Beautiful Roses!

Look at how gorgeous my knock out roses are! They line the backyard along the side fences. They are just as beautiful on the other side. Look back to this post a few weeks ago, they have made so much progress in 10 days! I just can't stop staring at them.

Top Three Thursday- Bucket List

This week we are talking about the top 3 items on our bucket list. I am going to do a combo with some of David's and mine. Until this week, I really haven't thought about mine. I need to sit down and write some out. As soon as David and I were talking about his, a few of mine came to me. I'll share some of my sister's too, I thought she was funny.

1.) Live in a Foreign Country for an extended period of time (1-2 years) with our family including kids. This one is David's. While he was working in Dubai for 4 months a few years ago he met Karl and his family. They lived in an apartment over looking the beach. They had a young son and got to travel all over, they even had a nanny/maid/cook that was live-in. I'm sure that is what sold David on the situation.

2.) Go on a Mission Trip (David)- He wants to travel (are you seeing a pattern here) and work on building houses for people who are in need. He is so handy that this would be very rewarding and beneficial.

3.) Become Debt Free- Including the house! This one is mine. If you couldn't already tell, we are on the Dave Ramsey plan. If you aren't familiar with his ideas, you use baby steps (just like the movie) to 1. Get a baby emergency fund, 2. Pay off all debt, not including house (cars and student loans included), 3. Get 6-8 months expenses saved up, etc.. I really want to be able to pay off everything including the house so one day we can "live like no one else!" 

Here are some of our other Bucket List items:
-Buy a beach house in the Caribbean (in cash)
-Be our own boss
-Visit every continent
-Own rental property/Fix up houses and sell them

My sister wants to meet Oprah or Ellen and participate in one of those trapeze circus places where you wear the harnesses! Shes silly.
What are your top three items on your bucket list?

Quick Trip to Ocean City, MD

I've been MIA for a few days while I was traveling for work to Ocean City, MD. We only had a few hours of free time so we went exploring. This was our partial view of the ocean from our hotel balcony.

We drove down to the boardwalk area to a restaurant that wasn't open (A lot of things were closed because of the off season). I grabbed a magnet and an ornament for David as a souvenir and off we went.

I think these next pictures are so cool. The sky was so dark and cloudy that it made for great photos (all on my iphone). I even ran up to the sand so I could say I went to the beach. This did not make for good flying weather on an 8 row plane!

 We ended up going into the bay area on route 50 for lunch at Sunset Grille. We sat by the window so we could have a view of the water and all the boats docked. I picked out the house and the boat I'd like to have.

 Here is my amazing lunch! A blackened  Mahi sandwich with french fries. It was so good! And off we went back home. I'm glad to be back!

Steeplechase 2010!

We had the best time at Steeplechase. If you didn't go outside on Saturday in Georgia, then you missed out on a thunderstormy, muddy day! We were going to make the most out of it though. We were invited by Darrin and Stacey, who were doing it as a birthday celebration for Stacey (Happy Early Birthday Tuesday!). We also went with Gina, Mark, Courtney and David.

Stacey did a great job decorating and now that we know there is a competition for theme's and decorations, it's on for next year! We had so much great food! There was fruit, veges, meat trays, chicken salad sandwiches, pasta salad, fondue and delicious desserts galore! 

 

Here are some couple shots. I apologize for putting this photo up David, but we all sympathize with your wet hair and shirt.

 This is David's sister Gina and her husband Mark. She had fun enjoying the muddy adventures of our day.

 Darrin & Stacey

So you saw what we all looked like posing for our photos, this is what we really looked like. Not as glamorous huh?  A lot of people that had front row spots left early so we got a great view of the events. We even had front row spots watching girls fall in the mud piles on their way to the bathrooms. They weren't too happy about that.

 Here are the horses racing by us! We heard that the ATL housewives were somewhere around and I would have went to find them except, well you get the point by now.

The guys pants just got ruined. This is Darrin embracing the muddy path. They were such troopers, setting up and making sure that we stayed dry.

Here is David's nice attire! I know I showed you lots of the dirty side of the day, but we had a blast. It was so fun sitting, eating, drinking and chatting with everyone. Such great company and we can't wait to go again!

Weekend Preview!

I just had to post pics of my new hat and shoes that I just LOVE! Thanks to Leah and Lacey who helped me pick out the shoes. We are going to steeplechase this weekend and I can not wait to wear my new big derby hat! The weather is not looking so good, but we will have fun anyway! So here is a preview of some of my outfit (I have cute yellow jewelery to match too!).

Hope everyone has a great weekend and I'll post about it next week!

Top Three Thursday- Pet Peeves

1.) Being late or people I am going somewhere with that are late. I like to be early to most everything so this really gets on my nerves.

2.) People who wear black shirts and brown shoes or brown belts! I am in no way a fashionista, but this one really bothers me. This is usually for the guys out there. That's why David has a belt with black on one side and brown on the other.

 3.) I couldn't think of a good one for number three, but it annoys me when people pick their nails. If you have a rough edge, I can see where you are coming from, but if you are doing it all the time to fingers and toes it irritates me. Get a clipper or a nail file!

What are your top three pet peeves?

Green with envy!

Here is little molly, I caught her with her tongue out! We were enjoying the weather this past weekend and she was cooling off in the shade. An update on Miss. Molly: She had her staples out yesterday (she took a few out herself, I guess she thought she would help the doctor out). Shes too active for her own good. Shes running and jumping probably more than she should, but still nurses it by using 3 legs to hop around. We still have to wait about 2 more weeks before we let her jump on the bed etc...

I also wanted to dedicate a portion of this post to my sister's brand new washer and dryer. When you see them you will agree that they deserve a shout-out. Yes, they might have been a stretch budget wise, but aren't they gorgeous? They are front loaders with chrome accents. They even have a steamer built in. I am not a laundry fan, but I think I might do my laundry more often if I had these. These are especially good for Michelle with James traveling for work, they will be reliable and under warranty for her. Her dryer has broken twice in the past few months and her neighbors dryer also went out. So if you need to do some laundry head on over to Texas!

As you can see from the photo below, it was a tight fit or as I like to say, a perfect fit!

Square Foot Garden- Update #2

This week has been so exciting for the garden! We have enjoyed coming home from work every day and taking my garden chart and looking to see what new things have sprouted. These have seemed to all grow over night! You have no idea how excited I am. Things are really growing! I will have to thin these plants out. I am not really sure how to do this, but I have heard people say it because you only need one sprout per hole. You add about 3 seeds per hole to make sure something grows and mine have all grown it seems. If you know the proper way to do this, please let me know, I'll have to do some research.

These are the yellow squash! These look the most impressive. My zucchini and cucumber sprouts are looking about the same. I am already thinking up some great summer recipes to use all these in. 

Here are my onions! We have some over-achievers that are getting so tall! 

This is a shot of the whole garden. Overall everything has started to grow except the peppers (2 different kinds) and the strawberries. 

I just wanted to give a little shout out to my beloved cilantro. This one has 4 different plants starting to grow, it was a slow start, but they are on their way.

These are the little tomatoes! 

While I was outside I decided to show you our beautiful knock-out roses that started to bloom this week also. Our greenery is just taking off and looks so nice this year. These are a bit crazy, but they are too pretty to cut back so I think we will let them go nuts!

I have no idea what these are, but they are in the back corner of our yard and are very pretty and pink right now. I love the spring time! If you have any garden tips, let me know! I will take all the help I can get. I will do weekly updates on the garden (unless nothing exciting happens). 

Menu Plan Monday

I've been reading my other money saving food blogs and every week they do a Menu Plan Monday. I enjoy reading what they do so I'm going to start doing this occasionally (I'd like to say all the time, but I'm sure I'll skip a few). When I grocery shop I always have a weekly meal plan. It is the best way to stay organized and save money for me. Check out Organizing Junkie for more great menu ideas. At Kroger this week chicken is on sale for $1.79 per pound and the rotisserie chickens are $3.99. I have a loadable Kroger plus coupon for $2 off so that is why its a chicken week! I will post the recipes after I make it for step by step pictures and instructions, but I also linked to them from where I originally got them. This week it's a kraft foods week. If you haven't been to their website you need to check it out and make an account. You can store all your recipes in a recipe box and come back and look at all of them.

Monday- Chicken Pesto Panini

Tuesday- Chicken Fajitas

Wednesday- Italian Chicken Quesadillas

Thursday-Weeknight Lasanga Toss

Friday- Grilled Chicken Bruschetta with vegetables

Saturday-Steeplechase! (more on this later)

Sunday- Homemade Pizza (Not sure what kind yet)

Top Three Thursday- Favorite Restaurants of All Time

This week's post is already making me hungry. It is top favorite restaurants of all time! I know some of you won't know about most of these, but if you've had the privilege of going then you know what I'm talking about.

1.) Nikko's Japanese Steakhouse- (Statesboro, GA). They still don't have a website, but if you are ever in south Georgia you need to go. We used to frequent there once or twice a week when we were in college. Good ole' Georgia Southern (Go Eagles!). I compare every ginger salad dressing and teriyaki sauce to theirs. We used to buy it in cups and take it back with us.

2.) El Sombrero Mexican- (Statesboro, GA) Not only did El Som provide lots of entertainment and strawberry daquiri's, but it was the best food ever. They have them in a few locations in Atlanta, but the food just isn't the same.

3.) Fontana's Italian Restaurant (Jacksonville, FL), Antoneta Biba's Italian (Buford, GA), & Maggiano's

These basically make up my favorite foods. I did leave off some close backups (Bill Grays-NY, Wegmans Subs-NY, Colombini's Pizza-Chili, NY) What are your top 3 restaurants of all time? I guarantee I know what restaurant my brother and sister in law will vote as their number 1 (You prob. do too if you are their facebook friend). I know one thing we are going to need to plan this year... A trip back down to Georgia Southern. I haven't been back since Michelle's graduation in 2006.

David's Birthday Goodies

I forgot to post this a few weeks ago, but I just looked at how yummy everything was. For David's birthday breakfast a few weeks ago I got up early and made these delicious crepes with a cream cheese filling (frosting from the carrot cake, which I talked about in the Easter post) and a fresh strawberry topping. Here is the recipe I got from allrecipes.com:

Ingredients

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons butter, melted

Directions

1. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour and the eggs. Gradually add in the milk and water, stirring to combine. Add the salt and butter; beat until smooth.
2. Heat a lightly oiled griddle or frying pan over medium high heat. Pour or scoop the batter onto the griddle, using approximately 1/4 cup for each crepe. Tilt the pan with a circular motion so that the batter coats the surface evenly.
3. Cook the crepe for about 2 minutes, until the bottom is light brown. Loosen with a spatula, turn and cook the other side. Serve hot.

The strawberry topping comes from Our Best Bites.

I decided to also make the carrot cake from the Pioneer Woman's blog.

Prep Time: 20 Minutes

Cook Time: 50 Minutes

Difficulty: Easy

Servings: 12

Ingredients- FOR CAKE:

• 2 cups Sugar
• 1 cup Vegetable Oil
• 4 whole Eggs
• 2 cups All-purpose Flour
• ½ teaspoons Salt
• 1 teaspoon Baking Soda
• 1 teaspoon Baking Powder
• 1 teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
• 2 cups Grated Carrots
•  
• For Icing
• 1 stick Regular Butter, Softened
• 1 package (8 Oz) Cream Cheese
• 1 pound Powdered Sugar
• 2 teaspoons Vanilla
• 1 cup Pecans, Chopped Finely

Preparation Instructions

Cake:
Mix together the sugar, oil and eggs in a large bowl. In another bowl sift together flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda and cinnamon. Add to first mixture and combine. Then add carrots and mix well. Pour into a greased and floured (Baker’s Joyed) pan (bundt, sheet cake, 9 x 13 pyrex) and bake until done, 25 to 50 minutes, depending on the pan you use.
Cool completely.
Icing:
In larger bowl, cream butter and cream cheese. Add sugar and vanilla and blend, then mix in the nuts. Spread on cooled carrot cake.

I had never made a carrot cake before and it was very fun! I just love to see the little carrot pieces that I grated. I made some for me without the cream cheese frosting.

Wedding in Athens

Friday night we went to a wedding in Athens, GA. This was for David's friend Colin and Anne. David met Colin a few years back when he started with his company that he is currently working for. Colin now works somewhere else, but they have remained friends. The ceremony was held at the day chapel in the botanical gardens. We didn't venture too much into the gardens so I didn't see many flowers, but the chapel was beautiful. I am a details person at weddings, so I will show you some of the details she incorporated. I did notice that she didn't have any official wedding favors (I guess you can count the candy), but it's the nature of my work that favors are a must at every event!  Her colors were a soft blue and a chocolate/copper brown. These were the programs.

The wood work inside the chapel was amazing.

Here is the bride and groom being announced as husband and wife!

Here is the wedding cake. I have never seen a cake like this, I think they had a chocolate base underneath and a fondant layer over it with a design cut out.

Here is a centerpiece.

Candy Bar

Here is a picture of me and David.

This is a picture of the me, the bride, and Meg (we met her at their stock the bar shower, so we sat a table with them). I loved Anne's dress. It had a lot of gorgeous details and was an ivory color. It was beautiful. One thing I kept saying was, I'm glad to get to go to a wedding, but am also glad ours is over. It is just so much planning and now we can just enjoy being married. Congratulations Colin and Anne. They are leaving for their honeymoon to France soon!