so about last night...

W had lots of reading to do as he is in the middle of catching up with classes from the snow days. Did I mention it snowed here..again? Probably not because snow days mean nothing to me since I work from home. Really, I don't like them anymore. Back to last night...

With W reading a million pages, I decided I would catch up on my magazine stack with a glass of wine and candle. Sounds so relaxing, right? Caught up in the moment, I went to put my glass of wine on the table without looking and next thing you know I'm saying screaming "W, I need your help now."

Enter W. The scene - red wine splattered on the light colored cloth ottoman, light colored cloth sectional, and light colored braided rug. oops.

A: "Get damp paper towels and dab, NOT rub"
W: "How did you manage this? Seriously, tell me the truth about what happened."
A: "I don't know. Really, I don't. It just fell out of my hand. You see I was just about to tell you that my hands have been falling asleep and..."

Enough of the play by play, but that was really the convo and it continued in that same fashion. We decided to  break out the Resolve because the dabbing wasn't completely working. After everything was sprayed, I needed to wipe off the table where the glass (unshattered) with a little bit of wine left was still sitting. W stepped out to get more paper towels and before he could return he heard a shatter and "uh oh, I need more towels." Yes, I managed to knock the glass off the table, splatter more red wine on the couch (different cushion) and break the glass this time. My what-else-can-you-do-but-laugh reflex kicked in and let's just say W's did not :) He stepped out of the room for a breather and heard "click/snap." As he walked in, I was taking a picture of the disaster instead of cleaning because it was such an unbelievable series of events that I had to document it. I will refrain from posting those pictures as I don't think that action was viewed favorably.

A roll of papers towels and flashlight inspection of the rug later, we retreated to the two unstained cushions on the sectional with a new glass of red wine.

I have not built up the courage to check out the victims today, but last night they seemed to be healing nicely.

Cheers!
A

List

It's been a while since I've done a list post. Here's your randomness for the day.

• I wish it were Spring or Fall
• Social Computing. My nerd side often thinks about this concept and how much it has changed or is changing our face to face social skills. With just returning from a conference, I have especially been thinking about it over the past week. Are you different through email, facebook, IM, blog, etc than in person? Does it take you longer to be "yourself" in person than virtually? For me, yes. This bothers me. I dream of a world sometimes without technology. 
• I know I'm not old but it is amazing how much you learn about yourself and admit to the more mature older you get. Embrace yourself.
• Getting a little too deep...reverse. There are pros and cons to working from home. One that has been on my mind lately is when your coworkers switch from humans to dogs, the gas levels greatly increase, especially when they sleep under your desk all day. Wooooof
• My cousin(s) is awesome and adorable. http://www.wistv.com/global/category.asp?c=195964&clipId=5502277&topVideoCatNo=174353&autoStart=true 
• I miss Winter Break. This slightly contradicts the first bullet. I don't mean this in regards to the weather. I miss it just as much as I will miss summer break come fall.
• The lack of consistency in punctuation with this post is driving me bananas, but I refuse to go back and edit. 
• I can't spell "bananas" without singing the song, b-a-n-a-n-a-s
• I'm craving a second honeymoon. You know, the kind where you do nothing but lay on the beach or a float for seven days straight and eat enough food to gain five pounds. I think the combination of an awesome Vegas vacation and Brit's upcoming adventure (I'll let her provide details) makes me want to just keep living that life. see photo above since it won't cooperate and move down here.

What's the positive version of "when it rains, it pours" because that's how I'm feeling today

I hope to have a great recipe or two to post soon

A

Long Time No Blog

Let's not even talk about how long it's been.


Grandma (never tell her I called her that) said it best - this was one of the best Christmases yet. True. We were able to spend time with most of our family - both sides. I am so glad we could make that work. One of the best things about Christmas was W was on break! It was wonderful having a husband again for three weeks. (Thanks for working so hard, W.)

Visitors and Happy 50th!


Right after Christmas, Brit and J came back to the East Coast for 10 days and we got to spend every single day with them. Wish we could do that every month, or every day would be great too. We stayed busy seeing family but had plenty of time to take it easy and hang out. Miss you guys so much!

We headed up to Oak Island for a few days to see mom and dad and celebrate their 50th birthdays! Us kids surprised mom and dad with an evening out on the town in Wilmington.

We spent lots of time in our pajamas, harvesting oysters and mussels from the backyard, eating lots of yummy food, and playing games.

Vegas


I just returned from one of the best vacations. Brit, Dad, and I had work travel scheduled that allowed us to easily meet up in Vegas for a father/daughters vacation. We ate lots of great food, saw awesome shows (Phantom and cirque du soleil mystere), drove past the Hoover Dam, and danced, j-j-just dance. We were enjoying each moment so much that we never remembered our cameras and only got a few pics with Brit's phone.

Clockwise: fountains at Bellagio, amazing view while at Hoover Dam, Hoover Dam (so busy talking that we drove 15 miles past it the first time), clubbin' it with Pop Daddy and Glee*

*The cast of Glee was celebrating a birthday at the bar club we went to. While we remained a few tables away and never met any of them, we were still pretty excited to have a celebrity(ies) sighting.

Thanks, Dad, for an amazing trip. We missed you, Mom!

Hopefully I'll get back in the swing of things and it won't be so long until the next post.

A

Under Construction

Pardon the "oops" as we reconstruct

One of my favorite places...

is Oregon. There are so many things to love about Oregon. The food, the wine, the beer, the mountains, the ocean, the people, the music, and on and on and on. I recently went to Bend, OR for work. I got there a day early and did a hike at Smith Rock State Park. It was only about 30 minutes from the airport and had some incredible views.

Back to reality at home, though and it's snow, snow, snow! There have been some HUGE icicles and lots of inches of snow.

We went and cut down our own Christmas tree this year...soo much fun! We made a day out of it and finally found our perfect tree just as it was getting dark. We had to cut some of the bottom off to get it in the front door, so I made a wreath with the leftovers. Isn't that what Christmas is all about.....leftovers?

Hope you had a wonderful Christmas!

We are headed back to the Carolinas tomorrow.....yee haw!!

"To the sweet, sunny South, take me home"

B

Bloga what?

Oh, hiiii! It's been a while, I know. Again, life got in the way. This little thing called a j-o-b, the holidays, and exams are a few of my excuses.

No need to talk about the job, as it is well, just that a job and it pays the bills, has great perks, and I'm very thankful for it.

Is it really December? I feel like everyone is saying that, but seriously wow time flew by. Let me back up to Thanksgiving because I think a lot of you will be shocked by our Thanksgiving this year. Wes and I were fortunate enough to enjoy Thanksgiving with both of our parents and one sibling (Missed you so much Brit and J). Mom and Dad hosted us, my brother in law (really, he can be referred to as my brother because I love him dearly), and my mother and father in law (same as above goes here). Wes and I came up with this idea because we wanted to be with everyone and didn't want to have to pick one family over the other. We sprang it on Mom and Dad and their two month old house. We had no idea how unusual it was to have both families together for a holiday until we told people and got their reactions. Maybe our family is different and we didn't see an issue until "outsiders" made us concerned. No concern was necessary as it was a perfect Thanksgiving with the exception of W having to study to gear up for exams. I hope this wasn't the one and only time we celebrate a holiday like this. Thanks Mom and Dad for opening your brand new home to everyone, allowing us to catch your deck on fire (true story), and giving us all the opportunity to gain 5+ lbs with the abundance of delicious food. (Sorry no pics)

Exams started right after Thanksgiving and they end in just a few days. Hallelujah! I can't believe we almost have one semester under our belt. Yes, this is a we thing because I watch W study :) That is creepy. I really don't stare at him. Anywho, holy dedication and determination from this boy. Go boy!

Since I can't go a post without mentioning food/cooking, I must say I've been cooking up a storm lately. It is my outlet. My outlet for organizing, planning, thinking, and trying to please others as I love to see W's reaction to the meal. Since the end of October, we've had at least one soup a week and I don't think we've had any repeats. Here are some of our favorites:

White Turkey Chili (used leftover Tgiving turkey and a can of rotel in place of the jalapeño and red pepper)
Bean and Chicken Sausage Stew
Baked Potato Soup
Two Bean Soup and Kale
Butternut Squash Minestrone (I can't find the recipe for this best W really liked it)
Chili - We've struggled here. I've tried vegetarian and beef chili and can't find the perfect one. Send your favorites my way, please.

Along with soups, my goal was to try one new recipe a week. Many of the soups took care of this goal but I continued to aim to try new recipes. Here are some of our recent non-soup favorites:

Cornbread (add 1/2C to 1C of corn kernels to the batter and we say it's the best semi-healthy cornbread recipe)
Roasted Butternut Squash and Bacon Pasta (per W it got a 5. this makes sense to you if you remember me talking here about our ranking)
Fajitas (per W "these might be the best fajitas I've ever had." Hooray! We cooked them on the grill, used chicken and cheated with a box of fajita rice)
Chicken and Rice Casserole (used leftover Tday turkey. This was a favorite of mine. It was comfort food)
Italian Drip Beef (I hate the name, but holy deliciousness.Make sure you top with cheese (havarti or provolone) and place it under the broiler. You're welcome. We've tried both recipes in that link and the Italian Drip is the way to go.)
Athenian Pasta Primavera (Would be a great Spring or Summer meal.)

Here's a final one for you that is great when sweet potatoes are on sale for $0.28 like they were the other week. No need to buy pumpkin pie spice, just use nutmeg, cloves, ginger, and cinnamon or google a substitute.
Sweet Potato Pecan Bars (click on the link and scroll down)

I feel the need to explain that I am not saying my cooking is spectacular, wonderful, unbelievable, yum, etc by my comments above. It is the recipes that are delicious and yummy. I simply follow a recipe.

A few things to note about some of the recipes and ingredients above:

• If a recipe calls for beans, we use dried beans that I've soaked, cooked, and froze. I try to avoid the canned beans now because of all the sodium and other unnecessary ingredients. If you plan in advance, it is just as convenient as canned beans.
• Butternut Squash...what a pain. Cooking and peeling it is annoying and I didn't find much enjoyment in it. Neither recipe above used an entire one so I froze the remaining amount of squash and used it for the second one. Worked just as well.
• Wherever a recipe calls for all purpose flour, I use whole wheat and you can't tell a difference so why not.
• Along the lines of the flour, we use brown rice, not white.

If you're still with me, stay warm and enjoy the excitement of the holidays!
A

Catching Up

Well, it's been quite a while since I posted anything. I've been traveling for the new j-o-b while trying to stay on top of emails, emails, emails.

Here's what's been going on...

I've been seeing more and more white falling from the sky. The dogs are loving it!

Even with the temps dropping and some white on the ground, radishes were hanging on strong.

I've finally finished my office. After finishing my desk, James put together a quick DIY shelf. We found a plank of wood on our property, and I found these two brackets for $20 at an antique store. And there you have a shelf for scarves and bags. We found the big cedar chest in North Carolina at an antique store. It's great for sweaters and other bulky items that take up space in drawers.

One other DIY project that James and I did together is a coat rack. We needed a place for hats, rain gear and heavy coats. I found this old piece of fence on our property and we cut it down smaller with a skill saw. (My first time using a skill saw! It kind of makes you feel like a bad ass.) Then, we screwed on some rustic curtain rod brackets that I found for a $1 each. I love this $4 project.

We're off to Flagstaff to visit friends for Thanksgiving!! One of the many benefits of living out west...we get to see great friends that were once too far away.

Have a great week!

B