Food Friday

I thought I would do these little posts about what I ate throughout the week just to give anyone who reads this an idea of how to eat healthy meals. By any means am I getting on a soapbox because I did eat two disgusting hotdogs this week. I have an issue with food, I cant just let it sit in my house and waste. I would rather throw it away so I don't eat it if its that unhealthy or just slowly eat it overtime. Right now we have hotdogs.. Sorry folks.

I eat pretty much the same things Monday through Friday. That is when I am the most strict with my meals. So these posts wont have the same thing re-occurring unless I toss it up some. I do not believe in diets, they are fads. People never stick to them and it just results in yo-yo'ing with weight, majority of them are unhealthy and have negative side effects that you never hear about. It just leads to more problems than good. What does work is figuring out what works for you, what are you triggers? What can you not live without? For me its chocolate, candy, cake, sweets you name it I will eat it. Its the worse but the thing that I have figured out is this, cutting myself completely off doesn't work because then a holiday or birthday rolls around and BAM I am shoving that crap in my face like I have never seen it before. I have a candy drawer I will admit and all that crap food on my Pinterest yeah I have probably made it and ate it. It is ALL about BALANCE, learning what your body needs and responds to.

This is what I eat every morning for breakfast. These smoothies really fill me up and they are so delicious. I have added spinach before to smoothies but I would recommend Kale it has more protein in it than red meat and it is fat free. 

I should also add in here that I do not believe in fat free, low fat nothing. In my house we drink 2% dairy products. No reduced fat. Your body needs fat to work properly so cutting it off is not good same goes for eating nothing but high fat foods. A little goes a long way and too much of anything that is good for you is bad. 

Without fail this is what I have for lunch of a daily basis. Half a turkey sandwich with 1/4 slide of cheese, mustard and cabbage on it. Then some mix of fruits and veggies. 

Dinner is always a different story simply because making dinner for one person sucks and it is not the easiest thing to do. It is something that I plan on working on harder so I am eating better meals at dinner. I took some left over tri-tip and reheated it in a frying pan with some broccoli I added a little olive oil and garlic to this mixture. I then took some pasta and cooked it. This meal was pretty dang good. 

Acorn Slippers

I have never really been much of a slippers person at all. I honestly don't like things on my feet and would prefer to just wear socks. I also do not like carpet (dont worry I am going some place with this). When we had our house built we decided to only put carpet in the bedrooms and put tile and hardwood every where else. Needless to say my feet get cold now and the only time of slipper I have ever liked are the ones that look like socks. I had a pair from Old Navy a long time ago and one of our dogs destroyed them. So I started my hunt for some slippers that would keep my feet warm and not annoy the crap out of me. I found some Acorn slippers on Zappos read the reviews and decided what the heck the worse thing could be is that they are itchy. 

I honestly did not have my hopes set very high at all on these slippers to be quiet honest with you. I felt like I was going to be over paying for some itchy wool sock slipper and they were going to be mega ugly. Boy was I wrong. I LOVE these slippers they are amazing they keep my feet warm, not itchy and are actually pretty dang cute. They are so much more durable than I thought as well the leather soles is actually made out of real leather. I have worn these for the last 2 months pretty much straight, they are that amazing. I have put them in the washer and hung them to dry and still amazing. Not a change at all. The best thing is that over time they become shaped to your feet. 

The only downside is that I read the reviews on Zappos and everyone said that they ran small so order the next size up. So I did I normally wear an 8 so I ordered the size 7 1/2-8 1/2 they are a tad bit too big. I wish I would've ordered the 7-8 but after 5-10 years of wearing these bad boys I'll just order a new pair and get the correct size. So I would suggest not ordering a size or half size up from what you normally would wear. In my case it did me no good. 

DIY Stain For Wood

I found this tutorial on a blog off of Pinterest. I twisted what the author did in her tutorial to make it work for myself. I will link her blog at the end of this. I did not take step by step pictures to this but I can tell you exactly where I got every supply you will need.

What You Need To Make the Stain:

Steal Wool Grade #0

Black Tea Bags

Vinegar

Hot Water

Mason Jar or container of choice

Steps:

Boil about a cup of hot water and Place 5 tea bags into the water. The amount of liquid you end up with really depends on the project you are doing these letters I did did not use that much of the stain so make according to your project. The more tea bags you add the darker it will be. Set cup of water and tea bags aside until the mixture is at room temperature. Take your steal wool and place it in the mason jar, you are then going to want to take your vinegar and poor it over the top of the steal wool until it is completely submerged. Do this while your tea cools. Once your tea is completely cool add it into the vinegar and steal wool. Now let it sit.. for awhile.. You want everything to have time to mix together and make a good stain for the wood. I think I let mine sit for 5 days or so. 

What You Need to Paint:

Cheap or old paint brush

Cheap Paint

Rag or Paper towels

Sanding block 

Letters

Steps:

I went to HomeDepot and bought a small sample container of paint in Swiss Coffee. I also picked up the paint brush and sanding block from here as well. I laid the letters down on some cardboard in the garage. It was in the middle of winter so our garage was not warm. The paint was pretty thick which actually helped me do what I wanted. You do not want to coat the letters so you cannot see any of the wood anymore you basically want to barely put any paint on your brush and then move that in as much as you possibly can. I did not go in the same direction at all on the letters I just went crazy. I knew that if I went in the same direction that I would end up with a final project that looked too neat. I used the brush and paper towel for this to make sure it was completely rubbed in. Essentially I "white washed"the wood letters without mixing the water into the paint but that is the technique I used. In some areas the paint was too thick for my liking so I sanded some of it off. I was trying to go for an old distressed tarnished look. 

Once your paint is dry on the letters (I let mine sit for two days before adding the stain) you are going to want to get your concoction and brush it over the letters or whatever you are using this technique on. I did two coats of the stain and then I let it sit for awhile. I also took a rag and rubbed the stain into the wood to make sure it was getting into the wood. Now because these letters are just going to sit on my wall I did not add a sealant but if I was using this on a headboard or on something that was going to get a lot of movement or touch I would definitely look into some clear sealants. 

Here are the links that gave me the idea:

http://beingbrook.com/rustic-headboard-aged-wood/

http://beingbrook.com/farmhouse-desk/

Its been almost a year since I have actually wrote anything and a lot has changed from that time. Then I was in school, now I am not.. I graduated. Been looking for a job and no such luck yet but there is still hope. We built a custom home a dream home, which is where I spend my days now.

I think I will be doing some revamping to my blog changing the context. I want to focus more on health, healthy foods, workouts open it up to be a health discussion I suppose. Probably talk about some of the fads, why they wont or do work and share recipes on here things I have tried on Pinterest and liked and things I have had no success with. 

There will always be hints of fashion on here because its in my blood. As well as home decorating, lets face it I have an empty house that needs help. 

I guess we shall see where my blog goes.. in the coming months hopefully some place good. 

Three Bird Nest

So here I am!!!

I know I have been MIA for awhile due to school and a lot of changes that are going on right now that when I have a second or two I will up date everyone who cares. 

I have been browsing this Etsy shop for awhile just staring at the beautiful scarfs and headbands, not sure which one to buy. This last Sunday I noticed that this grey and white stripped scarf was back up and I pounced on it. I ordered it without even thinking. I got the package in the mail today and opened it looked inside and didn't even take it out. I immediately thought "you have to blog about this shop asap!!" 

Like I said I ordered this on a Sunday and sometime during the day I received a shipping notification saying that my package was ready to ship. I was not expecting this seeing as it was a Sunday, so that was a huge plus. I didn't have any problems with my order and no need to contact the seller. But when I opened my package I was in awe, I am just going to let the pictures speak for themselves.

I love.. love the packaging I am a huge sucker for packaging. Send me something in cute packaging and I will write a review on my blog ;)

I thought the dumb dumb was a nice touch and it was delicious too.. If you look right about the sticker that is holding the sucker on she hand wrote thanks!. I thought that was a really nice touch, after all it is a small business but to take that time out of her busy day is really nice to her buyers. 

Now onto the scarf.. It is seriously the nicest, softest scarf of life. It would be perfect for either summer or winter its really light weight and BEAUTIFUL!!! 

If you guys are in the market for a scarf I highly recommend going over to Three Bird Nest and placing an order with this awesome Etsy Shop!!

www.threebirdnest.com

I apologize for the iPhone photos my camera was dead :(

Well Hello There...

So when I started this blog I figured I'd have enough time to write all the time and boy was I wrong. Especially this semester and everything else going on in our little lives has not provided me with a bunch of free time to sit and write. If I have free time now I want to sit and do nothing, although when I do sit and do nothing I get bored.. Oh the irony.. 

So my life as of right now is consisting of going to class five days a week, volunteering at an elementary school strategies room and on the weekends looking at houses to buy. Oh and doing a butt load of homework.. 

I'll just get down to the nitty gritty of this post, I have five classes left till I graduate and that graduation day (December 8th, 2012 exactly 262 days away) can not come soon enough. It's stressful getting close to graduation, one of our good friends graduated last spring and she was always saying how stressful it was getting close to graduation. I kind of thought she was crazy but now I understand, you have the last four years or five years in my case coming down to one day. Its exciting but its way stressful, you start worrying about how you're going to get a job and support yourself because being a poor college student isn't going to cut it anymore. 

Volunteering is actually a requirement for my disability class I am taking this term and it was fun and I enjoyed it until I got bit my a child, then it got annoying. This strategies room I am in has four autistic kids, a kid with huge behavioral issues that does not belong in there and one with a rare genetic disorder and one with fetal alcohol syndrome. I wont go into to much detail about any of the kids because there is confidentiality I have to worry about here. But it has taught me a lot already in the month I have been going, I really enjoy my thursdays/fridays being in the room but some days are harder than others. 

Ahh a house :) Tony and I hate this apartment we are in, the longer we live here the more we hate it. The management here gets ruder with each year and I will seriously be writing a review when we get out on apartments.com or something. We started the house buying process in January and started looking at houses in February, we put an offer on a house about a week and a half ago and now we are just waiting. Originally this house was one I would not have lived in at all due to a wonderful smell. It was built in 2006 and wasn't taken care of, originally Tony and I dubbed this house the rat house. Its super nice granite counter tops, tile floor and owners who didn't give two cents about it. It'll definitely be a project for Tony and I once we get ride of the nasty wall colors. 

So that's what I have been up to.. Hope all of you are doing swell :-)

Amanda Curtis

One of our really close friends was recently diagnosed with brain cancer after being in remission from HER2 positive breast cancer it is a very rare and agressive form of cancer. Seeing as Amanda will now be receiving 20 straight days of radiation and and then doing oral chemo she wont be able to work. This has now placed the financial burden on her husband who doesn't need to be focusing on money but rather seeing that his wife gets healthy. 

What I am asking from you, my blog followers is to donate what you can to a fund that will go directly to support her extra medical costs. I know not everyone has wads of money sitting around so anything would help even $5. 

Cancer is a nasty SOB and has affected many of us personally in various ways. Helping to fund medical costs of those who are affected helps them to not worry about financial woes and allows them to get more rest, focus on healing and allowing the medication they are taking to do its job. 

Please go to the site below and learn more about Justin and Mandy and their family. 

http://www.gofundme.com/e52to





Just as a side note: The third person who won my give away never contacted me after two emails and me waiting two weeks I gave up. Instead of drawing another winner and trying to get into contact with them I gave the prize to Amanda's daughter, Brooklyn. 

Lil Blue Boo Fundraiser!!

Cancer is a nasty thing it takes life as you know it and turns it up side down and keeps you on your toes. I have been affected by cancer in my life not personally but through friends and family. Many of us have seen someone close to us or an acquaintance battle it. It doesn't take very long before you figure out it isn't a friend (the cancer) you want around for very long.

If you follow my blog then you have seen my posts on Evy's Tree it is an awesome small internet business that makes handmade clothing for men, women and children. I also have her business on my Facebook so I have been slowly following the progress about Ashley from Little Blue Boo who has been diagnosed with Choriocarsinoma which a form of cancer that is a result from a molar pregnancy. What really got me to start following Ashley's progress through her fight with cancer was her video of her having her head shaved. One of my good friends was diagnosed with breast cancer two years ago and has been cancer free for a year, she also made the decision to shave her head once she began to loose her hair due to intense chemo treatments. The difference between Ashley and my friend is that Ashley video'd her shaving her head and if you can watch this video without crying it'd be a miracle. Its a very moving and personal video, I'll provide you the link and you'll soon see that Ashley is tall, thin, a young mom and business owner. 

http://www.lilblueboo.com/2012/01/a-rite-of-passage-a-video.html

Evy's Tree as well as many other small internet business owners has started a fund for Ashley and her family to have resources to pay off the costly medical bills she will soon acquire and hopefully we can all donate enough money to give her a month or two off to focus on her healing and not have to worry so much about keeping her business running. The blog that Amy wrote over at Evy's tree is way better than what I have told you. I just wanted to get the word out about what all these wonderful lady's are doing for Ashley. They have rightly named themselves Team Ashely! So head on over to her blog and read it!! 

http://evystree.com/blog/?p=1656

If you can participate in the auction go for it but if not there is a button on the right side of her page that you can donate to a paypal account that has been set up to go directly to Ashley. Any amount will help if 20 people donated $5.00 that'd be $100.00 that could cover their trash, water or a portion of their electric bill for a month. It may help to pay a portion of some of her medical bills. Literally any amount would help!!

And if you cannot participate spread my blog on, on your Facebook or email it to someone that you think might be willing to help. Simply getting the word out about this will help a lot!!

Winners!!

I have emailed all of you as of friday at 12:20 asking for your address. 

Hopefully if you havent checked your email this blog post will catch your attention as it is listing all the emails that have won.

1st place: hermie0001@hotmail.com

2nd place: Mar77777@msn.com

3rd place: vienred_88@hotmail.com

If I do not get responses from you guys by next Friday (1/27/12) I will have to draw new winners!!!

Please check your junk mail box!!!

GIVEAWAY TIME!!!! - CLOSED

I have been blogging since about May and have some regular followers whether they are actually subscribed to my blog or they check it regularly I thought a Thank you was in order. 

LaynieBug Designs Melissa Blair is sponsoring my giveaway, I love working with her and have loved watching her little business progress to what it is now. If you don't know anything about this business you need to head on over to Facebook and search for her!! She makes amazing hair accessories and is a joy to work with :).

The nitty gritty of the give away...

There will be three winners who will be chosen from random.org.

You MUST be friends with Layniebug Designs on Facebook 

(just click on the name and it'll take you right to her Facebook page).

You MUST leave a comment on this blog post with your email so I can contact you. If you do not feel comfortable leaving your email then please just leave your name, Melissa will be the one contacting you for me via Facebook. 

And for a bonus if you are a follower of my blog you get a double vote (if you are not a follower, become one!!). 

You can enter one time only. 

The giveaway will start today (1/16/12) and end (1/20/12) at noon.
Open to International participates. 

The first place winner will win:

 Black flower with two thin headbands and 8 hair ties in the colors above.

The second place winner will get:

 The turquoise flower that comes with two thin head bands and four hair ties. 

The third place winner will get:

The silver flower with two thin headbands with four hair ties. 

So to recap the ways you can win is to leave your email in a comment on this blog, be a friend of Layniebug Designs on Facebook and to be a follower of my blog these are all different avenues to enter. 

What I've been up to..

I had intentions of blogging a bunch this break and to read like three or four books just for fun.. But that has not happened at all. What I have really been wanting to do now is let my brain rot, watch TV and not move at all. I guess you could say I have a touch of the lazy's.. 

I went home for two and a half weeks, while that was fun visiting with the people I was able to see. It was also nice to come back home and get caught up on some stuff before school starts... Like the laundry and on my to do list.. cleaning this place up. It would have been nice if I came back home to a house and not an apartment that consists of me having to walk outside to take my dogs out (see touch of the lazy's).. 

But I like our little home. 

So you may ask.. well if you are so lazy, what the heck are you going to do the next two weeks??? 

Your answer: NOTHING!! But clean :) and get this apartment back into shape before the term starts.. I also have been planning our wedding.. 

Naive me thought I'd be able to put some of this off until the summer but I am slowly realizing that a couple of these things are going to have to be done sooner than I thought. This week Tony and I are going to go look at a couple different venues and possibly stop off at the store we are going to use for our invites just to ask some questions. 

My suggestion to all you peeps out there following my blog.. Keep an eye out for a give away I am going to be doing at the beginning of next week with LaynieBug Designs, you can check her out on Facebook!! 

Most Amazing Cookies EVER!!!

For Christmas one of the gifts I got was a Kitchen Aid stand mixer, which I have been wanting for a very very long time. You can only make so many things by hand before you just don't bake anymore. I decided I would try my mixer out on some cookies. I saw this recipe on Pinterest and decided to try it out... essentially I made it my own :)

What You'll need:

1 pound unsalted butter

1 3/4 cups granulated sugar

2 1/4 cups packed light-brown sugar

4 large eggs

6 Cups All Purpose Flour

1 tablespoon salt

2 teaspoons baking powder

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

2 pounds bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped

Directions

- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper or nonstick baking mats; set aside.

- In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and sugars.

- Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

- Reduce speed to low and add both flours, baking powder, baking soda, vanilla, and chocolate; mix until well combined.

- Using a 4-ounce scoop for larger cookies or a 1-ounce scoop for smaller cookies, scoop cookie dough onto prepared baking sheets, about 2 inches apart.

- Bake until lightly browned, but still soft, about 20 minutes for larger cookies and about 15 minutes for smaller cookies.

- Cool slightly on baking sheets before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

I used Ghiradelli chocolate bars I believe they were 60% Cocoa but I am not sure. I also modified this recipe because I did not want to spend 10 dollars on special flour so I just used AP instead of half bread and half pastry flour. This yield's A LOT Of cookies so beware, had I known that I would have half'd the recipe. 

YUMM!!!

I hope if you make these cookies they taste super good.

Maybe tomorrow I will have time to sit down and tell you a little bit about what I have been up to now that I am on winter break with only two weeks left :(

Best Potato Soup Ever!!

I found this recipe on Pinterest and just had to make it but of course I tweaked it so it isn't exactly the same as the one I found. 

Ingredients:

3-4 russet potatoes 

2/3 cup of sick butter

2/3 cup of flour

4 cups of milk

1 cup of heavy cream

1/4 cup of chicken or vegetable stock

5 slices of uncooked bacon

1/2 cup of sour cream

5 cloves of garlic 

2 bunches of green onions, sliced thinly

Colby Jack Cheese 1-2 cups

Pepper to taste

Wash and cut your potatoes into cubes place them into a pan and boil them for 15 minutes, cook bacon until no longer raw or however you like yours. You can either crumble your bacon up after its cooked or you can slice it up before you cook it. 

Melt you bacon in your soup pan once melted whisk the flour into the butter, once it is smooth with no lumps of flour are visible. Add your milk slowly and one cup at a time once all 4 cups are in the milk add the heavy cream. Put a splash of stock in the mixture. Add pepper.

Take your cooked potatoes and smash them up a little with your whisk, then add them to the cream mixture. Add onions and garlic bring mixture to a boil for 8 minutes and then turn heat down while stirring continuously.  Once the mixture is simmering add cheese, sour cream and bacon (I put the grease in with this too, I know not the healthiest :) 

Enjoy!! I didnt add as much cheese to the mixture while I was cooking it because I knew Tony and I would add more when we ate it. This isn't the healthiest but it is literally the best potato soup I have ever had!!

Some tips:

Because this is a cream based soup KEEP YOUR EYE ON IT!!! You cannot walk away from this at all because if you do it will burn. I let it simmer for about an hour after I finished everything keeping a very close eye on it. Don't cook the potatoes all the way either because if you do when you add them to your soup they'll turn into mush. 

Some Big NEWS!!!!

If you aren't on my Facebook then this is totally new information for you and if you are than only part of this will be new :)..

I AM ENGAGED!!!!!! 

Like any girl I imagined it my entire life but never knew exactly how it would go down or who it would be and all I can say is I am so happy to get to tell everyone a funny story and look forward to spending the rest of my life with Tony. 

Tony and I opened our Christmas presents last night because next weekend we will have Tony's niece and the following Thursday I will be heading home to spend time with my family and Tony will be spending time with his, it'll be our last Christmas apart :)

I had opened all my presents and he had opened all of his.. He told me I had one left but I had to go get it from the car because it was to big to wrap, so reluctantly I walked down to his truck and was expecting this rather large box to lug back up to our apartment but I found a little tiny pink box on his console. I picked it up really confused as to why I had to get this wrapped box from his truck and started to walk back in side. Like anyone with a brain I decided to shake it box and noticed it made no sound, I knew it contained jewelry inside because it was that type of box. I then noticed it was really light, lighter then it should have been. So I decided ehh whatever I'll open the dang thing. IT WAS EMPTY!!! I am not going to lie I was a little irritated and doing all of this while walking back inside our apartment, he parked far away on purpose. When I came in the house I said something along these lines but I am cleaning it up for my viewers "You got me an empty box? Why did you get me an empty box for Christmas? I didn't get you an empty box" there was some f words in there I am sure you guys can place them appropriately. Once he told me he didn't know why he got me an empty box he told me to come closer and got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. I pretty much lost it and was bawling, it is for sure a moment I will remember for the rest of my life and I am looking forward to marrying him!!!

So to answer you questions it wont be until 2013 because I need to finish up school and get a job to pay for my wedding :)

I hope you guys all had a wonderful weekend!! 

The cuts on my hand is from who knows, I literally have no idea I was sitting in history class on Thursday and went to grab my coffee when I noticed that my fingers hurt and I looked at my hand and I had those three cuts there.. Super weird. Anyways Three more finals left and then if I was you I would be looking out for a give away on my blog :-)

Raspberry Lemon Thumbprint Cookies

These cookies are probably one of my favorite types of cookies to eat, they remind me of shortbread cookies. I love love love shortbread cookies!! I also like anything lemon so these cookies pretty much take the cake.

Ingredients:
makes 4 dozen

• 1/2 cup raspberry jam or jelly
• 1 tablespoon Chambord or kirsch
• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 sticks (1 cup) butter, at room temperature
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 2 large egg yolks
• 1 tablespoon finely grated lemon zest
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 and lightly butter two cookie sheets. In other bowl combine jelly and Chambord and set a side. 

In another bowl combine flour, baking powder and and salt, wisk to combine.

Using your electric mixer combine butter and sugar until creamed. Add the eggs, lemon juice and zest and vanilla extract into the bowl and mix to combine. Add the flour mixture in two additions and beat until moist clumps form. 

Pinch off the dough to form 1-inch balls, place on your greased cookie sheets. Use your floured index finger or 1/2 teaspoon measuring spoon to create depressions in the center of each ball. Fill each indentation with nearly 1/2 teaspoon of the jam mixture. Bake until golden brown, about 20 minutes, these cookies can actually take any where from 12-20 minutes to cook my suggestion is to keep an eye on them when the edges turn a nice brown color they are done, pull them out and let them cook you do not want the edges to be a dark brown because then they will be too done and they will fall apart. Let them cool on the cookie sheet.

Chirstmas Cookies

Hi all!!! I decided to randomly post recipes for chirstmas cookies. Some of these recipes will be easy and some will be hard.


Cool-whip Cookies:
One box of your choice of cake mix any kind will work.
One container of cool-whip the small one.
Powder sugar to roll cookies in.
1 egg

Combine ingredients above and then roll into balls then roll in the powder sugar and place on a cookie sheet bake for 10-12 minutes. These cookies should be light and fluffy.


Enjoy!!

Christmas Tree!!

This year Tony and I decided we would put up our first Christmas tree and it has turned into a very pretty arch enemy. It was all fine until one of our dogs started to take the ornaments off the tree, thankfully we didn't buy expensive ornaments. So we decided to "solve" this by moving all the ornaments up to the third branch so she couldn't reach them. We were outsmarted my a dog, she decided to get on the couch then onto the side table and pull a little pretty bird off and destroy it. I had felt and Styrofoam all over my apartment literally from one end to the other. It was not fun to pick up.. 

Then the caterpillars...

When we got the real tree we shook it off pretty good or so we thought, there must be some caterpillar eggs on the tree because the dogs have every so nicely put two of them on me which results in me screaming and throwing it off of me. Its a little tiny caterpillar and it feels oh so gross!!!.. 

Don't get me wrong I love having our tree up but I am pretty sure our dogs think it gets our attention more then they are (which it is not) and the little bugs on it gross me out!! I am going to buy a fake tree next year after Christmas so it'll be on sale.. 

Did I forget to mention that I am also allergic to it, if I stop taking my Allegra I cannot breathe and have to use my inhaler. 

I was totally going for Charlie brown too and the red skirt I know does not match but I couldn't find a cute tree skirt so I just grabbed the cheapest one I could find. 

Merry Christmas!!

My semester is almost over and I am so looking forward to doing some blogging and reading over break :)

Tony's niece is with us, she insisted on being in our photo :)

Happy Thanks Giving!!!!

This Thanks Giving Tony and I decided that we would stay home for Thanks Giving and we had a really nice relaxing day. It started out with us getting up at 5 am to go get the paper to see what the Black Friday deals were going to be. Then we went back to bed, got up and didn't start cooking until 12, we ate at 4pm. I was super nervous about making my first Thanks Giving meal by myself but it turned out quiet nice and the only thing that showed me who was boss was the green beans. I turned my back on them and they were burnt :( but they still tasted okay enough to eat. 

We started our Black Friday shopping at 10 pm, we went to the Gap Outlet, Carters, Osh Kosh, Forever 21, Bath and Body Works, Best Buy and Cabela's. The only place we had lines at was Best Buy and Cabela's and I only got yelled at by one old guy at Cabela's because he thought I was line cutting, which I wasn't I swear. We got home at 5:30 am and went straight to bed..

Tomorrow we are getting our Christmas tree :) I have never actually went up to the mountains to get a tree so it should be fun. If I have time I will post some photos of our adventure!!

Happy Late Thanks Giving!!!

New things at Laynie Bug Designs!!!

Melissa at LaynieBugDesigns on Facebook has become more than just an awesome lady to get cute hair accessories from, she's my internet pen pal :). Through doing reviews and other various things for her on my blog I have developed the kind of relationship that one can ask favors of, in the hair accessory department.. 

So to start my little review off here is a story. 

I found a DIY tutorial for a braided headband that was made out of an old t-shirt on Pinterest. I pinned it with the thought of "I'll make that some day when I am not in school..." Then Tony and I went to the Homecoming game for my University and I needed to wear something white, seeing as our shirts are grey it didn't really go with the stupid requirement of wearing white. So I dug into my pinterest and found the braided headband and decided I was going to knock one out the night before. It was successful but I had to tie mine in the back, the next day it dawned onto me that Melissa would be able to do wonders with this tutorial and I was right (she doesn't use old t-shirts though to make them)!!!

Here is the braided head band.

$6 a piece or 2 for $10

What I love most about these is it doesn't feel like you have anything in your hair at all, they do not fall out. Usually headbands will slip right off my head which is amazing because I have a crap ton of curly hair. They add something fun yet subtle to your hair and you can wear them with a flower or with nothing at all, with your hair up or down!!

The other new thing that Melissa has came out with is the in the last couple of months and I got the joy of trying out is the elastic headbands and hair ties. These things are pretty amazing, I like that the hair ties do not cut off your hair something that is really common for hair ties to do if you constantly have your hair up is that they will eventually break your hair off. These are strong enough to hold your hair in place yet too weak to cause breakage. 

Headband price... good question comment below Melissa and tell us!!!

Hair ties are $1 each.. 

I LOVE the headbands because they are smooth and flat, perfect for attaching a flower to if you want and they also do not slip off your head. They're also hardly noticeable like the braided headbands, I really like these and will probably be buying more in the future. They are perfect for just getting your hair out of your face..

Through my obsession with pinterest I also found an awesome way to get lift at your crown without having to tease your hair I am not a big fan of teasing I like when other people do it to me like my fabulous hair stylist and when other people do it to themselves but me doing it to myself is a no. It probably has something to do with the fact that I am lazy and that I am to afraid to do it to my curly hair because I never straighten it :)

So I thought I would share this one with you!!

I always pull my bangs back into a little poof so you totally do not have to do this step. But your going to start by gathering the hair right at your crown like you are going to tease it except you are going to push it up and clip it with a small clip, I leave the front sections around my face down, when you've done this it should look something like the photo.. 

You are then going to gather your hair into a ponytail or messy bun and get it as close as possible to the little clip you placed into your hair. Once the pony tail or messy bun is secured then remove the clip and you have volume at your crown like you teased it!!

End product....

Excuse my tired look in all of these photos I got up early this morning to write a paper on Van Gogh and then I am going to school which I hate doing on a Saturday to get a depressing fitness test for one of my classes :(.. 

Happy Halloween weekend!!!

New Yummy Recipes

I found these two recipes on Pinterest and twisted them a little to make them my own. They where so good I decided to take some time out of my Friday to share them with you guys :)

This one is a super simple desert that I made even easier by buying store bought cookie dough. 

Cookie Dough Cheesecake Bars

Step one: 

Spray 8 or 9in square pyrax or metal oven safe container with cooking spray

Combine 1 1/2 cups of gram cracker crumbs with 5 tbsp of unsalted butter

Bake in oven for 6 minutes on 325.

Step two:

take 10oz of room temp cream cheese and combine that with 1/4 cup of sugar mix with blender until smooth then add one egg and 1 tsp of vanilla extract. Set aside, when cracker crumb mixture is out of oven and cool poor cream cheese mixture over the top. 

Step three: 

Take a small tube of store bought cookie dough and take hunks of the dough flatten them into disks/mold them into the shape of the pan and then put them over the cream cheese lightly. I let my cookie dough sit out for a bit while I was doing the two steps up above. Cover majority of the cream cheese with the cookie dough mixture. 

Bake all of this for 30 minutes or until the top feels firm and when you shake the pan it doesn't giggle anymore.

This last step is a must once the bars are done baking and have cooled down where you can no longer feel hot heat on the bottom of the pan REFRIGERATE before consuming or you will have nasty bars and you will ask why you baked this. At least that't what I did, these bars taste 10 times better if allowed to chill in the fridge for awhile. 

If you want the original recipe because I did not follow the exact instructions go here!!

Slow cooker Chicken Papikash Recipe

This is such an easy dinner to make, I made it just this last Wednesday before heading to class and when I got home all I had to do was make the noodles!!

Step one:

Combine 15oz of tomato sauce and tomato sauce can full of water with one can of green beans and one can of corn I rinsed and drained the corn and green beans. Add one small onion. Take Mexican chili powder, cumin, 1 dash of red pepper flakes, black pepper and paprika add those spices to your liking. (I went of the normal recipe here because it only called for salt, black pepper and paprika which did not sound very tasty to me.

Mix that together.

 Add frozen skinless chicken breasts or thighs (can use fresh, I just didn't have any so I put two frozen breasts in) to mixture, cook for 4 1/2 to 6 hours in your crock pot. 

Step two:

Check on your mixture at about 5 1/2 hours, that is when I noticed my chicken was cooked, ladle out 3 to 4 ladle fulls of the juice and SLOWLY combine it with 3/4 cup of sour cream. You do not have to do this step it just mild's down all the spices so it is not as hot, the reason why you cannot add the sour cream directly into the crock pot is because the sour cream needs to be tempered so it does not curdle and become nasty.  

Turn your crock pot onto warm if it has that setting or turn it off and keep the lid on it.

Step three:

Bring water to a boil on stove and add egg noodles cook until done, about 10-12 minutes of boiling.

Once noodles are done and drained, place noodles in bowl and top it off with the crock pot mixture. 

Enjoy!! 

This made enough for two people and for Tony's lunch the next day, it was pretty good.

If you want the original recipe, because once again I did not follow it go here!!

Hope you all have a safe and fun Halloween!! 

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