Happy Halloween!

Paisley The Dinosaur!

Trick or Treat....give me a good bone to eat!

Hear me rawwwrrrr!!!

All dino'd out from celebrating Halloween!

It's been a pretty quiet day and night around here for it being Halloween! I spent the day lounging with Paisley, watched old horror movies on TV and drank enough orange juice and emergen-c to last me a year! I'm really hoping whatever bug and illness is trying to bring me down moves on sooner than later! Since I was still at risk for infecting the kiddos at the hospital (have to be fever free for 24 hours), I had to stay at home again. And who wouldn't love a free day off from work?! Normally I would...but since it was Halloween, I am super bummed I missed it! All of the kiddos were going to get dressed up in their costumes then have a parade around the hospital while trick-or-treating....ahhh sooo cute!!! Since I missed out, I got Paisley dressed up for a little bit. She's such a good sport and always goes along with getting dressed up. I think it's because she knows she'll be spoiled with treats afterwards! The only other exciting thing today that happened was I got a new phone! My blackberry lately has been nothing but unreliable. To send or receive a message, I had to turn my phone on and off to first read it and then on and off again just to reply! It would rarely let me answer a call and usually wouldn't connect if I was trying to call someone...so after 3+ish years, it was definitely time for an upgrade and since Jordan gave me the go-ahead, I got the new iPhone 5! My life is already better knowing I have a reliable phone! And I was shocked to find out that it actually was cheaper than an Android phone...who knew?! So I spent the rest of the afternoon playing on that and getting it all set up! Since it was nice out today, Jordan grilled out hamburgers to get the most of the awesome fall weather we've been having because I have a feeling it won't be around for long. Now we're going to spend the rest of the night watching a horror movie and eating some Halloween candy since we didn't have any trick-or-treaters stop by our place! Happy Halloween everyone! 

DIY flannel infinity scarf

I've spent the day lounging and fighting off what I hope is not about to be strep throat and/or double ear infections. Sucky. My immune system chooses to fail at the most inopportune times but what can ya do. Between naps, studying, reading and hacking up some nasty stuff from my lungs, I couldn't stand just laying around anymore. Which led me to Pinterest of course and I saw some pictures of flannel infinity scarves made from old flannel pajama pants! Every year on Christmas Eve, Jordan's family has a cool tradition of giving new pj's to sleep in and then everyone spends Christmas morning kicked back in the new pj's while opening presents. So I figured Jordan would have a few pairs of flannel pants that he doesn't wear anymore or that have shrunk so I started rummaging through his closet...and low and behold, I found two pairs he was willing to let me refashion into an infinity scarf! Good thing Christmas is less than two months away so he can get a new pair of flannel pants (and hopefully I don't shrink them...whoops, my bad. I dry things just like my Dad...) Anyway, this project took me only 30 minutes to do and the result is a fun, flannel infinity scarf that will keep me nice and cozy! And even better, I can wear it on game days because it is black and gold! I combined a few different tutorials that I read through and came up with one that worked the best for me so here's the directions!

frumpy flannel pants before...
fun game day infinity scarf after!

start by cutting the inseam of the pants to the top.
do for both legs.
this works great if you have a puppy staring at you who wants
your attention instead of a another craft....

cut off across the top where the inseam ends.

next, open up the two pant legs and lay them on top of each other
wrong-side out (so the outer seams from the original pants should be facing out)

pin the bottom end together and then sew.

after sewing the ends together, that doubles the length of your fabric!
now, fold the fabric long ways (hot dog style) with seams still wrong side out.
basically, you should have a tube formed
then pin the sides and sew up the long side.

once the long side is sewn, turn the tube right-side out.
then take the two ends (cut off one of the hems because this makes the fabric really bulky and hard to sew through)
and feed one side into the other just like a half inch or so.
Then pin and sew the ends.
Since it has the original hem on it still, this makes for a clean seam!

And that's it! A very easy peasy project! And probably free for most people because who doesn't have a pair of flannel pants stored away somewhere that you can't quite part with yet?! Well, now you have reason to and give them a fashion upgrade! I love the new combination of two of my favorite things for the winter: flannel and scarves! 

wedding weekend recap

Love Hug dressed and ready to go to the Weibring-Bogue Wedding!
Dress: Target, $19.99 (on sale!)
Tights: Target, $4.00
Heels: borrowed from Leah
Jewelry: made by my mom!

Congrats to the new Mr. and Mrs. Bogue

first time as wedding guests being Mr. & Mrs. Easton :)

party on! 

3 shades of Grey

slow jam dance together...

sending off floating lanterns to end the night!

We had the most amazing weekend and got to witness a truly beautiful and incredible wedding ceremony between our close friends, Jared and Heather. The sun was shining and the wind held off so it made for a perfect fall afternoon to watch them exchange their vows outside with all the fall colors, sounds and smells surrounding them. Seeing Jared cry as he watched his bride make her way to him down the aisle was enough to get me choked up but once they started reciting their own vows they each wrote, well, that really made me (and every other guest there, besides Jordan) turn on the waterworks. Their love for each other that they share is so evident and it shined through in every aspect of their wedding--from their vows to the songs and readings all the way to the speeches their families and friends gave about them and to the way they looked at each other while dancing. We had a blast celebrating with them and with all of our closest friends! Jordan and I are so lucky to have such awesome people in our lives who encourage us to show the same sort of love and respect to one another like what we witnessed on Saturday. It was a magical day filled with family and friends, one heck of a party and mounds of love and laughter! Here's to your happily ever after, Mr. and Mrs. Bogue! Congrats! :)

Friday Funnies - 10.26

It's that time of the week....time for another edition of Friday Funnies to jump to your weekend! Since Halloween is next week, I figured I'd show you a classic and easy costume that is bound to cause some laughter. Whether you like cats or hate cats, everyone looooves a good ol' Crazy Cat Lady!!!!

The happiest crazy cat lady in all the land
image via Pinterest

buckle up and enjoy the ride!

Poor Janice, how did you enjoy that ride with that punk screaming in your ears?!!
Better stick to the carousel and tea cups kiddo.

And on that note, happy Friday and happy weekend everybody!!!! Our close friend's Jared and Heater are getting married this weekend so we have some good friends coming to town tonight to stay with us...and then we'll all be celebrating their marriage tomorrow! Can't wait for a big reunion and party! Hope everyone enjoys the weekend, fall weather and some football!

nightly rituals

There are some things that happen every night around our place. Some things like having dinner together, taking Paisley for a walk, and competing with each other during Wheel of  Fortune just to name a few. And then there are those things that happen every night like clockwork that I wish didn't happen. Like for instance, Paisley will jump up on my lap and right when I think she's going to cuddle with me, she lets a fart go right in my face. Has anyone ever eaten a dog's fart? I have. They are the worst. Actually, I would bet that there are very few things that smell and/or taste worse than a dog's fart. Another one is when I'll be having a conversation with Jordan then look over and realize he's snoring and has been asleep for probably the past 5-10ish minutes. So obviously that means he agrees with everything I was saying by default, it's only fair that way. Or one more is when I get all cozy in the recliner or on the couch to watch the news specifically for the next day's forecast only to fall asleep right before the weather portion of the news starts and then wake up right after the news is over. Seriously? Just my luck! The only reason I even stayed up and in the living room in the first place was to hear the weather and now I missed it? I need to pull it together. 

However, all of that ills in comparison to the worst of the worst of our nightly rituals that happens at our place. You might think I am exaggerating this one, but you would in fact be wrong to think that....and besides, there is no exaggerating something so obscene as this. It all starts out so innocent and every time, I'm so unsuspecting of it. Jordan and I brush our teeth, wash our faces and then get in bed. Usually I'll grab my nook to read or turn on whichever movie I picked out for that week and start it from where I left off. Meanwhile, Jordan flops around like a fish out of the water, shifts the blankets all around the place and finally gets comfortable. And before he falls asleep for the night, he always does two things: 1. gives me a kiss goodnight and 2. turns over to face the wall and simultaneously farts into the fan. Yes, folks you read that right. HE FARTS INTO THE FAN WHICH IS OSCILLATING AND POINTING RIGHT AT ME. Then he starts laughing and chuckling at himself. Literally, every single night, Jordan CROP DUSTS ME. It's like I'm living an awful fortune from a cheap fortune cookie every night that says, "tonight you will be crop dusted and you will taste it. (in bed.)" I only wish I were making this up. But, unfortunately, I'm not. And there is no winning. Whatever fart escaped over the blankets I've already breathed in and tasted. And if I try to hide from it under the blankets, the stench that is trapped underneath is respectfully 100x worse. Talk about a serious dutch oven and that's without eating Mexican or Chinese for dinner. And you know that statistic that says people eat something like 8 spiders a year at night while sleeping? Well, I eat like 38 farts a week thanks to Jordan and Paisley. And you're right, there could be much worse things that happen but whether it's an SBD (silent but deadly, obviously) or a loud fart that vibrates, they are all gag worthy. And what's worse than having that be the last thing to happen to you in a day? Oh nothing came to mind? Exactly. I rest my case.

Me: dramatic? Never.
Jordan's farts: deadly? Always.
image via Pinterest

Perfect Picks

Oh yeah, we're the highlighted team...at the top!

Jordan and I play in an NFL Pick 'Em Pool with my dad, sister, brother, several uncles and then lots of co-workers and friends of my uncles. We thought it would be a fun thing to get into and give us all something to talk smack about with each other. Well.....it has quickly turned into MUCH more than that. Basically, it's a really easy concept: you pick who you think is going to win every NFL game for the week and then give a tiebreaker score. That's it. No picking individual players or a defense. And the people who finish in the Top 3 each week win money! This pick 'em pool is perfect for me and Jordan because it's a great combination of my luck and his football knowledge (although, I know my fair share of football facts.) After a few kind of rough weeks, we've slowly been creeping our way back up to the top. Then the past two weeks, the Top 3 places came down to the tiebreaker score and we got beat out. Devastating. And so this week we came back with a vengeance!  AND WE TOTALLY DOMINATED!!!! We had PERFECT picks across the board for a solid 13-0 showing and no tie breaker to determine the winner. We outright won it and made some huge ground for the overall points for the season to get within 3 of the winner. Whoop whoop! Now that's what I call teamwork, baby!

Carved pumpkins & Roasted seeds!

Now that Halloween is getting closer, we thought it was finally time to carve our Great Pumpkins!!! After the search we had for these bad boys, we obviously couldn't let them go to waste! And with the perfect weather we had today and a lazy Sunday, there was no better time in our mind to carve them than today! 

And there's the finished products after lots of concentrating and carving, perfecting the cuts, and cleaning the seeds! I went with a monogram and Est. 2012, which is no surprise. I love monograms and since it's our first Halloween as a married couple, I couldn't pass it up! Jordan likes to carve out a challenging design so he went with Hades from Hercules! I think they look pretty awesome and now our porch is ready for Halloween! 

Now for the pumpkin seeds recipes! I made these in two separate batches today because I didn't know if cooking them in the oven at the same time would mix the flavors or have them end up tasting funky and since I was home all day anyway...I figured, why not! So the two different flavors I did were salty/spicy garlic and cinnamon-sugar apple cider! Yummmy they are tasty! I know it might seem like a lot of work to separate the seeds from all of the pulp and goop, but one taste of the seeds, and you'll know that it was worth the work! The first thing to do for whichever seasoning you decide to go with is to soak the seeds in a bowl of hot water then rinse them off and pay them dry. That really helps to get the pulp off easily!

Salty-Garlic Seeds:
2 cups pumpkin seeds, cleaned and rinsed
1 1/2 tablespoons melted butter OR olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt (I like using corse salt)
1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
2 teaspoons Worcestershire Sauce
1/8 teaspoon cracked black pepper

Directions: **Same directions for both flavors of seeds!**
1. Preheat oven to 275*F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper 
melt the butter in a mixing bowl then add salt, garlic powder and garlic salt, worcestershire sauce, and pepper. Mix this up well then add in the seeds.
2. Once the seeds are fully coated, spread evenly onto the parchment paper in a single layer.
3. Bake for 1 hour, checking occasionally and tossing them around. Bake until the butter mixture is dried and until they are  nice and golden brown.
4. Take out from the oven and take the parchment paper with seeds still on it off the baking sheet to cool. Store in an air tight container!

Cinnamon-Sugar Apple Cider Seeds:
2 cups pumpkin seeds, cleaned and rinsed
1 1/2 cups apple cider
1 1/2 tablespoons melted butter OR olive oil
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg

mmm fresh roasted pumpkin seeds!
Salty and Sweet!

Aside from the Hawks losing terribly yesterday, we still had an enjoyable weekend! It was beautiful fall weather here, we spent time with friends and each other, and got to carve our pumpkins! Next weekend our good friends Jared & Heather are getting married we're really looking forward to celebrating with them!!! Eeek and that means that my girl friends Leah and Hilary will be coming to town on Friday for the weekend/wedding! Really looking forward to next weekend already so let's hope that doesn't make the week drag on, isn't that the worst?! Enjoy the last few hours of the weekend and here's to a not so manic Monday! :)