Monday, December 31, 2018

Happy last day of 2018!  Here is a quick recap from the weekend!  

Friday I got to wear my new short yellow Hunters (part of the $500 Nordstrom gift card I won – post coming soon now that almost all of it is accounted for).  I ran a few errands and even got to sit on my patio for a bit because it was so mild out.  

Then, hub and I went to a 12:45 showing of this.  I fell asleep a couple of times but I did have a few laughs.  Verdict:  Save your money.

After the movie our boys friend came over and stayed til after dinner and my husband got me new tires for my car so that was good to check that off of our list.  

Saturday our boys went to a friend’s house and we watched the UK vs. U of L game at our friends house with Ale 8 bourbon slushies, KFC, and Domino’s pizza.  After the game we did Costco and picked up our boys and one boy went bowling.  

Game outfit

Our friends’ adorable golden retriever during the game

My Fab Fit Fun box came – will report on the winter box contents soon and if I think it’s worth it.

Sunday was travel to in laws for Christmas celebration – outfit below

I made a red velvet bundt cake and let’s just say that there was an incident involving the dog destroying part of it.  

I also made potato casserole and let’s just say the dog also stepped on part of it.  

Cute college niece

We had a busy but fun weekend seeing lots of great people!  

Happy New Year’s Eve tonight!  I will be back tomorrow to tell you what I did!

Amy 

Saturday, December 29, 2018

Do you have exciting plans? My favorite way to spend New Year’s Eve is at home with my little family or with close friends at their house or mine.  I have done the big parties, I have done the hotel packages, and I have gone out to eat over the years.  I worry about being out on the roads and I prefer a quieter atmosphere now.  

Last year was really fun.  We got together with my two college besties and their families and went to one house for appetizers then went to a restaurant, and finally finished at another house for dessert.  

 Some Ideas:

-Have a family friendly gathering and do your countdown at 9 pm.

-Go to the Dollar Tree as soon as you can and check out their supply of party stuff.  Also, the Target Dollar Spot and your local grocery will have some stuff.  

-Use a color theme like white and silver or gold

-Order some food and make some food or ask everyone to bring something.  Themes can be fun like Mexican food or Italian food.  Check out my post here if you need inspiration for entertaining at home.  

This year, we are going back to celebrate with my mom.  She requested this in lieu of doing a Christmas celebration this year.  She spent a few days at my sister’s house for Eve and Day and now we are all going back after leaving her house on the 23rd.  

Domino’s thin crust

She wants to order Domino’s thin crust pizza – I got another person hooked on it!  And, we are all bringing appetizers.  I am making little smokies – just get the tiny little links and mix equal parts grape jelly and chili sauce and put in a little crockpot or on the stovetop and serve with toothpicks.  My husband loves these and I make them just once a year.  I’m also bringing a dip that my aunt makes and the raspberry meringues that I talked about awhile ago.

Chipped Beef Dip:

Mix up 3 tbs. milk, 3 tbs. miracle whip (light works fine), 8 oz. cream cheese (neufchatel or light works fine), a tsp. of Worchesthire and a package of the cheap thin beef slices cut up.  I think the brand I use is called Budding’s and it’s like 70 cents a package.  Serve with Ritz crackers.  

Pink Meringue Cookies

These are super easy but you have to follow directions perfectly.  They take about an hour but the hands on time is only about 10 minutes.  

3 egg whites, 1 tsp. white vinegar, and 1/8 tsp. salt – Beat these until you have stiff peaks.

Add 3/4 cup sugar and 3.5 tablespoons of raspberry jello and gradually beat in

Fold in 1 cup chocolate chips

put them on parchment paper lined cookie sheets (you will need 2) and bake at 250 for 25 minutes

then turn off heat and leave in oven for 20 more minutes

do not open oven door or meringue will fall.

Enjoy!

I love this look below with the sparkly leggings contrasted with the plaid flannel. You could also do a pajama theme and that would be fun for kids.

I’m also bringing champagne, cotton candy, this new game for the adults, and Shirley Temples for the kids.

What about you?

Happy New Year! See you back here for Hello Monday!

Amy

Friday, December 28, 2018

Happy Friday – not that anyone cares what day of the week it is right now!  Is anyone out there?  Boy, blog land is quite quiet this week.  Since I’m a teacher I have more time right now (and I’m also procrastinating about grading the final exams I picked up at school yesterday) and in the summer to blog, but it seems like I am opposite of everyone else who has gone radio silent this week.  I don’t even think there is a Friday Favorites link up today, but I still have some favorites. Oh well, here goes me beating to my own drum.  

I talked about my Christmas here and I talked about my favorite brands here if you are just joining me this week.  

I use WordPress for my blog and my stats show that I have 4 readers from Sweden (Hi Tin-Tin!), 2 from the Ukraine, 1 from Canada and 1 from the UK – Hi Joanne!  How cool, right?  I’m going to do a post about hygge and fika soon.  I was taught about fika by my Swedish readers but I was really into hygge last winter.  You’ll have to wait on the post if you don’t know what I’m talking about!  Lol!  

I gave my husband this cozy University of Kentucky blanket but I have taken it over!  I am savoring my morning coffees and slow mornings.  Heck, I make time for this during the school weeks, too, but I just am enjoying moving even slower right now.  

So, I abandoned my Christmas themed books and this book here has surprised me in a good way.  It is a bit cheesy and would make a good Hallmark movie, but I’m enjoying it.  Pick it up if you can.  

I read about this next one on a blog and I haven’t gotten into it yet but I’m excited about the premise of the book.  I’m all about books that help you find joy and contentment.  

I took a picture of my husband and one son stretching in front of the fire.  My husband will be off until January 2 after working just Wednesday and Thursday.  

I posted about some very thoughtful friends and this was another one.  This couple that we have been friends with for 20 plus years sent us this “snack box”.  We have enjoyed it and it was something different than flowers. 

This photo popped up on Facebook from Christmas at my parents three years ago.  These two are a couple of strong and amazing women.  They are 40 and 43 and I love them so much.  We cried together but we also laughed together and we have talked every day since the funeral.  So, this photo is bittersweet because we had the whole family together and healthy, but it is also a happy photo to me because of the love I feel for them.  

By Wednesday night our bellies were full of ham and holiday leftovers so we headed out to a new restaurant.  

Onion petals with sauce

My Short yellow Hunters arrived.  I’m working on a post with my $500 Nordstrom gift card items.  I ordered several things when I first got it but then took a break and ordered a few more after Christmas during their big sale.  These boots were $75 and I have worn my full length black ones to death for the last 6 years.  I like the idea of having a bright sunny color for a rainy day.  

Where were these earrings when I was looking for black tassel earrings at the beginning of December?  These were 6.99 at Chico’s.  

I asked Santa to bring me new readers but he didn’t so I found these at Whole Foods while looking for my husband’s protein shake.  See, there are shopping opportunities everywhere!  The sides are tortoise shell.  If my contacts are in I need readers.  If my contacts are out I don’t.  Oh, the joys of aging!  

If you’ve stuck through this whole post, thank you!  This was very “stream of consciousness” today I think.  

Happy a very happy Friday, weekend, and New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day!  I am posting soon about New Year’s Eve suggestions – I think I’m doing a Saturday post!  So, come back tomorrow if you still need some ideas.

Amy 

Wednesday, December 26, 2018

I’m mixing up my blog routine this week but that’s okay because I hardly know what day it is!  Are you like that, too, when on vacation?  Hub heads back to work for the next two days but then is off until January 2. 

So, let me get you up to speed.  My Dad passed on December 18.  We had the visitation on December 20 and the funeral on December 21.  I helped my mom with some things on December 22.  On December 23, hub and I finished our shopping for our immediate family and then it was Christmas Eve.  I had done plenty of online shopping so I was not in bad shape.  

Christmas Eve morning I got up and out early to wait in line for almost an hour for a ham!  Yes, I am embarrassed to admit this.  After that, I headed to Trader Joe’s in the same shopping center. The rest of the day I wrapped and wrapped.  But, I had two special deliveries come to my door that I will tell you about in a minute.  At 4:30, we went to church and then came home and ate dinner and opened Christmas pjs and played our new Christmas Eve game “What do you meme?”  I thought it was really fun.  One son was a good sport and the other thought it was “cringe-worthy” in his words. 

Christmas morning came and we started opening presents around 8.  Both days were just the four of us and you know what, I think it was just what we all needed.  We hadn’t been home much and we hadn’t been just the four of us much.  Yes, I was sad and had many “moments”, but I also felt the love and was thankful for my many blessings.  

Here is one special delivery.  Frozen soup plus a bottle of bourbon cream for my coffee. These friends came to the funeral but also wanted to bring me these comforting things.  I was so touched.  

The next delivery made me speechless and I’m rarely without words.  My friend had taken a picture of this photo of my dad from the funeral display, printed it out, and made it into an ornament.  She also brought me the Anthropologie Capri Blue Fir and Firewood votive candle set.  How special is this?  This was my favorite photo and my Dad always told us he looked like Tom Cruise, which he didn’t, but he thought it was funny.

This is what I wore to the Eve service.  This was the exact outfit I wore to the visitation except with my burgundy velvet top.  My little nieces told me my pants and shoes looked like they were from the 1800s!  Ha!

We sat in the balcony again this year.  I teared up several times because my Dad loved church and Christmas music.  

I decided to save my pasta plans and do this simple meal after church.

See that crust?  That’s what I stood in line for.

We got this for our family and played it.  Hub and I really liked it and the boys made fun of it.  It is a mature game.  There is a separate extra mature pack of cards.  It will make your eyeballs bleed.  They are DIRTY.  Hub and I read them after the boys left the room.

Annual p.j. pants.  One got moose pants and he called them “meese fleece” and the other got camping pants and he called them “trailer park pants”.  

Tolerating the game.

Christmas morning egg casserole and mimosa

One son made me muffins for Christmas and the other made me blog graphics and the promise to help me with my blog!  I was touched by both gifts because they were just sweet simple things.  Here is a blog graphic he made. Isn’t that cute?

Hub gave me these clogs that are like my beloved MIA Sofias but a little bit higher – these are the Abbas.  I will test them out some more to see if they are too high.  He also gave me a massage gift certificate.  So, I called my gift “Swedish clogs and a Swedish massage”.  It was very thoughtful.  We are not regular massage people around here.

One of hub’s gifts from me was this charcuterie board.  He loves saying that word and eating it.  I made him this for Christmas Day lunch.

I had a spiked hot chocolate.  It was so decadent!

The whole fam watched Die Hard and we had a fire.  It was so nice.  

We just snacked around during the movie and for dinner.  Hub had to go to bed early for work but it was a really nice and simple Christmas and just what we needed.  We will see hub’s side of the family on December 30 due to their travel schedule and my family on New Year’s Eve day because my mom wanted us to gather again then and not do our normal traditions.  

How about yours?  

Thanks for reading!

Amy 

Tuesday, December 25, 2018

Merry Christmas to you and yours!  May you have a lovely day surrounded by family and friends.  If you are missing a loved one, my thoughts are with you, as I will be, too.  

I also want to say a heartfelt thank you for reading my blog this year, whether you have been with me for awhile or whether you are a brand new reader, I really appreciate you coming here and I consider you a friend now.  

I started this little blog in April and really didn’t know if I could sustain it.  I had been a blog reader for years but was daunted (and still am) by the technology, photography, content creation, time commitment and so much more. I want to say thank you for your comments that have all been positive and supportive.  I especially want to thank you for the messages of comfort last week when I talked about losing my dear Dad.  

I hope you will stick around, because I’m not done for the year yet!  Here’s what I have planned for this week and into 2019: 

What to Wear, Do, and Eat on New Year’s Eve, Do you care about Clothing brands?, How Having the Right Stuff in Your Closet Makes your Life Easier, How to Make Friends as an Adult, January Fresh Starts, How to Deal with Grief, and Books I Read in 2018. 

What else would you like to see?  I’m all ears!  

Merry Everything, friends!

Amy 

Monday, December 24, 2018

Is it Monday? Haha! Happy Christmas Eve to all!

I am going to be a wrapping maniac today because nothing is wrapped yet.

I also may get in a ham line this morning. Honey baked ham is a once or twice a year treat for us – Christmas and Easter. There’s no other ham that compares. My husband uses it for 16 bean soup when we have had our fill of it as the main course and sandwiches so it gets used for several meals. For dinner tonight I’m making pesto pasta with artichokes and sundried tomatoes and shrimp and fettuccine Alfredo with chicken along with goat cheese garlic toast. We have a 5:00 church service.

Now I am just with my little family of four but the last few days we honored my dad and it was beautiful, fitting, and perfect.

Here are the nine grandchildren. I did all of the girls’ hair. My mom went to one sister’s house and then we will gather back at my mom’s house in a few days.

Merry Christmas Eve to all!

Amy

Thursday, December 20, 2018

I think my boys were 4 in this photo. I bought them bomber jackets and they wore camo pants for my Dad. After having 3 girls, my Dad’s first grandchildren were my twin boys.

My Dad passed away in the early morning hours Tuesday.  Feel free to click away today – I will understand.  But, I want to honor him in this space. This afternoon from 4-8 we will hold visitation and tomorrow we will have his service at 11 at my childhood church and the church where I was married.  Afterwards, he will have a full military honors service at his burial plot in the veterans cemetary because he was a career military man.  He was a fighter pilot in The Vietnam War and then continued on with the US Air Force until age 50 when he started a second career as a corporate pilot.  

How old do you have to be to feel ready to live life without a Dad?  Don’t get me wrong, I’m so grateful to have enjoyed him for 47 years and I know that some of us don’t get so lucky.  But, I’m greedy and I wanted more.  He has been such a powerful constant in my life.  He was a great sounding board for problems and we often would just chat about recipes, bourbon, current events, and many other things.  He loved running and getting up early.  He loved coffee and tea.  He loved doing his own house projects and doing yard work.  He appreciated almost all food and always was the first to compliment you on your meals. He loved every gift we gave him for his birthdays, Christmas, or Father’s Day.

My Dad was the oldest of three boys and as the story goes, kind of unprepared to be a father to a baby girl.  The joke was on him because he went on to have two more girls and no boys!  He had to play with dolls and learn to fix our hair.  My Dad loved to talk about how I mispronounced words and continued to imitate my words for 47 years.  He loved to talk about how I loved his bean soup as a baby.  I get my good memory from him and in his words we both have “a mind like a steel trap.”

When all the stuff about Title Nine came out I honestly didn’t get the fuss.  My Dad was the reason for this.  He always made me feel that I could do and be anything I wanted in life – gender not being a deterrent.  He told me I was smart and funny and talented and I believed him.  This never changed throughout my life.  Some powerful statements he make have always stuck with me.  When I was feeling that I was spread thin and not able to be the best teacher I could be, he told me that my average day was someone else’s best day.  When I announced I was pregnant with twins he told me he didn’t know anyone else better equipped to handle twins.  

My Dad led a good life and it was a long life of 76 years.  I want him to feel peace that he leaves behind a legacy of his three daughters, three sons-in-law, and nine grandchildren.  He had a marriage of 53 years.  His career was his passion and he got to do things that others only dream about.  But, he loved his family most of all and truly was a “family man”.  

We love you Dad and we will do our best to let you live on through us.  Until we meet again.  

Love,

Amy

Wednesday, December 19, 2018

This post seems kind of silly now because I lost my Dad early Tuesday morning.   He was finally transferred from the hospital here in my city to his hometown rehab center on Sunday.  I am posting a tribute to him tomorrow.  I am at peace because I didn’t want him to suffer and I’m glad he made it “home”, but this all happened so quickly, so I think I’m also still in shock.   I wanted to tell you because you have been so sweet with your messages of support.  Thank you, truly, from the bottom of my heart.  Come back for my tribute tomorrow or not if it’s too much right now.  I will probably take a break until Monday but this space has helped me.

I think the undershirt is a little too clingy.  This velvet kimono was only $20 last year, MJ green pants, and my Mia Sofia Clogs.  I love these shoes.  It was a milder weather day I think.  

Hub doesn’t smile in pictures.  It’s a family thing.  This was his work party Thursday night.  MJ velvet pants, black consignment pumps, Old Navy $15 metallic shirt, and old Target wrap.  

Thursday was a late night so Friday was a ponytail day.  Old Navy tunic, Old Navy vest, old jeans that I will donate because the rear is seriously almost ripping out, and black booties.  

Monday was jeans day and these are Vigoss jeans that are really my only pair I want to keep, same clogs, and a Free People top that I ordered from my Nordstrom gift card winnings.  

Over the break, I plan to do a major closet purge and only keep things that I really love and that flatter.  I also plan to start a health campaign for myself in honor of my Dad who I ran with for many, many years.  He was a lifelong runner to stay healthy and was still running 6 weeks ago.  I started running at age 22 and kept running until I was 28 and we ran a few races together and would run whenever I was home.  I then took up running again around age 32 and ran until my neck started giving me issues.  So, I don’t know what exercise I will do.  I have to think about it.  

Thanks for reading!

Amy 

Tuesday, December 18, 2018

Spoiler Alert!  I love it!  Mamas of young kids, I used to dread when my kids would be too old for the magic of Christmas!  I used to lament the fact that it took years to understand the fun only to quickly grow out of it a few years later!  I hope today’s post will make you feel a bit better.

I remember well the days of being a room mom and trying to create and give my high school finals, trying to take a personal day to shop and wrap, trying to squeeze all of the activities in – there was something almost every night!  I was caught up in trying to have the perfect holiday now that I was The Mom!  It made me so tired!  

Now, the holiday is much more relaxed and if I may say, the reason behind the season is more at the front of our celebrations.  Along with the religious parts, we are more focused on quality time with family and friends.  I am able to take more time for myself and my husband and I have more time together.  

I love to go to a 4:00 or 5:00 Christmas Eve service with communion.  Last year we sat in the balcony and had a great view.  We went for Chinese food for the first time ever!  I actually prefer a nice meal at home and will probably try to do that this year.  It is just the four of us for Eve usually.  Some years my parents came to go to church with us.  We usually went to their house the day after Christmas with my sisters and their families.  My parents would rotate going to one of our houses on Christmas Day.  

My boys aren’t big on breakfast, but I made cute little mini cinnamon rolls last year for Christmas morning.  

Now that we have teens, we wake up slowly and enjoy coffee, tree lights, candles, and just being lazy. When the boys wake up, the four of us open presents and then spend time enjoying them.  Some years, I will throw in a french toast casserole or breakfast casserole. 

Then, my in laws and my sister in law’s family come over most years.  Here is my spread from last year.  

I make these cookies every year – a tradition started by my aunt who got the recipe from her mother’s friend.  I will put the recipe on here soon!  They are so special and everyone looks forward to these.  

We used a tripod and took this on Christmas Eve for our family in Germany.  Two of us got in our jammies too quickly!  

We almost always get a Honey Baked Ham and this was me standing in line at 7:00 a.m. on Christmas Eve.  My social media post said that I used to stand in line for concert tickets but now stand in line for ham along with other people in my age bracket!

I am bringing this french toast casserole to school for a brunch on Thursday.  I will try to put this recipe up soon, too!

I

This was from one son at age 7 at the start of our break.  This is my wish for you, too!

It’s hard to believe this was just a year ago.  We met my parents for a Christmas music show.  

Other traditions include:

new pj’s on Eve

playing a new game on Eve

getting chips and salsa from a Mexican restaurant to munch on Christmas Day

mimosas on Christmas morning

meeting as many friends as possible for a meal over break

going to the movies a few times

traveling to both grandparents’ towns

doing a family charity project

What about you?  If you have teens, what do you think?  I’d love to start some new traditions, too.  We are major homebodies and just love being at home during this season!

Amy