Three Year Anniversary!

Wow, three years ago today I was blessed enough to marry the most wonderful man in the world.

That would be this guy.

Jealous, ladies?

All I can say is that since we've been married, my life has been so full of joy and a lot of laughter. I can honestly say he makes me laugh every single day. And we all know how hilarious I am, so I'm sure the same is true for him. ;-)

This week has definitely gotten off to a rough start for me - my sweet grandfather (Poppy) passed away on Sunday night - so needless to say, this day is a little bittersweet. But it really is just a reminder of what an amazing husband and friend I have.

Each year (and generally more often than that!), I revisit one of my most treasured wedding gifts. It wasn't the TV or living room furniture or even our wedding itself, it's this little book made by one of my sweet friends, Lori.

It's an "Advice for the Bride-to-be" book. She collected words of advice from mine and Greg's family as well as our entire wedding party. Lots of funny memories, great quotes and really good advice, which I so cherish.

What an amazing way to keep things in perspective and re-visit advice from the people I love most in the world.

In fact, in the book, I came across this sweet message from my Grammy and Poppy, which I really cherish now more than ever. Amazing advice from a marriage that lasted 56 years. If that isn't inspiration, I really don't know what is.

Happy Anniversary to my sweet husband!

And if you could, please keep my family in your prayers this week.

Fall-ing

Hmmmm, it must be fall. I'm starting to see lots of blog posts and Pinterest pins of beautiful, aspirational fall photos. But I do love fall. There's a chill in the air, the boots and scarves have come out and fall TV is officially in full-swing. OK, really only one of those things is true in Texas. I'll let you guess which one.

Since the state of Texas generally doesn't get the memo about fall weather until, ohhhh late October, here are a few signs that tell me it's fall:

College Football.

Oh yes, Kirk Herbstreit and his frosted tips are now back in my house every Saturday morning (what's that? His frosted tips are gone this year!? Blasphemous!) via College Gameday.

And to transition my house for the football season, a wreath change was certainly in order, so I made another yarn wreath - this time in OK State colors (although it's working perfectly as Halloween-themed, as well). Here's a semi-thorough tutorial on how to make a yarn wreath + rosettes.

Fall Clothes

I'm one of those people that feels like a season isn't really even here until I've been shopping. No need for a full, new wardrobe, just a few new items. And at the top of my list was these cute little things, that I finally bought this weekend.

Cold/Allergies

What would fall be without a good old fashioned headcold. Sniffle, sniffle. Cough, cough. So, I'm all hopped on vitamins, green tea and these Zinc cold therapy pills that are supposed to halt cold symptoms. Still waiting...

Fall TV

More to come on this, but quite possibly my favorite thing about the fall is the return of all my favorite shows. I'm one of those people that think of the characters on my TV show as my friends. Which is why I just screamed "MARSHALL & LILY ARE HAVING A BABY" eyes glistening with happy tears.

 So, overall I would say we're that we're fully embracing the "fall weather" with open arms. Happy Fall!

Eat Up!

We've fallen into a bit of a rut. At least when it comes to food. I probably have my grocery list memorized. We stick with the usuals - we grill a lot, we do pasta, lots of fish, etc. - and don't experiment much.

So the hubby had the great idea of trying out a new recipe each week. We're shooting for Sunday nights since both of us work full-time and don't have time to cook a full-out meal with lots of ingredients during the week. So, we had our first Recipe Sunday two weeks ago and tested out White Cheese Chicken Enchiladas, as originally found here. (I mean, I obviously found it through Pinterest).

It was DELISH. Totally worth the time and effort.

Last week, we decided to get a little wild. And when I say "get wild," I mean "gain five pounds from one meal." We tried Chicken Fried Steak. (Hey, I NEVER said they were HEALTHY meals!) Here's the recipe we tried and here's how it turned out:

Amazing. Totally recommend. Plus, we still have a handful of wedding gifts that we've never taken out of the box and this little countertop grill was one of them... until now!

Finally, while I'm not much of a baker, I took a stab at these little treats - Oreo Cheesecake Cookies. And apparently my baking curse has been BROKEN! They were super-yummy.

(source)

Now, I promise not to write a blog post every time we try a new recipe - I know none of you care that much (except my Mom. I bet my Mom cares. :-), but I'm always looking for new recipes, ideas, etc. so thought I would share the successes. Though I'm sure there will be failures to come, as well.

Happy Eating!

Master Bedroom Part 1: Dreaming of a Re-do

I need some help in the bedroom. WHOA, let's back that truck up. [beep... beep... beep...] I need some DESIGN help in my master bedroom. It's the one room that I've been wanting to furnish since the day we moved in, but it somehow got ranked lower on the list than other items.

 

Yes, the hubby and I made a list of all the things we want to buy/projects we want to do to our home. Then, we both ranked them separately and took the "average rank" to determine what we would tackle first. Yes, this is what happens when you merge a chronic list-maker (me) and a very pragmatic accountant (hubby). But we couldn't buy everything all at once, so this system worked out well for us!

 

So, we knocked out a washer/dryer, fridge (the necessities!), new kitchen table, coffee/side tables for the LR, tackled the master bathroom, guest bedroom #2... [deep breath] and now we're finally getting to our beloved master bedroom. Where the - uh - magic happens (at least according to MTV's Cribs).

 

 The room has already been painted (tackled last fall) a very neutral caramel color with a dark chocolate accent wall. I've decided on (and am pretty freakin' excited) about the color scheme I've chosen (and the hubby has approved), but more on that later!

 

For now, we're trying to decide on bedroom furniture and WOWZA - it is really expensive! We keep telling ourselves that it's a good investment and will last 20 years, but that price tag I've been seeing is a little hard to swallow.

 

We also just haven't really fell in love with an entire set, until it occurred to me - why not mix and match? OK, not entirely, but I have fallen in LOVE with several West Elm bed/headboards. In particular, these little gems:

Here's a few bedroom furniture sets we like (minus the bed):

 

And to be honest, the headboards we like are cheaper than the beds from the furniture set.

 

So, give me your advice. Is it a bad idea to buy a bedroom set minus the headboard and get the headboard we really like? Will the fabric headboard go out of style soon? We're SO torn between the nailhead upholstered headboard and the scroll headboard. Someone with more style should gently shove me in the right direction...

Car Wars

So, we're car-hunting. Yes, Greg's old truck is going to be passing on soon and, let's face it, it's time for an upgrade. The poor old truck - it's suspension is so bad, when you're driving (or riding in it) even on the smoothest of roads, you're bouncing all over the place like you're in the Beverly Hillbillies truck.

So the debate began about what kind of vehicle he would drive. Greg wants to drive a car, (he's driven a truck basically since he turned 16 and he wants something with a trunk that is small). I think he should drive an SUV (so we would have one car and one SUV). At the top of our list to test drive was the GMC Acadia (my pick), the Ford Taurus - new body style (Greg's pick), the Jeep Grand Cherokee (new body style) and we cut it off there.

 

We decided to go test drive the Acadia and the Taurus just to get a feel for what they were like inside, how they drove, etc. 

 

 

And then shiz got weird. And I'll take about 90% of the blame. Sometimes, I feel the need the be friendly, chatty and inquisitive when in situations like this (driving around in a car with a stranger, for example), but for some reason it just came across as awkward.

 

Scene: We just got finished test-driving the Taurus. I could tell Greg was in lurve with it. We were taking a look at the bells and whistles and the sales guy suggested we check out the trunk. He opens it up and I blurt out,"Wow, that's huge!" (In my defense, it was surprisingly large.) "You could fit a lot of bodies in there!"  Um. What? What? Why did I say that? The sales guy not only didn't laugh, but awkwardly walked away. Greg looks at me and mouths "BODIES? Really?" Uh, yeah. So inappropriate.

 

Now I know the big question you all have and the answer is yes, ABSOLUTELY. I had to fight EVERY urge to jump in the back seat, poke my head in between the sales guy and Greg and say "How fast does this thing go? Does it have automatic transmission? Does it have four wheel drive?"

 

Yes, that Home Alone 1 reference just happened.

 

We're leaning two different ways; at this point, we're just going to think about it some more, possibly test drive a few different models and (knowing me) make a car/suv pros and cons list. But ultimately, I'm leaving it up to the hubby as this will be his car. More to come on the car-hunting adventures! I've promised the hubby I will leave awkward, innapropriate commentary at home this time.

 

Hope everyone had a great Labor Day Weekend!