Archives for April 2010

Weekend Recap

April 11, 2010 by Amy Leave a Comment

We had a busy weekend and I feel like I need another day off!

Friday we met my family out at O’Charley’s for dinner. It would have been a normal visit except for the BUTTER FIASCO. We kept asking the waiter for butter because he’d only bring one little scoop for 5 pieces of bread. We asked so much he finally brought a bowl with 9 or 10 servings of butter. He was quite surprised when he returned to only 4 left. We love butter on our bread! The girls spent the rest of the evening watching an old Mary Kate and Ashley VHS movie. That was like a time warp! I headed off to the gym and let Scott play PS3.

Saturday I got up and made some scones. More on those in my weekly PW weekly recap. And then I high-tailed it to the gym to work them off. The girls and I headed to the park for a picnic until Scott got home from working a local bicycle race. When he got home, we went to a birthday party for a lady from our previous church. She turned 90 and has been married for 73 years! They had a slideshow and were showing them in 1937 when they got married. It was awe-inspiring! Saturday afternoon the girls went to Scott’s parents for the night. They wanted to visit our old church again. So Saturday evening we spent with Jake and Jill. Jill and I cooked and the boys watched their (Jake and Jill’s but I wouldn’t put it past Jake and Scott to have one) baby and played PS3. It was fun to have someone to cook with! More on what we ate in my weekly PW recap. Are you waiting on pins and needles for it yet??

Today was church, lunch at Scott’s parents and then a little shopping. We stayed in for the rest of the day. A few random things from the weekend…Scott put up not one, but two tire swings, I spring-cleaned our entire kitchen and pantry, we sold our new recliner to Jake and Jill and another small thing to Craigslist. It feels good to be going out with the old (well, in some cases new [recliner]) and in with the new (and in some cases, old [tires]).

Sunday Highlights – imPOSSIBLE– Finding Freedom From Bondage

April 11, 2010 by Amy Leave a Comment

Chris started this morning with an explanation about elephants that have the power to push over trains but can be held in place by a simple stake and chain after a time of conditioning when they are young. At some point, they quit resisting and accept they can’t go anywhere and quit trying when they are older. Elephants are capable of freeing themselves but it’s the elephant that does not try to get free. They are the problem, not the stake. Some of us are in bondage and we are the issue.

Romans 7:18-25

Some try to use a get out of jail free card by accepting it as “a thorn in your flesh” instead of fighting the sin.

You are not called to make peace with sin but to wage war against it.

Romans 8:1-4

We are free from the penalty of sin

We are also free from the POWER of sin

When we were are in Christ, the chain is broken. You are FREE, LET IT GO.

v7-9

You become hostile to God when you hold on. You can not please God. You can get what life is all about and stills miss your role. You can not make yourself right. You must give up your pride and rely on Christ.

Learn His word in 15 min/day
Memorize verses that relate to your struggle
Listen to His voice. When you know it, you know it.
Become accountable
RUN from your sin

This morning’s sermon was very powerful and I know so many were empowered to break free from the bondage of sin. Praise the Lord!

Listen to the podcast this week.

Thursday Random

April 8, 2010 by Amy 1 Comment

Today was a good day. I like good days. Let’s make a list.

I found this new iPhone camera Hipstamatic and it rocks! Yes? Yes!

I had a really good design session at work today. I love taking an issue and trying to figure out all the moving parts and all the nitty gritty details to get the problem solved. I was kind of sad when my two hour meeting was over. #geek
I scored a complimentary copy of Plan B byPete Wilson from BookSneeze to review. I already have it pre-ordered but I’m so excited to get it early! Look for a giveaway coming up!
iPhone announced some great stuff today for the new OS coming out in June, namely multitasking and folders. I really hope my still-broken iPhone holds out until June. Unfortunately these new features won’t work on a 3G phone, you have to have the 3GS.
The fam took a nice walk at lunch today. I love walking with them!
I bought meet and greet tickets to see Danny Gokey when he opens for Tim McGraw in Charlotte in July.
I made yummy crockpot lasagna. Not a PDub recipe, but off of her Tasty Kitchen site she runs where others can submit their own recipes. It was so easy and done in 2.5 hrs. Perfect while we were gone to gymnastics tonight.
I think we have our new recliner sold which rocks!
I started participating tonight in MoneySavingMom.com’s Clear Out the Clutter Challenge tonight. I cleared out our hall closet, living room cabinet and pantry. I have two big stacks of blankets and jackets, two garbage bags to throw away and 3 grocery bags of stuff to giveaway. Score!
Vampire Diaries was SO amazing tonight. Probably my favorite episode yet and the best part is the previews for next week look even better!

It’s the little things!

American Idol Top 9

April 6, 2010 by Amy 5 Comments

Aaron -I watched this live and simply can not remember it. Boring and old-fashioned if I remember right.

Katie -I actually really enjoyed this from Katie. You could tell she felt very comfortable with the song and hey, getting asked to prom by 5 guys surely doesn’t hurt the confidence factor.

Andrew -While I don’t think he made this current, there were brilliant parts to this and overall I enjoyed listening to it.

Michael – We all know I’m not on the big Mike train but this one was extra choppy and overly dramatic for me.

Crystal -I felt like she faltered a few times on this. But still great!

Tim -For once I didn’t absolutely hate one of his performances.

Casey – Beautiful. Gorgeous. Heartfelt. CASEY!

Siobhan -Wow, so beautiful. Vocals were outstanding!

Lee – Did not enjoy this. Bagpipes were weird. I think they sounded ok but him marching on stage in his full outfit was just awkward and didn’t fit the song.

Best: Siobhan and Casey

In trouble: Aaron

Make sure to check out more reviews at boomama.net

Old Recliner, New Recliner

April 6, 2010 by Amy 21 Comments

Tonight we were leaving Moe’s from dinner and Scott wanted to stop at a furniture store and look for a new table beside his recliner. Well, somehow we got a little distracted in the recliners. We have a recliner. We bought our recliner when I graduated college ten years ago this year. We actually used some leftover scholarship money to buy it. The recliner has kind of been our baby. When we first got it, I used to lay with Scott in his lap and watch WWE wrestling with him. About the same time, we got our dog and Scott used to hold her on the recliner. And two years later when I was pregnant with Emma, I had to sleep in the recliner because I couldn’t breathe lying down. And then when we had her, Scott would rock her in the recliner and I would fall asleep nursing her in it. And we would rock her in it while she watched cartoons and fell asleep for naps and nighttime. And then we did it all again with Lexi. And then the girls got old enough to sit in the recliner by themselves. To say that we have memories in that recliner is an understatement. In fact, I remember writing a post very similar to this and sure enough, I have basically written this post before. If you don’t believe all the memories, take a look at a few of these pics (and yes, there are a lot!):

But we thought it was time we should replace it when the furniture store made us an offer we couldn’t refuse. So then of course when we brought it home we all realized what we were doing. And I began to wax poetic about how we had rocked the girls as babies and how sad it would be to sell it and yada, yada. And then all the sudden we were taking turns having our last rock in it. And we were taking pictures and before I knew it, I looked down and Emma was almost sobbing. And then Lexi was crying saying “I’m gonna missss ittttt.”

And then Scott and I brought the new one in and moved the old one to the corner and it felt a bit like a discarded family member, the new recliner an welcome intruder. I never, ever thought I could be so attached to a recliner. I mean, the chair is known as “Scott’s recliner”, not even mine! But Scott and I looked at each other and we just couldn’t let it go. The old black, leather recliner got moved back to its rightful place. I know if recliners could smile, it’d be beaming.

So sorry, new recliner, we’re still busy making memories.

Top Ten Tuesday: Ten Steps to a More Organized House

April 6, 2010 by Amy 23 Comments

It’s no secret that Scott is organized. Ultra-organized. I’ll-scream-if-it’s-not-in-the-right-place-organized. And I am…not. I once thought I was rather organized but no, compared to him I am not. I was thinking about a few of his habits that I could probably (or have) learned from:

Close the cabinet doors as soon as you get what you need. Growing up, you knew we had been in the kitchen by the cabinet doors left open. You got what you needed and moved on. I remember when we were first married, Scott was always on me about closing the cabinet doors. I have to say, I’ve picked up on this one and now it drives me a little bonkers when I walk in a kitchen and see some open. I feel like it makes the kitchen look cleaner and more organized, even if it isn’t.
Related to that, clean up the kitchen as you cook. For years, I would get everything out as I needed it and leave the mess for later. Now I throw away trash as I go and put stuff back as I use it. Well, this is in general. Sometimes I still have a mess of flour and pots and pans lying around but in general, my ingredients are at least put up when I’m done. It feels much less overwhelming after cooking!
Put your clothes in the hamper when you take them off. This is Organization 101 right? Not even organization 101, it’s more like Life 101. Put your clothes in the hamper. I am lucky in that I don’t have to struggle with a husband who leaves their stinky underwear on the floor. Usually it’s mine! But I find that if I try to put them in the hamper as I take them off, my room feels lots more clean!
Put remotes back in the drawer every night. Without fail, Scott finds all the remotes at the end of the day and puts them back in a drawer. I certainly haven’t mastered this one but I can’t even tell you the last time the remote was lost. Also kind of sad? Since leaving home I quit calling it the clicker. What do you call it?
Have a place for the keys. This is definitely one I’m still working on but when Scott drives, the keys always go back in the same drawer. If he drove last, I know right where to go to get them. So easy!
Put similar papers in notebooks. Scott loves him some notebooks and page protectors. When he has a group of papers that he needs to keep long-term, they go in a notebook. Mine are scattered in stacks everywhere!
Use plastic containers to group like items. This is probably a Organizational 101 too but I’ll give you the best example on this that he did for me and it’s such a no-brainer. He got me a plastic container with a lid for all my tampons. Now when I get a new box, I just dump them all in one place. Now I don’t have full boxes and half-empty boxes cluttering our cabinet. And I just pull out my plastic box for the week and back it goes! He does this a lot for things that came in many pieces in a box.
Use cord organizers for all your electronic cords. This never bothered me much but Scott has to have cords grouped together and hidden. The least amount of cord, the better. And I have to say, I enjoy the organized cords. I still leave this one up to him but it really does make a room look more organized.
Hang as much as you can on the wall. This is really helpful in the garage. Scott’s general philosophy about organization is if the floor is clean, the room is clean. No lie. So it’s no surprise that he’ll put a nail in the wall or a hook or make a shelf for just about anything. But I have to admit, it does make the room look clean.
I came up with the first 9 on my own just by what I’ve noticed over the last 16 years but I just asked “the master” what his one piece of advice would be and it was “Put everything back where it goes when you’re done.” And I suppose a lot of these fall under that but oh boy, does this describe him. I’ll find my glass of water in the dishwasher before I get a second drink if I’m not careful. But it works…when you’re done with it, whether it be shoes, a glass, notebook, remote, coat, pen, towel, hairbrush, if you just put it back when you’re done, you’ll be on your way to a cleaner house!

I just read the list to Scott and he said “very good”. So there you have it, approval from a certified organizer!

Make sure to check out more Top Ten Tuesday lists at http://ohamanda.com/

Spring Break

April 5, 2010 by Amy 3 Comments

You can tell Spring Break is going on around here

Painting

Playing school

Sprinkler!

Cooking with Pioneer Woman: Weekly Update

April 5, 2010 by Amy 2 Comments

Again, behind on the weekly update thing. Biweekly title just isn’t as interesting though. I keep recycling all my favorites (tomato soup, pizza, chicken pot pie, mocha brownies) and slacking on trying new stuff. But this week I found a lady through PW that cooked the entire cookbook and it got me a little pumped.

2010-04-05_1624

I never really meant to cook through the whole thing but why stop now? Plus? After I tweeted about it, PW offered to send me a copy of her next cookbook so I could get a head start. OMG!

That tweet could have been a whole PW Update post on its own, but how about I share a few recipe results too?

Apple Pie (cookbook only)

This was very close to a #fail. My pie crust was so flaky that when I folded the pie crust up onto the apples, it creased, split and started spilling the yummy cinnamon and sugar sauce everywhere. You might be able to tell in the picture where I had tried to scoop the sauce up after trying to repair the crust. But, it never seemed to stick and I had juice everywhere on the pan and it was burnt. In really good news, the apple pie itself was salvageable, albeit arguably less juicy. We plopped some ice cream on it and called it good. Her pie crust recipe is just to die for so you know…pie crust…ice cream…can’t be too bad.

French Breakfast Puffs

These came out to perfection. Perfection! I felt like they were just the right consistency as if everything in the baking world timed and heated correctly to come together and make this cinnamon muffin. I felt like I was eating something straight from the Starbucks baked goods shelf. Score! It was perfect as a coffee cake.

Not Your Granny’s Mac and Cheese

I made this to take to a cook-out. We also had jalapeno poppers to take and while I wanted to try the mac and cheese in the cookbook, I just felt like the Mexican flair to this mac and cheese from her site fit better. Well, when I started cooking it, I knew if nothing else, this would be a pretty dish.

photo (1)

And then I dumped the pepperjack cheese in and all my doubts began to melt away quite literally

And the finished product did not disappoint

It was yummy!

All these will be on my make-again list!

So…have you bought her cookbook yet?