happy turkey day

Well today is officially Happy Turkey Day! Has this year just flown by or is it just me?

If I think back to this time last year... let's see. I had just heard the news the Monday before Thanksgiving that my company was closing it's doors & I would have to start looking for another job. This was not the type of news anyone wants to hear right before the holidays for sure. At that moment I wasn't sure how I was going to make it through but somehow I've managed.

Thanksgiving is the time of year to think about all the things in your life that you are thankful for... even though there are things we all wish that were different, everyone still has a list of things that they're thankful for.

I'm very thankful for having the love & support of my wonderful family. I wish that everyone had a relationship with their family like I do with mine. I've been truly blessed that's for sure.

I'm thankful for being able to spend precious moments everyday with my grandma in her last years. Those are memories that I will have in my heart forever & nobody can take away or ever replace.

I'm thankful that I have a wonderful boyfriend (hopefully future husband) Fred. Words can't express how deep my love for him really is & how I look forward to spending the rest of my life with him & having his babies.

I'm thankful for all of my awesome friends. I have the greatest friends in the world. They're always supportive & there when ever I've needed them.

Really, I could go on & on with all the things I'm thankful for in my life, but those are just a few.

Today started way to early... got out of bed around 8am & started cooking. I made hashbrown casserole & 2 pans of apple dumplings. Needless to say time ran a little short & we didn't leave the house until 11:30am. We ran by Fred's parents house to drop off hashbrown casserole & 1 pan of apple dumplings, then headed towards Mustang to my brother's house. We got there at 12:30pm... better late then never right? Well, that's always my theory at least. Plus, I think everyone's pretty much used to me never being on time anyways. If I plan to be on time somewhere, it never fails something will happen that will cause me to be late & usually really late... so I finally just gave up & quit worrying about pushing myself.

After hanging out at my brother's house for a few hours, we left & headed back to Fred's parents house. We stayed there until about 6ish then headed home for the night. Sitting on the couch after eating two meals within a 3 hour period of time, my eyes started closing, so Fred decided it was time to take me home before I passed out on his parent's couch.

I can't help it, first mistake was that we stayed out way to late last night when we should've been a little smarter & went to bed at like 10pm. Then eating all that wonderful food today... twice... yeah that pretty much did me in. Lots of holiday food usually equals a nap shortly there after for me.

All in all... I'm thankful for everything & everyone in my life. I'm especially thankful for sharing Thanksgiving with both of our wonderful families. Today was just an all around great day!

Happy Turkey Day

it's a girl

Well it's official... I'm going to be the proud great-aunt again to a baby girl! My niece Rachel is pregnant, due on Gabrielle's birthday in fact, which is April 25th. Gabrielle is my great-niece, so how cool would that be if they shared the same birthday.

I'm so excited for my niece & I can't wait to have another great-niece.

This only makes my baby fever even worse then before. I've had baby fever for several years now & it just keeps getting worse. Especially since it seems like everyone I know has had babies in the past year or they are currently pregnant. I'm so jealous I can't even put it into words.

Unfortunately at the rate I'm going... I'll be lucky to have any children before I turn 40 years old. Very depressing to think about, so I try not to if I can help it. I joke about it all the time but deep inside it really bothers me & I'd give anything to have a marriage & children in my life. I still keep hoping & crossing my fingers for this to come true.

In the meantime, I will just enjoy everyone else's children.

Cracker Barrel Hashbrown Casserole

If you haven't had the hasbrown casserole from Cracker Barrel then you seriously need to, because it's awesome! I happened to find the recipe for it online & I've made it several times now & it's turned out great! Just thought I would share the recipe.

Cracker Barrel Hashbrown Casserole

2 lbs. frozen hashbrowns
1/2 cup melted butter
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 pt. sour cream
1/2 cup chopped onion
2 cups grated cheddar
1 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. pepper
2 cups crushed cornflakes
1/4 cup melted butter

DEFROST hashbrowns

COMBINE next 7 ingr. and mix with hashbrowns

PUT all in a 3 qt. casserole

SAUTE cornflakes in butter and sprinkle on top

COVER and BAKE at 350 for about 40 min

My friend Krissy suggested to use Frosted Flakes instead of regular corn flakes & I really liked it better when I made it that way. Just a little suggestion.

Xpress Redi-Set-Go

This has got to be the coolest thing ever! I'm so amazed at the neat stuff they come out with these days. I first saw the GT Xpress 101 a year ago & I wanted one from the moment I saw it. Then a few weeks ago I saw this new & improved version called the Xpress Redi-Set-Go... wow! So move over GT Xpress 101! Now I've gotta have this new & improved version!

To top it off, we were at Fred's parents house the other day & I walked in the kitchen & guess what his mom had sitting on her counter? Yep, you guessed it... a Xpress Redi-Set-Go! It's allot smaller than what I had imagined, because on tv I think everything looks bigger I guess. That's ok, I still think it's cool & I still want one! I mean come on, think of all the ways you could use this thing, wow. My first thought is... omlet! And if you visit the website you can watch a video with this lady making a bunch of fun stuff with it too!

So I'm adding this to my list for Santa this Christmas!

Click here for the update to this story:  Xpress Redi-Set-Go - update

skunky

By noon time rolled around yesterday, I was ready to crawl in a hole somewhere, but instead of giving into that thought, I somehow managed to make it through the rest of the afternoon & I'm happy to say I somehow survived!

I worked late, then had to run by the post office to drop off the mail. I barely made it to the bank before 6pm when they close, then I headed home. Of course when I left work it was already dark outside, which always sucks. I got home, let Abigail outside, put her dinner down, changed clothes, then headed to Tan & Tone. After tanning I decided to go ahead & stop by Wal-Mart to get a few things. I got home around 8:30pm jumped in the shower & got around. Fred didn't get home til 10pm, then he jumped in the shower & we headed to "Friends" to meet our buddies & have a few drinks. After we left there we stopped at IHOP to grab something to eat before heading home.

Arriving home... we had quite the surprise awaiting us. Not a good surprise either... a very bad surprise! Definitely a surprise we could've done completely without. As we opened the front door our breath was taken away by the one & only un-distinctable smell of a SKUNK! Keep in mind we live in an apartment ontop of the barn. So somehow a skunky wiggled its way into the barn & decided to grace us with it's breath taking perfume de skunk. I'm not even sure breath taking is even the right word to describe it. Despite the strong smell, we somehow managed to go to bed, sleep through the night & we were still alive this morning. Let's just say that the smell was still very strong this morning & it wasn't until I let Abigail outside & walked back in the house that I realized just how strong the smell really was. It would almost knock ya down, YUCK, YUCK & DOUBLE YUCK! We left the house & headed to Fred's parents house & on the ride in the truck I realized my purse even smelled like skunk, even better huh! My next thought was, oh shit I probably smell like a skunk too... great just what I wanna smell like.

We opened both overhead barn doors, windows, sprayed fabreeze, thrown a bunch of moth balls all around & turned one of those large fans downstairs in hopes this would free the skunky smell & keep skunky out or from coming back in again. I searched the internet & found that mixing baking soda & water & spraying this mixture all around will also help eliminate the smell... so I've done that too. I have to say just in the past few hours the smell has gotten better, but it's still there. Faint... but the smell is still there. Hopefully by tomorrow morning it will be vanished for good. I've got all my fingers & toes crossed.

I'm hoping tonight I don't have any more skunk nightmeres either, geez. Yes... it's true, last night I had a nightmere about a skunk & let's just say it didn't end up like I would want it to happen in for-real life either. In for-real life there would be a firearm involved, but in my nightmere somehow I ended up adopting the skunk, getting it de-skunked & taking care of it... can we say YIKES. That was a true nightmere & scared the hell out of me! Why in the world would I have adopted a skunk? Geez, I must have missed the part in my nightmere where I was drugged to have even thought about doing something like that. Who knows.

Dreams/Nightmeres are so crazy sometimes. Well... maybe I'm just speaking for myself, but oh well.

Yet another crazy story in my life.

almost friday

Just a few more hours until it is officially Friday. One more week until Thanksgiving is here. Hard to believe another year is almost over. Crazy how fast time flies by the older you get. Someone slow it down please!

I hate it when the time changes & it's starts getting dark by the time I get off work. It's hard to do anything outside in the evenings after work, unless you rush rush rush & then it' gets dark & cold & you might as well go inside, crawl under a heating blanket & pop in a movie or find something on tv.

To me, winter is the time of year that's perfect for hibernating in the warmth of home. Cold & freezing temperatures are just simply miserable to me. If they made a pair of coveralls that were like a heating blanket, I would definitely invest in a pair & wear them everytime I decided to step foot outside during the winter months. I'm the type of person that will let my truck run for 30 minutes, to make sure it's nice & toasty inside before making the brisk run from the front door to the truck.

Today was a good day. The weather was decent & even though the work day wasn't near long enough for me to get everything accomplished that I wanted to... that's ok. I've gotten allot marked off my to-do-list at work this week & hopefully tomorrow I will really be able to kick it into action & get even more marked off my list.

Fred left this morning & headed to Carter, he should be back sometime tomorrow or Saturday. I don't mind him being gone, but I do miss him while he's away. I enjoy spending time together & I have fun when it's just the two of us. I can't really describe it, except we just fit together.

I met my friend Pam for dinner at Charleston's this evening & guess what I had to eat? Of course... Baked Potato Soup & salad. You can't go to Charleston's to eat & not order Baked Potato Soup, come on! I'm so glad I found the recipe for it & if you haven't seen my post with the recipe, here's the link to it, click here: Charleston's Baked Potato Soup

I'm excited to go look at more houses this weekend. Just the thought of having a home with a nice size kitchen where I have room to cook & have family & friends over for dinner or even holidays. I just wanna jump up & down just thinking about it! Having a washer & dryer is a dream also... I wouldn't have to lug loads of laundry across the yard to Kev's house & feel like I'm intruding into anyone else's space. Or wouldn't have to deal with the non-working dryers at the laundry mats either. To have enough room in the bedroom to be able to walk around both sides of the bed... a closet big enough to fit both our wardrobes... oh what a dream!

I will probably pass out from excitement when the day comes we actually purchase a home. Don't laugh, but I have this feeling that a few tears might roll down my cheek. Happy tears, of course. But just the thought of having a nice house again, is emotional for me. It might sound crazy, but I'm just being truthful here.

Well it's time for me to call it a night & get some beauty rest. Tune back in tomorrow for more excitement.

Pioneer Woman - Apple Dumplings

I stole this recipe off The Pioneer Woman... for those who haven't ever read her blog or visited her website before... you have no idea what your missing out on! I will warn you though, her website is very addicting! Here's the link for this recipe, she has lots of pictures & stuff: http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2008/02/apple_dumplings/

Let me just say that after the first time I made this recipe I was addicted to it & it was a complete hit w/everyone who tried it. It's so easy to make too, which is right up my alley. I would recommend it to everyone in th entire world! This is one of those recipes that is to die for... TRUST ME!

Apple Dumplings

2 Granny Smith Apples

2 cans of crescent rolls

2 sticks of butter

1 1/2 cups of sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

cinnamon

1 can of Mountain Dew

1. Peel and core apples
2. Cut apples into 8 slices each
3. Roll each slice in a crescent roll
4. Place in 9x13 buttered pan
5. Melt butter, than add sugar and barely stir
6. Add vanilla, stir and pour over apples
7. Pour Mountain Dew around the edges of the pan
8. Sprinkle with cinnamon
9. Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes
10. Serve with ice cream and spoon some of the sweet sauces from the pan over the top