Treat

I haven't baked or made anything sweet in SUCH a long time, so since I was home from work last week I was feeling the itch to bust out a new recipe. It is so hard for me to make treats because Keith is not a cake/candy/dessert person on a daily basis like I am. I always want to make something he likes but then it largely goes uneaten and I have to ditch it after a week. Thankfully I stumbled across this recipe for homemade Reese's cups on pinterest and I knew it would be a hit in our house.

You see, Keith LOVE Reese's cups, but he greatly prefers the ones that are made around Easter because they have much more peanut butter in them. Making them myself meant that I could add as much peanut butter as possible, and make my husband super happy. The results were AWESOME! They are super rich, so its hard to eat more than half of one at a time, but overall this was a super easy twist on a classic.

The recipe calls for a mini muffin tin, but I only had a regular sized one, hence their uber richness haha

Peanut butter filling!

I added SO much peanut butter that the chocolate for the top didn't go all the way around so they're a little more like peanut butter chocolate sandwiches, but who cares ;)

Mega tasty, I suggest if you have an extra 30 minutes on your hands and are looking for something great for dessert you try these out!

Flat

I have something to confess: ever since I started driving about 6 years ago I have been stricken with a terrible curse... I ALWAYS get flat tires! Like, WAY more than other people. It happened more often than I would like to admit on my Hyundai when I lived in Florida and the curse seems to have made its way to Nashville. I got rear-ended this summer and managed to get TWO flat tires on our Fit when I pulled off the side of the road and now I've managed to get a flat on our Element. WORST curse ever. Days like this I strangely miss our Philly home and being able to take public transportation...

Bowl

Last night Keith and went to have some cheap mexican food and beer after he got home from work and had planned to settle into a night on the couch watching our favorite shows. When we were done with dinner though, we got a call from our friends Brad and Jen asking if we wanted to join them at the bowling alley and we made a quick, spontaneous decision to go meet them instead of being old and boring haha. It turned out to be SO much fun, even though I'm probably the worst bowler ever, yikes! (if we're going by golf scoring though, I totally whooped everyone haha). My family definitely spoiled me with bumpers... we ALWAYS used bumpers! I wasn't prepared for this real bowling business.

But why did you choose the blue balls?

My perfect form haha

Brad and Jen

Jen KILLED it! She beat us all by like 50 pins

Watching in amazement as Jen gets strike after strike haha

Project: Wedding

Our good friends Jonathan and Erin are getting married in just a few short weeks and I was so honored when Erin asked if I could help her with a few decorations to spruce up their reception hall. I'm no expert, but thanks to pinterest I was able to drum up an idea to hang behind the major tables for the reception and distract a little from the drab interior. Here was my inspiration photo:

I wanted to do more than just cream colored tulle, so I also purchased colors that tied into the colors of the flower arrangements. Here is the work in progress (note, it is still a work in progress!!):

My faithful helper, always there when I don't need him.

All the colors cut into even strips.

My first test run... I'm still playing with the arrangement of the colored pieces.

Sorry it's so hard to see against our beige house.

With the amount of tulle happening in our guest room, I have officially banned the cat from entering. Overall I'm pretty pleased with how easy this project has been, the most time consuming thing was measuring and cutting. I definitely think these will add a more playful and feminine touch to the room, and I think with a little more finagling they will be just what Erin was looking for! (Oh and thanks for giving me something to work on during my fall break!)

Snake Factory

So if you know me at all, or are friends with me via facebook, or instagram you know that my cat and I have a little misunderstanding regarding my love for snakes. He keeps bringing them to me as gifts even when I tell him that I absolutely have had my fill for a lifetime. It's ironic to me that this snake gift-giving only happens when Keith (the snake catcher) isn't home, and won't be home for a very long time. Perhaps Theo has a deal with Fear Factor and he's just trying to help me work through my issues? Regardless... it's a nightmare. Eve brought up a valid point... why do I still let him outside? Well, it's truly a double edged sword. If I leave him in he will claw at my legs and meow until I just want to wring his neck, but when I let him out I have to know that he will leave me be, but may bring in a few critters along the way. I'm not ok with either of these options, which is why this self proclaimed "winter hater" is PRAYING for winter to come asap so that all the critters will go into hiding and my ridiculous cat will park himself in front of the heater for 3 months. Bliss... absolutely bliss it will be!

On to yesterdays story: you may remember less than a month ago I chronicled this crisis where I bucked up and took care of the snake all on my own. Theo's catch yesterday? TRIPLE the size of that little guy. AT LEAST 2 ft long, and an inch wide in the middle. When I saw it I almost laughed at the thought of being scared last month because of the new monster that was staring me down. I handled it like any sensible person would do... I ran to the couch, tried to pretend it wasn't there and when I couldn't do that any longer I put on rain boots and gloves (in case it jumped!) and covered it with an old pot. and then I spent the rest of the day pretending everything was normal and that there wasn't a terrible scary creature in my living room. Theo was not so pleased:

He searched... he cried... and then he pouted like a true two year old would. This cat has way too much personality sometimes haha. Eventually Keith got home and saved the day, but not without a little drama. In his effort to slide a box under the pot and flip it the snake got out and tried to hide in our laundry hamper (which meant I screamed, ran, and jumped on the washing machine). Even Keith was a little jilted and commented a few times on how big it was. I'm pretty glad I didn't try and tackle this one alone, I am ok with admitting I'm not that brave haha.

As for today, I am establishing a no open door policy... Theo will need to be throughly inspected for critters before he comes anywhere near me. Fingers crossed!

Kid Craft

Even though I'm home this week for fall break, I have been keeping pretty busy and haven't found much time to catalogue what has been going on with us. In the meantime here's a look at a couple of projects that I have done with my new group of students:

This is a great one that I found online, I would honestly suggest doing this yourself... since I don't have the budget or the patience for oil pastels, I found this project that replicates the feel of pastels without the cost or the mess! All I did was mix a little sugar with some hot water and soaked regular old chalk for at least 15 minutes. The website I got this from called it "chalk painting" because the chalk is saturated, and therefore goes on very smoothly... with my kindergarten students I called it "magic chalk" because it goes on the page very dark and as the water dries the bright color of the chalk comes out. They were beyond amazed haha. With my middle schoolers we talked about lines and patterns which led to many Cosby sweater-esque final projects (which I LOVED!). They were very willing to explore with the chalk, and were even more excited when I showed them what it was, and explained they could very easily do this same project at home. I think the hardest part of this whole project was finding colorful skinny chalk (vs. fat sidewalk chalk)... no one uses chalkboards anymore, so it wasn't as widely available as I assumed haha. Here is a look at the very few middle school projects I documented... I am SUPER bummed I didn't take more pictures!

And then there's this..... documentation of a total project FAILURE! We're all allowed to have those right? It was Thursday and I knew my 5 year olds had already had a very long week of school so I thought I would bring something fun so that we could just play. Enter: play dough. Great idea right? I even had all the ingredients to put together a whole bunch without spending more than 50 cents on salt. Things were going my way...

...until I handed all the play dough out and watched in horror as their hot, sweaty little hands just MELTED every bit of it. It seriously turned to soup and they mashed it between their fingers and spread it on every inch of the tables. I have never seen such a mess in my life! It was awful. I spent a half an hour extra trying to clean it all up and apologized profusely to all my helpers. Ugh. NEVER AGAIN! Beware of homemade play dough recipes... they may work quite well in your hands but kids have crazy little fire hands that will turn this into your worst nightmare. It was the worst, and I left that class feeling totally defeated. 

Thankfully this story does have a happy ending though... I walked into my class of middle schoolers who proceeded to self-start on a project we had worked on previously, and were so excited to complete it that they hardly wanted me to interrupt to discuss an upcoming project with them. Once I got talking and showed them examples though, they were ecstatic; you see, we're about to start saving plastic bottle caps with the intention of making a huge mural!

via

Isn't that the coolest! I can't wait to start designing something with them and to see what the final product will look like. So if you want to recycle your bottle caps for a good cause, I will be graciously accepting all donations... we're going to need a lot haha

Away

I know I've mentioned this before, but this month we found out that our good friends Ryan, Chelsey and baby Elliot are leaving Nashville for a new opportunity in California. They have lots of friends here that are sad to see them go, so yesterday the beautiful Jordana along with her fiance Trent, threw them a great going away party down in Franklin. It is SO bittersweet to see them go, because this new job for Ryan is going to be life changing... I just wish it didn't involve them moving so far away! There was a wonderful group of people that stopped by to say their goodbyes to the Meyer's and we spent the night eating and socializing out by the pool, or in front of the fireplace. It was the perfect night for a party outside! Here are some of my photos:

The rainbow fruit skewers that I put together... doesn't it look kind of like an edible arrangement? Can you tell I'm proud...

Chelsey and Elliot

Look at this little charmer!

He smiles so big when he sees his mamma :)

Beautiful Sammie in front of the food spread.

Renee and her little one Levi

Keith with Bennett and his girlfriend McKel.

He has trouble making a regular smile haha

Joseph, Trent and Isaac.

Our hosts! Trent and Jordie.

Jordie with sweet baby Sage

She was the life of the party haha

Sage kept doing this happy scream, testing out her big girl voice and Isaac was showing us this trick to make some hysterical noises

Ryan and Levi planned their outfits haha

Tytus with wiggleworm Sage

Elliot LOVED staring at the fireplace

Just chillin..

Sisters... Jordie and Sammie

Soaking up our last moments with baby Elliot.

Tytus and Isaac. 

Meyer's

To Ryan and Chelsey: I think that it's so funny that one year after Keith and I moved to Nashville you guys will be leaving. As selfish as I'm being about your departure, I could not be more excited for you as a family and I'm truly thankful for the time we had together this past year. We will always be here to support you as friends, and look forward to an excuse to visit California :) and to Trent and Jordie: Thanks for hosting an awesome party! I ate WAY too much, and was terribly happy about it haha