Our Thanksgiving

I am the type of person that loves to lounge around in my pj's on Thanksgiving, with all my family around me, cooking up a huge feast in the kitchen with all the ladies, and watching football after a full belly. But this year my FIL invited my husband and I (and the kids of course!) to a nice hotel for brunch with him and his parents. Since we haven't seen his parents since 2007 (when Gav was only a year old! & they hadn't met Kenna yet) we decided not to decline. We went to a super nice resort style hotel nearby and had the biggest most delicious brunch ever, then we walked around the hotel and took pictures. Here are some pictures from our day:



Daddy & Gavin at brunch




My mini monster!




Our attempt at a family picture.




My babies




Kenna & Uncle Conner





A better family picture!



Hubbs and I :)

Four Generations.

The whole group

Me & my man



She fell asleep on the way home





My little man with Santa's elf!



After brunch, we went home and relaxed, then had another big Thanksgiving feast with my MIL. I think I gained at least 10 lbs this weekend. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday too!

Visit Kris' Grandparents.

I'm thankful for...

I am incredibly thankful for my wonderful husband who works so hard to provide for us. I'm thankful to have two happy, healthy children. I'm thankful for all of my wonderful in laws, they are all so good to my husband and I and they treat me as if I were there own. I am thankful to have a roof over my head, for my husband to have two good jobs, and that I am able to stay home with my babies and watch them grow. I am thankful Gav has started pre-k this year (3 hours for mommy!) and that he loves it so much! I am thankful that my husband's grandparents came to visit us for Thanksgiving, they were so happy to see the kids and we were so happy to see them! I could go on and on, I am thankful for so many things in my life right now. I am one blessed lady :)

I am also thankful that we've finally gotten the cool weather! It was in the 40's today!! Yesssss

I hope you all are having a wonderful holiday & if you're planning on going black Friday shopping... be careful & safe!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

I'm jealous

The high for today was 75 degrees. The kids and I went to the park at 10 o'clock this morning wearing shorts and tank tops. How is that possible? It is the end of November, we are days away from Thanksgiving and I am still having to put the AC on during the day & keep my fan on at night so I don't break out in a sweat under the covers. Kenna is still sleeping in her shorts and tank top pj's...  She should be in full head to toe flannel onesies by now! I'm so sick of the heat. Don't get me wrong, I'm so so so so happy that we're finally in the 70's but I'm so so so jealous of all the Northerners that are getting snow right now. Boy, what I would give to bundle my kids up and play in the snow with them right now.

A few weeks ago, it was pretty cool out and we were wearing coats and boots. Where did that weather go? I'm hoping we'll see some snow this year... Even if it's just a little glimpse!

::fingers crossed for some snow this year::

Holiday Cards From Shutterfly

There is no question Shutterfly has the most gorgeous (and reasonably priced!!) Holiday cards! I get all of our Christmas cards, birthday cards, invitations, announcements, everything from them! I have been ordering cards from them since Gavin was born. You're sure to find a card you love in their huge selection. Here are just a few of my favorites this year...

 How cute are those?? As you can tell, I like the black backgrounds with a pop of color but if that's not your thing, Shutterfly has tons of other styles to choose from. You can get folded cards, flat cards, stationary cards... There is an endless amount of designs. And you can get them for as little as $.32 each, you can't beat that! Now I just need to get some adorable pictures of the kids (that'll be the hard part ;)) So what are you waiting for?? Go order your Holiday cards from Shutterfly!

Cooking FAIL

I'm not a big fan of pork but we had a pork shoulder in the freezer and I needed to cook it up asap (it's been in there for a while). So I started looking for a good crock pot recipe. I came across a lot of them but nothing that sounded appealing to me. Then I found one from a blog and it sounded better than any of the others I'd seen so I decided to try it out. All the ingredients sounded good to me and I had them all on hand. As I was throwing them all in the crock pot I got a whiff of the apple cider vinegar (which I have never used before) and almost gagged. Guh-ross. I thought for a second I may have just ruined the pork, then thought maybe it would cook out and wouldn't be so strong after 10 hours in the crock pot.

I should have listened to my first instinct.

It was totally disgusting. I was so disappointed. I'm never ever ever using apple cider vinegar again. I couldn't even eat the pork. Hubbs and the kids wouldn't eat it either. My MIL said she liked it so at least it's not going to waste. I think she was just being nice though!

Total fail. I should just stick to chicken and beef.

Christmas is just around the corner

I am so ready to put up our tree and start decorating the house! I know Christmas is only weeks away but it hasn't seemed that way until recently. We're finally getting some cool weather down here, and have to put on coats before we leave the house. I can wear my uggs now :) & there is Christmas music on the radio! Is it too early to put up the tree??? Hubbs and my MIL both say I'm crazy and it's way too early to put the tree up but I cant wait another week!!

Here are a few items on my Christmas list this year...

The 50mm f/1.8 II lens for my camera

 

A day at the spa for some nice massages, facials, and pampering.



This beautiful gold tone watch from fossil. I love the color and the white face.

Those are just a few things from my list ;) Now I'm off to hunt for black Friday ads and start deciding what to get the kiddos for Christmas!

A little of this & a little of that

Gahhh. Kenna was running a 103 degree fever last night!!! Freaked me out! I took her straight to the DR at 9am this morning. Found out she has a bad ear infection, and that's on top of the two teeth she's getting right now. She has been suuuuperrr cranky. Poor thing. DR gave her an antibiotic and some claritin for her congestion so she should be feeling better by Sunday evening.

So it's Friday night. I just finished clipping and organizing tons of coupons. I went through our local supermarket ads and made a long grocery list. Tomorrow I'm going to head to Walmart and try to save loads of money by price matching and using coupons on top of sales. Money is pretty tight for us right now so I'm trying to find ways to cut back as much as I can. Hopefully this will help! If any of you money-saving-mommies have any tips, I would greatly appreciate them.

My car died AGAIN. I really need to just get rid of the POS and get a new one but that's not an option at the moment. So for the time being I'm taking my MIL to work in the mornings and using her car during the day. It sucks but at least she's willing to help me out and let me use her car for a little while! That's a blessing :)

In house news, our realtor sent a stager to our house Thursday. We were sitting at the dinner table Wednesday night, kind of laughing about it and wondering what in the world this stager was going to come in our house and change. Turns out she was GREAT! She totally re-vamped our whole house, using our OWN pieces. It's amazing how she made the house look so different. I will try to get some before and after pics up soon!

We don't really have plans this weekend. Just going to sit around and relax, and enjoy the cool weather we'll have. Hoping our little Kenna bug will be feeling better soon! Hope ya'll have an amazing weekend :)

A Delicious Dinner

Last night we had roasted prime rib and a cheesy spinach rice bake. It was delicious. We spoiled ourselves with such a yummy meal. I meant to take pictures of the entrees right out of the oven but went ahead and made my plate first! So these are not the best pictures but hey, at least I got a few before the food was gone...

I was so nervous about making the prime rib because it is such a pricey piece of meat, and I did not want to mess it up! My MIL got it on sale a few weeks ago and we've had it stored in the freezer until I worked up the courage to roast it.

I find a lot of my recipes through food.com. I like that site because people give great reviews on the recipes and then I know how to tweak it to my family's tastes. There is a user on food.com called Kittencalskitchen she has the yummiest recipes! She always gets raving reviews about how good her recipes are. The two dishes I made last night are both from her. HERE is the prime rib. & HERE is the spinach Parmesan rice bake.

I am going to try out her Chicken Crescent Roll Casserole on Thursday.

So there you have it, my secret recipe finder! Now you can go find something yummy to make for dinner tonight :)

Menu Plan Monday

Sunday: Chinese Take-Out

Monday: Prime Rib Roast and Spinach Parmesan Rice Bake

Tuesday: Lemon Chicken and Roasted Potatoes & Broccoli with Cheese Sauce
Wednesday: Tortellini with Ashley's Red Sauce and Italian Sausage

Thursday: Chicken Crescent Roll Casserole

Friday: Hamburgers and Homemade Mac N Cheese

Saturday: Pizza

A house update

We got an offer on the house :)

But it was a low-ball offer :/

I'm hating that this is such a buyer's market right now. But I know that when our house sells, and it's time for us to find a new house, I'll be loving that it's still a buyer's market. I'm trying to stay positive, can you tell?

The house around the corner that's exactly like ours and priced $13,000 less... is under contract. I have mixed feelings about that. That makes less competition for us, but I'm super jealous it sold so fast.

We spent most of our weekend steam-cleaning carpets, vacuuming, wiping down counters, scrubbing showers, toilets and floors, doing laundry, and sprucing up the house for the open house. I even made some cookies to sit out on the counter! Only to find out that after exhausting ourselves with all that... one person showed up at the open house. I was so bummed. I can only hope we'll have some showings this week... while the house is still clean.

We did some sprucing up in pretty much every room in the house. Here is a before and after picture of the study (which we're using as a sitting room).

BEFORE

The hideous couch belonged to hubbs' grandparents, so my MIL hates the thought of getting rid of it. It was such an eye sore but with a $35 slip cover and some $7 pillows (I love Kohl's!), it looks like a whole new couch :) We took the lamp from another room, and the picture on the wall is one from mine and hubbs old house so those two updates were free!

AFTER

Even though the open house didn't go as planned, at least the house is spotless and we have a whole batch of chocolate chip cookies to eat! ...still thinking positive...

Is it already Monday?

Well, not quite but in a few hours it will be!

We had a good weekend... spent a lot of time getting ready for the open house we had Sunday (more on that tomorrow).

Saturday, Gav's grandpa (hubbs' dad) picked Gav up and they had a guys day. They went to lunch, saw a movie, and went shopping for some new clothes! While they were doing that, Kenna and I went out to lunch with my MIL and SIL, and we did some shopping of our own :) I forgot how much quieter it is with just one child! When the kids are together, they're always egging eachother on and seeing who can scream the loudest. With just one kid on my hands, I didn't have to yell at anyone or make any threats! Haha, no but seriously... It was a good day.

Sunday just flew by for us. And daylight savings has completley thrown us off. Kenna was up at 6am today!!! Then went to bed at 6:30 pm so I can expect another early morning tomorrow. Hopefully she'll adjust pretty fast and we'll be back in our normal routine.

Hope you all had a fabulous weekend!

Friday Follow

Have a happy weekend :)

Hubb's near death experience

So Kris called me in a panic last night on his way home from work.

Apparently he was on the service road, about to get onto the ramp to the highway when his brake light came on. He tapped his brakes, and the car didn't slow down. So he starts banging his foot on the brake pedal, and all the lights on his dashboard light up. Every one of them. He starts freaking out, swerves across three lanes of traffic and makes a sharp turn in an empty parking lot. He throws the car in neutral, then in park, and shuts it off. While he's trying to catch his breath and take in what just happened, he calls me.

I was in shock and didn't know what to think, so I drove out to meet him while he waited for a tow truck. The tow truck picked up his car and took it to the dealership last night and we were waiting on the call this morning letting us know what's wrong with it. Toyota calls and says they cant find anything wrong with the car, that there are no signs of any problems, and that he can come pick up his car whenever he would like.

Uhm, are you kidding me? I consider that thing a death trap now and don't ever want to get in it again. Wasn't Toyota going through some re-calls a few months back for something like this? Kris has a 2007 Toyota Camry Hybrid and when the recall took place, he took his car up there and had them "fix" the problem. But obviously it's not fixed. It was raining pretty hard last night and they're trying to tell us that he lost traction and that's why the brakes weren't working. Kris knows what it feels like when he looses traction, and he says that's not what happened... and that doesn't explain why every light on the dashboard lit up.

I don't know what to think about all of this and am seriously afraid to get back in that car. Especially with the kids. What if this happens again but we're on a highway going 70 mph and cant stop? Yeah it could happen, then what???

Happy Halloweeeeen

While Halloween is not one of my favorite holidays, it sure is at the top of the kids list. They absolutely love getting all dressed up and going trick-or-treating. Then they come home and are on a sugar rush for the next week! What's not to love, right?!

Here are some pictures from our Halloween filled weekend...

The creepy pumpkin Gav carved with Daddy

My little NINJA!!!



Playing games at his school's Fall Festival



My pink skeleton munchin on some candy



Finally time for trick-or-treating. The ninja & the cheetah



I love how Spongebob is the only one cheesin' in this picture....

Scaring his sister with the bat.



 Haha I love the last picture, Kenna did not know what to think about that scary skeleton. She stood there and stared at it for the longest time.

Hope you all had a fun-filled Halloween weekend too :)