Baseball and Ballet

Graig's 40th Birthday!!

2012-01-25T15:25:00.003-05:00

Last Friday was Graig's 40th Birthday! I wanted to surprise him by throwing him a suprise party at work!

Because I wanted it to be a surprise I didn't tell Brock or Ava until they arrived at the party. We carpool picking up Ava with our friends Dan and Jenn. Thankfully it was Dan's turn to pick up the girls so he brought Ava with him to the party. Ava was so confused when she first arrived. This is me trying to explain to her what was happening. Brock had basketball practice and didn't get to the party until late.

Graig's Mom Janice came to the party and brought pictures from when he was little. They were a big hit!

I was SO happy that Graig was surprised! He had no clue we were having a party for him! Here is Graig hugging his Mom and Ava when he first came in.

I had the party on campus so I ordered campus catering for the cake and other snacks. It made things SO easy! Everyone in our family loves the cakes from campus! I get them for our birthdays and other speical occasions.

I love this picture of Graig and his Mom and of course the big 4-0 sign in the background!!

Here's a group picture of everyone from the party. I invited mostly his co-workers. I love how some of them are holding up his baby pictures-ha ha!

I think his 40th bday is one that Graig will remember for a long time! Happy Wednesday!

Our week!

2012-01-23T19:58:00.001-05:00

I have been SO busy I haven't had a second to post! Last week was crazy busy for us! Friday we celebrated Graig's 40th birthday! I had a surprise party for him so I spent a lot of time working on the party. My talented friend Rebecca took pictures for me. She just gave them to them to me today. This is one of him just coming in to the party. He was SO surprised!

Here is one of our little family (minus Brock because he had basketball practice)

Our birthday's are exactly one week apart. My friends took me out to celebrate on Wednesday night. Here is an instagram picture of us. I am so thankful for these ladies! We had a great time.

We went to my favorite restaurant and we ordered my favorite spinach artichoke dip as an appetizer. I had to take a picture of it because it's so good!!

Brock has mid terms this week and he's been busy studying. Yesterday we were watching football and he turned my desk in the living room around so he could watch TV and study at the same time. Our friends Dan and Jenn came over to watch football with us. Their son Marshall (in this picture) is 5. He loves Brock! .

Ava and Marty decided to put Marshall up in a cheerleading stunt.

I also started my project life scrapbook last week! I got the Clementine set for Christmas and it's been one of my favorite presents. Project Life makes it so easy to scrapbook. I have a ton of pictures to organize. So far I've done 4 pages and I have about 400 left to go-ha ha!

I am a total loser it's 8:30 and I'm headed to bed because I have a cold :( I can't be sick tomorrow because I have an all day retreat with my Greek students and then classes start on Wednesday. I'll post pictures from Graig's surprise party later in the week. Happy Monday!

Valentine Craft!

2012-01-17T20:21:00.001-05:00

Saturday night Allison, Sabrina and I got together for a craft night. We made heart wreaths like we saw on pinterest. They were free because we only used red burlap and wire. Sabrina had already had both things we needed. I love free crafts! I put mine in an empty frame that was in our dining room. I think they are adorable!

Our weekend!

2012-01-15T19:36:00.001-05:00

My weekend started on Friday because I stayed home because it was my birthday! I turned 36! I had a fun filled day. I started at an early morning exercise class and then I went to b-fast with 2 friends Sabrina and Sara. We didn't take pictures
My friend Heidi picked me up and we went shopping and met Rebecca for lunch.

Friday night Graig and I went out for my birthday dinner. Ava and her friend Marty came with us. Here we are at dinner. Don't Marty and Ava looked excited?

After dinner we went to TJ Maxx and I got a couple of things. My favorite thing I got was this framed print.

When we got home I got a package from etsy that ordered. I got a burlap banner for valentines day. This is how it came wrapped up.

Sunday night our friends Dan and Jenn (Marty's mom and Dad) came over to watch football. Here is a picture of baby Henry he shares a birthday with Graig! Graig will turn 40 on Friday and Henry will be 2.

Ava and Marty were practicing the Nutcracker ballet here they are posing. I love these girls!

Our week

2012-01-12T14:33:00.000-05:00

This week has flown by in our house! I am a taxi driver always carting Brock and Ava around to practice, dance, friend's houses, etc. I feel like I'm never home! I love every minute of it but I feel like I'm always in my car!

This is what we've been up to this week.

Friday night I hosted Bunco! Everyone brought a bunco prize so at the end of the night everyone went home with a prize! Here we are all with a Bunco cake made by Allison.

Saturday morning I went jogging with my friend Heidi and fell down! I skinned up my knees and hands. I looked at Heidi over my shoulder and tripped on a lip in the sidewalk. Heidi is an athletic trainer and she thought maybe I broke one of the bones in my hands since it hurt so bad. I went in for xrays and thankfully nothing was broken!

One of my friends posted this on facebook this week and I love it!! I am a VERY slow so I can relate to this. Tomorrow is my 36th birthday! I used part of my birthday money from my Dad (thanks Dad!) to sign up for a 15k in July. It's called the Boilermaker and there are 14,000 runners! I am trying to talk all my friends into running it with me because I think it would be so fun if we all ran together!

Saturday night Allison and I had a craft night. My idea was to make a valentine swag for our fireplace.I saw this idea on a blog and thought it was so cute. Anyway, this was my progress. Thankfully I got on etsy on ordered a valentine swag. Sometimes it's easier to buy something that someone else made instead of trying to make it yourself.

Allison saved our craft night and had supplies to make these Valentine's Day frames which turned out really cute!

This is very random but I found an online typing test and tried it. It's so addicting!

Visit the Typing Test and try!

Friday, Friday!

2012-01-06T16:11:00.000-05:00

TGIF, I am so glad it's Friday! It was a short work week but Ava and Brock both had a little stomach bug and just getting back into the swing of things has made this a loooong week!

I am happy to say that I am doing pretty good with my resolutions expect for the not drinking diet coke. I can't help it I LOVE diet coke and I don't think I'm going to give it up. I love it too much!

I started using my fitness pal to track what I eat and my exercise which I absolutely love. It makes writing down what I eat so much easier. And it's a free app on the iPhone! I have been using it for 2 days this is my day so far today. I already tracked some stuff that I plan on eating later at my Bunco party!

I found this picture on another blog and it's SO true! I do want to eat healthier this year but I also have to be careful. I have a certain 9 year old that watches everything I do and say so I don't want to be obsessed with this. I just want to be healthy.

I need to start getting ready for Bunco night which starts in a few hours. I am looking forward to a fun night with friends!

Happy Friday!

New Year's Resolutions

2012-01-04T16:53:00.000-05:00

Like almost everyone I made some New Year's Resolutions on January 1. I love the start of a new year. I always feel like I have a fresh start to make changes and try some new things with my life.

Last year I actually stuck with my resolution of working out all year. Now going to the gym and working out is a part of my daily routine. I love it and I can't imagine my life without working out. In 2011 I didn't put my resolutions on my blog but I did in 2010 and you can read about them here.

I thought I would share my 2012 resolutions on here so you can see what they are and so I can hold myself accountable. I'll give updates on my progress throughout the year so you will know how I'm doing.

1. Be a loving wife and mom. This is my #1 goal this year. Brock and Ava are growing up WAY too fast and I feel like they need me now more than ever. Brock has started high school so he's been adjusting to that huge transition and Ava is 9 and is more independent than ever before. I want to support them and nurture them and guide them through these
important years. I also need to support Graig and be a good wife to him. I am SO crabby and short with him sometimes. I need to work on that this year.

2. Eat healthy/write down what I eat This is always a resolution for me. I did weight watchers last fall lost about 10 lbs and when I was on WW I wrote down every single thing I ate. I started doing that again on Jan. 1. It helps me eat better when I know that I have to write it down. I am going to focus on eating more fruits and vegetables and eating less processed food. I love diet coke but I'm not going to have it at my house so it will be a treat when I go out to eat or go to the movies.

3. Be focused and organized at work I love my job and have lots of events and projects going on at once so things at work go much smoother if I have a plan.

4. Gracious Hostess I love have get togethers and little parties at home. I want to do more entertaining at our house this year.

5. Faithful friend I love my friends and I want to make sure that I make time for them this year. I want to support them and be there for them when they need me.

6. Don't gossip or be negative I really thought this would get easier as I got older but I still do this more than I like and I always feel awful after talking about people.

7. Blog 4 x per week I love blogging but sometimes I get so busy it's not a priority. I want to make sure I blog regularly this year.

8. Don't waste $$ I spend a lot of money on clothes, things for our house, eating out etc. I am going to be more mindful this year about how I spend our money. Graig and I are going to sit down once a week to talk about our finances so we stay on track. We have financial goals and things we are saving for and we need to be on the same page.

9. Try Yoga I am going to go to yoga once a week this year as another way to be healthy and stay in shape. I've gone twice and it's really hard but I like it so far and I want to learn more about it.

If you've read this far-thank you! I know it's a long post. It's a big list but these are the things I want to work on this year. I wrote these down in my planner about a week ago and I look at them everyday to keep myself focused on my goals for the new year.

New Years weekend!

2012-01-01T20:52:00.001-05:00

I'll give you a quick recap of our New Year's weekend.

Friday Sabrina and Eliza came over and we exchanged Chistmas gifts and ate lunch together. After lunch we decided to go to the mall. I'm sorry I don't have any pictures of this festive occasion but Sabrina and I were both looking rough so we decided not to take any pictures but it was a fun day!

Friday night Allison and I went to Sabrina's for a craft night. We actually finished a craft! Usually we just talk and eat and the crafts don't get finished-ha ha

Sabrina and I made Valentine's Day blocks and Allison made Syracuse blocks. I think they turned out really cute and they were so easy to make!

While we were there Allison gave Eliza and Ava mani/pedi's. Here is a look at Ava's mani/pedi she has OPI Lincoln Park After Dark on with silver sparkles on top.

Saturday morning Allison and I met for breakfast and to get pedi's. Here's a pic of us waiting at the salon. The wait was SO long that I had to leave but Allison got a pedi. I am going back early tomorrow morning so I hope it's not crowded!

Saturday afternoon Ava and I ran a 5k. It was Ava's first race! She kept telling me all morning that she was going to sprint the whole way and win the race-ha ha! It was a fun, laid back race and I didn't have any anxiety or stress about it! I think because I signed up to do it last minute and I didn't put any pressure on myself to run the whole thing or get a certain time. I ran it in 36 minutes and Ava finished in 35.

Here we are before the race.

These are my friends that ran the race. My neighbor and friend Heidi in white ran her first ever 5k! Melany, Sara, Jenni, and Faith are hard core runners. I call them my fast friends. They are amazing runners. I hugged them at the starting line and met up with them for ice tea and coffee after the race.

Here is Heidi, me, Ava, Anika (Ava's BFF) and Mickaela before the race. I love this picture of us!

I didn't take one picture on NYE. I met Allison for a NYE drink, we watched a parade, Ava danced at First Night, we ate pizza and wings, and we met some of our friends at the Hampton Inn for swimming and fun. We were exhausted after our busy day so we came home at 11pm and rang the new year in at home.

I hope you had a great New Year's! I am looking forward to 2012

Top 10 decorating projects for 2011!

2011-12-28T12:59:00.001-05:00

Today Rhoda from Southern Hospitality is hosting a top 10 projects party featuring decorating projects from 2011. I don't think I did 10 put I do like participating every year so it will be fun to look back and see what I've done this year.

Let's get started.

I love, love, love to decorate my hutch in our dining room for every season. This is from the summer when I had all my milk glass on it.

I bought this desk table for $10 at a garage sale this summer. I spray painted it turquoise and use it as my desk. It's in our living room.

This was a quick (and messy!) project. I put reindeer moss on a wooden monogram. I really like the way this turned out!

This is another quick project ( I love those) a black and white ribbon wreath!

I got this little cart for $1 at a yard sale. I spray painted it and added our monogram. I keep it in our kitchen. The bottom shelf holds our white platters and bowls, the middle shelf holds snacks for Brock and Ava and the top shelf I use for display.

I also did a mini bedroom makeover this year. This is our kids art area where I display pictures and Brock and Ava's artwork. The large shutter Graig found for me.

I found this little table at a yard sale for $1. I spray painted it and now Graig uses it as his nightstand.

For a few years I have wanted a bar area for our house. I found this bar cart for $8! I spray painted it black and got new glass for the bottom shelf. This little bar cart lives in our sunroom.

Here are my decorating projects from 2009. Happy Wednesday!

New Years Hutch!

2011-12-28T12:01:00.001-05:00

I decided to decorate our hutch for the new year! I got a lot of new fiesta ware from my Dad and his girlfriend Vicki when I visited them for Thanksgiving. She loves to visit thrift and antique stores and she found me a couple of lots of fiesta! I was thrilled when my Dad called and told me the good news.
I also collect milk glass and my mother in law Janice got me the beautiful piece in the middle of the top shelf for Christmas.
My favorite fiesta piece is the red pitcher on the top of my hutch
( fiesta calls it red it's really an orange color)
Here are some pictures of our New Years hutch! Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas 2011

2011-12-25T10:46:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas from our family to yours! We hope that you have a wonderful day filled with peace, love and joy!

Christmas Eve

2011-12-24T21:41:00.000-05:00

This morning Brock and I volunteered at our town's annual Christmas dinner for the elderly and needy. We helped get the 135 take out meals ready. It was a great experience and we want to help out again next year.
This afternoon we went to church and Ava danced with the liturgical dancers. Our service started at 4pm and our church was packed! It was so nice to see it so full. We sang a lot of beautiful Christmas songs and I saw a lot of people we knew so it was a great way to start our Christmas weekend!

Here are some pictures of Ava with the liturgical dancers.

Ava with her friends Grace and Abby.

Here is the whole group. These girls did a great job! I had most of the little girls in white in my Sunday school class last year. It was fun to see them again!

After church we went around and looked at Christmas lights and then we came home and ate dinner and have been relaxing. We're excited about Christmas tomorrow!

Cookie night!!

2011-12-22T17:00:00.000-05:00

Like everyone I love the Pioneer Woman's Blog. Last Christmas she did a post about sugar cookies and icing. I tried these cookies for Brock's 8th grade graduation party and they turned out great. For his party I just made round cookies this time I wanted to try shapes. Her recipe made about 4 dozen cookies it was very simple but the whole baking and icing process took 4 hours. When I make these again I will bake one night and ice them another night.

Here is my little helper Ava mixing the icing. See that new hot pink feather in her hair? She got that yesterday when she got her hair cut.

Here are some of the cookies after they were piped with frosting. This is the part that took the longest. I'm not sure if it's really necessary so probably won't do this next time or just do some of them this way.

The best thing I got for cookie decorating were these squeeze bottles at Walmart in their cake decorating section. They were $2 for two of them. I just put my icing in these and started decorating!

I also printed out these adorable tags from the Crafting Chicks blog

Here are the finished cookies! We used a variety of sprinkles, colored sugar and different icing tips. They aren't perfect but I am so proud of how they turned out!

Here's a close up I think they green and red star is my favorite one!

The best part about these cookies is that they taste SO good! I let them dry overnight and this morning I put them on plates so I could give them to our friends and neighbors. I could eat ALL of these if they stayed in our house!

Our week

2011-12-21T16:30:00.000-05:00

Monday at lunch I went out with a few other Nutcracker Moms to discuss our ~~hellish~~ wonderful Nutcracker weekend. We all agreed that the Nutcracker was a great experience for our girls but SO exhausting! We were so tired on Monday that we didn't even take a picture during our lunch!

After lunch on Monday I went to a consignment store in town. With Christmas a few short days away I told myself I wouldn't buy anything but I found these adorable plates and I couldn't resist them! The plates came in a box and are in perfect condition! I just need to find a place to hang them in our house!

Monday afternoon at work I started feeling sick. I thought I had strep-I went to the Dr. and thank goodness I don't have it! Monday night I had big plans for us to make cookies but that didn't happen. We all came home and took naps. Here is a picture of Brock sleeping on the couch with Daisy.

Speaking of Daisy she is sporting a winter vest from Old Navy. She loves it and we keep her in it all the time.

Today at lunch Graig and I picked Ava up from school to take her to get pizza and to look at hamsters. She has been talking about getting a hamster for months and it's all she wants for Christmas. Here she is holding her hamster. We paid for it today and we are going to pick it up on Christmas Eve. I think Ava is SO happy that she won't be able to sleep for the next three days!

Since I'm feeling better I am hoping to make our Christmas cookies tonight! Happy Wednesday!

Nutcracker 2011!

2011-12-19T14:03:00.001-05:00

It has been a looooooooooooong few days in our house because Ava just got finished with her first ever Nutcracker ballet! This year Ava was a little boy in the party scene. She was THRILLED in October when she was chosen to be a kid (at that point she didn't know if she would be a boy or a girl) and I will never forget her jumping up and down on Main Street when she found out she got the part she wanted.

Ava had 5 performances over 4 days. She got to miss two days of school because during the day last Thursday and Friday they did performances for the elementary schools.

Here is Ava in the middle with some of the other kids. They line the kids up in height order and then they are paired up boy/girl according to height. Ava was one of the tallest :) I am SO happy she was a boy because she just had to wear her hair in a bun and she can do that herself. The girls wore their hair in spiral curls. Ava has been practicing doing spiral curls in case she gets to be a girl next year.

Here is Ava with her friend Elizabeth another boy.

Here is Ava with her partner Rose.

Ava and me backstage.

Ava with her BFF Anika who was a soldier.

Anika (we call her my second daughter) and me. I love the makeup the soldiers wore. They looked so cute!

Ava started ballet when she was 3 and at her first ballet recital they paired each 3 year old with an older

girl before the recital. The older girls helped the little girls backstage. Ava got paired with Amber. Amber is now in her second year of college and she was an Arabian in the Nutcracker. This year Ava is going to get to take care of a 3 year old ballerina at the recital. She has already informed her teacher that she wants Eliza (my friend Sabrina's daughter).

Ava's friend Maria came to see the show. These girls were best friends in daycare and took ballet together when they were little.

It was a fun (and exhausting!) Ava had a great time and is already talking about doing it again next year! Tonight we are going to make cut out sugar cookies and we're going to go out and look at the Christmas lights. I love this time of year and I want us to enjoy every minute of it!

Craft night!

2011-12-15T07:00:00.000-05:00

Tuesday night my friend Allison and I got together to make some cute candy cane vases. While we worked we watched Christmas Vacation (Love that movie!) and ate Chinese food. This is really an

easy and fun craft project! These took about 15 minutes to make! Here is the finished product.

My assistant and constant shadow Ava is holding the empty container that I used. It's an empty cotton candy container from Wal-Mart. (Allison's idea-brilliant!) I found this in the Christmas candy aisle. We just cut off the very top so our candy canes would stick out.

I used 3 boxes of plain candy canes on my vase. Here is an in progress picture.

Almost finished!

When I was finished I just tied a bow around the center and was done! These would make easy (and cheap!) gifts for teachers and neighbors. I spent $9 on this. The little tree in the vase was $5 from Walmart, the candy canes were $1 per box and the cotton candy was $1.

Speaking of candy canes here is another project I just finished. It's a candy cane wreath I made using red and white felt. This was such an easy project, I love those! I followed the tutorial from I heart naptime. For Valentine's Day I am just going to switch out my green ribbon for a pink one.

My last day of work for the week is today! I took tomorrow off to help Ava at the Nutcracker. She has two performances tomorrow. One during the day for area schools and one in the evening. Happy Thursday!

Christmas Tour 2011

2011-12-14T08:57:00.001-05:00

Welcome to our Christmas tour 2011! I have done this tour for 3 years and I love seeing how people decorate for Christmas. I am always looking for new ideas! I also love to look back and see what I changed or added over the years.

This year I was really late getting our decorations up. I usually like to put our decorations up the weekend after Thanksgiving but this year that didn't happen so I went really went simple with our decorations. I only bought a couple of new things.

Let's start in the dining room.

Our hutch. I love changing this up for every season! Right now it's red and green with a little turquoise for Christmas!

I always like to hang ornaments on our chandelier.

A Christmas countdown made by my talented friend Sabrina. Inside each tiny envelope is an activity that you can do each day to get ready for Christmas like drinking hot chocolate, going sledding, reading Christmas stories, etc.

Graig brought home this centerpiece for us. I love the roses with the fresh pine.

Here's a little tree in our office. I put it in front of a side window so you can see it from the street. I had all clear lights but Brock and Ava love the colored lights so I used all colored lights this year. I always love having my Christmas trees lit up when we are home.

Our living room! This window is over our fireplace. I made the Candy Cane wreath which looks so cheery.

Here's a fun wreath that I made for our living room door last year. I love the lime, silver and red!

Our sunroom! The wreath was made by my firiend Sabrina and I made the JOY sign. I bought little Christmas tree at a craft show. I use traditional red and green colors in my Christmas decor.

A little Christmas in our kitchen. I don't have too much in here but I do love this Christmas plate on top of our fridge.

And last but not least here's a picture of Ava with Santa! I was surprised (and happy!) that Ava wanted to get her picture taken with Santa at the mall. I can't believe how fast our little girl is growing up!

Merry Christmas!! I always love looking at holiday decorations. I can't wait to tour the other homes and see everyone's Christmas decorations.

Girlfriend Gift Swap

2011-12-13T09:19:00.001-05:00

Monday night I got together with my girlfriends for a Christmas gift swap. We decided to do this gift swap on Saturday so our lovely hostess Allison only had two days to prepare her house and we only had two days to shop for the perfect present!

Here is Allison's adorable Christmas Tree. She went to grad school at Syracuse and loves Syracuse basketball. She decorated this tree in Syracuse orange and blue.

Here are the gifts before our Yankee swap!

This is a cute little vase that Allison made using candy canes. I think this is so cute! I'm going to copy it and make one for myself.

Allison and Sabrina

Sabrina, me and Sara with our presents. Actually it looks like Sara has a cookie-ha ha! I got a purple iPhone case and lottery tickets. I loved my present!

Tonight is Ava's dress rehearsal for the Nutcracker! I can't wait. The parents get to watch tonight so I'm going to take lots of pictures. She has 5 performances. It is going to be a busy weekend for us!

Our weekend!

2011-12-12T16:00:00.000-05:00

We had a busy and fun weekend! Friday night Ava and I made cookies for a cookie exchange that I had on Sunday. I made Candy Cane Blossoms and they turned out so cute!

Source: bakedperfection.com via Angie on Pinterest

Saturday morning I went to brunch with some friends to celebrate our friends Allison's birthday. Here is Tara, me, Sabrina, Sara and Allison at brunch. I had a great time with these girls!

Saturday afternoon we went to the wedding of one of Graig's high school friends. I love winter weddings and this one was beautiful! Here is Graig with all of his friends that were at the wedding. This isn't the greatest picture because I took it on my iPhone but I think you can tell how much these guys love getting together. They were laughing and cracking jokes and making fun of each other all night long!

Here we are at the wedding!

Before we left Brock wanted to take a picture with me. He is such a sweet boy!

Sunday we went to Sunday school and church and then we came home ate lunch and then Allison and I went to a cookie exchange. There were 25 ladies that participated. I brought home a ton of cookies. We are eating some now and I froze some so we would have a wide variety of treats for Christmas.

Here is a picture of one table of cookies.

These iced sugar cookies were my favorite. I wish my sugar cookies came out this good! Everyone also shared their cookie recipe along with their cookies so I will be trying to make these before Christmas.

This has nothing to do with our weekend but I saw Ellie under the tree and I had to take a picture. She is the sweetest dog. She loves to eat (as you can tell) and every time I get out the leashes to take the dogs for a walk Ellie runs and hides under our bed so she doesn't have to go. Bless her heart she just keeps getting bigger and bigger.

Tonight I'm celebrating Christmas with a gift exchange with my friends. Happy Monday!

Hello friends!

2011-12-11T21:31:00.000-05:00

I am still here, I am still reading blogs every day but I have been SO busy I haven't been able to post my own. Here are some pictures to give you an idea of what we have been up to the last few weeks :)

Thanksgiving-we had a great day and ate A LOT! Grandma Jan came to celebrate with us. Ava did her best to dress up like a Pilgrim. She said she was a boy Pilgrim-ha ha!

I found a white pumpkin this year and I used it as our simple Thanksgiving centerpiece.

After thanksgiving I flew to St. Louis to visit with my family and to attend a conference for work. I had a great time visiting with my Dad, Vicki, Shelby and Ryan and most of all Ainsley! She is getting SO big and is completely adorable I loved spending time with her. My sister takes a lot of pictures with her iPhone and when ever you lift your phone Ainsley thinks you are going to take a picture so she smiles really big. It's so cute!

We took Ainsley on a double decker carousal. Shelby and I loved it but Ainsley was a little scared.

I only got to spend 2 days with my family before I went to my conference. Here we are with my Dad on our last morning together.

The first day of my conference was great! I attended a few good sessions and met up with two former students at the opening reception! Both Matt and Jason were fraternity presidents in college and now they are working as Greek Advisors. It was fun to catch up with them! Unfortunately I got really bad food poisoning from the food at the opening session so the next day I stayed in my hotel room all day. I have never been so sick in my life.

Brock and Ava have been super busy. Brock made the JV basketball team so he has had practice every night after school and Ava is going to be in the Nutcracker ballet so she has been busy in rehearsals for that.

Here is Ava with her BFF Anika in their Nutcracker costumes. Ava plays a little boy and Anika is a soldier.

I have got to get to bed. Graig and I took the day off work tomorrow to go Christmas shopping. Usually I have all of our Christmas bought and wrapped by now but this year I haven't bought a thing! Hopefully we will find a lot of presents tomorrow!

Saturday

2011-11-19T20:03:00.001-05:00

This morning Ava danced in the Christmas parade. She was a Santa it was SO cute but this is the only picture I got. She told her dance teacher that she wanted the warmest costume so she got the Santa suit.

Brock has been sick so today I made us best corn and potato chowder. I found the recipe on pinterest from the Mama Loves food blog. Her blog is great and has a ton of great recipes. I added it to my favorites list and will be visiting her blog often!

This afternoon I finished cleaning up all my flowerbeds and I put up our Christmas lights. It was a beautiful day (and I know we don't have many left) so I wanted to get it done today. After working outside I came in and took a nap and TOTALLY forgot that I had a parent meeting for the Nutcracker! Today was the hair meeting (I'm serious) where we learn how to do our daughter's hair for the part they have. I am SO thankful Ava is a boy in the Nutcracker so she will just wear her hair back in a bun.

I also finally finished the bench I got during my girl's weekend in Vermont. It is adorable! I love the tangerine fabric that I got at Joanne Fabrics. I spraypainted the wood with a black gloss. It was NASTY when I bought it but I think it turned out really cute!

I also hung up this ribbon wreath that I made. I love the fall colors. This week I'm going to get out our Christmas decorations but I'm not going to put them up until the day after Thanksgiving. I want to keep our fall decorations out as long as possible!

Thursday randomness!

2011-11-17T20:56:00.001-05:00

The week after Thanksgiving I have a conference for work in St. Louis so I'm going a few days before to spend some time with my family before the conference. I'm going to see my Dad and Vicki and my sister Shelby and Ryan and their little Ainsley. I told Ava that I wasn't going to spend too much time with my family since it's a work trip but she's still SO sad that she can't go with me. She went up to bed while I was talking to my sister last night and I found this note :(

I love pinterest and found a picture of a hot chocolate station for the kitchen. I thought it was a really cute idea so I made one for our kitchen tonight. I think Brock and Ava are going to love it!

For the past few weeks Graig has been coughing and coughing and he has been really tired. He hates going to the doctor and missing work so he thought he would get better after a few days. Fast forward three weeks he's still coughing so this morning he FINALLY went to the doctor and he has bronchitis. The doctor put him on three different medicines so I hope that he will be better soon.

Graig has been doing a lot of this for the past few weeks...he would NOT like this picture so I hope he doesn't read this blog post-ha ha!

Our bookstore on campus has some cute hats and jewerly so I went and got some Christmas presents today and I got a few things for myself- this is a terrible iPhone picture but I love my new chevron hat!

Happy Thursday!

Watch Week!

2011-11-09T15:22:00.001-05:00

Last week Ava had parent watch week at ballet. Watch week is where parents get to watch their kids during their dance class. Usually parents aren't allowed to watch the classes. Even when Ava was 3 they shut the door and wouldn't let us to watch so I loved the week when they actually let us watch! Of course then I could take as many pictures as I wanted and now Ava is SO embarrassed that I am even there so I only got to snap a few pictures with my phone. Thankfully I have been going to watch weeks for years so I have a few blog posts like this one, and this one with some better pictures.

Happy Monday!

Brock's best day

2011-11-08T16:44:00.000-05:00

Today the new modern warfare game was released. Millions of teenage boys raced to the store to get their hands on this new game.

According to the girl that check us out, at midnight our Wally World had a huge line to buy this game. Thankfully Brock and I went at 6:30 this morning and there was no line. We make him buy all of his own video games so he used his hard earned paper route money to buy this game.

Here is us in the parking lot (no I wasn't showered or ready to go to work but I did make it on time!). Brock is looking so embarrassed! I told him I wanted a few pics for the blog-ha ha!

I also took a picture of him by the MW display. He told me that he wish that everyone who reads this blog could see what he is saying before the picture was taken. It goes like this:

me-Brock smile I want a nice picture of you
Brock-Mom you are SO embarrassing who takes pictures at Wal Mart
me-Brock you had better smile or I am not getting this game for you and we are not going out to breakfast
Brock-Fine take ONE and only ONE. If it's not good we're not taking another one
me-if I don't get a good picture we are not leaving this store

He has to be at school at 7:30 so after we got his game we went to breakfast at McD. We both got pancakes they were delish.

I'm sure we won't see him at all tonight because he'll be playing his new game!

Thanksgiving Decorations!

2011-11-06T20:51:00.001-05:00

I love decorating for holidays especially fall holidays! Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays of the year and I always like to add a little Thanksgiving flair to our home. Here are some decorations from this year.

I LOVE this platter! I got it at an auction last summer. It's really old so I won't actually use it to put our turkey on but I like the way it looks on our dining room hutch.

If you've been reading my blog you know I love decorating our hutch for every season and holiday. This is what it looks like all decorated for Thanksgiving.

Brock made this turkey in kindergarten and I still get it out every year. It's little head fell off this year and I had to staple it back on. It's so sweet. I'm always going to put it out.

This is the little cart I made for our kitchen. The lower shelf has serving platters, the middle shelf holds Brock and Ava's snacks for their lunches and I like decorating the top shelf. I got the Give Thanks sign at TJ Maxx.

My Mom got me 2 of these Thanksgiving placemats a few years ago. I think they are adorable!

Linking up to:

http://www.craftomaniac.blogspot.com/

Hot Dog!

2011-11-06T15:46:00.000-05:00

This weekend has been SO busy! I had to work on Friday evening and all day yesterday. I coordinate a leadership development conference every year for freshman and sophomore students and the conference was this weekend. I have been working on planning this conference since August and it's always fun to plan but I'm SO glad it's over! I was SO tired last night when I got home and today after church and Sunday school I have been getting things done so we are ready for the week.

Here is a picture of all the students at the conference.

A picture of Ava from Halloween was featured this week in our campus newspaper and on our College website. A student photographer snapped this picture during the Halloween carnival before Trick or Treating on campus.She tucked her hands inside her costume so she looked like a real hot dog-ha ha!

Tonight I am going to start reading this book that I bought a few weeks ago. It's usually just our little family and Grandma Jan for Thanksgiving but I still want to make it a special meal for us. I hope this book gives me lots of good ideas!

Trick or Treat!

2011-11-03T16:48:00.000-04:00

Last Friday we went trick or treating on campus. We go every year and it's always fun. This year we went with our neighbors and some of Ava's friends from school.
We went to Target a few weeks ago to look for costumes. Ava found a hot dog costume and begged me to get it for her. She loves dressing up as food for Halloween. Last year she dressed up as grapes. Ava's BFF also names Ava dressed up as skittles and her other BFF Anika dressed up as a monster.

There was also a tiny baby dressed up like hotdog so Ava and the baby took a picture together. Big hot dog and mini hot dog!

Uncle Garth and Aunt Jill are visiting from Colorado so we are going out to dinner with them tonight. Happy Thursday!

Ava's photo shoot

2011-10-29T23:40:00.003-04:00

We just got back from a Halloween Party. It was fun! I went with Sabrina and Allison. I dressed up like an 80's girl, Allison went as a cheerleader and Sabrina was a Greek goddess. I will post pictures from our fun night soon.

Today I wanted to show some pictures of Ava. My friend Rebecca is a photographer. She is SO talented. A few weeks ago she asked me if she could photograph Ava and of course I said yes. She takes amazing photos!

This one is my absolute favorite!

This blue ballet costume is from Ava's dance recital two years ago. I love how it brings out the blue in her eyes.

Ava looking sassy in her red jazz costume.

I love the way she looks in this picture. I'm going to have this one blown up so I can put it in a big frame.

These are just a few of the images that Rebecca took at Ava's photo shoot. I can't wait to see the rest!

Happy Saturday!

Friends and Fiestaware

2011-10-22T23:38:00.000-04:00

This has been a VERY busy week with work for our family I felt like we were on the go all week. This weekend we don't have any plans so I have been happy to relax and just enjoy being at home!

I did manage a couple of very fun nights out with friends this week. Wednesday was the monthly wine night. There were 5 of us that went and we had a great time! All of these ladies are in my running group. We usually see each other at 5:15am so it was nice to get dressed up and go out with them for a fun night.

Last night Ava and I had a girls night. I didn't take any pictures of the grown up girls but there were 5 of us including Sabrina and Melany. We went out for Mexican food and the mall. We ended the night with ice cream at Friendly's.

In other exciting news I added 40 pieces to my fiesta ware collection today! I am SO excited!

My Dad's lovely girlfriend Vicki bought them for me. Dad and Vicki go to a lot of antique stores and I told them to look for fiesta ware and if they found any to buy it and I would pay them back. My Dad face timed us tonight so I could see all of my pieces. She got me tons of plates, small plates, bowls, a pitcher, cups, and a platter in lots of different colors. I can't wait to get it when I visit at Thanksgiving.
I want to display it all in our house. I found these two inspiration images on pinterest tonight.

I love the fiesta colors in this picture and I love the shelves it's displayed on.

I would LOVE to have one of these Hoosier cabinets in our house. I'm not sure where I would put it but I think it would be a great place to display my fiesta pieces.

Here are the two pieces that I have now. This radioactive red bowl which looks orange to me but fiesta calls it red and it was made with uranium! So I only use it for display -ha ha!

I also got this light green fiesta ware plate a few weeks ago in Vermont.

I hope you are having a good weekend!

Halloween Hutch

2011-10-18T19:38:00.000-04:00

Every season I decorate the hutch in our dining room. Last weekend I decorated it for Halloween! I love the turquoise and orange colors that I used to decorate with this Halloween. Ava painted a turquoise pumpkin on the top shelf. I kept a lot of my milk glass out too and I love the white pumpkin that I found at a farm stand!

My friend Sabrina made this subway art for the craft show last weekend. I was excited that it didn't sell because that meant I got to bring it home!

I added halloween pretzels to our candy basket. I hope this helps us to eat less Halloweeen candy this year!
I got this cute basket at Wal-Mart and added the orange ribbon.

This cute happy Halloween sign is in our living room. I spray painted the frame orange. I really like the way it turned out! I got the Halloween sign from this blog.

I have one last Halloween decoration to show. I made this adorable rag wreath for the craft show. I can't believe it didn't sell! I'm sort of glad it didn't because that means I got to keep it for my house! I love all the different colors in this wreath!

Happy Tuesday!!

Our weekend!

2011-10-16T21:36:00.000-04:00

This weekend was busy, busy, busy! I'm exhausted I'm ready for the week so I can rest-ha ha!

As part of my job I coordinate a craft show during our homecoming weekend. My talented friend Sabrina had a table in the show and I added a few things that I made. I thought our table display was so pretty! It was fun putting it all together. Sabrina made that Halloween subway art sign. I'm so glad it didn't sell because after the show I bought it! It looks adorable in our dining room.

Yesterday during the craft show two of my former students Jackie and Junait came to visit me! I was SO happy to see them! Jackie was Ava's babysitter one summer. They dated in college and got married last weekend! They are both teachers now and came up from NYC to visit during homecoming. It was fun catching up with them!

Ava was sad because she didn't get to see Jackie and Junait. Ava is going to be in the Nutcracker ballet in December she was at her first Nutcracker practice on Saturday!

Last night Brock had four of his friends sleep over. I know they had a good time because our basement was a mess and all of our snacks are gone. Boys are loud and stinky but I know in four years Brock will be away at college and I will wish that they were still hanging out at our house playing basketball and eating everything in our fridge!

This afternoon we watched Ethan and Eliza for Sabrina. We put Eliza on our lazy susan on our table and spun her around. She loved it! I love this picture of the two of them!

These two girls are growing up WAY too fast too! Here is one of the first pictures of the two of them together. I love how Ava doesn't have any front teeth in this picture.

I hope you had a great weekend!

Our fall mantle!

2011-10-11T17:22:00.003-04:00

I love decorating our mantle for the seasons. Fall is my absolute favorite time to decorate our house because I love the deep fall colors like orange, red and brown. This year I am also mixing in my favorite color-turquoise! I tried to keep things really simple this year. I am starting to hate things that look too cluttered. Of course my scale, birdcage and Ballard apothecary jars are things I use year round on my mantle. I love the old window but Graig doesn't get it. He always asks me why we have an old window hanging in our living room-ha ha!

In other exciting news Brock and Ava had their open houses last week at school! Brock started high school this year! I still can't believe it Brock is in high school! We got to go to each of Brock's classes to meet all of his teachers. Ava's school does looping which means they have the same teacher for two years. Ava is in the second year of her loop so she has the same teacher this year that she had last year. Ava LOVES her teacher so she's excited that she gets to be with her for another year!

This past weekend I went on a girls weekend with my friends. We had so much fun! We went shopping and antiquing. I got some cute things that I'll show later this week. Our new friend Melany took this and put it on facebook.Melany has the cutest blog which you can find here. She is a talented seamstress and she features a lot of her projects on her blog. Aren't the mums in this picture beautiful?

Happy Monday!

Our weekend!

2011-10-02T21:35:00.001-04:00

This weekend started for me at Ava's school. Her elementary school mascot is the purple panda and on Friday Ava got to dress up as the Purple Panda at their afternoon assembly. She was SO excited to be in the purple panda costume. Her friend also named Ava was the other Purple Panda. This is the best picture I got of them in their costumes.

Yesterday I worked on this cart that I got at at yard sale. I LOVE the way it turned out! I put it in the corner of our kitchen. On the middle shelf I put snacks and on the bottom shelf I put some of my white serving dishes.

Today was the Pit Run! Sabrina and I have been training for this race since March. It was a hard race. I keep wondering when running will get easier. I'm not sure it ever will for me but I think I'm hooked! I'd like to do the 10k next year. My time this year was 36 minutes not great but my goal was to finish!

Here is our running group. We met and walked to a coffee shop. I'm in the back with the black hat. This is an awful picture of me but I do love our group so I wanted to put it on here.

Here is a picture of Brock and I before the race this morning. Please excuse the terrible lighting. This is the only picture we got we were running out the door when I told Graig to snap this picture of us.

Brock and Graig ran the race today too. Graig wanted to bet because he loves to bet on everything and of course Graig lost the race. Brock's time was 24 minutes! I am so proud of my boy!
So after the race Brock wanted to spend his winnings so he bought a flat screen TV for his room. I don't know if he'll ever come out of there now-ha ha!

My friends Sara and Allison got these flowers for Sabrina and I after the race. They tied a shoelace around the vase isn't that cute? I thought that was so sweet of them!

Also congrats and good luck to my sister Shelby!! She started the couch to 5k program this morning and wrote about it on her blog today. You go girl! I am SO proud of my little sister!

Tonight we ordered pizza and wings and watched TV and relaxed. I hope you had a great weekend!

Boy Mom

2011-09-29T20:55:00.000-04:00

Earlier this week one of my favorite bloggers Erin from Blue Eyed Bride wrote a beautiful post about being a boy mom. She has two little boys. I have one big boy and I NEVER thought I would be a boy mom! I just knew that I was going to be the Mom of two girls just like my family growing up. Graig always thought he would have three boys just like his family growing up.

When I was pregnant with Brock I just knew I was going to have a girl. I had one baby shower before we found out what I was having and I told all my friends to get me girl stuff. I was going to name our girl Abby Allison. I was SHOCKED at the ultrasound when they told us we were having a boy. I didn't know a thing about boys! Graig was so thrilled he really wanted a son.

Fast forward 14 years and I have LOVED being a boy Mom. I have been to so many baseball and basketball games I can't even begin count them all. I watch shows about aliens and monsters with Brock because he loves them. His two favorites are Monster Quest and Ancient Aliens we watch these two shows every week.

Brock loves having his friends over. We try to always have plenty of snacks on hand because 14 year old boys eat a lot!

I always go and cheer him on at his many games. I am getting good at taking action shots.

He is so sweet, kind and funny. I am thankful every day that I am a boy mom and have Brock as a son!

This and That

2011-09-27T19:30:00.001-04:00

Last weekend we went to a farm stand and I got some pumpkins and mums for our yard for fall. I saw some white pumpkins and I thought they were SO adorable so I got two of them for the hutch in our dining room. I love white pumpkins!

I am still getting fall stuff out of our attic. This is a fall centerpiece that I've used for a couple of years on our dining room table. This year I put it on the coffee table in our sun room. I love that I can use this from now until Thanksgiving. I just love fall colors!

Two festive pumpkins in our living room. I love the turquoise/orange colors together. The candle stick is from Hobby Lobby and the green vase is from Restoration Hardware I want to do more turquoise/orange decorations this year.

This is a little box that I painted with chalkboard paint. In the background is a picture of my Mom when she was a baby.

I got these adorable Missoni bowls from Target for my friend as a housewarming gift. Love them!

Moving on to running now. This weekend is the 5k race that Sabrina and I have been training for since March. In August we joined a running group with about 15 ladies. I am SO glad we joined this group! We usually run together on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday mornings at 5:15 (Saturday's we usually do 6). We call ourselves the Pack and we totally motivate and support each other -which has been a huge blessing for me. This morning after our run we got the shirts that were going to wear to our race this weekend. I love it! I can't wait to wear it!

On the back of the shirt we each wrote a reason why we did the race. Mine is near the bottom and it says "for my mom" She died of a heart attack last year at age 64. I still can't believe she's gone. I love my Mom SO much but I don't want to have a heart attack at an early age. My Dad also had a heart attack at an early age but thankfully he survived and is doing well! After my Mom died I promised myself I would get in shape and eat better. So training for this race was part of that promise to myself. I know she would be proud of me!

Fall Fun!

2011-09-25T20:59:00.001-04:00

We had the best weather here this weekend! We spent almost the whole weekend outside soaking up the beautiful sunshine. Yesterday I took Brock and Ava and two of Ava's friends to a Cider Mill and a Pumpkin festival! I was SO happy that both B and A were excited to go. I know that there will come a day (probably very soon) that they won't want to do things with me. So when they want to do things together I jump at the chance!

We started our day at the Cider Mill. We tasted and bought many tasty fall treats including cider, donuts, apples and pumpkin bread.

Too Cool! I love this picture of Ava with her two friends I am SO thankful that Ava has such sweet, caring friends!

Brock is almost 6 feet tall! I also have a picture of Brock in front of this same sign when he was two years old.

Me and the girls. I always love these wooden cutouts-ha ha!

Before we left the Cider Mill we fed the ducks which was fun!

Our next stop was at the Pumpkin Festival where we met Grandma Jan.

Look at these giant pumpkins!

I loved the color of this pumpkin.

Here the girls are after a fun filled day outside. I think this picture is precious!

Last night Brock went to his first Bar Mitzvah. I wish I would have taken his picture he looked so handsome in his polo shirt. While Brock was at the party I took Ava to see A Dolphin Tale. It was a cute movie!

I hope you had a good weekend!

Our week!

2011-09-23T19:41:00.003-04:00

Has been hellish, I've been sick all week :( I'm glad it's finally the weekend so I can rest and relax and get feeling better. Last weekend before I got sick I went to a dinner for our College's athletic program. It was a fun night! Here are the people from our table we had a fun night and we are already making plans to go again next year. I hope Graig isn't traveling and can go with me next year.

I have a new favorite breakfast. The Pioneer Woman's Egg in the Hole. They are so good! I have made them two times this week for breakfast!

Last night we went to Target to get Ava her Halloween costume. She wanted to be food. She loves being food for Halloween! Last Halloween she went as grapes and this Halloween she decided to be a Hot Dog. Her costume looks similar to this one. I think she will look so cute!

Have a good weekend!

Craft Night!

2011-09-17T15:54:00.000-04:00

Since Graig and Ava are out of town I decided to have my friends over for a craft night last night. I made chicken pasta a delicious recipe that I wrote a post about here. We made wreaths and we also started working on chalkboard trays. The chalkboard trays take some time to dry so last night we only put the primer on them. I hope when our chalkboard trays are done they look like these. I love these!

Here are some pics from our fun craft night.

Look at this messy table! We had a lot of crafts going on last night!

Me and my friend Allison.

Here are Erin and Wendy showing off their creations. I think their wreaths turned out really cute!

My friends Sabrina and Sara were there too. I just didn't get a picture of them. Sabrina has the cutest burlap wreaths right now on her blog. Tonight I'm going to a dinner on campus to support our athletics department. It should be a fun night! Happy Saturday!

Leaving on a jet plane

2011-09-15T20:37:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow Ava and Graig are leaving for Colorado! Graig has a conference in Denver for work and Ava is going to spend the week with Uncle Garth and Aunt Jill. I am SO happy that she gets to spend time with them. Here is Ava with Garth and Jill when they visited us last fall.

Jill and Garth are expecting their first baby in the spring so last night I went out and got them a couple of gifts. I hope they find out what they're having because Ava and I LOVE to shop for baby clothes.

Here is Ava all packed up and ready to go!

Tomorrow night I am having a girls craft night with my friends. I am looking forward to it because it's been a long week!

Iphone pictures

2011-09-13T15:09:00.002-04:00

I take most of my pictures with my iPhone. I can't wait until the day when cell phones have cameras that are just as good as a regular digital cameras! I thought I would do a post today with pictures from my phone.

Last week Ava and I did masks! She thought this was so fun!

Brock Aaron before his 8th grade graduation. I might have already posted this but I love this picture of him. I think he looks like mini Graig in this picture!

Daisy Duke-she can be so adorable sometimes when she's not barking her head off and getting on my last nerve-ha ha!

Eliza in her new princess nightgown that we got her for her b-day. Sabrina sent this to me from her iPhone. I love this picture!

Ava wanted her hair curly for the flash mob last Saturday. Poor thing her hair is SO straight it doesn't stay curly long. She loves having her hair curly!

My new favorite beverage (other than diet coke) is Banana Seltzer. Last time I was at the grocery store I bought 10 bottles and I embarrassed B and A to death because I bought so many.

I actually forgot I bought this cute stand at a garage sale a couple of weekends ago. When I was going through my pictures I found it. I am going to paint it and put it in Ava's room.

My friend Allison sent these iPhone pictures to me from the race on Saturday. Brock looks thrilled to be there and Graig is holding a sign that my friend Sabrina made for me.

I think Tuesday's are going to be my favorite day of the week this school year because we don't have anything to do after school/work on Tuesday's. We can just go home and relax and be together as a family! Happy Tuesday!

Our weekend in pictures

2011-09-11T18:37:00.002-04:00

I thought I would do a post about our weekend in pictures

Yesterday Brock had a baseball game. He pitched and he had his first ever no-hitter!

Ava danced in a flash mob on Main Street.

I went to garage sales, lunch and to the mall with Allison and Sabrina. I got this adorable pillow at TJMaxx.

I did a little photo shoot with Cotton and Ellie. I like this picture but I hate how their eyes look, I can't seem to fix that.

I ran in my first ever 5k!

Here are some girls from my running group that ran the race. Erin our teacher is next to me in pink. My time was 33.24.

I decorated for fall. Fall is my absolute favorite season to decorate for!

Tonight I'm going to a 9/11 vigil on campus. I can't believe it's been 10 years since that terrible day. Brock was 4 when it happened and I was pregnant with Ava. I remember watching the news that day at work. It was so sad. The only thing I wanted to do was go home and be with Graig and Brock and call my family.

School Daze

2011-09-09T21:10:00.001-04:00

Wednesday Brock and Ava started school! Brock is a freshman in high school and Ava is in 4th grade. I know I always say this but I can't believe how big they are. They are growing up way too fast! I tried to get some good pictures of them on Wednesday morning. It's SO hard getting a good picture of both of them.

Wednesday we got A LOT of rain and Brock and Ava got out of school early because it was starting to flood. Wednesday evening they closed our street due to flooding. The street was actually closed right past our driveway! The flooding was so bad that the College that I work at (that hardly ever closes for anything) was closed yesterday and Brock and Ava didn't have school yesterday or today.

About 1/4 of a mile down our street there was water all over the road.

The golf course by our house was also flooded.

Thankfully the water is starting to go down and things are getting back to normal around here. I am very thankful that we didn't have any damage to our house. This weekend Brock has a baseball game and Ava is going to dance in a flash mob. It should be a fun weekend!

Saturday mornings!

2011-09-03T07:50:00.000-04:00

Saturday mornings during hte summer are spent going to garage sales and our farmer's market with my friends Allison and Sabrina I am SO sad the yard sale season is almost over :(

A few weekends ago I got this old milk jar. It has the name of our town on it. I just love it. It's in our kitchen and I'm trying to grow some plant sprouts in it.

I also always look for milk glass to add to my collection.

At the farmer's market I always get fresh fruits, vegetables and plants. There is one lady that comes every week and she has the best plants so I always stop by and get one. Last week I got some Rosemary and a few weeks ago I got a basil plant.

I also bought these beautiful ferns from her. I hope they last!

Happy Saturday!!

TGIF!!

2011-09-02T20:29:00.000-04:00

This past week has been exhausting both mentally and physically. I am SO happy it's Friday! Today is the last day of sorority and fraternity recruitment! I love recruitment but it makes work CRAZY so I am happy it will be over today! Ava is sad it's over because she loves going to all of the recruitment events and hanging out with the students.

Ava likes to help me at events. Here is Ava with her friend Sarah during the set up for the Welcome Back Party at the College. She loved trying this sumo wrestling!

Yesterday Brock had his freshman orientation! I can't believe he's going to be a freshman in high school He is growing up WAY too fast.

After orientation I dropped Brock and his friend George off at one of our campus dining halls. These boys aren't at all interested in girls(thank goodness!! I am NOT ready for Brock to have a girlfriend!) but they get really excited about food! Here is Brock and George before a baseball game earlier this summer.

On campus we ran into Marissa she is Ava's babysitter and all-time favorite college student. Brock looks really uncomfortable in this picture-ha ha!

This weekend we hope to relax and get a few things done around the house.

I got this book from the library and I want to read it this weekend. Sometimes I get so frustrated helping Brock and Ava with their homework so I hope this book has some good tips for me!

We're also going to take Brock to see Apollo 18. He is really excited to see this movie!

Have a good weekend!

Our week

2011-08-29T20:57:00.000-04:00

This past week hasn't been too exciting :( The college students came back last week so Graig and I have been SUPER busy at work. I come home and I'm so tired I just sit down and don't want to do anything. At the end of this week things should really calm down-thank goodness!

Ava and I are in a bad habit of getting ice cream almost every night after dinner. We are just LOVING it this summer. Here is Ava eating her cone tonight. I'm not sure why this sideways. Brock is obviously interested in what was on tv-ha ha!

I think this is a cute picture of all three dogs. I took this tonight from the road. It's a little blurry. Graig would love to use this as one of our Christmas card pictures. He loves these dogs so much.

Allison, Sabrina and I went to yard sales on Saturday and I found the perfect cart to make this bar cart. This idea is from http://www.keller-creative.com/. My cart looks very similar to this one and the best part it was only $1! I jumped up and down when I saw it I was so excited! I can't wait to start working on it. I really hope mine turns out this cute.

I have no idea where I will put this because our house is beginning to look like an episode of Hoaders. And I don't NEED another bar cart because we don't even drink I just think it's completely adorable and I will find a place for it somewhere!

Tuesday, Tuesday!!

2011-08-23T19:25:00.001-04:00

The college students came back on Sunday so I am busy, busy, busy at work. I made these cute little treat bags to welcome them back to school. They had pens, pencils and candy in them.

Last weekend Allison and I went to yard sales. I got this adorable turqousise enamal bowl. I just LOVE it! I put a plant in it and put it in our dining room table.

I'm also SO proud of these flowers on our deck. They have just done so well this year. Usually my deck flowers wilt and die in June.

I got this milk glass container at yard sales too. I added this basil plant that I got at the farmer's market. I hope this basil lives it would be so nice to have fresh basil at home. I'll let you know usually my basil dies after a week or two.

Last but not least these pretty flowers from my garden. I love all the summer blooms I've gotten from my garden this year!

Happy Tuesday!

Ava's note

2011-08-21T20:21:00.000-04:00

Ava is at a tough age. She can be so sweet, cuddly and adorable one minute and the next minute she's acting like a little snot. We drive each other crazy on a daily basis-ha ha!

Ava taped the sweetest note in my shower last week. She also put a similar one on my mirror and she said she hid a third note but she said it would take a while for me to find it.

I took this picture with my iPhone

It said

Dear Mom,

I really, really love you. Everybody talks about how great you are. Everybody say I'm so lucky to have a mom just like you

xoxo

Ava

When I started this blog she was only 6 and she had just graduated from kindergarten. Now she's going into 4th grade. It's gone by so fast. I can't believe our little girl is getting bigger and bigger every day.

Here are some older pics of Ava that I found on my computer.

Ava at grandma Jan's

Ava in her new gymnastics uniform in Wyoming

Ava with baby Eliza I love this picture of them!

Ava on her 1st day of 1st grade

And her is a picture of Ava from last month when we visited my family in Illinois. She has grown so much!

I'm SO lucky to be her Mom!

Our weekend!

2011-08-15T21:45:00.001-04:00

This weekend was fun, fun, fun! I wanted to get a lot of stuff done around the house before the students get back next week but instead I just crafted, ate, shopped, took naps both days and had a GREAT time!

Friday night I went to my friend Sabrina's house for a night filled with crafting! We are going to have a table at a craft fair in October and we started making ribbon rag wreaths on Friday evening. We have LOTS to do to get ready for this craft fair.

I picked these flowers from our garden. I love the big pink flower it's called a dinner plate dahlia and I just planted it this year. I love picking flowers from our garden!

Sabrina, Allison and I went to yard sales on Saturday and I got some more milk glass which I added to my hutch. I know I am doing terrible job at not buying anything for our home. I just can't help myself at yard sales!

Sunday I went to see The Help with some friends. It was such a great movie! Today I went back to work. I am busy, busy, busy because the students come back on Saturday. I have SO much to do before they get back. Have a great week!

Friday, Friday!

2011-08-12T17:14:00.003-04:00

I am SO glad it's Friday! I have a lot to check off my to do list before the college students come back next weekend so I am hoping to have a productive weekend!
You know how I said yesterday that I didn't want to buy anything for our house for a month...well I went to my first auction last night and of course I did buy a few things. I think auctions could be a new addiction for me. It was really fun!

I'll post pictures of all my treasure's later but I want to show you this antique platter that I got, It's a T.&R. Boote White Ironstone Rectangular Platter from 1890!
I found this picture this morning on eBay. This is exactly like my platter.

I have been wanting to make a chalkboard platter like I saw in the Pottery Barn catalog and I think this will be the perfect. I am going to work on this project this weekend. Hopefully it will turn out really cute and I can show it on my blog next week!

I also want to see The Help this weekend. I LOVED this book and I can't wait to see the movie!

My sister wrote a beautiful post about her trip to the apple orchard with Ainsley. I am SO thankful that they are both healthy now and can do things like go to the orchard together :) I love this picture of the two of them.

Sweet girl! I love her so much!!

Have a great weekend!

Changing and Rearranging!

2011-08-11T17:12:00.001-04:00

This month I have decided to TRY not to buy anything new for our house. This is going to be really challenging for me because I love to shop and buy new things. We just have SO much stuff and I am trying really hard to organize our basement, attic and closets and drawers. So I need to take a little break from buying things and really concentrate on organizing what we already have.

At the beginning of the summer I stenciled the area above our fireplace. I liked it OK but I didn't love it so I knew I would change it. I painted it halcyon green the same color that's in our dining room. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this color in our dining room.

I also added the same color to the backs of our shelves in our living room

Here is the same color above our fireplace. I'm not sure if I like it or not. I would like to add another stencil and I have looked a little online but I haven't found anything that I love yet.

This beauty was hanging by our side entrance (the door that everyone comes in!) and I thought it was too big so I moved it to our dining room. My friend Sabrina and I made these shutters a few summers ago. I still love it!

This is our office. Actually Graig uses this office more than I do especially since I made my own little office space in the living room. I re-did that patchwork picture a few years ago using scrapbook paper and modge podge.

I found these large frames for $5 so Sabrina and I spray painted them and I added wire to the back of mine so I could clip things on it. I think this looks best hanging in G's office. That way we can clip up notes, pictures, etc. I am SO happy because I was going to buy something to go in this space but I think this fits really well!

Here's a closeup!

This is our side door and the way most people enter our home. I did have the shutter hanging in this space but I think it's too big for this area. I had this magnetic board hanging in the office but I moved it out here. I actually have two of them so I am going to hang another one below this one. I am going to use one for B and one for A to organize all of their school paperwork.

I think re-decorating my home this way will be fun. I'm thinking of other stuff I could move around. I will let you know how my month long hiatus from not buying anything home related I know G will be happy because I'm not spending any money-ha ha!

Brock and Ava and a new recipe!

2011-08-10T17:21:00.003-04:00

I have been a major slacker the past few weeks, I haven't tried anything new since I got home from visiting my family in Illinois/Iowa. In the beginning of the summer I wrote this post about trying new recipes every week. This week I'll try some new ones and post them next week.

This isn't really a recipe but it's something that I have been LOVING this summer. Grilled zucchini- I make this at least 2-3 times per week.

I buy zucchini like this at the farmer's market every Saturday and Tuesday. They are 3 for $1.50! So cheap and delicious!

I cut one zucchini into thin slices and then I toss the zucchini with 3 teaspoons of olive oil and then I add a little garlic salt and pepper. I usually cook them in the oven on 375 for 30 minutes (unless it's too hot and then I cook them on the grill) until they turn a little brown on the edges. I think this is the best summer side dish! We had this last night with grilled chicken and corn on the cob.

Last night Ava had her friend Marty sleep over. I took this when they woke up this morning. I thought it was hilarious because Ava always thinks she has an injury of some sort. Last night she used duct tape and taped this ice pack to her leg. She said she had a leg injury from jumping on the trampoline.

I wanted to take a cute picture of Ava and Marty together and this is the best one I got. Ava was still feeling bad about her "leg injury".

Brock is getting up and around a little bit now. This morning before I left for work he was playing on the computer. Today at lunch we went to Applebees and he had chicken fingers and fries, I think he's finally feeling better! He has a check up tomorrow with his surgeon.

I had this frame in the basement and Ava drew us a picture to go in our bedroom. This is a very colorful picture of our home. I think Ava did a great job drawing and coloring it! I put it right above my night stand.

Happy Wednesday!

Brock's 14th birthday!

2011-08-07T20:28:00.000-04:00

Today was Brock's 14th birthday! It was a low key kind of day because he is still recovering from his tonsil surgery. I CAN'T believe he's 14 already! The years have gone by SO fast. He has grown from a sweet little boy to a young man.

Here is a picture of Brock from tonight. One of the perks of Graig's job is a golf cart. He coordinates the summer camps on campus so he has to travel around campus all the time. The golf cart makes it much easier for him to get around to all the places he needs to go on campus.

This afternoon he felt good enough so we went and ate lunch out and then we went to the movies. He wanted to see Planet of the Apes. I wasn't excited at all about seeing it but it turned out to be a really good movie!

I think this picture is SO funny! I took a quick picture of Brock and I on the golf cart and Ava squeezed her head in. You know she hates to miss being in a picture-ha ha!

A touch of tangerine

2011-08-05T13:52:00.001-04:00

If you have read my blog or know me in real life you know that I have been obsessed with the color turquoise for a few years. It seems that everything I buy, craft or spray paint has been turquoise. The proof?
Just look at this post, this post, this post, and this post. Obviously, I am a little crazy about turquoise.

As a little break from our LONG car ride home on Friday we stopped at Hobby Lobby and I found the divine tangerine fabric. I decided to make a couple of small place mats for our dining room with them. I made them with stitch witch while talking to my friend Sabrina on the phone the other night. I love the way they turned out and the new color that they add to our home.

Tangerine might be my new favorite color! Happy Friday! I am going with some friends tonight to watch Change Up It looks like such a funny movie! Have a great weekend!

Home Organization notebook

2011-08-04T13:35:00.000-04:00

Erin from Blue Eyed Bride is having a home organization notebook link up party today. I have had my home organization notebook for about a year and it has made things so much easier for me! There are a lot of websites and blogs that have printable pages and templates that you can use. I found that it worked out better for me to create my own personalized sheets.

Here is my home organization binder. I keep in on my desk in the living room.

My sections tabs include

To Do-a running to do list. I add to this list almost every day.

Home Daily Sheets-I took a picture of this sheet below. This is where I keep track of the things I need to get done every day.

Workouts- I took a picture of this sheet below. I like to workout 5-6 days per week. I keep track of my daily workouts.

Decorating-I print out pictures of decorating ideas and things I'd like to do in our home.

Cooking-I took a picture of this sheet below. I keep my running grocery list, a weekly menu and a list of daily chores that I need to get done.

Projects-That I want to work on, crafts I want to make, etc.

Lists-longer range to do lists, things we want to do around the house, gifts I need to buy, etc.

Goals-the personal goals that I have for myself and my family. I review these once a week.

I also have a pocket in front where I keep miscellaneous things. Right now I have a list of things that need to be done before I go back to work on August 8, bunco scorecards, a workout from a magazine, and a picture of a house that has beautiful landscaping.

This is my daily sheet. I plan what I'm going to do each day and write it on this sheet. I also like to keep track of what I eat (I'm doing WW) and keep track of the money I spend each day.

I'm home today so my sheet is pretty full. On days when I am working I only put one or two things on my to do list. If I put too much on my daily to do list I get overwhelmed and I feel like a failure if I don't get everything done.
These are the things I need to accomplish today
-work out
-water plants inside and out
-start organizing my basement craft area
-work outside in our flower beds
-return library books

This is the sheet where I keep track of my daily workouts. I like to see what I've accomplished week to week and track my progress.

I also like to plan what we are going to have every night for dinner. I find if I know what we are going to eat at home we tend to eat at home more. I also like to do a least one daily house chore so I don't have to spend all weekend cleaning my house. I am lucky because I have someone come clean our house every other week. So if I don't get to things or if I get too busy I know it will be cleaned. I feel so good when our house is clean and organized!

Here are some other blogs that really helped me in developing my home organization notebook.
Erin from Sunny Side Up.
Jennifer from Her Southern Charm

My home organization notebook has helped me SO much. I love it! I am MUCH happier if I am organized. If my house is clean and I know what I need to do each day I am much less stressed out and I am a more cheerful wife, mom and friend. I am happy to email you my sheets if you would like to use them. Thanks Erin for coordinating this link up!

Treasures from our trip!

2011-08-02T21:51:00.001-04:00

Graig likes to joke that my family does two things when we are together-eat and shop. My last trip home was no exception we ate A LOT and we shopped A LOT! We had a great time! I want to share some of my treasures that I got on this trip!

My sister and Vicki kept talking about this store called Stuff. It's a consignment store that sells upscale items. Usually I don't like consignment shops however after visiting Stuff I have changed my mind! It's a great store and we got some great things! Twice a year they have a 50% off sale and last Saturday was the day of the sale! We went on Friday to scope out what we wanted. Then we went back on Saturday morning and picked out some amazing things!
First I got 3 pairs of sandals for work. They all look like brand new! I also got the two pairs of flats at the outlet mall.

I had my eye on these dishes. I got a whole set (4 plates, 4 salad plates, 4 big bowls and a huge serving bowl) for $15! They sell this set at Target. I looked and a set of plates cost $15 so I was SO lucky to get the entire collection for $15!

I have a weakness for vases and planters so I got this yellow one for 1!

We also went to several antique stores and I picked up a few things

These darling salt and pepper shakers. I love the color of these!

A 2 quart mason jar. I have been looking for one of these and I'm so glad I found one!

A cute little wooden box.

We went to TJ Maxx one day while my sister was at work. To be nice I got her this flowered platter and she HATED it-ha ha! So I took it home and put it on top of our fridge.

Speaking of TJ Maxx one just opened in our little town over the weekend! I am SO happy. Ava and I went in there today and I got a pair of dress pants for work and this adorable colander. I think I'm going to spend a lot of time and money in that store!

Shelby and I always like to go to Hobby Lobby when we are together. The only thing I found this time were these little monogrammed hooks hang up in our front entry.

Shelby gave me this little coach wristlet. I LOVE it! Thanks Shel!

My Dad also got us a beautiful blanket which is currently being washed. I will show pictures of it soon. It was made at the Amana woolen mill in Amana, Iowa. We had a nice time visiting there!

I also got ALL of Brock's back to school shopping done in Iowa. This is the first year that Brock has actually wanted to go school shopping so it was fun to shop with him! Ava has SO many clothes that I want to go through all of her clothes before I buy her anything for back to school.

While we were gone Graig surprised me by re-doing the floors in our office. We had carpet in our office and it was nasty and gross. The wood looks SO much better. I love, love, love them!

Tomorrow is a big day for Brock he is having his tonsils taken out :( We have to be at the hospital at 6:30am

Tomorrow is also my sister Shelby's birthday! Happy Birthday! We love you so much!

Family photo shoot

2011-07-30T23:15:00.000-04:00

This morning before we left Shelby's house we decided to do a little photo shoot. Shelby and I had grand plans for this photo shoot but Ainsley was tired and a little fussy and my Dad was anxious to get on the road so in the end we were happy that we got any pictures at all!

This picture is actually from last night. We had pizza and ice cream cake to celebrate two birthdays-Brock and Shelby!

PaPa Bob with Brock, Ava and Ainsley.

This is from this morning Ava, Brock and Ainsley. Poor Ainsley Brock and Ava fought over her all week. The both wanted to hold her all the time!

Sisters with their girls!

Vicki, Ainsley and Shelby

Ainsley and Ava!

Brock, Ava, Ainsley and me

We had a great time visiting our family! Thanks Shelby and Ryan and Dad and Vicki for your wonderful hospitality :) Tomorrow morning we head back to NY!

our week at Shelby's!

2011-07-29T18:03:00.001-04:00

Monday morning we left my Dad's house to travel to my sister's house in Iowa. We were excited to see Ainsley and to see their new house! Warning-this post contains A LOT of pictures-ha ha!

Ryan, Ava feeding Ainsley and Brock

Brock feeding Ainsley. Ainsley is just like Shelby and LOVES to eat.

I love this picture of Ainsley. Shelby always has the cutest bows in her hair.

This is the best picture of Brock and Ainsley! He looks SO happy and she loves hanging out with her cousin Brock!

Brock was so good with Ainsley he loves holding her and playing with her. Brock and Ava fought about who got to hold Ainsley all week.

One day while Shelby was at work we took Brock on his first college tour at the University of Iowa. The campus is beautiful! Here is a picture of the old capital on campus. It was 100 degrees on the day of our tour. We decided that in the future we will only visit colleges in the spring or fall when it's cooler!

After leaving campus we headed to the mall to eat lunch and do a little shopping. While we were there Shelby and Ava took Ainsley on her first carousel ride!

I love this picture of the three of them. Ava looks SO happy to be holding Ainsley!

Ava on her horse!

Brock, Vicki and Dad

Here is Brock, Ava, me and Shelby

We also took Brock and Ava ice skating. Ava didn't really like it but Brock loved it! Here is in on the ice!

We have had a great time visiting with my family! We still have a few days left before we head home. Brock is getting his tonsils out net week so we are trying to squeeze out the last bit of summer fun before his operation. Happy Friday!!

Visiting Family!

2011-07-28T21:03:00.000-04:00

This week Brock, Ava and I have been in Illinois and Iowa visiting my family. It's been fun to spend time with them. We have been doing a lot of eating, shopping, hunting for antiques, swimming and loving on little Ainsley.
Here are some pictures from this fun week.

These are pictures from when we visited EIU. The University where my Mom, Dad, Shelby attended and where Shelby and I met our husbands! It was fun to go back and see all the changes.

Graig couldn't come with us this time but he asked me to take a picture of Brock on this hill at EIU that Brock loved playing on when he was a baby
As you can tell Brock is thrilled by taking all of these pictures!

About 5 seconds after this picture. Brock tripped Ava and she fell down the hill. They drive me CRAZY sometimes-ha ha!

We also visted Taylor Hall where we lived when Brock was born.

Here is Brock and Ava by our old front door

Here is Brock peeking in his old room. They are doing construction on our old apartment and no one is living in there now so it wasn't creepy that he was peeking in.

These pictures are all from last Sunday and Monday. I will show our pictures from Shelby's tomorrow.
Have a great night!

Ava's ballet camp

2011-07-25T18:55:00.001-04:00

For the past two weeks Ava has been spending her days at ballet camp. Friday was her last day and the studio put on a little show so we could see what the girls have been learning at camp. It was a cute show but SO hot! There is no AC in the studio and it was about 95 degrees outside on Friday. As soon as the show got over we got in the car and I turned the AC up to high and we drove to get ice cream right away to cool down.

I took about 50 pictures using the action setting on my camera. Ava knew I was taking her picture and didn't want to smile-ha ha! She is such a stinker sometimes!

Ava's "cousin" Eliza came to the show to see her. Ava was thrilled that she and her mom Sabrina were there!

After her recital we had to go up to campus so I could go to a reception. Ava went with me and she was THRILLED when she saw her favorite student Marissa! Marissa is an education major and is SO good with Ava. She always makes her feel so special. They have fun together! I love this picture of them.

We are visiting my family in Illinois and Iowa this week. I love, love, love being in Illinois. Even though we have lived in NY for 12 years I still feel like Illinois is my home and I am so happy to be back!

A new table

2011-07-23T09:43:00.001-04:00

A few weekends ago I went to a yard sale and found a beautiful old table for $10. I wrote about my table in this post. I left it on our deck for about a week and then I decided to bring it inside because it was just too nice to be outside.

We have an office with a computer desk but Graig and the kids use that desk all the time. I decided that I needed one of my own so I put the table in our living room and made it into a little desk for me. I think it's just perfect in our living room. I already LOVE having my own desk and space to work on projects and write my blog posts.

I also have another little table in our living room and while I was putting my desk together I decided to do a little rearranging on that table too. I just love the succulent plant I got at Lowe's.

We're off to Illinois today. I can't wait to see my family! Have a good weekend.

Recipe Time!

2011-07-21T21:41:00.002-04:00

It has been hot, hot, hot here. It's been so hot that Brock's baseball game scheduled for tonight was cancelled due to the extreme heat.

Yesterday was the second hottest day of the year and Sabrina, Allison and I thought it would be fun to make the jelly recipe that I posted last week. We sweated like crazy but the jelly was easy to make and 1 recipe made 6 jars so we each got to take home some. I tried some of the jelly tonight on a piece of toast and it was delish!! I'm SO going to make this again!

We had these cute little jelly jars that we put our jelly in, I think these would make cute gifts!

I have been going to farm stands to get fresh fruit and vegetables. Last weekend I got some zucchini and I wasn't sure what to do with it so I looked and found a weight watcher recipe for zucchini fries. The recipe is here. They turned out so good and they were really easy to make!

I buy fresh eggs every week from my friend who has chickens. Fresh eggs are delicious!! I have been making Kimba's (A Soft Place to Land) french toast at least once a week for a few months. Brock and Ava love this french toast! The recipe can be found here.

Next week we are going to be traveling to Illinois and Iowa to visit my Dad and my sister Shelby. We leave on Saturday and can't wait! Shelby and I want to try to make home made baby food for this little cutie.

Have you tried any new recipes this week?

Milk Glass

2011-07-17T21:51:00.000-04:00

This weekend was busy, busy, busy! Brock had 3 baseball games, 4 basketball games and Ava had ballet practice and went to a water park with our neighbors. I spent a little time on Saturday morning at garage sales with Allison and Sabrina. I got some cute plates, platters and a little table. I got one milk glass vase and it inspired me to change my whole dining room hutch around on Saturday night.

I have seen beautiful displays of milk glass that others have done and I wanted to see how my collection would look all in one place. Here is an entire website devoted to milkglass. I just found it tonight and it was very interesting to look through.

I have gotten every single piece of my milkglass at garage sales. When I see a piece I always buy it and I've never spent more than $3 an item. Usually it's $1 or less. I know that some of my pieces aren't real milkglass and I'm OK with that. It's just a fun collection that I like.

What do you collect?

Cute or ugly?

2011-07-15T22:13:00.000-04:00

Wednesday night Sabrina, Allison and I got together for a craft night. I love getting together with these two we always have so much fun! We decided to make rag wreaths using different colored ribbon and scrap fabric cut down to 6 inch strips. We tied the strips around our wreath forms. I didn't take a picture of this step but you just tie your strips to the wreath. We used all different colors and patterns.

I can't decide if I like it or not. Sometimes I look at it and think it's the cutest thing ever and sometimes I'm just not sure. What do you think?

Here it is hanging on the mirror in our dining room. This mirror was the first craft project Sabrina and I did I talk about the mirror project in this post.

And this boy is always cute! Brock LOVES baking here he is licking the spoon after making brownies-ha ha!

Have a good weekend!

Wednesday recipes!

2011-07-13T07:33:00.000-04:00

These are three summer recipes that look amazing! I printed these from online and I'm going to make them this weekend.
The first one is Grilled BBQ Potato Skins. This recipe is from the Neelys (love them!) on the Food Network. It combines two of my all time favorites potato skins and pulled pork. I think these will be amazing!
Here's a picture from their website

Another recipe I want to make this weekend is homemade salsa. I LOVE salsa and I don't really make it at home much. I found this recipe from the Pioneer Woman and I can't wait to try it. This is a picture from her blog. Doesn't this look SO good? She also has another recipe on her blog today that I want to try it's avacado egg salad. That sounds delish!

I have also been wanting to make strawberry freezer jam. I have never made jam or jelly but I think it would be fun to try. Everyone says this is easy to make so I want to try it!
Here is a picture from the Kraft website.

What summer recipes do you want to make?

Things that make me happy!

2011-07-12T11:51:00.000-04:00

It has been SO hot and miserable here. I love summer but this heat and humidity have got to go! I'm having one bad hair day after another-ha ha.

Anyway, I am going to concentrate on the good things instead of the things that are driving me crazy so here are some things that are making me happy today.

I picked this bunch of flowers from my garden to put on our dining room table.

Here is a close up of one of the sunflowers. I planted my sunflowers in a huge pot this year and they are very happy there. They have been blooming for a couple of weeks now.

Here is my summer centerpiece. My poor little succulent in the apothecary jar has seen better days. I still love the idea of having succulents in jars. I just bought a new one that I need to plant in this jar. Hopefully this one will live!

I love these little stem vases I got at Target. I filled them with flowers from our yard.

This is another succulent plant I got at Lowe's. I put it in a silver bowl I got at a garage sale.

I love potted sunflowers. I bought this one last week and I love it!

This is a table that I got at a yard sale for $10! I have a ton of tables but this one was so cheap and in such good condition I couldn't pass it up. This is an in-progress project. Last weekend I spray painted it turquoise This weekend I want to put our monogram on it or paint some chevron stripes...or do both! I haven't decided yet.

I really want to be more organized so I bought this book on Amazon yesterday. I can't wait to read it.

I also saw this idea on the Real Simple website and I thought it was great. This is a snack station for your fridge. So when you or your kids need a snack they can go into this container and get a quick snack. I am going to make one of these for us this week.

What is making you happy today?

Our weekend!

2011-07-10T20:57:00.000-04:00

This weeknd was SO fun!!Friday night Brock, Ava and I went to to spend the night with my mother in law Janice. We never do this because she lives close to us but I'm glad we did because it was a fun night!
She spent a couple of years renovating a old house in the beautiful village of Cooperstown. Which is home to the Baseball Hall of Fame and many gorgeous homes.

I have always admired Janice's decorating which is a relaxed and casual style. She loves to entertain and she thinks of everything! When you go to her house you always feel welcomed by her comfortable home.
Here are some pictures from her house.

This is her living room which is right off the kitchen. I love her corner fireplace!

This is her beautiful kitchen! She painted the cabinets off white and she just added the copper sink and back splash. I would LOVE to have this kitchen. We were getting ready to go shopping when I was taking these pictures and Ava was doing her hair-ha ha!

She is right in town but she has a huge lot. Here is a view from her back porch. I love her tall trees and barn. I will take some pictures of the inside of the barn next time I visit. She has done that over and it's really nice inside.

Saturday during the day we went to the mall because Brock needed to get some new clothes. The only thing I got was this adorable pillow from Target. It's going to go on our bed. I love it!

Saturday night my friend Inez invited a few of our friends up to her Dad's condo for a girls night to celebrate her birthday and our friend Sabrina's birthday. We have never done this before but I am SO glad we did. It was nice to get away and talk and visit without or kids and husbands.

I am so mad a myself we were having so much fun at the condo that I did not take any pictures-uggh! I did get a few at dinner.

Inez, Sabrina, Stacie and Alisha

Alisha and me

Here are two of the yummy cocktails that we had during our dinner!

This morning it was back to reality! I came home and worked around the house. It is so beautiful out today so this evening I sat on our deck and gave myself a mani/pedi. I used Essie's Big Spender, this might be my new favorite summer color!

This week is going to be busy for Brock and Ava. Ava starts ballet camp and Brock is going to start agility camp (which is basically a running camp that the HS basketball coach sponsors). Have a good week!

Craft Projects

2011-07-08T16:48:00.001-04:00

Here are two craft projects that I found on different blogs that I want to try to make very soon. I feel like I always have some type of project in the works. Thankfully Graig, Brock and Ava are

This bar cart is just perfect and it combines two of my absolute favorite things-monograms and a bar cart!
I made a bar cart for our sun room earlier this summer and I have done many posts about my love of monograms.

Isn't it adorable? I need to find one of these carts and when I do I am going to come right home and make this for our deck. Kim from Keller creative has a step by step tutorial on how to make this cart.

I love, love, love this star burst mirror that I found on the Katie's blog. I adore her blog and her sweet little girl Ellie! She links to a blog that has step by step instructions. I need to make one of these very soon!

Here is Katie's room

I think it would look perfect hanging above our new bedroom. Here is the link to my mini bedroom makeover that I did earlier this month.

Happy Friday!! I have a fun weekend planned with my family and some friends. I can't wait to show you the pictures next week.

Smile!

2011-07-07T16:30:00.002-04:00

This has been the perfect summer week! It's been beautiful here in NY and we have spent a lot of time outside enjoying this great weather. Ava has had a good time spending the week with her Grandma Jan (except for last night when she got home sick and wanted to come home-ha ha) and Brock has been playing baseball games in the evenings and going to basketball camp during the days. Graig and I grilled out steaks and got to eat dinner on the deck on Tuesday night which was really nice!

Here are some things that made me smile this week.

As you have probably noticed Brock is not one for smiling in pictures. I love his smile but he hates smiling in pictures. After 13 (almost 14-yikes) years of me being his personal paparazzi and taking his picture all the time he is probably sick of me sticking a camera in his face. So I was especially happy when I took looked at these pictures I took of him at a baseball game last weekend and I saw him smiling!!

He said he saw me taking his pictures and he knew it would make me happy. He can be so sweet!

Here is a picture of Brock and his friend Connor after the game. Brock is trying really hard not to smile.

I know I missed recipe Wednesday yesterday and this is the only recipe I tried last week. It's called Jello Cake and it's really good! Click here for the recipe.

I also love this new succulent plant I got at Lowe's. I love it so much I got a second one for our living room!

Tonight Brock has a basketball game so we are going to that and I hope we have time to eat out and do some shopping after his game!

Summer Fun: Baseball and Shake-ups

2011-07-02T12:22:00.001-04:00

Sadly my "stay-cation" is coming to an end :( I go back to work on Tuesday. Luckily, I love my job so going back to work isn't hard. I'm actually excited to go back and to get to work on some summer projects, the college students will be back in mid-August!

Last night Brock had a baseball game and after the game I was able to take a couple of pictures of the team.
Most of them were not interested in having their picture taken and this is the best one I could get.

I also took one of Brock and his good friend George. I love these boys and their smelly baseball stuff that is always in my house.

I also am happy to report that I started making homemade lemon shakeups like you get at the fair. I always go to a stand like this at our summer fair.

Yesterday I decided to make my own. I added some sugar (just enough to cover the bottom of the plastic cup), ice, juice from one freshly squeezed lemon and I also added the juiced lemon halves. Then I poured the ingredients from one cup to another until the sugar was dissolved and then I poured the shake-up to my glass. Today I ran out of lemons so I used two limes instead. I think this would also be good with an orange.

Cute lemon shake-up glass from my sister Shelby.

Have a good Saturday! I'm off to a baseball game and then to the store to get more lemons :)

Master Bedroom Makeover

2011-07-01T15:02:00.001-04:00

This week I decided to give our bedroom a little makeover. I have been looking FOREVER for a new comforter or quilt for our bed. We have a king size bed and everything I have liked is SO expensive. I didn't want to spend a lot of money so I decided to go to Wal-Mart to see that they had. Also we live in a small town so it's really the only place to shop-ha ha! I found an adorable quilt from the Better Homes and Gardens collection for only $26! I couldn't believe it. I also got some shams and they were only $6 each.

I also brought in accessories and pictures that I had in other areas of our house to complete the mini-makeover!

Ta-da! Here is the whole room. I love the way it turned out and it feels so comfortable. I love being in my room now!

This is the window seat bench in our room. I bought 2 shams for this area and added two blue pillows that I already had.

I brought up this crock from down stairs. It has all my magazines and some books in it.

This is Graig's night stand that I showed yesterday. I bought this last weekend at a yard sale for $2. It fits perfectly in the little space between our bed and the window.

The top picture my friend Sabrina made for me. The bottom picture I bought at the Dollar General. Like I said shopping options are limited in our small town-ha ha!

I bought these hooks from Wal-Mart to organize my necklaces.

This is our new gallery wall. The artwork was made by Brock and Ava that I had hanging up in other places in our house. The shutter I had in our garage. I cleaned it up and added some pictures to it. I saw this idea on a blog but I forgot which one. If it's your blog thank you! I loved this idea when I saw it.

This is my night stand. The little pitcher holds some nailpolish, lotion and some pens.

I love having a lot a lot of pillow on our bed it makes our bed some cozy and comfortable. Brock laid down on our bed and he said with all of the pillows he felt like he was in a hotel-ha ha!

This is Graig's dresser. I got the white bowl for his wallet, keys, etc. The clear glass jar is for change.

This is my dresser. I bought the turquoise tray at an antique store. The little turquoise bowl is from anthropologie and I put my earrings in it.

I love having fresh flowers on my dresser. I got these from our garden.

I hope you liked our master bedroom mini-makeover! Happy Friday! I'm so glad it's the weekend. We have a fun weekend planned-garage sailing, baseball games, a cookout, a date night for Graig and me!

Yard Sale Finds!

2011-06-30T13:40:00.000-04:00

I am one yard sale away from being featured on the show Hoarders-ha ha! My friends Sabrina, Allison and I go bright and early every Saturday to look for treasures for our homes. We always leave at about 7:30 in the morning. You have to go early to get the best stuff!
Here are some of the things that I have found recently. They have found some great stuff too,. Hopefully they will put their treasures on their blogs too!

I love this silver pitcher. I keep it in our kitchen and I hide our sunscreen and bug spray in it.

I got this huge pineapple for $1 last weekend. I think it's adorable.

Ava found this antique oil can at a yard sale in our neighborhood. I spray painted it turquoise.

This is one of my favorite yard sale finds-an antique bird cage. I love the yellow color.

I think I might have already showed this before but I just adore it. We got these windows for free from a guy that was putting in new windows in his house. I just took it home and cleaned it up and put it on my wall above our fireplace.

I spray painted these red chargers turquoise and all of the plates, the bowl, the cloth napkin and napkin ring are all from yard sales! I love getting dishes at yard sales. You can find some really cute ones!

This little table that I painted is another of my favorite yard sale finds. This table was only $1!

I had to leave early one weekend and Sabrina and Allison picked this milk glass for me. I love it!

I got this table for $2 at a yard sale last weekend. I painted it...wait for it...turquoise and now Graig uses it as his nightstand!

So I guess I should by stock in that turquoise spray paint after looking at all these pictures together I realize I use that color a lot-ha ha! We are going to go again this weekend. I can't wait to show you what we find! Happy Thursday!