Lazy food making

I know I promised a recipe yesterday, but we didn't have the supplies so I didn't make it. I made chicken bacon cheddar melts instead. Tonight we made chicken parmesan grinders; I didn't take a picture and I think most people know how to make chicken parm. I'm such a bad food blogger. Maybe tomorrow I will actually make something interesting. We shall see.

In other news, fiance actually just sat down with me to tape the invites to the mats- he put the tape on and I centered it and stuck it to the mat. We had a good system going until we ran out of tape. I have gone through 12, yes 12, rolls of tape since I started assembly and now I have to go out to buy more. Only a little more than half of the mats are stuck to the pocketfolds and we still have more invites to do. A labor of love these invites are!

Sometimes I feel as if I am talking to myself on here. I suppose it's an outlet for me, but some feedback every once and again wouldn't hurt. Whether you are friend, stranger, or knottie, feel free to comment =)

An iffy weekend

Saturday started off as a good day- a baby shower for my older cousin that is expecting a little girl, Ava, in about a month. She got so many cute clothes and toys, it only increased the growing baby fever that I have!! (And fiance, if you are reading this, that should have been kinda obvious by now- no need to get all pale and panicked.) But then I had a falling out with my family which completely ruined my night and made me really upset. But I think it's all smoothed over now so hopefully I won't have to go through that again.

Sunday we went to my future in-laws house to look at pictures of fiance growing up. We are going to to table numbers with pictures of us at the corresponding ages. Now I have to get my pictures together (my mom is supposed to be searching the house for me) and I can start those.

I am off to watch Twilight and work on assembling some more pieces of our invitations. I should have a new recipe to post tonight so check back!!!

Bacon, Cheese & Potato Chowder

This is my first food post and I forgot to take a picture of the dinner before we ate it. It wasn't very pretty looking, the picture I am going to use from the Kraft Foods website is much prettier!!

Fiance and I love hearty meals in the winter time. I found this soup last year while we were still living in the apartment. It became a fast favorite; I made it several times last winter. This winter it sort of slipped through the cracks until fiance brought it up last week and asked me to make it one night. So I did.
Recipe as follows. Normal text is the recipe, italic text is my changes.

Bacon, Cheese & Potato Chowder

Recipe adapted from kraftrecipes.com

3 cups fat-free milk
1 can (10-3/4 oz.) condensed cream of potato soup

2 cups frozen Southern-style hash browns

1 cup  2% Milk Shredded Sharp Cheddar Cheese

2 slices  Bacon, cooked, crumbled (I used 4 slices of turkey bacon)

2 green onions, thinly sliced (I used half of a small white onion) 

Mix milk and soup in large saucepan. (I add the onions here as well) Stir in hash browns (The bacon was added here as well, to get the smoked flavor into the soup a bit). Bring to boil on high heat, stirring occasionally; simmer on medium-low 10 min., stirring frequently. Serve topped with cheese, bacon and onions.

Do It Yourself Project!!

Tonight I did a wedding project- bouquet charms for my bridesmaids!! I know a couple of them will see this post but it's ok, these aren't a big secret. I will bring them to the florist and have them attached to each girl's bouquet. I thought it was a sweet idea, and it wasn't too difficult to make.

The printer is tired..

..but we have all but one insert for the invites printed out!! We have to print out the directions cards tomorrow, then assemble everything. I have started to glue down the invite mat and the invitation onto the pocketfold; I did 10 invites and went thorough a whole roll of tape. Tomorrow's job is to go buy more tape. Everything looks great so far and I can't wait to finish them all.

I have so many little projects to do, I am so excited to see it all come together! I will try to post pictures as I complete things. I also have to start taking pictures of the food I am cooking. It hasn't been anything exciting lately, I don't think anyone needs the recipe to make pasta and sauce :-P

Exciting day!!

Today I had my hair and makeup trial for the wedding. If came out fantastic!!! I am so happy with both styles and the girls that did completed my look were so friendly and nice. I did not want to take my hair down or my makeup off, but I finally did and now I'm back to my plain old self. Cannot wait until I'm all done up again!!

When I got home I found that my stamps and stamp pads had come in the mail, so I started to stamp the napkins. The color I bought isn't working too well, so I will have to play around with it tomorrow and try to make it work. The glue also came so I can make the bouquet charms.

After dinner, Ben finished printing the invite inserts so I could complete my mock up invite. It looks great!!! A few minor changes, and a few extra cuts I will have to make on the paper cutter, but it's exactly what I wanted!

Hopefully tomorrow is as successful as today was =) Leave comments, people, I think I'm talking to myself in this blog!!

2009 Recap

I know it's late, but I realized I didn't do a recap of 2009 and I want to before I forget anything.

In 2009:
-We bought our first home. Packed up our college student apartment and moved into a grown up house.
-We did a photo shoot in the house, which is great because the house doesn't really look like it did in March anymore.
-My parents filed for divorce.
-We took a set of engagement pictures by the shore and instantly realized we chose the right photographer.
-I conquered my fear of driving long distances to places I didn't know (aka I got a GPS).
-I bought my wedding dress.
-Fiance leased a new car.
-I got through my first clinical affiliation and began to think that maybe I can be a physical therapist after all.
-Ben and I started a new hobby of caching which I love and miss dearly because of the snow.
-I modeled in a bridal show, which was pretty cool.
-We learned and continue to learn how to budget our money.
-We took another set of engagement pictures in a college town and had a blast with each other and the photog.
-I faced division of my families and struggled to come to maintain the life I used to know.
-I took my last college lecture course ever, completing 5.5 years of academic study. What is left: 2 hands on internships (aka clinical affiliations)
-We had our first real Christmas tree =)
-We went on a New Year's Eve cruise with a group of great friends.

Hopefully 2010 will bring just as many good memories as 2009!!

Up to my elbows in wedding supplies...

This week has been a long week of running around and spending money on the wedding. I got napkins and stamping materials to stamp them, stuff for bouquet charms, and ordered our cake topper. I emailed the ladies and the gentlemen updates on the wedding info, Ben called and got limo quotes and set up rehearsal dinner, and I scheduled my hair and makeup trial for Wednesday!! The rest of our invitation pieces came yesterday and tonight we fixed the colors and adjusted the printer so that I can print all the pieces and start assembly. I started a mock up invite and it looks great so far!!

I am now addicted a little bit to Etsy. Etsy is like Ebay for handmade goods. Jewelry, boxes, just about anything that can be made by hand is listed on here. I got our cake topper and I am looking at jewelry on there too. Very reasonable prices and for the most part good quality from what I have heard. I am thinking about putting some of the wedding products up on there when the wedding is over. Even if I don't get any purchases, at least I tried. And if I do, that's so extra money coming in. We will see.

I apologize that this blog has been mostly wedding stuff thus far. It's really all I have been doing because I want to get as much done as possible. I have not been cooking, only soup and Healthy Choice meals which I don't think you guys need pictures of. I promise I will try to add some variety to my posts!

Waiting for the phone to ring...

I really hate when you call and leave a message for someone, and don't hear back from them. I know that I am guilty of doing the same thing and quite often, but I feel that these situations are different:

1. Call the doctor's office Monday to get a change in prescription. Receptionist takes message and says that they will call if there are any problems. I ask her to call me regardless because I have had problems with them not calling in a prescription in the past. She "makes a note of it". Do not hear back from office. Call the pharmacy this morning- yeah, my prescription got called in and my refill is waiting for me to pick up. How hard is it to call me to tell me the task at hand is complete? Especially because I specifically asked.

2. Call the hair salon to set up my wedding trials. Receptionist (or whoever answers the phone) takes a message because she doesn't know which stylists are assigned to me, and I do not know either. She promises I will hear back by the end of the afternoon. I didn't. I know they are busy, though, so I hope to hear back tomorrow.

On a brighter note, plans are starting to come together. I need to stop overwhelming myself and plan one thing at a time. But first, I must make a list. I love lists =) Maybe if I organize myself, I will breathe a little easier.

What a blah day

Work today was uneventful, just some people that get annoyed at me when they are doing something stupid. Yes, it is my fault you handed me the wrong credit card and now I have to return everything and re-ring it. And of course it is my fault that you didn't tell me you had a gift card wrapped in the scrap of paper you put down on the counter and that I have to return everything and re-ring it. Ugh.

I don't know why, but all of a sudden I am having serious wedding stress. Probably because it is getting so close to the date. I have so many projects to do, have to decide all the rsvp dates and such, we still have a vendor to book, I am just feeling very overwhelmed. And I know everyone goes through it and it is just my turn. But my gosh, it hit me like a brick! I have been frantically google searching for a product I cannot seem to find in stores. I have also been stalking Michael's for supplies- went to a different location today and they had everything I need!



Wedding checks in the past two days:
-Got part of my bridesmaid gifts yesterday
-Got supplies for said project today
-Finished designing invites

I wish my friends lived closer so we could have a girls night and work on projects. Looks like I'm on my own, luckily I have a willing fiance to help me out. ...Right honey?

Vent- wedding invitations!

I just had to vent for a moment. Today I printed out the mock up of one of the projects I had made in PhotoShop for the wedding. It printed horribly!! It was very streaky and the colors were distorted.  It turns out that the brush I used was meant to be small and I resized it to 3 times its size making it blurry and distorted. Holy cow did I panic!! Am I really going to have to remake ALL the inserts for the invitations?!

Short answer: no. Thank the heavens above. Fiance figured out how to manipulate the image in a different program so now I have to go through each document and change out the image. It's really annoying, but less annoying than starting from scratch.

Can't wait to put them all together!

Vent over.

Lazy Days

The past few days have been relaxing and very nice. New Year's Eve was a blast- on a boat with great friends and great food. Dinner was fabulous- beef, chicken piccata, baked stuffed shrimp, veggies, potatoes...it was all so yummy, wish we could have taken a doggie bag! It was freezing cold so our time on the deck of the boat was limited, but we did go up to watch the fireworks at midnight. It did not seem like New Year's this year though because we did not get to see the ball drop. Next year...

The scary thing is that we are getting married this year! Fiance said it to me at midnight and it made it all the more real. 2 years ago we were thinking we had so much time!!! Not now. We have a couple things left to book and I have to get to work with the projects I am making by hand. You will be seeing updates on the blog, I'm sure!

Anywho- fiance was not feeling so great on New Year's Day, so both of us sat around on the couch in our pajamas for the majority of the day. It was nice, I will admit.  Just playing around on the computer and such. I hope the rest of the weekend goes the same way.

I am eagerly awaiting the rest of the supplies I need to start making the invitations, I will update when they get here!