Love Long Weekends!

Hey, remember me, the girl that used to blog here.  I hope so.  Last week was a good and bad week.  I got a new job (Yeah!), but I'm having trouble coming up with blogging content and I don't really want to get too caught up in participating in things just to have some blogging content.  So I'll slowly make my way back and blog what I've got and not push myself too much.  I'll get back to commenting too!  I have been reading though, so please don't think I haven't. With that said, it was a great weekend.

We decided on Wednesday that we should take Friday off.  We had plans for the weekend and wanted to enjoy them and had some things to get done around the house.

Friday we got some stuff done (cleaning, cooking) and headed off to the beach.  On the way we stopped at the Outlets where I got some new running clothes (finally some shorts) and visited the Loft Outlet.  I think I could have stayed in there for hours!  I found a few new shirts and sweaters.  With my new position I feel like I need to dress up a little bit more.  I'm pretty sure KC doesn't want me going back there for a while, but I'm planning to go back when mom and dad visit!  I'm limiting myself though to what I can't buy (solid sweaters, ruffle tanks and plain cardigans (without something underneath - not allowed!).  I think I need to expand my accessories, scarves and jewelry will go far.  I've never been one to branch far in the jewelry area but I think it'll help!

We got to the beach house late Friday and stayed up late chatting.  Saturday while KC went to play Ultimate with his team I went for a run/walk.  Half marathon training is not going well though.  I was fine until last weekend, when my ankle started hurting and I just can't figure it out.  I tried to go easy on it this week but I think I just need to let it rest for a few more days.  It just hurts and I don't know what's wrong, it's in the back, so doesn't feel like I rolled it.

The rest of the day Saturday we went to the beach and it was wonderful.  Earl couldn't keep us away.  The water was a bit rough.and the waves were definitely big.  Sunday the waves calmed a bit.  All in all though, the weather was phenomenal.  Temps in the upper-80's I think and just beautiful.  We could not have asked for more perfect weather.  One a little bit of a sun-burn so all-in-all a very successful beach trip!

It was different people's responsibilities to plan meals (we did breakfast) and one of his teammates was talking to KC about dinner and they had the fabulous idea to replicate a Tahou's Garbage Plate.  His teammate is from Rochester and we went to school there so it was a must at that point.  Now before I go into the details into what is contained in a plate, I should say that the first time I heard of it, I thought, how disgusting, are you serious.  Then I tried it and I was like, whoa, not bad.  Then, one night at 2AM as we headed home from the bar we stopped and that was it, it is like heavenly drunk food!  Ha ha.  Your typical garbage plate looks similar to this:

What is it you ask?  Well, it's have 'hash browns' and half macaroni salad on the bottom.  Then 2-cheeseburgers on top, followed by the 'special sauce'.  Typically there are fresh chopped onions on top (not on mine) and then people put various amounts of hot sauce, ketchup and mustard on top.  The key is to cut it all up and mix it together.  It looks gross, but it is so delicious.  I only at 1 burger and definitely it wasn't as big as the pic above.  If you ever go to Rochester, NY, I would highly recommend a Tahou's garbage plate, either from the original Tahou's or at a local 'Hots'.  There are other varieties, with hot dogs and chicken and other things instead of burgers, but that is a traditional plate and the only one I've had to vouch for.

Monday we headed to the local Triple A team's baseball game as friends had extra tickets.  It was hot but it was nice to spend an afternoon at a baseball game.  We went into extra innings and had a lot of fun.  It was relaxing, nice to sit and chat.  Afterwards some people came over for dinner and then we took to relaxing.

At the game this was the foul pole:  "Eat more Fowl".

I find it so funny and I love watching all of the Chik-Fil-A commercials and billboards.  The cows are so funny. Who-ever came up with that marketing idea is a genius and I hope they got their share of the $$.  They make me laugh every time I see them.

I started Firefly Lane and I'm halfway through it.  So far, I'm liking it.  I didn't read a description beforehand, just some recommendations and decided to just wing it.  I kind of like doing that, I have no idea where the book is going right now, but I'm definitely liking it.

If you made it to the end, thanks, sorry it was so long!  I hope everyone else had a great weekend as well.  Time for a 4-day week, just think, it's already Tuesday!

Great weekend!

We had a great long weekend.  I don't think I could have asked for anything more (except for if I had taken pictures to share).

Friday I got out of work a little early, finished sealing the envelopes to my Luau invitations and waited for KC to get home.  We popped by the mailbox to send them out, and then headed out to the mall.  I finally got my iPhone charger fixed and got a new shirt at Old Navy.  We finished the night by meeting a friend for sushi for dinner and then just hanging around the house.

Saturday, I felt like a social butterfly.  We got up early and headed out to play paintball.  I will admit I was scared that I was going to end up with big welts on my but I didn't get hit on any body parts (only the mask and paintball gun), so I made out pretty well.  The girls only played about 5 games or so and then sat out (it got really busy) and the guys played 5 or so more games afterwards.  After getting lunch with these friends we said our goodbyes and met-up with my sister and another friend for a little pool time.  It was a really nice day, not too hot so a few hours by the pool was rather relaxing.  After a quick shower we met up with another friend for dinner at the Irregardless Cafe and it was delicious.  I love salmon and wish I cooked it more at home.  It is one of my favorite meals to get when we are out.  After dinner and some drinks at a downtown pub with a great view of the city we met back up with the first set of friends for a few more drinks.  I felt like we were all over the place.  It was a late night and I may have consumed 1 too many beverages but it was definitely a fun day.

Sunday we visited the Duke Forest for a short hike.  I have some pictures at home of Maya during the hike, maybe I'll add them in later.

 ETA:  here's a cute picture of KC and Miss Maya during our hike.

This was followed by an awesome lunch of a DQ blizzard - yum!  After some groceries we headed over to a friends to cook some dinner and hang out.  Turns out we didn't miss the fireworks afterall.  His house was situated so that we could see the fireworks people were setting off in other neighborhoods at their houses, it was kinda fun.

Monday brought us another hike, and then lots of cleaning so we can get ready for the next 3 weeks of craziness July brings us.  Last night we watched "It's Complicated" and laughed the entire time, what a great movie!

After all the cleaning and laundry it was definitely apparent that it's time to go through my closet and get rid of some clothes.  Ugh, not fun, buuuut that should mean I get to replace some too right?

Hope you all had a great weekend!

It's Monday already?!?!

It was a great weekend. It felt like we got to do everything we could have wanted to. Sunday was a rather uneventful day with grocery shopping and cleaning the house, but Friday and Saturday we kept busy.

Friday night started off with dinner at a Sushi restaurant that another couple wanted to visit. We don't hang out with just them often so it was nice to just sit and visit. I've never been much of a sushi snob, but this place was definitely not at the top of my list of sushi restaurants to visit again. The other couple said the same thing and said that it was better the last time that they went.

 

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While there we were talking about TV and movies, etc and they recommended Netflix. We had been talking about it for some time and they finally convinced us to give it a try. I started our account last night.

Following dinner we headed to the bowling alley.  Let's just say that my bowling skills are weak to say the least. The first game left much to be desired but I picked it up for the second game.

At the start of the second game the cosmic bowling began. I'm glad we weren't staying much longer, it was really hard to see the ball go down the alley until it got to the pins.  At least I got to wear clown shoes!

Saturday morning started off early with a 5K charity run.  I turned in a time of about 27:30. While it's not the best time, I'm happy that I finished and under my goal of 28 minutes. Week 1 of 10K training has been completed successfully. On to week 2!

Saturday night we went downtown to Beerfest.  There were many (many) beer vendors and you could try as many 2oz samples of whatever you wanted.

There were two 'lines' of endless tents, jam-packed with people.

We tried many different kinds of beer.

Had lots of fun with friends.

Made lots of jokes and laughed the whole night (KC probably said something entirely inappropriate).

Saw some interesting people.

Went home with dirty 'beer' feet (apparently I like taking pictures of feet this weekend!).

And enjoyed every last minute of the night.

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend as well!

*All pictures from personal collection.

Weekend Recap & Recipes

It was a great weekend.  I had hoped to post this weekend but didn't get around to it.

Friday - It was the Friday before a holiday so my manager let us out at 11:30.  It was great to not have to stay late and to be able to have the afternoon to myself.  I went to lunch with a friend, which we so very, very rarely do just the 2 of us and we sat there for 1.5hrs.  It was a lot of fun.  I came home to these from my awesome husband.  (Sorry for the iPhone picture)

It was a great start to the weekend.  We picked up some paint for a project this week (I'll blog about it when I'm done), stopped by the mall and then grabbed some dinner.  All in all it was great to just spend the evening together.

Saturday - Since KC went out-of-town to play Ultimate Frisbee for the day, I had the whole day to myself.  I ran errands, had lunch with another friend and then started baking.  I love banana bread and save all of my rotten bananas in the freezer to make some banana bread.  The bananas started to pile up so I make 4 batches of banana bread, some for Easter and some to share with friends.  I also made an ice cream cake for Easter and it was delicious.  (Recipes below)  I love Funfetti cake and at the store the other day, there was a box of Funfetti cookie mix.  Yum, Yum!  I definitely made some of those for Sunday and they were delicious (despite the fact that I'm not a big fan of frosted cookies)!

Sunday - Sunday was Easter.  It's so hard not to spend the day with family.  I know it's been about 6 years that we've been away from them but that doesn't make it any easier.  We decided to go to 11:30 mass so we could work out beforehand.  It was packed.  We found a parking spot but ended up in the Fellow ship hall because the church was full already when we got there at 11:10.  It was a beautiful service, I just love the hymns that were sung.  After groceries, we lounged around and I made some pretzel salad before we headed over to eat with some friends.  We had a nice meal and everything was delicious.  Afterward, we watched Opening Night, which I will say was a little disappointing, but hey it's only the first game of the season.

I hope you all had a wonderful and joyous Easter weekend.

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Weekend Recipes

Pretzel Salad
1 cup crushed pretzels
1 cup sugar (divided)
8 oz. cream cheese
8 oz.  Cool Whip
1 stick of butter (melted)

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
• Mix pretzels, 1/2 cup of sugar and melted butter in a bowl.  Press into a 9x13" pan.  Bake for 7 minutes. Allow to cool.
• Whip cream cheese, Cool Whip and 1/2 cup of sugar in a bowl.
• Break pretzel mixture into pieces and fold into cream cheese, Cool Whip mixture and enjoy!

Ice Cream Cake
1 vanilla ice cream (softened)
1 chocolate ice cream (softened)
1 tube chocolate chip cookie dough
Cool Whip
Caramel and/or Fudge topping
Candy toppings

I use a springform pan for this so it was easy to add/remove things and then cut when ready to serve

• Bake 1/2 of the cookie mixture in the pan and then remove from pan to cool
• Bake 2nd 1/2 of the cookie mixture and leave in pan
• Put 1 layer of vanilla ice cream over the cookie, freeze 30 minutes
• Put the other cookie (that was removed from the pan) on top of the ice cream
• Put 1 layer of chocolate ice cream on the second cookie, freeze 30 minutes
• Put a layer of Cool Whip on top, freeze 30 minutes
• Garnish top with Caramel/Fudge toppings and candy
• Freeze until about 10 minutes before serving, remove edge of spring form pan and leave on counter to soften

You could do this with many different types of ice cream.  I think it would be good to put a layer of fudge or caramel on top of the ice cream or cookie as well

Weekend Recap & Random Info

It was a pretty good weekend even though I had to call in to work periodically.  I didn't take any pictures, I need to get better at doing that.

Friday

Hubs and I went out for sushi and it was delicious.  I don't think that we've ever been out for sushi just the 2 of us but it was nice.  We got to get rolls that we both liked and finished them all!  After that we spent the evening home together and just caught up on some TV shows.  It was nice to just spend a quiet evening together just the 2 of us.

Saturday

We spent most of the day cleaning the house, working outside and doing little things (I had to call in to a conference call for work).  We made some chili in the crock-pot, for probably the last time this year. :-(  For dessert I made Rocky Road brownies and they were pretty good.  I made some modifications - doubled it, used 1/2 brown sugar and 1/2 white sugar for "cake-like" brownies, pecans instead of almonds and 1/2 of the chocolate chips were butterscotch chips instead of chocolate, yum!  We'll be adding these to the keepers list.

Sunday

We had some beautiful weather on Sunday and I went for a 5 mi walk on one of the trails around a local lake and it was beautiful out!  After the hubs got out of work we had softball practice.  Hubs has never played before and he did great.  I'm so happy he'll be playing on our team this season.

We had some birthday dinners to celebrate so we went to Brasa the Brazilian Steakhouse.  If you've never eaten at a Brazilian Steakhouse, it's an experience.  You're meat comes out on swords (anywhere from 10-12 different kinds/cuts) and you have a little stone (or coaster-like object) in front of you that is green on one side and red on the other.  If you want them to stop by you when they bring out new meats, then you have the green side up and if you don't then you put the red side up.  I would recommend not eating much for the day before you go!  There is also a cold/hot bar that goes along with your meats.  I enjoyed some of the cuts of meat better than others, but definitely ate too much.  The pineapple with cinnamon is my absolute favorite!  It was a bit pricier than we had all remembered but we were celebrating 2 birthdays so, I guess it equaled going out 2 different times.

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Random Info

• A new Stampin' Up order is coming in today, hopefully I'll be able to spend some time making some cards and card sets for gifts for people.  New supplies always make me excited!


• I finished my first 4 times through the first circuit of the 30 Day Shred and will be starting the second work out this week.


• I really really want spring to come and quickly!  The weather was a tease!


• We might be going skiing again in a few weeks!  We had so much fun at Snowshoe Mountain over Valentine's Day weekend.


• We got a Save-The-Date in the mail for a destination wedding next March!  I'm really pushing hard to go, it's just so far in advance to plan already, who knows what we'll be doing 1 year from now.


• I finished "The Last Song" last night.  I liked it, I didn't cry as much as I normally would because I had been reading it in small chunks.  It wasn't my favorite Nicholas Sparks book but I'm glad I finished it before the movie comes out.


• I'm swapping my books for March and April because someone is going to give me "The Help" instead of me going out and buying it.


• I added a picture to my sidebar listing what I'm reading now and I what I just finished reading.


• Hubs is out of town this weekend again, but that makes for a fun meal planning week (I'll explain more in my next post)


• We watched the Academy Awards last night briefly.  I don't usually watch them, but I enjoyed what I saw last night.
  
  
  
  • I thought Sandra Bullock looked fantastic (and I loved "The Blind Side")
  
  
  
  

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  • I didn't recognize Cameron Diaz at first, but I thought she looked great as well
  
  
  
  

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  • There are many others that I liked and disliked, but those are my favorites so far!  I have pretty simple fashion tastes so there were quite a few popular ones that weren't my favorites.
  
  
  
  

Have a great day!