October 23, 2010

Today was a busy day. Jon and I went to Morgan's soccer game this morning. When we came home, we chilled out a little. Jon played on the computer and I fell asleep on the couch while watching the Notre Dame game. When I woke up, it was time to go to Lauren's soccer tourney game. The Invaders won and will be playing the championship game tomorrow afternoon. I attempted to make cupcakes for Julie's Halloween party tonight. I discovered that I didn't have enough milk to make the homemade frosting, so I decided to make sugar cookies instead. When it came time to get my (cheap, homemade) costume together, I couldn't find my big fake plastic knife. So I had to ditch the costume and go as a deranged killer. (Because the look like normal people. Get it?) Jon and I drove separate because he knew he wouldn't stay too lon. It was mostly people from my work and he didn't know but only a few. I had fun. It was kind of laid back, not too wild. I got my ass handed to me in a Euchre game. It only lasted a couple deals because Helen (my opponent) got two loners. It was a quick game, indeed.

October 22, 2010

Pumpkin carving time! We went over to my mom and dad's for dinner and to carve pumpkins tonight. I was originally going to carve the Mona Lisa on mine. I had the pattern printed out and it was considered and 'advanced' pattern. I have to admit I was a little intimidated. There were a lot of small cuts to be made by her mouth. But I was willing to give it a try. However, when I went to tape the pattern on my pumpkin, I discovered that my pumpkin was too small. It wasn't tall enough actually. So I opted for a puppy pattern in honor of my Duke. It was only an 'intermediate' pattern. After we were all done carving, we all put the pumpkins on the porch. We had a lot of fun and they all turned out great!

October 21, 2010

Whenever I watch Hoarders, two thoughts go through my head. And they are at different ends of the spectrum. At one end, I think to myself, our house is usually a little messy. (Or as my mom calls it, "It looks lived in.") And I think, well, its not as bad as this crazy kook's house. At the other end, no matter how clean I may think my house is, after I watch the show I am motivated to clean something, because hoarding has to start somewhere, right? And I'm weird about people coming over to our house, because in my mind, I think it's never clean enough for company. Don't get me wrong, when people do come over, we clean up. But everyone I know knows that they are not to stop by our house without calling first or planning a day ahead so we can clean. And I got to thinking, I wonder if people think we are hoarders and that's why we don't like people to come over? Well, I'm here to say that we are not hoarders. There are no piles of unwanted crap with dead cats to be discovered underneath. We have working plumbing. And a clean counter top and stove top on which to cook.

October 20, 2010

Well, my schedule got a little screwy this week. I am usually off on Wednesdays and I worked today. It threw me off a little on my days. Tonight a group of us went to Hacienda to celebrate Jon's and my birthdays from last month. We usually all get together for dinner for birthdays, but everyone was so busy last month with vacations. Chris and Laura bought our dinner, which was really nice. And my parents had the staff come out and sing and give me and Jon sombreros. Ethan showed off his Pop Warner football metal and I promised him I would let him be my picture of the day. It was good to see everyone as we don't all have time to get together at the same time. Lives are so busy...

October 19, 2010

I got nothing.

October 18, 2010

Bubba Burrito.

October 17, 2010

Today, my dad and I drove to Ludington to take pictures. We were hoping for the leaves to be more turned up north, but we were a little disappointed. We still got some great pictures, but were just hoping for more. We stopped in Grand Haven on the way home. Here at one of their city parks, is an actual once-used train, the Pere Marquette Steam Locomotive No. 1223. Its all nice and pretty and restored and sits on a track right next to a playground. You can even climb on it and look in all the windows. Pretty neat. I've never been on a train before.

October 16, 2010

I like the way the sun casts a shadow filled glow in the yard early in the morning. Too bad the scenery isn't more interesting. Just our side yard. Well...Duke's yard. He owns it.

October 15, 2010

I saw this cloud formation when I was leaving work today. I thought it looked like angel wings. If I had seen them just a little earlier, I could have snapped the picture so that it looked like the little tree had wings. But they were steadily moving.

October 14, 2010

October 13, 2010

Today, I spent a lot of time attempting to make a cute fall treat that I saw online. Mini caramel apples. Here's the concept: Use a melon-baller to scoop out balls of Granny Smith apples and stick lollipop sticks in them. Then dip them in caramel, sprinkle them with crushed peanuts, drizzle them with chocolate. Sounds easy enough. Well, it turns out that caramel is not too happy with the unskinned apple ball and decides to run away, dripping all the way down to the bottom. I ended up with a sheet of apple-balls-on-a-stick sitting in a large pool of caramel and peanuts. I was pretty disappointed. It was an experiment. It failed. Later in the evening, Jon and I went over to my parents. My mom bought pizza and Lauren and Morgan helped put up their Halloween decorations. Morgan is not to keen on the monster in the window or the witch that sits on the front porch. She understands that they are fake and made of plastic and were bought at a store and are kept in a storage room until we put them out, but she still doesn't like them.

October 12, 2010

Tonight for dinner, I attempted to make some krab bisque similar to what we had at Steamers in Ludington. It was pretty good. However, a few changes I would make for next time. Double the liquid portion of the soup but use the same amount of krab. It was a little too thick this time around. Add some onions and red peppers. Possibly cut the krab up smaller or when its all done, use an immersion blender to break it all up.

October 11, 2010

Indian Summer. Duke approved.

October 10, 2010

My favorite tool--the tree killer.

Since the weather was outstanding today, Jon and I spent a few hours outside doing yard work. We both mowed some of the yard. Put all the deck furniture away. I then cleaned up the front of the garage. Cut down some overgrown bushes, cleaned the gutters and cut some tree branches down. I would love to cut down all the trees, but we don't have the money and Jon likes trees. But Jon doesn't like picking up leaves. So decide, buddy, which you like/dislike more?

October 9, 2010

We started the day out going to Morgan's soccer game in the morning. I don't remember if she won or not, but I know that she had 3 goals herself. Jen picked me up in the afternoon and we went to a Tastefully Simple party at Artistic Hair, where she gets her hair done. We popped over to Pop Style for some popcorn before heading home. I (mostly) watched the game when I got home. Later in the evening, about a million fire trucks went by the house. When I went outside and stood on the deck, I could still hear them, so I knew they were close. Jon and I hopped in the car to see if we could see anything. I've never seen a house on fire before. Turns out, it was right up the street, and no fire, but just some smoke coming out of an empty warehouse. Which is a good thing. I mean, I realize smoke is very dangerous, but I'm glad the firefighters didn't have to fight a fire and lives were not inherently in danger.

October 8, 2010

I got my Scentsy order in today. I love it! I think I might be a little obsessed with it already. I want one or two more for other rooms in the house. This one is in the kitchen and I can smelll it in the living room sitting here on the computer. The scent I have in right now is Sunkissed Citrus and it smells awesome in here. The plug-in has to stay out of the way of the animals, so I might opt for the bigger one that sits on a counter or table for my next purchase. Oooh, I can't wait to try out more scents!

October 7, 2010

I haven't had Peanut Butter Cap'n Crunch in forever. It tastes as great as it used to and still tears up the inside of your mouth.

October 6, 2010

October 5, 2010

Tonight all the TLs and ETLs (supervisors and managers) went out for a team builder. We met at Barnaby's for dinner at 4. Pizza, beer and fried pickles! Then we all met at Strikes and Spares for bowling and go-karts. I was winning the go-kart race by a mile. But Bryan and Brian conspired to take me out and I ended up third. I had decided early on that I wasn't gonna bowl because I didn't want to risk hurting my bad knee. Peer pressure and the jams on the jukebox lured me in anyway. I bowled two games and will pay for it tomorrow.

October 4, 2010

Today I went shopping for new work pants. If there isn't anything else in the world that will motivate a person to lose weight, trying on new clothes will. I have to get motivated. I need help.

I came home and cleaned today. Did the dishes, did some laundry and put a couple Halloween decorations up. This light-up spider hanging from the ceiling fan made a really cool light pattern on the ceiling.

October 3, 2010

Halloween is coming. Or as Target Marketing calls it--Halloweekend.

Duke is sporting his trick or treat collar for the month. I am trying to teach Duke to walk on a leash. We have an acre of yard and for the most part, it's all fenced in. Duke has always had the run of the yard for whenever and for however long as he has wanted it. So we don't walk him. Which means he is a nightmare to walk on a leash whenever we need to take him somewhere. I'm using the Gentle Leader to break him of his habit of pulling. He doesn't like to wear it, but I'm hoping he gets used to it. And eventually, when he learns to not pull on his leash, he won't have to wear it at all. If you don't have a dog, or have never heard of it, it fits over the snout and around the neck. When your dog pulls forward, it pulls his nose to the side, theoretically stopping him from pulling. I'm taking him out into the yard for only a little bit at a time. This is the first day, and my goal is for it to take less than a month to break his pulling habit. I'm jealous of people who can take their dog anywhere and the dog will trot right next to them on a loose leash and not be a pain in the ass.

October 2, 2010

D&B. Not Dooney and Bourke. Duke and Bubba.

October 1, 2010

Have you ever used Restaurant.com? It's wonderful. It is a website where you can buy restaurant gift cards for less than half the price. For the most part, they sell $25 and $50 gift certificates for $10-$15.All you do is put in the zip code to pull up participating restaurants in a certain area. Now, I will admit, there isn't a huge selection, and certainly not your most popular restaurants. No Hacienda, Fridays or Granite City. But if you ever want to try out a new or unknown restaurant, this is the best way to do it without spending a ton of money. Here's the kicker--most of the time they run a deal where you can get anywhere from 70-90% off the purchase price. Today, I bought 2 - $25 gift certificates for Francesco's (on Lincolnway, near the 100 Center). Normally, they would have been $15 a piece. But since they were 90% off, I got them for $1.50 a piece. Now, when Jon and I decide to go (because they never expire), we just print off the certificate and take it in with us. It sounds too good to be true. But it's totally legit, and yes we have used them already and they work fine. In fact, we used them twice for different restaurants when we went up to Ludington last weekend.

September 30, 2010

It's beginning to look a lot like...fall. There's lots of corn down. Leaves are starting to turn and fall. The days are breezy and the nights are getting cooler. We'll probably have to mow the lawn one last time this year.