Secret Santa

What I made my Secret Santa- a bow holder.




Steph and me in our matching pink shirts.




Sweet Leslie.




My former co-teacher, Heather.




Angela was my Secret Santa! Thank you so much.




My Secret Santa, Celly.




My Tara!




The shirt Angela made for me! So perfect.




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

On the 3rd Day of Christmas...

....My friend Paige suggested for me- Mexican Corn Dip with Fritos!

My good friend Paige brought this dip to our LIFEgroup Christmas party two weeks ago and I haven't been able to forget it.  I am not much of a chip eater, but I LOVE fritos.  But only the Scoop kind.

Here's the recipe:

2 to 3 Cans of Mexican Corn
1 small can of green chiles
1 small can of diced jalepenos
8 oz sour cream
2 cups shredded cheddar

You could also use fresh peppers.  I couldn't find the diced jalepenos at WalMart, so I just bought a small can of sliced ones and diced them up (very carefully- I really don't want it in my eyes!).
I've also heard of people using cream cheese instead of sour cream.  That sounds yummy.  You could add a dash of garlic or hot sauce depending on your preference.

Take all of your ingredients and mix them up.  Refrigerate for a few hours or overnight if possible (the flavors will really settle, so this is important).

This recipe is going with me tomorrow to my work Christmas party.  I almost hope no one else likes it so that I can eat it all myself!

On the 2nd Day of Christmas...

...My cousin made with me- Sausage balls and chocolate pretzels!

My oldest cousin Britni came over and helped me make some yummy food.  But first was present time.

A bag for Britni.

And the Pioneer Woman cookbook for me!!

Sausage balls:

Iphone friends.

One lonely sausage ball, waiting for a family.

So somehow these came out flat...I think we decided that there wasn't enough sausage to parts Bisquick and cheese.  Which is crazy, because I left out over a cup of Bisquick.  Not really sure what happened.  However, they tasted amazing.

The caramel wasn't exactly caramelly.  Uh-oh.

Pretzels kept breaking and sticking and all sorts of a hot mess.

The babies were pretzel beggars.

Starting over with new pretzel rods and melted chocolate.

Butterscotch was a failure too.  Whoops.  Not only was it out of date (expiration date was February), it didn't melt.

Decorating was so fun.  Ps, am I not styling or what?

Pretty!

The carnage.

The tongs were not helpful.

Yum.

The skewers helped a little, but not enough.

Happy Birthday, Aunt Twyla!  And thanks Britni for doing the dishes!

Mint chocolate pretzels.  Not that good in your mouth.

On the First Day of Christmas...

...My true love gave to me- APPLE CIDER COOKIES!

Compliments of cooksrecipes.com.  Inspired by a jug of apple cider on an end cap at WalMart.



The recipe suggested putting a glaze on the cookies.  I got tired and both homework and bed were calling my name, so I skipped it.  I bet it would have been awesome though.  I told myself I would wake up early and make the glaze tomorrow, but I sincerely doubt it....

Sickie and Studying

My sweet husband was kind enough to pass along the stomach flu he had over the weekend.  I left work at 8:30 yesterday and spent the rest of the day and all of today home sick and miserable.  Of course I took good care of the hubby over the weekend, but when I got sick, he was working a 24 hour shift and I was sick at home alone.  Luckily my doggies were more than willing to cuddle up with me on the couch, which they are normally not allowed to do.  Quincy gave me kisses and got me laughing when I felt extra terrible.  Sweet boy.  I woke up at 2 pm today and finished some last minute homework (Tuesday is normally my homework day, so I missed that chunk of time to finish the week's assignments).  Then I had to drag myself to class and pretend that I was interested in personality types and the differences in my classmates.  Normally that would fascinate me, but I felt too terrible to care.

Now I am sitting at home doing a study guide for my class tomorrow night.  The test is over five chapters and the study guide makes no sense.  One of my questions started out "For which of the following...", but the study guide is fill in the blank.  Oh my.  So let me procrastinate for a minute and keep blogging.

I can't believe that I have only twenty-seven credit hours left until I have my degree in mental health psychology.  Even though it's not a degree that I ever wanted, it's still a degree.  My degree.  With graduation comes the dilemma- to continue on and get my masters degree or to start a family?  Is it possible to do both?  Which is more important to me from a spiritual standpoint?  The more I think about it, the more I believe that God wants to bless Lee and I with many children, children to raise to know and love and serve Him.  But I also feel that I need to glorify God in my job, and have always felt that I need to work in adoption or humanitarian aid or counseling. 

So many questions!  Big questions!  I assumed that I wouldn't get senioritis since I am twenty-five and married and have a job that I enjoy.  But senioritis creeped up on me anyway- sneaky, sneaky!

Ok, I've wasted enough time.  The silly study guide is calling my name.  Catch you guys on the flip side!

Biggest Loser and Bones

Hello all!!!
Today started the kick off the the Biggest Loser at my job.  We are going to start weighing in every Friday and have our final weigh in on December 10th.  I know that I won't "win" (winner is the one who loses the highest percentage of their body weight), but I am really excited about everyone trying together to eat well and work out.  I mostly just want to slim down (my pants are too tight) and find some lean definition.  And start thinking about running again!!  (If I could ever get this toe to cooperate.)  I went to the grocery store and stocked up on healthy snack items (yay, hummus).  And when I got home from class today, I worked out!  I had an unopened exercise dvd on the shelf, so I broke open...

The pussycat dolls!  I'm not sure what caused me to buy this dvd.  Perhaps it was the accompanying free subscription to Fitness magazine?  The dvd was fun, but not a work out I would do in front of my little brother...it's pretty skanky.  Fun, but skanky. 
Current weight: 133.6
Goal Weight:  121

If you have any healthy eating or workout advice, please pass it along.  I would love some good tips.


Bones:

Have any of you watched this show?  Lee and I just finished the third season.  In the last episode, a fairly central character is revealed to be the apprentice of a serial killer.  The character had fallen victim to their pure logic, and was persuaded by "the master" to make the world and mankind better by removing evil from it...ironic, huh?  Killing as a tool for goodness.  I was heartbroken when this character was revealed to be the apprentice.  I cried.  And not just a little.  I felt like I had been betrayed by a friend.  This might show that I am to immersed in tv...and it is true that when I like a show I like to watch only that show until I've seen every episode.  But I don't think I've ever watched anything where a "good" character turns out to be bad.  And I guess it was partly due to the fact that this character wasn't bad in an outright, selfish, evil kind of way.  I was so sad for this character.  :( :( :( 

My Birthday Bash

This Wednesday was my 25th birthday.  It's pretty crazy that I am a quarter of a century old.  Happy birthday to me!

When I was in high school, I would have told you that when I was 25 I would live somewhere glamourous and work in marketing.  I wanted to be married to someone with green eyes who played baseball and travel all the time to exotic locations.  I wanted to drive a Land Rover or a Jeep Grand Cherokee and live in a two-story house.  I thought that I would cook an elaborate dinner every night and buy my clothes from the Limited and Ann Taylor.  I figured that I would be close to finishing grad school (either my MBA or possibly considering law school) and beginning to think about having babies.

My reality is closer to this:  I live in my hometown and work in education/ childcare/ social work.  I love my hazel eyed, God-fearing EMT husband.  We've been to Ethiopia, Mexcio twice, and taken many trip across the US.  I drive a black Xterra named Jean.  I live in the house that Lee's grandparents built in 1953.  I cook rarely (once a week) and buy my clothes mostly from Target, Marshalls, and the consignment stores in town.  I am 27 credit hours from my psychology degree.  And I want to have a baby.

My life doesn't exactly look like what I thought I wanted.  And that's okay.  I am content and satisfied with the life that God has given me.  When I look at the people in my life I realize that I am incredibly blessed.  Life is what you make it.  And I hope to make mine even better in this next year.

My actual birthday day:
I had to work.  Do you like how I said "had to" as if people should automatically be excused from work on their birthday?  My boss and some other co-workers called me at 6:45 from Washington D.C. and sang me "Happy Birthday".  When I got to work for staff meeting, other co-workers had brought a cookie cake and my favorite pizza dip.  My co-teacher gave me a ton of yummy candy and a cute Halloween t-shirt.  I really work with some of the best people.  And then my dad brought me flowers at work!!!  Pink is my favorite.

After work, I had to go to class.  Again with the "had to".  I also had a presentation with my friend Bethany over gender roles.

She's amazing.

After class, I met up with my sweet man and went to dinner at Osaka.  I had only been there once (years ago, for prom when I was a sophomore with a cool senior boyfriend).  There is a new location not too far from our house.  Osaka is a Japanese steakhouse and sushi restaurant that has a section of hibachi grilling.  We chose to sit on that side and were very entertained by the experience. 

Then Lee and I went home and tried to watch a "Bones" on Netflix.  We usually watch it in bed on the laptop, and today the allure of sleep a stronger pull than the storyline.

All in all, not a bad day.  I had many calls and texts throughout the day from family and friends.  What a lovely thing.  That's why I love birthdays- everyone gets to be part of the special day.  I heard from people that I don't get to talk to as much as I would like (stupid busy lives.)

Happy birthday to me!