Thanksgiving

This was the first year we celebrated Thanksgiving at our house (exciting!).  I tried to resist the urge to go all-out Martha Stewart, but did do a few things that would be considered martha-esque.

I decorated the mantle:



and set the table all fancy-like:



I spent $1 total for decorating the house (I bought fake leaves at Jo Ann because I didn't want to deal with the mess of real leaves).  Most of it is leftover wedding stuff that I'm glad I kept around.

On the menu:

Roasted Turkey
Tofurkey
Stuffing (vegetarian)
Roasted Sweet Potatoes
Mashed Potatoes
Green Bean Casserole
Smoked Gouda Macaroni and Cheese
Chicken Nugget Kabobs
Rolls
Pumpkin Pie

The total head count was 8 (including three kids) and it was the perfect size for my house.  We didn't have to do two tables or anything, we just had to squeeze in one extra chair at the dining room table.  I did have some trouble with heating food back up after doing a lot of cooking on Wednesday.  I have to admit that I wasn't organized at all as far as putting together a schedule of when things would have to go back into the oven, etc. so when we actually sat down to eat we had less than steaming hot food.  Oh well...I learned my lesson. 

Here's my Mom with my nephews and niece:



My nephew and niece LOVE my cat.  They talked for weeks about coming over to my house and chasing him all over the house.  Percy is such a great sport, and he seems to really like all of the attention (except when they try to pick him up or scare him with screeching).  Inevitably, he always is exhausted after they leave and is usually in a verry cuddly mood with Andy and me. 

Here he is (between naps) post kids:



I can't wait until we can do it again!

september 2011

this month kind of flew by.  there was one week in there where it was crawling and i felt like the week (let alone the month) would never end.  thankfully, it did end, and now i can do a recap!

the football season started and andy couldn't be happier.  the first weekend of college football season, some friends came over to watch some games and hang out.  thanks to some help from kyle, andy got his kegerator set up just in time.



after a night of football, rockband, Things (an awesome game) and other good times, a few of us went to brunch/lunch at Bob & Edith's diner in Arlington.  it was cozy.



andy was away for what seemed like forever.  in hindsight, it was only a week and a half...but it seemed like such a long time.  i spent my nights putzing around the house and playing with percy.  i also entertained myself by buying percy a halloween costume and forcing him to wear it.


(he is a cowboy.  his bandana should clue you in to that.  and the cowboy hat discarded by his front paws)

i also did FaceTime with andy while he was away and took lots of pictures of percy doing cat stuff.


(why does the flash on my phone do that to his eyes?!?  scary.)

after (what seemed like) months of him being away, i picked up andy at the airport and we ran into each others' arms and smothered each other with wet kisses.  ha, jokes.  but we did half hug in the car and talk about how much we missed each other.  i got sick while andy was away and he was lucky enough to come home to a coughing, sneezy, whiney wife.

this past weekend, andy's family was in town for a visit.  we had been planning to go to the national book festival (my bright idea), and decided to drive down to the mall and hope for parking.  after driving around the mall twice, we nixed the driving idea and went back home to hop on the metro.  due to a million events happening in the city on that day, the train was super crowded.  we were all sandwiched in like sardines and andy's poor sister had to stand there sandwiched in, holding her crying four-month-old baby and trying to hold on to the railing.  no one offered to give up their seat, which i thought was pretty sad.  we eventually made it to the festival and saw some authors who we didn't know.  andy's mom and sister bought some autographed copies of children's books (perhaps out of pity for me, since my idea turned out to be a complete and utter failure).

after a short stay at the book festival (we had missed all of the famous people we would've known), we walked over to a restaurant for lunch.  on the way there, we stopped for a photo op in front of the white house.


(me, andy's nephew, andy, his sis, bro-in-law.  andy's mom was taking the picture.)

we ate lunch at founding farmers, a delish restaurant i highly recommend to any dc peeps.  we saw someone famous in the restaurant and made numerous trips to the "bathroom" to confirm his identity amongst the group.

after our exhausting day in the city, we decided to round out the day with some retail therapy. 

we said our goodbyes to his family on sunday morning, and andy and i spent the rest of the day relaxing and trying (unsuccessfully) to get rid of my illness.  i cuddled with my new favorite pillow pet and went through half a box of kleenex.



this week is only a three-day week for me.  i am heading up to my big sister's wedding on thursday morning(!!!!).  i am so looking forward to seeing all of my family and i'm also looking forward to spending some time away from dc! 
 

oreo truffles

a couple of weekends ago, i joined a bunch of friends at a lake house on lake anna, which is in southern(er than dc) virginia.  as part of my undying desire to be the best at everything baking/cooking, i decided i needed to whip up something delicious for a weekend treat.  i have a pinboard dedicated to recipes...and a hefty percentage of those recipes are dedicated to sweets (so what??).  i wanted something fun and easy, so finally settled on these treats from bakerella:

Source: bakerella.com via Liz on Pinterest

i didn't take any pictures of the final product (i forgot).  the only evidence is this quick picture i snapped with my phone:


they were really really easy to make.  there was a lot of rolling, and i did have a lot of white chocolate/rolled oreo truffle mixage (there were eventually little black oreo flecks in my white chocolate), but they were cute, and people ate them up. 

score one for liz.

pert's stick

i mentioned earlier that one of my favorite things that percy does is sit by the window to wait for me to get home from work.  one of my other favorite percy-isms is a newer habit that he's gotten into.  it started about a month ago, and we are stumped as to why...but for some reason he has become obsessed with this cat toy that sat virtually untouched for the past six months.  it's this plastic stick with an elastic string attached to it.  at the end of the elastic there were three pom poms (i say "were" because two of the pom poms have proven they are unable to withstand the jaws of percy).
we don't know where it started, but one day we realized that he was carrying one of the balls in his mouth and dragging the whole thing all over the house.  we would be sitting on the couch watching tv, and he would jump into one of our laps and drop the ball, meow, then beg with his eyes for us to play with him.  we usually complied.
about two weeks ago, i was sleeping and i heard a clanking noise.  shortly after that, percy jumped up onto the bed and meowed.  i sat up in bed and realized that he had dragged the toy all the way up to the bedroom.  i went back to sleep, only to be awakened a few minutes later by percy jumping on my legs and meowing, begging me to play with him.  i had to pick him up and carry him to the basement (hey, i have to get sleep somehow).  it kind of became his routine to carry the stick up to our bedroom, so eventually we started putting the stick in a drawer for the night, and that has seemed to help. 

it is pretty cute to hear the stick clanking on the stairs as he runs up with that toy dragging behind him. 

here are a few pictures of the little guy posing with his new favorite toy:

earthquake!

on monday, i experienced my first earthquake.  i was at work (i work in bethesda, maryland, but live in northern virginia), looking over some reports with my boss, when all of a sudden everything started to shake.  it sort of felt like someone was pushing a heavy cart past the cube, but then it lasted longer and i quickly realized that it was not a cart, but something bigger.  it didn't last long, and as soon as it was over people started standing up in their cubes and looking around, everyone with shocked looks on their faces.  most people were joking about it, but i think we were all a little spooked.
we went back to work for a little while, then they announced over the speakers that we would be evacuating the building (the building i work in is about 40 years old and is definitely not built to withstand earthquakes).  luckily, it was a really pretty, sunny day and we weren't too upset about having to spend 45 minutes outside.  if it had been two weeks ago, we would've all been hot and sweaty.
some of my co-workers with young children left early to go console their little ones, but most people just went back to work.  i think everyone was on google maps watching the traffic situation (it got really ugly).  by the time i left work at around 5:30, the traffic had all cleared on my route and it was just a normal commute for me.
the last mile or two before arriving home, i got a little bit nervous thinking about the possible damage to my house.  there were a few buildings in the area that had cracked windows, and that was what i was most concerned about.  i was also nervous about my cat's reaction to the whole thing..whether he would've tried to escape to save his life.  luckily, when i got home i was greeted by my usual Mr. Pert sitting on his cat climber thing, waiting for me at the (uncracked) window.  i love when he's lying on his perch like the lazy 'ol thing that he is and then he perks up and meows when he confirms that it is indeed me getting out of the car.
thankfully, there was zero damage to the house on my floors (a few pictures hanging on the wall were crooked...but they were never really straight to begin with.  good job earthquake planning, me!).  after breathing a sigh of relief that the main floor and the upstairs had no damage, i headed down to the man cave to check out it's status.  turns out, the "throw random crap on the mantel until we actually have a plan of where to put it" method of home decorating was not the best way to go.  we had some frame breakage and a couple of dents and dings to the viking horns:

thankfully, no real damage to me, andy, pert, or the house!  now we just have to buckle down for the hurricane that's headed our way this weekend!

Office

Don't worry, this is not a post about work.  It is a post about a lonely little bedroom that gets mistreated on a daily basis by the author of this blog.  You know how some houses have a junk drawer?  Well, mine has a junk room.  I try to keep all of the rooms in my house pretty bare.  I like the look of cleanliness that comes with a clutter-free home.  As a result of keeping absolutely everything out of all of the other rooms in the house, the office gets clutter overload.  I'll occasionally dump boxes or bags in there "until I get a chance to go through it and organize it".  Yeah, well, that never happens.  There never is a chance.  There's always much more interesting stuff going on elsewhere.  It's such a shame, too, because it's an entire room of my house that I could be using for whatever my heart desires.  In an effort to motivate myself to actually clean that room and make it useful, I've pinned a bunch of lovely home office spaces over on pinterest.  Here are a few of my favorites:

Source: tumblr.com via Liz on Pinterest

Source: tinypic.com via Liz on Pinterest

i like the storage solutions here:

Source: candicestringham.typepad.com via Liz on Pinterest

i think a closet office would be money:

Source: google.com via Liz on Pinterest

Source: tecpetajaphoto.com via Liz on Pinterest

Who knows, maybe this is a sign that I'm officially ready to haul all that junk down to goodwill?
 

welcome to the world, little c!

i thought i'd share a few photos i took of my new little nephew.  he was born on june 15 of this year, and i got to take some special pictures of him when he was only three days old!  he was completely calm throughout taking these pictures - he didn't make the littlest peep!













i hope you enjoyed them!

crafts i've been eyeing

i've been admiring so many things over on pinterest this week.  honestly, pinterest gets me in the mood to do so many things.  the problem is, i usually hop over to pinterest at some point during the work day, and then by the time i get home i've forgotten all of the cool projects i'm supposed to be working on.  in an effort to actually get out there and do some crafting this weekend, i decided to actually print out pictures and stick them up as inspiration.  as further motivation to start on some of these projects, i thought i'd list them here so i can come back to check them off (i love checking things off of lists).

in no particular order...

this looks like fun:

Source: theidearoom.net via Liz on Pinterest

(i bought a butterfly hole punch two weeks ago at michael's and it was a dud.  i'm hoping to take it back/exchange it this weekend.)  instead of using paper for the butterflies, i thought it might be cute to use fabric from the bunting we used at our wedding.  that way it would be crafty and sentimental.


i'm pretty sure you can just buy the wire and little clips at ikea, but i am also contemplating making something from stuff i already own (i had to buy a lot of twine and bailing wire for my wedding, and i know i'll never use it for anything else:

Source: suziebeezie.tumblr.com via Liz on Pinterest

this is cute, and looks super easy:

Source: marthastewart.com via Liz on Pinterest

i'd like to do this with street names in dc or maybe andy's and my favorite places to eat/things to do:

Source: tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com via Liz on Pinterest

a week or two ago i came across scrabble-like letters at michael's and grabbed them off the shelf.  i knew i saw a project that involved scrabble letters, but i forgot about it until i revisited my "diy" pinboard today:

Source: rockettstgeorge.co.uk via Liz on Pinterest

this isn't really a craft, but it is something i should do this weekend to clean up from the painting weekend we had last weekend:

Source: thisoldhouse.com via Liz on Pinterest

also not a craft, but something i have been wanting to do:

Source: marthastewart.com via Liz on Pinterest

i know i always let my weekends get away from me, but this weekend i want to actually accomplish some of this stuff, and maybe one or two things off of my to do list i posted earlier this month.  here's to using a blog as a false source of accountability!

a fun, productive, and hot weekend

since we started our house hunt a few years ago (it was on an off for a couple of years), andy has been talking about his big plans for the basement.  he had grand plans for an ultimate "man cave" complete with a bar, Virginia Tech themed paint, football memorabilia, and a shuffle board table.  all along, i have agreed to let him have his "man cave" and even agreed to help him with any of the projects he was working on.  in the back of my head, i kind of knew that it would either 1) take such a long time for andy to get around to doing any of it that he would forget or 2) not happen because of our laziness.  i know us well enough to know that we kind of procrastinate on pretty much everything and end up taking the easy way out a lot of the time (we both drive cars we hate because we covet our weekends and don't want to give one up for car shopping, so will most likely drive our cars until we are no longer physically able...the AC in andy's car is showing some signs of weakness, so maybe it will be sooner rather than later).

this weekend we finally got around to crossing off one of the big milestones toward having the dream man cave.  we painted!  and it took a really long time!

here is a photo pre-painting / post-taping:


(notice all of my measuring tools on the footstool: level, old school ruler, tape measurer, pencil and painter's tape)

and some post-painting pictures:








sorry for the iphone quality...my battery on my other camera was dead and i didn't want to wait to take pictures...again, i'm lazy.


the process of taping and measuring and taping over again took the largest chunk of our time.  we started working at about 11 am on saturday and ended for the day at 4:30 am on sunday.  after six hours or so of sleep, we went to the big McD's and stopped at home depot to pick up some more paint.  we painted on sunday from about noon until 4:30.  we finished up with some white paint details after work on monday and finished up at about 11:30 pm.

since i enjoy doing arts & crafts type things, i had a great time.  i was singing along to the music blaring out of my iphone dock and was humming along at 4 in the morning.  andy was not as amused at the whole painting thing and was pretty much grumpy all day sunday, but appreciative of all of the help i was giving him.
now that the pain in our backs has started to die down and the blisters have popped, we are both thrilled with the way it came out.  it definitely gives us a lot more confidence as home owners and aspiring diy-ers.
this project has definitely whet my appetite for painting and decorating.

i hope to start on the office/guest room this weekend or sooner, but know that sometimes teen mom gets in the way of even the best of intentions.

it's pretty awesome, i think, that i still stop almost every night and wonder if all of this could truly be my life.  it's usually after we're done watching tv or doing other stuff in the basement and i'm making my way upstairs to the bedroom.  i usually stop and stare at the stairs and think "holy crap.  i have stairs.  and i have a house.  and it's awesome."  and when i'm out doing errands with andy on the weekends, i still stop and think "holy crap.  i have a boyfriend. and he loves me".  (he is no longer my boyfriend but is, in fact, my husband...i am still not used to that yet). 
yes, it is amazing to me that i have the life that i'd always thought was out of my reach.  but that's not really what i'm impressed with.  what i am most impressed with is that i am in the moment & mindful enough to actually stop and think and be grateful.  i can honestly say that this is one of the first times in my entire life when i've been able to do that.  usually i'm complaining about how annoying things are and how many curve balls life has thrown my way.  it was a rough few years back at the beginning of my adulthood, but all of the hard work and patience has finally paid off.  and lately life has been pretty darn good to me.  i'm recognizing it now, and i hope that i will remember this feeling when the next wave of stress/anxiety/negativity comes my way. 
now that life has settled down a bit for me (yippee! the wedding is over!), i'm thinking more about house projects i'd like to do.  i'm definitely not going to be doing any major renovations any time soon since the house is in pretty good shape and i'm not exactly "handy". 
i've been working on a photo wall for a while now.  i bought a ton of frames from ikea when i first moved into my house, and i just went back to supplement my collection a couple of weeks ago.  so far i'm loving my choices - all white frames with some pictures from the wedding (we will haven't gotten back our professional photos yet...), a couple of pictures of my niece/nephews, and a few different pieces of art work that i created (inspired by finds on pinterest).  i haven't put anything on the walls yet, partly because i have to buy the hanging wire stuff (the placement of the hook by ikea is a bit awkward) and partly because i'm not sure if i want to paint my lower level first. 
because i always love when they do lists over on younghouselove, here is my list of different things i am hoping to accomplish around the house this summer:
- paint red "accent wall" in the living room.  i'm thinking subtle greyish blue.
- paint entire downstairs (main level is my territory, basement is andy's)
- paint stair railing?
- hang photo wall
- find or build bookcases/storage for huge empty wall in living room
- clean out "office"/extra bedroom.  take some stuff up to the attic, donate everything else to gw
- find another bedside table for upstairs guest bedroom at gw and give it a makeover
- find another bedside table for downstairs guest bedroom
- find or make a desk for an "office". i'm sort of considering using the upstairs guest bedroom closet as a small, makeshift office
- organize all of my crafting supplies
- purge all of my old clothing and send it to gw
- go through basement closet and get rid of old stuff that we never use any more

okay, that list is long enough for now.  i'm not sure how much i'll get done this weekend - my mom is in town and i'll feel guilty if i'm dragging her to home depot thirty times in one day (why is it that i never get everything i need when i go to home depot?  i always forget at least one thing...so ridiculous).

i'm off to see wicked tonight with some friends.  i'm not usually the going-out-in-the-middle-of-the-week type, but i'm trying to come out of my shell more and take advantage of living in an awesome city at an awesome time in my life.  anyway, it should be fun.  and a little bit of culture never killed anyone.

wedding update

In a little over a month, I'm getting married.  I signed into theknot.com today to update some RSVPs we got this week and my heart skipped a beat when I saw that there are only 44 days until THE day.  HOLY.

I feel pretty comfortable with where I am as far as wedding planning goes.  I have taken care of most of the big stuff.  There is still one thing on my "to do" list, and each week I transfer it over to a new "to do" list, but each week I put it on the back burner and don't get around to it.  So, if you're planning on coming to my wedding, you better hope I cross it off my list or you're not gonna have any plates or champagne flutes at the wedding.  Why haven't I crossed it off my list?  Most likely because it involves making a phone call to someone and I just hate making phone calls.  Especially when I'm at work all day and that would mean all of my co-workers in the cubes surrounding me would overhear my conversation and it would just be embarrassing to be arranging for dining ware for your wedding only 44 days out, right?  I wouldn't want them to think that I can't handle it.

One of the things I'm most excited about is all of the fun arts & crafts projects I've got lined up for myself.  It should be a good 'ol time at my house for the next 44 days.  On the list of things I'll be working on:


Decorating the dozens of jars and bottles I've been collecting over the past couple of months:

Source: iloveswmag.com via Liz on Pinterest

Creating an escort card display similar to this:

Source: projectwedding.com via Liz on Pinterest

Painting a sign similar to this:

Source: ruffledblog.com via Liz on Pinterest

Gathering supplies to make bags for out of town guests similar to this:

Source: 100layercake.com via Liz on Pinterest

While picking out a wedding dress and choosing on cake flavors is super fun, the things I'm looking forward to the most about getting ready for the big day are these little projects.  There is finally an excuse to channel my inner Martha Stewart.  I just need to get my office all set up upstairs and I can lock myself in that room for the next 44 days.

p.s. If you are coming to my wedding from out of town, DO NOT expect something fancy and lobster-cloth-bag-like to greet you upon your arrival into town.  I'm going to make 'em cute, but there's no way in hell they make a bag like that for Dublin, Virginia. 

cookiemas 2010

as i mentioned in my last post, cookie baking is what i live for.  unlike most people, i don't get together with a bunch of girlfriends and bake cookies all day.  i like to do it in the quiet calm of my own kitchen with christmas carols playing at a reasonable decibel in the background.  something about measuring out the specific ingredients for each cookie, mixing them according to the instructions, and then pulling them out of the oven looking like the little picture at the top of the recipe is therapeutic for me.  at a time when i feel like i am doing a number of things the wrong way (ahem, what wedding??), i need to have these small things to remind me that i am capable of completing something successfully.

here is my day (actually, two days) in pictures:

first i wanted to do something easy to get my feet wet, if you will.  so i went with hershey peanut butter blossoms.  they are so simple and the recipe always produces massive amounts.  they're a good filler cookie.

then, to honor my nephew, i made o'henry bars.  not only do these bars share a name with owen, they are delicious as well.  if you have never had these, make them.  you will not regret it.

next up on my list were these bad boys.  three years ago, andy's mom gave me a great cookie recipe book.  i told andy to browse through the pages and pick one he's like me to make.  he picked these, and they have been a huge hit in the family.

to add a little something new to the mix and also to use some sprinkles, i decided to whip up some whoopie pies (hint hint if you need to get me a christmas present - i would LOVE this cook book).

i think they are adorable.



amidst all this cookie making, i called my parents and asked my dad what he wanted me to make him (of the cookie variety).  classic dad, he said he wanted chocolate chip cookies (sad horn).  so i made some of those.  is it me, or are these the hardest cookies to make?  i can never make these right.  for that reason, no one except immediate family members will be munching on these this holiday season.



these ones were new last year, and i decided to bring them back for an encore.  they seem to be lighter and healthier than all the other cookies (i can believe what i want to believe) and sometimes it's nice to have a break from all the chocolate.  the only downside is that you have to make the dough ahead of time and then let it chill in the fridge for two hours.  i tend to forget about that part.
 

i have been making buckeye balls for a number of years.  they're always well-received.  they are incredibly easy to make, they just take some patience.

every year there is a last-minute cookie idea.  it's usually because i forget how much i've made and i panic that i haven't made enough to share with everyone.  this year's panic cookie was the snickerdoodle.  they are pretty easy to make in a hurry and the recipe calls for standard ingredients.

i could have kept going.  i seemed to have endless energy when it came to making these cookies.  i didn't care that i was washing the same bowls after every batch and i didn't care that my hands were so dry from washing dishes that they were starting to crack.

thankfully, i ran out of eggs and had to stop.