Bread

I made bread tonight. Using this Artisan Bread in 5 minutes a day recipe. The theory is you mix up a batch of dough once, and it stays good for two weeks. Then you have it on hand to bake whenever you want. It makes two loaves, if you're wondering (the recipe never tells you that).

We ripped hunks of it off and ate it. It was all very Alladin-esque. We'll see if it becomes a weekly thing. With  a little bit more practice and planning, perhaps.

11.11.11

So, if you've spent any time with me over the past few weeks, you've probably heard me weasel my plans for this Veteran's Day into our conversation. I've been a little obsessive about it really.

You see, I've been helping plan a wedding. I've been crafting, and scheming, and stalking the weather channel's web site. Friday was the big day (11.11.11.) and I'm so, so excited/relieved that everything worked out.

I'm not a professional photographer, but I did take a few shots of the decor (in the few  brief minutes I found  to spare) so I could show you guys. I can't wait until Kimbe has their real pictures up. They are going to be so good (if I do say so myself...not to brag or anything.).

The wedding was on the Groom's family's horse farm, and this place was pretty much oozing rustic charm. 

So, there's a glimpse into my veteran's day weekend. I hope you all found some time to relax :)

Birthday Boy

Cory is 24 years old, as of today. The big two-four. Last year we did a big mario party. I've decided to save the parties for someone who wants/appreciates them in the future, so we took it nice and easy this weekend. 

We stretched it into a birthday weekend, starting Friday night. I made some delicious steak, under the careful guidance of my father, the master of steak. (Seriously, he has a PhD in Steak. He knows what he's talking about.) And so I present to you, the first steak I have ever really cooked. (Its like a rite of passage in my family).

Cory likes steak. He loves my Dad's steak. He had low expectations for mine (he told me afterwards), but he was pleasantly surprised.

He ate all of his NY strip, and half of mine. Looks like I found the best way to fatten him up. With this and Peanut M&M's he'll be plump in no time, right?

 I also bought all his favorite snacks for a movie night. (Turns out, you end up with a lot of food items when you do birthday shopping at the grocery store. Or maybe I just express my feelings through food.)

We didn't get to eat any of those snacks because movie night turned into "Go to the college of engineering and finish up one last project for 3.5 hours." So, we spent the night side by side in the computer lab. Without snacks. And I got bored of the internet. I didn't even know that was possible. Anyway...

Saturday morning the deal was that Cory could sleep in as long as he wanted unharassed. You're welcome.

I used the time this gained me to make his birthday cake and birthday waffles. It was time well spent.

I made chocolate cake (from a mix. I have yet to eat a made from scratch cake that made me think, "Yea. That was worth the effort. Consider that a challenge, my baking friends.). The icing was the same AMAZING Dulce De Leche recipe Freya used for Brett's party a few months ago. Cory raved for days about it then, and he doesn't rave about food. Ever. I knew it was serious after he told me, "We should fill a bathtub with this stuff, and then he could just lay in it." (Somewhat direct quote. He really liked this stuff.)

We went man shopping for his actual birthday gift. I didn't tell him where we were going, but he claims he figured it out on his own.

 1) Office Depot for his choice of pen (we got Zebras. Pretty fancy.). 2) Gamestop, so he could pre-order his game for next weekend. 3)Edwin Watts, so he could get something golf related. 

Like a kid in a candy shop. For real.

All done! His new 3 wood makes him happy. As does his giant bag of tees.

We were planning on going to the Greek Foods Fest with Danny and Joanna this weekend (as per annual tradition--3 years running, people!), and Jesse and Tanya were up for a night of Greek food too. So we decided to eat cake and ice cream afterwards for a small, simple no big deal birthday celebration. Not party. Cause I'm not doing those anymore, right?

I just can't help myself. I already had the banners in my "party drawer" so I put those up. But once I got started, I couldn't stop. I mean, what is a birthday without ridiculous hats? We needed some. So I made some!

We finished the weekend off with a Sunday afternoon with Cory's family.  I forgot my memory card, so no pictures of that. Cory's mom always makes your favorite thing for dinner on your birthday, but Cory wouldn't tell her what to make. So, she surprised him with birthday steak for too! Haha--we didn't plan that. So basically it was the best weekend of Cory's life so far.  

Happy birthday, babe! You're my fave.

Reunited.

I don't really know what I'd like to tell you about. I could tell you about the smoke coming from under the hood of my car. I could tell you about how I accidentally waxed off half my eyebrow last week. I could tell you about how I made this recipe for 2 single cupcakes, but I used baking soda instead of baking powder so they tasted like chemicals.  But...I don't really feel like it.  So, I'll tell you about this other thing instead.

I picked this awesome little thingie up at Goodwill for a few dollars a while ago.

I thought it was cute.  And it went along with my collection of pretty white things. And then I saw it on the Nester's china buffet in her book page decor post.  And I realized it was a two part little stand thingie. And I thought that was neat.

And then, I went thrifting with Freya, and found the second tier!

Originally priced at $1.99. Luckily, Salvation Army has a 50% off deal once a week. So, it only cost me $1.00 to reunite them! Umm, score.

The smaller one has the little brackets for yet another tier. I don't think I'll be so lucky as to find that one too. But you never know.

Little Punkins

Lara decided we were going to be super cute and fallish and walk her dog down to the pumpkin patch by her apartment for a girls night of pumpkin shopping.

The sign used to say "The pumpkins are coming!" For some reason I have to say that in a british accent.

Her friend Karen had two spare dogs she brought along. Dogs all around! 

It sounds cute on paper, but it wasn't going very well.  The chocolate lab is only 5 months old, and she was going nuts. She was barking, and jumping, and attacking, and growling. She was going to scare the children. 

We were at a loss. We thought she'd calm down on the walk, but it just made her worse. We were just about to turn around and walk home because there was no way we could bring the dogs around little kids when they were acting like that, but then I decided to try one more thing.

So I got down, and I looked deep into her eyes. I told her we couldn't have fun if she continued to act badly. We'd have to go home, and she couldn't see the pumpkins.

She behaved perfectly the rest of the night. I'm serious. It worked. We even got COMPLIMENTED on her behavior. 

Just call me the Dog Whisperer. 

I bought 4 tiny pumpkins. The cost me a whopping $2.00. I played with them for a while to figure out where our little burst of fall would make the biggest difference.

I finally just lined them all up on the kitchen window sill.  They look good with my new window treatment, yes?

The window "treatment" involved a large leftover piece of canvas dropcloth, three tacks, and two strategically placed staples.  I was planning to sew it, but the tacks and staples worked so...yea.

I asked Cory what he thought about it.

Without looking up he says,"I think they're beautiful my love. You are sooo fancy."

I am so fancy.

Desperate times/measures

Yesterday I wrenched our steadfastly closed kitchen window open, and let the fall breeze blow in. It made me kind of giddy. And I did the dishes, and wind blew in through the window, and  I stared outside for a while. And noticed there were leaves in the gutters. And this surprised me. The weather has been increasingly lovely, finally somewhat cool and comfortable. The first "official" day of fall was last week (or so I heard from friend's facebook status reports). That should have tipped me off, yet, I'm still surprised to see the leaves falling. 

We don't really get a crazy riot of colors down here. Everything just goes kind of brownish from Octoberish to Februaryish, and then perks back up in March-ish. So I took a walk, and enjoyed the new brownishness of a Northern Florida Fall.

After my walk I was feeling rather motivated and decided to tackle a problem we have. We own approximately 23 cups. And we've developed a very, very bad habit of using them. All of them. I've been irritated/impressed with it for a while--two people should not be flying through 23 cups a week!--but had yet to do anything about it. We'd fill up the dishwasher with cups in 3 days. Things were out of control.

 I mentioned to Cory a while ago that we should limit ourselves to one cup, that we rinse out and reuse. But neither of us followed through with that.

So, I hid the cups. Well almost all the cups.

So far its working!

General Conference Weekend

It feels so good to just step back and listen to the wise words of the prophet and apostles. 

So relaxing, inspiring, and very much needed.

Yesterday we streamed the session online, and my hands painted while my mind listened. 

(You can see the painted project here, if you're so inclined)

One line I just can't get out of my head: "It's okay to scrimp and save." 

It's more than okay! Get with it.

It's a huge weakness I have, but luckily Cory is what I like the call the "Anti-Spend."  So I'll follow his lead.

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