New House

Front outside

Standing at the front door, looking to the left, there is the living room!

Standing at the front door, looking straight ahead .

First guest bed ... the entire right wall is a closet. Probably the craft room.

Standing in the hallway, door leads to the garage, looking into the hallway bathroom.                                                          

Hallway bathroom - shower, tub, sink, toilet

Guest bedroom - shelves are staying!

Master bedroom

Master bathroom

Kitchen ... and relator. :)

Standing at the back door, looking through the dining room into the living room. Kitchen is on the left. 

Before I'm 25

This is not a "25 Before 25" list.  I think I made one of those on my old blog, and filled it with things I would love to do, however they were mostly expensive and not attainable with the amount of vacation time that we are given at our jobs.

This list will most likely not have 25 things (I'm thinking of things as I write), but it will have a few things that I need to do or think about.

1. Realize that 25 isn't really that old. My baby clock isn't ticking yet, even though I think it is.

2. Complete my yellow and gray bedroom.  We are moving into our first house in December, and the bedroom is my first priority. Here are some ideas I have:

This is the bedspread we currently have.

We currently have this hanging on our wall as well. I want this hanging on one wall. The attractive man in this picture can stay too, I suppose. :)

I want a gallery wall like this. I found a bunch of yellow/gray/teal prints on Etsy that I am asking to have printed for Christmas. I want to put them all in white frames. Maybe the gallery can be on the same wall as the "LOVE" letters?

I want these curtains from Ikea.

I want to make this headboard ... shutters will probably be white or light yellow.

I want this dresser from Ikea

 I will probably paint the walls a really light gray and I also have a dark gray chair my aunt is giving us, if we ever bring a vehicle to Colorado that it will actually fit into.  It used to be my great-grandma's chair. My aunt reupholstered it and it is so cute now!

3. Get more involved with God. We really struggle with personal Bible study. We can barely make it to church some Sundays. I really think it would be good for us to do something together and maybe separately as well.

4. I hate the phrase "bloom where you're planted," but it's the best phrase I can think of for this next one. I want to be happier here, complain about Oklahoma less, let Garrett know that I want to stay here, he isn't the one forcing me to live here.

5. Actually pray for people.  I often say, "I'll be praying for you!" I often forget about it 10 minutes later. I want to work on that.

6. Go to somewhere I avoid because of bad memories, and make a good memory there.

7. Eat healthier. I'm doing a detox the first week of November. I'll keep you posted on how that goes.

8. See a midnight showing. I have been avoiding midnight showings of movies like The Plague. The last time I went to a midnight showing was when Captain America came out and then the next week Harry Potter 7.2 came out. I still hadn't recovered from one when I attended the other. The morning after the second one, I babysat at 8am, and swore off midnight showings. I had never been so exhausted. However, I will be on vacation when Les Miserables comes to theaters.  Midnight showing on Christmas Eve? What do you think, Garrett?

9. Play the piano more when people are around. Garrett says I never play the piano. This isn't true, however, he has zero evidence that I have even touched the piano in the last 6 months. I hate playing in front of people.

10. Think of one more thing for this list. 9 things is a weird amount.

We Bought A House!

Well, it's official. We bought a house!  This is what it looks like!  Ignore the fire hydrant and electrical box, and check out that great climbing tree!

I would be lying if I told you that our house buying process was stress free. We looked at 4 other houses before this one, and I started to wonder if we should wait until we could afford something bigger. I was just not impressed with a single house that we looked at. Then, this house came along. It has a master bathroom and two different bedrooms that will fit our king-sized bed. It has a one car garage. It has a shed. A room that would be perfect for a craft room. The kitchen is small, but the dining area is good sized. The living room is big and has a cathedral ceiling. I LOVE IT. And, because I love it, so does Garrett.  He's pretty cool like that. 

We made an offer on Monday night, and they accepted it Tuesday without any negotiations. Not only are they paying our closing costs, but they are giving us a pretty big repair allowance, which is awesome because there are a couple things that we wanted fixed.  I will post more pictures when it's our stuff in the house and not someone else's!

Our closing date is November 30th!

Chicago Trip 2012

Every year-and-a-half or so my friend Devin and I drive up to Elgin, Illinois to see our friend Justin. We only went to school together one year, but can easily pick up where we left off. I love it! I love how they have made a commitment to keep up with our friendship even though I am an old married lady now.
Every time we visit, Justin makes sure we go to the city at least once because he knows how much I love it.
This year, the day we went to the city was cold and rainy (just drizzling). I thought it was perfect! The only downside was that my shoes were pretty much soaked by the time we got back on the train to head back. I love how busy the city is.

I love these pictures because you can see how cloudy it was that day...you can't see the tops of the tallest skyscrapers. Even in the clouds, the city is still beautiful.

The ferris wheel at Navy Pier. I really wanted to ride, but it was closed because of the weather.

The Chicago Theater

A statue made out of canoes ... this was new since the last time I was there. Also, notice the Corvette Limo in the back.

View of the city from Navy Pier ... here is one of the shots where you can't see the top of the buildings due to cloud cover.

Another view from Navy Pier

I'm obsessed with this city, ok?!

This is where Batman flips his bike in The Dark Knight.

What We're Eating Parts 2 & 3

This section of the blog is going to be postponed for 2 weeks. I leave on Thursday for Chicago and Garrett & I always go on a date when one of us goes on a trip. Last night's dinner was at Olive Garden where I had Chicken and Gnocchi soup, stuffed mushrooms, and a mango daiquiri. Yum.

Next Monday, I will be driving home from Chicago, so dinner will most likely be extremely greasy and probably come in a paper sack.

I will leave you with this Chicken and Gnocchi Soup recipe from Taste of Home. We made it last month, and we loved it almost as much as Olive Garden!


Chicken & Gnocchi Soup
1 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1/3 cup of butter, divided
1 small onion, chopped
1 medium carrot, chopped
1 celery rib, chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
3 1/2 cups of 2% milk
1/3 cup of flour
1 1/2 cups of heaving whipping cream
1 teaspoon reduced sodium chicken bouillon granules
1/4 teaspoon of pepper
1/2 cup of chopped fresh spinach

In a large pot, Brown chicken in 2 tablespoons of butter. Remove and keep warm. In same pot, sauté onion, carrot, celery, and garlic. Whisk in flour, gradually stir in milk, cream, bouillon, & pepper. Let boil. Then reduce heat and cook 2 minutes. Add gnocchi and spinach, cook 3 minutes. Add chicken. Simmer 10 minutes, do not let boil.
Enjoy!

Here's a picture of my soup at Olive Garden.
Also a picture of the sunset when we walked out of the restaurant last night, just for fun... :)

What We're Eating Part 1

I have decided to do a series on this blog. Every Monday I will post a recipe of what we are eating for dinner. I will try and do recipes that are relatively easy and cheap!

This week's recipe is Tortellini with Smoked Sausage & Edamame.

You will need:
1 package of frozen tortellini
1 smoked sausage link
1/2 a cup of frozen, shelled edamame
Olive oil
Parmesan cheese (optional)

First off, make sure that you get tortellini from the frozen section of your grocery store. Usually the brands that are sold in the deli section are a lot more expensive.

Slice up the sausage and brown in a frying pan. While the sausage is cooking, boil water and cook the tortellini according to package directions. Usually the tortellini and the sausage get done at about the same time. The edamame can be prepared several ways, but we usually just put 1/2 a cup in a bowl, cover with Saran Wrap and microwave for 2-3 minutes.

Drain the tortellini and place the noodles back in the pot. Add the sausage and edamame to the pot as well. Toss with olive oil. Then eat!!

We both love this recipe. We usually can get 2 dinners out of this. The tortellini is about $4/package, the sausage is $2.50 and the edamame is $1.50. That's an $8 meal that can feed both of us twice!!

Hope you try out this recipe and enjoy!