the most dire of circumstances.
6. The ability to make ends meet when so many people can't.
7. All my crafting supplies and the ability to use them to make fun things.
8. My phone, so I can always call my grandma and ask her if she thinks a cup and a half of oil in carrot cake is too much, even though that's what the recipe says.
9. Good books that can take away the world for a few hours on a rainy day.
10. You.

What are you thankful for?

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.

Happy 4th!

Valentine's Day! (Finally)

Warning! This post is super image heavy!
Also, sorry the pictures aren't great. You try taking pictures while cooking a feast!

It's been almost a week since Vday, so I'll (try to) keep this short.

Chris is usually the "doer" between the two of us. He's good at planning what we're going to do for such an occasion. This year, I wanted to do something for him, so I planned a picnic. There was even a picnic basket. Unfortunately, it rained and we didn't really want to sit in wet grass, so we picnic-ed in my livingroom floor.

I made homemade chicken salad sandwiches on croissants (those weren't homemade) with lettuce and tomato. I love chicken salad but I rarely make it. So when I do, it's one of Chris' favorite things. I make a sweet version with grapes. I even slice the grapes individually; it's very involved, but very worth it.
Chopping the chicken, pre-salad.
All done! Yuuuuuummmmm!

I also got some goat cheese, jalapeno havarti- his favorite, wheat thins, grapes, and apple chips as side dishes.
Yes, that is a giant Easter teacup as a bowl for the grapes.

Chris insisted on a picture of me with all my hard work.

Then there was the cake. Now, I am very excited about this cake. Let me tell you about it.
I made an angel food cake from a box, which was supersupereasy, by the way.

Then I heated a bag of frozen raspberries in a small saucepan with about 3 tablespoons of sugar until they were mostly liquid and boiling like crazy. Then I let them cool a bit.

After the cake was cool, I cut the top inch and a half off the cake and set it aside. With my fingers, I scooped and pinched out a little "moat." I used the pieces I removed from the moat to fill in the hole in the middle.Then in went the raspberries! Then I carefully put the top of the cake back on, and made a really simple topping/frosting. I used my mixer and creamed 8oz of cream cheese, then added a big tub of whipped topping and about 3/4 of a cup of confectioner's sugar. Oh! And a little vanilla. Always add vanilla.

I wasn't really all that careful in my frosting. I just tried to get most of it on the cake. I like to put it all on top to start with then slowly work it down the sides. This topping was really easy to work with because it was so light and creamy since it's mostly cool whip anyway.

I threw a few fresh raspberries on the top. I spent nearly $4 on fresh raspberries, but when I got them home I realized that they were mostly molded. These were the only ones that were salvageable.
I call this masterpiece a "Bleeding Angel Cake." Why? Well, just look at what it looks like when you cut it!

If you attempt this cake, you should keep in mind that it does need to go in the fridge, since it has cream cheese and whipped cream in the frosting. Also, we learned that this is NOT a two person type of cake. It needs to be shared! A week later and we have over half left. The good news is that it's still just as tasty.

As for the presents, Chris got me this:
My very favorite print from The Black Apple. I'm getting quite the itchy "add to cart" finger because of it. I really think it needs a friend. But two is a weird number. I like things in threes, so I'm having a dilemma about that. We'll see. He also gave me a box of chocolates and a mini planter kit for outside my door. It came with soil, the planter and flower seends. It will be something for my gnomes to look after!

For Chris, I (of course) counted all the food as part of my present but since he's been reading biographies lately (I got him two Alan Alda books for Christmas), I got him Barack Obama's first book.

All in all, it was a very nice Valentine's Day. Did I mention how good that cake was? I'm thinking of doing it with peaches next time. Mmmmm......

Have a happy weekend, everybody. I'm going home and will come back with clean clothes and new contacts and glasses! Yay for vision! See you next week.

Love Is In The Air!

Okay, Love is on my door.


Got this at Hobby Lobby for $4.99. It was unfinished wood, so I painted it white. It's just so cute for Valentine's Day!

Plus a bonus picture: GNOMES!

The Holidays

It's January! When did that happen?

Finally, here's my post-Holiday 2008 wrap-up. I'll make it very concise since it's been almost a month.

Christmas with the Wilsons:
Oh the food.....

Coconut Cake... a tradition with Chris' family.

Homemade marshmallows dipped in chocolate, via this Martha recipe.

Cheese straws! Go Emily, go!

Peppermint bark..... we really liked the peppermint bark.
I really liked licking the spoon covered in melted white chocolate.
Other than the food, there were plenty of presents, laughs, and little kids running around picking stuff up.

Christmas at Mamaw's:
There was more food, more presents, and more laughs.


Christmas at Granny's:
I don't have any pictures from this, but it was lots of fun. My favorite present came from Lydia, a set of 5 Doctor Horrible pins. So cute.

New Year's in Rayle:
Abbie's mom made my favorite: Chicken 'n' Dumplins. I got to meet Abbie's fiancee, Joey, and his two little girls. We put a ridiculously difficult puzzle together. That about sums it up....

Yeah, okay. I know this post isn't exactly full of details, but it is almost 1am and the new semester starts tomorrow.

Hopefully I can get back to blogging regularly now. Maybe so much you'll even get sick of me.

Goodnight for now.

A Long December

I lied.

Okay, it wasn't so much a lie as a non-truth. I haven't gotten around to going through holiday pictures or posting about holiday fun. I'm a terrible, terrible person. After the New Year, this will all change.

I'm leaving tomorrow to go to Abbie's parents house in the metropolis of Rayle for our annual New Years party. Okay, so it's not so much a party as it is me hanging out with Abbie's family putting a puzzle together. But it's our tradition. We've done this every year for 12 or 13 years (we're not exactly sure when we started). When I get back, I will make one looooong post about the holidays and that will be that. Then I can get back to posting about regular, everyday, nerdy, boring things.

I leave you now with my favorite band, and a song that is just perfect for this week between Christmas and New Year's.

Counting Crows "A Long December"

"And its been a long december and theres reason to believe
Maybe this year will be better than the last"

100; Pinky Promises

Okay, I really promise to post all about my Holiday festivities, but it's been a long week. There was much travel, some presents, good company, and enough food to feed several armies.

I have pictures, but haven't bothered to get any of them off the camera yet. It will all be done in the next few days. Pinky swear.

On another note, this is blog post number ONE HUNDRED. I meant to make it a much more exciting post, but it's just not going to happen.

For now, I will leave you with what I'm looking forward to tonight. As we speak (as I type) I'm downloading the new Doctor Who Christmas Special and am sooooo excited about it. I can't wait to sit down tonight with Chris and watch it. Eek!



I hope everyone had as Holly Jolly of a Christmas as I did.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like....

Well, you know.


After Thanksgiving, Chris and I drove to Jasper where his parents live to spend a few days. If you don't know, Jasper is in the foothills of the North Georgia mountains. It's beautiful up there and they even have four seasons! The leaves change colors and everything. Here in Statesboro we only have two: hot.... and Christmas.

We we went driving up through the mountains on Friday afternoon and we took these:
On Saturday night, we put up the Christmas tree... which was a big deal for me since this was the first time I'd helped Chris' family put up the tree.

Here's me with my family-to-be putting the ornaments on:

The finished tree:

A blurry-but-still-good picture of Chris and me in front of the tree:

All this holiday cheer must have rubbed off on me. Apartment 22B is now a Winter Wonderland.

Chris' mom made me this wreath for my door:

I got a doormat at Kmart for $2.99:

And then I got a tree. I've never wanted anything but a traditional green tree with clear lights, but something hit me tonight and I went for the white one. And I must say, I think it's beautiful.

Fluffing the branches is hard, mentally-demanding work:

Chris helped decorate:

Pretty, glittery ornaments:

We're very proud of our work:

A pretty glowing tree is so much fun to walk around the corner to. It makes me smile every time. The only thing missing is a star. I couldn't find one I liked enough at Wal-Mart or Kmart. I'll try Hobby Lobby tomorrow, but for now my tree is star-less, which I don't really mind all that much. It's my tree and I love it.

Happy Tuesday to all.

PS.... check back tomorrow for new crafting goodies!